My moms used to boost from the mall and commit identity theft with checks and credit cards. She would do whatever it took to make money. “Honey, when you got a man’s back, I mean truly got his back, a woman gotta step up. Sometimes a woman gotta use what she got to get what she gotta get to take care of her family.” The fact that moms would give it up for money if she felt she needed to, used to piss my father off. But when he had a woman on the hook that he was getting money from, moms wouldn’t say shit. For them, it was always about the money. ’Cause no matter who or where they were gettin’ money from, it was always for us. We were always a family.

But money turned out to be their downfall. When I was seventeen, my daddy had a woman who was givin’ him money. My father would bring the money home and was givin’ it to my moms. That’s just how they did it. But one night the woman followed him to our apartment and she waited for daddy to come out. I was watching from the window and saw her walk up on him, put the gun to his head, and kill him.

“Daddy, no!” I screamed at the top of my lungs and kept screaming, as the woman looked up at me and ran to her car. I wanted to run out there, but I couldn’t move. My moms came to see what I was screaming about, but I couldn’t talk. All I could do was point out the window at my father’s body.

“Oh God! God, no!” she yelled and ran out. It felt like all the life had been drained from my body. He and I were so close. And I loved my daddy so much that I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. It felt like part me was dying out there.

It still does.

After that, moms had to go for herself. She went out and got herself a job and worked it for two weeks, before she accidentally slipped in the ladies room.