black boy, arise

by Trey Styles

"...That wouldn’t make him a man to escape responsibility, although some of the unrealistic expectations are killing me and my spirit, but no one cares to hear it."“In the bathroom, everything went down from sex to gambling, and of course, some students would be in there skipping classes. I skipped a couple of times in the bathroom, but it was a terrible place to skip. Toilets were clogged up with feces and urine. It wasn’t uncommon for toilets not to work. I had no real friends in 9th grade since I didn’t interact with people much and my old friends from middle school were in different classes. Moreover, some of them had changed in high school and started trying to be down with the in-crowd. I wasn’t a part of that crowd—although I sometimes wanted to be. Deep down inside, I knew that crowd wasn’t my lane.”Being a Black boy in America is hard. It’s especially hard when you’re growing up in Detroit, one of the most impoverished and violent cities in the country. Imagine trying to excel in a school with overcrowded classrooms, minimal resources, and delinquent youths. Black Boy, Arise follows the story of Dequan, a young boy who was paralyzed by low self-esteem, and was raised by a single mother after his stepfather’s incarceration. Dequan’s journey is one of self-discovery and coming of age while tackling his darkest mental and emotional demons. How can Dequan and other Black boys arise from their surroundings and circumstances? What does it take to defy the odds and beat the statistics?

Kindle Edition

Published September 2, 2020