Growing in the World Anonymous

Bridgeport, Connecticut: A fleet of fifty-two Greater Bridgeport Transit Authority-owned buses spurt to a start while the sun begins to rise. Each bus slowly creeps along one of the nineteen lines spanning across Fairfield County; one of them, Bus No. 2, continues to the Dock Shopping Center underneath Interstate 95 toward a Stop and Shop in neighboring Stratford. Along the side of the building is a small, wooden bench that emits splinters to any poor soul who decides to sit down wearing shorts. The bus, blue and white with a marquee above the windshield reading “Coastal Link” appeared from underneath the interstate, slowly inching toward the bench. Men and women in their 40's and 50's filled the bench, expressions of despair and regret on their faces, quietly keeping to themselves while being compressed together like on a train car in a New York City Subway.

But there were two people that did not fit that particular description, two people who stood out of the crowd like a sore thumb: a 28 year old Hispanic woman with dark brown eyes, black frizzy hair, short and petite at just five feet tall, and a belly three times the size of a cantaloupe. Beside her sat a young boy, with the same hair in a bowl cut, same eyes, and even the...