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The One Who Had Potential, Part V

V.
From the day it seemed that things just got worse,
she started handing with less-than-great friends,
and more than once she was caught cutting class,
more and more Miles could feel his heart rend.

He tired talking to her…so many times,
but there’s so much teenagers just will not see,
after a while, when she skipped school,
he called the cops to report truancy.

This, of course, led to a big screaming match,
but Miles kept strong, he could not back down.
She had the brains to become something great,
he could not go weak, fail his parents now.

It hurt him to hear her scream names at him,
but he laid down the law, and then held firm,
made sure that she did he homework each night,
despite snide remarks and stares that could burn.

He would lay n Martina’s arms at night,
her embrace a relief from his worries,
she too could see things were getting worse,
and something needed to chance in a hurry.

Miles tried tutors, even therapy,
to try and help get Whitney back on track,
was it trauma over their parents death?
He tried so hard to be the father she lacked.

But thousands of dollars and countless hours
didn’t seem to chance the state of her head,
worst still Whitney was smart enough to say
exactly what the therapist wanted said.

But why, if she could read people like that,
was there no foresight guiding her thinking?
She had to know there was no future in
a life of self-victimhood and drinking.

Miles even reduced his work hours
to ensure that Whitney got to her school,
but she’d just sneak off after he had left,
he was despondent, what more could he do?

He tried telling her of the mistakes he made,
how he and Martina used to exist,
he’d slept in gutters, she’d been beat by johns,
such a lifestyle just cannot persist.

He thought the details might scare the girl straight,
but Whitney laughed, and went on to explain:
“You think you’re better now, slaving away,
too dumb to see your efforts are in vain?”

Miles had to threaten to throw her out
if her studies she refused to complete,
she slouched through high school for the last two years,
and squabbled with her brother every week.

But finally the graduation came,
and he watched his sister get her degree,
after she found him, and said just these words:
“I’m moving out, and you cannot stop me.”

This depressed him so that he said to Martina:
“Did we even do any good at all?”
Things were grim at the house for several days,
and just made worse when they received the call…

CONCLUDES IN PART VI.

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