Octavia E. Butler - Earthseed, Book 1 -… [583]

“No! You’ll be killed out there! What’s the matter with you? Stay home!” … “Mama, I won’t let him beat me again,” he said. “I don’t need him hitting me and telling me what to do. Pretty soon, I’ll be able to make more money in a day than he can in a week—maybe in a month.” — , Octavia E. Butler - Earthseed, Book 1 -…, 583

Note

The chapter’s argument compressed into call-and-response: Cory can only say ‘there’ is death, Keith can only answer in fists and dollars. His escalation from ‘in a week’ to ‘maybe in a month’ is the sound of a boy outbidding his father in real time, and the reader knows the price is already being paid.