I Am...Somebody!

I sighed as my gloved hand stirred the chilli pot slowley. I scratched my hair netted head as the school bell rang, signaling time for me and the rest of the Cafateria workers to get ridiculed. Why? Because we’re black, and they are white. To them, we are nothing. They were superior because their skin color is lighter than ours. Because we are nothing, we mean nothing, we are only here to serve them.

I jumped as something wet and slimely hitme in the back of the neck. “Hey nigger! I’m hungry! Hurry your ass up!” A white boy shouted, making all of his friends laugh.

I took a deep breath and reached my hand back to my neck and wiped the food off. I looked at my hand. Mashed Potatoes. I counted to ten in my head and grabbed the chili pot of the stove and brought it over to the serving area.

As I served the kids, I kept my head down not making eye contact. If you make eye contact with the wrong type of person, with the right connections, you’ll be lynched. I don’t want to die that way. I refuse to let my mother find my dead in a river, beaten so badly she can harldy reconise me.

I hand was suddenly in my sight. The hand snapped at me, and a high pitched female voice siad, “Oh, nigger! I asked you a fucking question! How many calories are in this crap chilli?”

I shrugged.

She smacked me, “Answer me!”

I shrugged and looked her inbettween her eyes, “I don’t know, ma’am.”

She gasped and squealed, “Did you just look me in the eyes!?”

My eyes widened as the cafateria went quiet. I looked down at my hands.

I didn’t look her in the eyes! I didn’t! I know better!

I stuttered, “N-no ma’am! I k-know my place!”

I heard shuffling, then all I felt was pain. I landed on the cold filthy ground. I couldn’t feel the right side of my face. I looked up at her. She hit me with her food tray.

She was red in the face as she screamed, “You callin’ me a liar, you ugly nigger?!”

I inteneded to relpy, but the feeling of my face came rushing back. It was so painful!

I couldn’t satnd it anymore, nor could my body, for next all I saw was darkness.

My last thought was, ‘This is the end.’