For a few months on end she disappeared and I had to cook, clean and take care of myself. I took myself to the doctor, sometimes getting one of the older dope boys to pretend he was my father so my shots and immunizations were up to par.

She always made sure the rent was paid and food was in the ice box. That I didn't have to worry about. I didn't take school seriously at all. I talked back to teacher and started letting the environment shape me.

I duly listened to elder black men in my

neighborhood who told me that Niggahs were only good for three things: getting some pussy, playing a sport and staying out of jail.

We drink booze and we sold drugs, they

continued to say. We whipped bitches asses to keep them in line and we protected our word and balls like they were an endangered species.

I took all that to heart. I became it, slept on it, fucked and ate it. Even though Mama was a ho, I loved and respected her no matter what. I never back talked her; never let her see me cry.

She never talked down to me. When she saw me her eyes lit up.

Mama sold her body up until she was found dead behind a restaurant on South Beach a few years ago, before I turned twenty. I was still bitter about that.

Daddy had killed her because he got tired of her whoring around Dade County. But he never brought up the fact that he was an even bigger ho than she was.

At her funeral I was distraught; I tore up every flower. I fought my Daddy and accused him of murder. Family pulled him from the church. I was in a blinding rage. I couldn't control myself.

The police came and I denied the allegations. I wasn't a snitch. I didn't like crackers in my business. They didn't care about a prostitute anyways.

The look on their pale faces told me that.

Rumors circulated that Daddy had another kid somewhere. But he denied it and without any proof, what could I say? He was a prick.

I hated him with a passion and he never showed me fatherly things. We never spoke. He never looked out for me.

Funny, we lived in the same house and

we didn't have any type of a relationship. I stopped giving a damn after I turned eleven years old.

I gave up on a Daddy/Son relationship. I even asked God to erase his existence from my memory. Some girl hugged me at Mama's funeral.

In tears of her own she held me tight. She was clad in a floral dress and big red ribbons in her hair.

Her name was Paula Jakes, a year younger than me. I didn't know who she was, pretty little thing. But all I could do think about my mother.

How she suffered when she was alive; I wanted to know what drove her to prostitution, why she never told me about my grandparents.

I had so much contempt...