Part 2 of Queenpin –

A bloody hand reaches up and knocks on Apartment 613. Moments later a dilated pupil appears through the peephole.

The woman attached to that dilated pupil speaks, “Who is it?” Ebony stands at the door empty-handed. Blood dripping down her leg, her hair is a mess and her clothes are no better. “Momma, is that you?” The door creaks open an inch. Pat McDaniels peeks out to give Ebony a yellowed-tooth snarl. She’s aged a hundred years. Pat doesn’t have time to entertain the bullshit today. It’s almost time to get high again and this bitch outside the door is fucking up her Chi. “You got the wrong place, honey”, Pat replies with a smooth voice dripping in sarcasm and laced with outrage. Ebony unleashes a puff of smoke and a flash of red behind tired eyes.  Incredulous and unmoving Ebony stares at the barely cracked door. This was what she worked so hard to get back to? A woman who claims to be childless but is living in the same damn place they have always lived? The history within those walls is heavy and presses into the hallway to be unleashed, remembered, acknowledged for what was lost. Like a cloud of smoke from a blunt, history permeates into everything leaving behind a strong stench that can never be cleansed. No matter how many times you open a window to air shit out. Ebony wouldn’t know what that feeling of high is. She’s never smoked a joint or did any type of drugs for that matter in her life. Even though half the cheerleader squad in Oswego high school would suck a prepubescent boy off for a drag or two on a joint, she never partook in those festivities. There wasn’t a hot enough guy to lose her morals over or bring down the fortress she built around her heart. Within this moment however Ebony yearns for an escape. It’s all or nothing now and the rage builds within. The old woman on the other side of that door who was a coke head raising princess Ebony is now in denial. “Mama please open the door,” Ebony spits out then looks down at her leg to watch mesmerized as a line of blood trickles down and splashes onto the linoleum floor. The reality of what happened hits Ebony in the chest and she staggers backward but quickly squares her shoulders. A determination to get and make Pat pay for all the years forgotten in the foster care system where the men played in her princess panties and their women stood by, afraid to speak up. She felt owned by all those filthy bastards because the check from the state said so. All of the horrible memories are rising to the surface of her brain and she gags at the bile fighting to get free from her throat. She appeals one last time to the woman who birthed her, “Ma, it’s me, Eb. I came because I graduated from high school and—” Pat sucks her teeth and holds up her hand for silence “my damn daughter is dead!!” She begins to close the door. “What are you doing? It’s me, Ebony!! I don’t have nowhere else to go Momma! PLEASE!”

Ebony feels a piece of herself rip apart. One minute she is standing there staring at her mom and the next…. There are two Ebony’s in front of the door now. Good and Evil playing out in her mind and for a brief moment she wants to stop what is to come. She is a glass vase that’s been slammed against a wall then painstakingly put back together by its owner. They know that a sliver of something is missing but can’t quite pinpoint it. To the outside world the vase looks whole again, until you try to fill it with water, exposing the leaks. That gaggle of girls who robbed and tried to beat Ebony up didn’t accomplish it, neither did her foster father who raped her the moment she stepped through his door or the handful of social workers who would always send her back to the homes she constantly ran away from. It has taken her mother, the woman who birthed her to make Ebony go fully cold inside. She has felt it before but not like this. It’s a coldness that settles in the pit of your stomach then spreads throughout your body freezing you up and shutting down your brain. You are able to still function, speak and deal with life but not the way you did before. It makes you numb to things, the best high money can’t even buy because you control the switch. Like a morphine drip before the government regulated the usage of it in hospitals; you are in control on how many times you press that button. Ebony can feel that coldness now and her pupils dilate like she is high. The two Ebony’s converge back into one like an atomic explosion and her hand slams against the door. “My daughter is dead bitch! Now move your ass out the way!” Pat screams. The rats and little boys freeze in place because Manhunt is no longer important. Ebony jams her foot into the door and gives a diabolical smile that makes Pat pause in confusion. Ebony’s  lips are almost splitting in two and she bites down to contain the rage. “Just let me sleep here tonight Pat. Ms. Esther said you knew I was coming.” Pat pushes the door harder and kicks at her foot that’s planted in the door.

“Open the fucking door!” Ebony kicks it in and grabs her mother’s arm. “Why’s you go and do that to the door child? Damn!” The two women tumble inside of the apartment. It’s decorated in flophouse squalor where the living room coffee table is covered with empty surgical needles, pipes and a mirror with cocaine on it. Pat begins to clean the table off. “Look, whoever told you I was your momma lied to you, okay? My daughter is dead.” Ebony ignores her and wanders around the apartment, avoiding the trash strewn all over the place. Clothes are piled in one corner and empty bottles of soda and beer in another with crumpled sheets of paper in between. “Okay so how’d you know I was with some people then? Ma, it’s me. It’s Ebony. Why can’t I sleep here?” Ebony grins. She continues to make her tour around the $.99 cent store furnishings ending inside the kitchen where a swarm of flies circle the dishes in the kitchen sink. Ebony opens the refrigerator. Pat glares from the doorway, “Well Eb, Ebony, whatever the fuck you call yourself, get out my house! You messing with my establishment.” To her surprise the inside of the fridge is sanitary white. It is filled with unlabeled glass bottles and packages wrapped in foil. “Who else stays here? Is my father here?!” Pat barges into the kitchen to confront Ebony. “Get the hell out our fridge!” Mikey Alonzo slips through the front door unnoticed as the women face off in the kitchen. He is a small time hustler and now resident of the McDaniels household. His baggy jeans droop off his ass to cover his cheddar and broccoli colored Timberland boots. On his wrist is a guess watch to match his guess t-shirt and denim jacket. Ebony inspects the fridge like the police on a drug raid “I just want to know who keeps the fridge so clean because obviously it’s not you. Is it Dad? He’s here, isn’t he? God it’s freaking hot as hell in this place!” Mikey admires the backside view of Ebony for a moment then clears his throat “what the fuck happened to the door Pat?” Startled, Ebony straightens her spine and doesn’t turn around. Pat turns quickly with a look of horror on her face. She runs into the living room and flops down on the floor in front of Mikey to plead her case. You don’t let no one, not even a paying customer into the place you rest your head at. Especially the place where thousands of dollars’ worth of drugs are on display in the fridge. So Pat knows the shit has officially hit the fan, slapped against the wall and has started covering the windows. Mikey never plays with his money or people. Ebony casually walks up behind Pat and crosses her arms over her ample chest. Pat please “Shit, Daddy, I tried to tell her to go away, but she not a good listener. Keep rambling on about her damn Father!” Mikey smiles “and she is…?” Ebony extends her hand “I’m the dead daughter.”

Minutes later Mikey is in the living room as Ebony relaxes into the lumped-up raggedy couch. “Now how the hell am I supposed to believe that long ass story you just told me? We got a legit business here and I don’t like chicks fucking with my cash.” Pat paces the room and rambles, almost to herself “come on, Daddy, it’s that time for me, baby. Kick her out for all I care. You know what Momma needs.” Ebony rolls her eyes and addresses Mikey with all of her charm “I don’t care if you believe it or not. A shower and a change of clothes will do me just fine.” He takes a large guzzle of his ice cold beverage and pauses for a beat. “Don’t push your luck, alright? The only reason you still here is because I think you kind of cute. That’s if you did your hair.” Ebony rubs her hands self-consciously through her luscious curls and adjusts her outfit. Mikey walks over to the fridge, retrieves a foil package and tosses it over to Pat. She scrambles to a corner of the room, like a hungry rabid dog and unwraps the package “Yessss!” He strolls back over and begins to roll up a weed joint “Plus, you something much better for the clientele to look at. Other than that, I don’t have time for playing games.” Ebony stares at her mother in disgust “Mikey, right? First, I really need a towel and a change of clothes.” Pat holds a crack rock up to the overhead lighting and watches it sparkle like a fine cut diamond. Ebony stares at her mother in disgust but continues, “Second, take a look at the photos on the wall sometimes. Maybe then I wouldn’t think you so fucking stupid” and she sashays off into the bathroom slamming the door behind her. Mikey licks the tip of the joint closed and springs off the couch to march over to the living room wall to examine a solitary picture frame. Inside the dusty and worn wooden frame is a black and white photo of a young smiling Ebony standing between Pat and Greg. Their arms wrapped around Ebony to shield her from the world. Mikey blinks and scratches his head then lights the weed joint and blows a puff of smoke at the frame “Holy Shit. You are Cutthroat’s daughter!”

Now morning, Pat sits in the corner of the living room with drool on her collar swaying back and forth. Mikey and Ebony squint at the sunlight filtering into the apartment. They have been awake all night getting to know more about each other. Ebony stands up and stretches in an oversized T-shirt and panties “I can’t believe old man Lewis still lives next door. Why are you trying to get his corner apartment anyway?” Mikey begins to also stretch. Arms out wide and uninviting “just need more room. Been in Brooklyn five years and I still miss the dirty south. Nothing like a big house than some small pissy-ass projects.” He stands up to look out the window “Tennessee, where the liveliest niggas be!” Ebony giggles and rolls her eyes “It’s never too late to go back. Leave this place to me” Mikey stares into the distant void of his past life “Nah, I never had a house down there, either. Just wishful thinking, you know.” “Are you for real? Just go back and make it happen for yourself then. I mean, I know my momma’s going through a rough patch but we still a family” Ebony appeals to him. He turns from the window and tilts his head like someone finally gets him “that’s exactly why I hustle! One day me and my family is gonna be together, too, livin’ it up, chilling in a big old yard, grilling up a storm. You know how we do it. Chicken, ribs, hushpuppies, corn bread, all the finer things in life when you going through all this trife.” They both laugh and Mikey says “Hey, did that just rhyme?” She laughs even harder, doubled over at the gut kind of laugh that can bring tears to your eyes “You are stupid.” Mikey leans in and places his hand on her shoulder casually “Whatever.” Ebony recoils like a viper snake drawing back to strike. Mikey shrugs it off like he’s used to rejection “I’m saying, you got a man? I mean this is your crib, honestly and a man kinda lonely making all this money without a shorty to share it with. Cutthroat had his people put me in charge of things until he come home. Might as well make it a family affair. You down?” Ebony is overwhelmed by this news “You knew my father??” He smirks, “Girl please, me and the old man go way back. As a kid I use to come out here during the summer. Just kick it to pass the time. He always bought the neighborhood kids ice cream.” “Yeah, I miss that” Ebony relaxes. He continues his story, “Well one day all these project hoodrats surrounded me. Almost beat me to death for this fly ass jacket I was wearing. Remember the corduroy denim jackets we used to wear in high school?” She tenses, “How old are you?” Grinning Mikey states “Twenty-something.” She doesn’t like the sound of that “Well, I’m 18 something so no, I don’t remember.” “Whatever shorty. Anyway back to my story, he came and pulled me out the pile. Stared them down until they scattered. From that day forward he was God to me.” Ebony studies Mikey’s face “Can I trust you though?” He is stoic in his response “Girl, you Cutthroat’s daughter. I swear I’d do right by you.” Pat stirs from her drug-induced coma. Ebony glares at the woman who birthed her. Can she really trust either of them to keep her safe? The last decade has been hell on her mentally and physically. Neither of them has said more than a few words about her father. She can tell they love what they got going now but Ebony needs to see her dad. Make sure he is okay and let him know she survived. Fuck that, more than survived, she escaped. Ebony spent many nights crying herself to sleep but even more nights plotting. She would have her face firmly planted against her bedroom wall. Time ticking by and she would calm herself by breathing in and out slowly. Most nights were spent tuning out the screams happening in other parts of the home or covering her own face with a pillow to muffle her own screams. When she was left to her own devices she mapped out every possible scenario of coming back to Brooklyn. Now that she is here this isn’t what she expected to find. Her mother still strung out and running dope out of their apartment. It’s a whole new ballgame but this dude wants to cut her in. She has no fucking clue about selling drugs but she isn’t going back upstate. That’s a given because there’s nothing left. She could never convince her foster mom to run away with her and it hurt so much to leave her behind. Ebony rubs self-consciously at a scar on her right arm. Pats’ slurred speech makes its way across the room “What time is it, Daddy? Why is that damn girl still here? She’s a fucking liar, okay!” The cold switch is flipped on and like a gazelle, Ebony leaps across the room “Look bitch, you going to stop spewing lies about me!” She snatches the needle out of Pat’s arm, smacks her hard across the face and shakes her by the shoulders “Now you tell him who I am, damn it! Right now, or I swear!” Pat scrambles awake like a bucket of ice cold weather has been poured over her “You’re a liar! I don’t have a–” Ebony smacks her again and shakes her mother by the shoulders making her head bobble back and forth like a rag doll being tossed around by the family dog “Who am I?!” Pat musters the courage to scream and spit in Ebony’s face “She’s DEAD! I don’t–” Ebony cracks a mirror on the edge of the table and holds it to Pat’s throat “WHO AM I?! Pat’s eyes bug out “They said you were dead okay! You died! You aren’t really here. They said you DIED EBONY.” Pat sobs uncontrollably as her daughter looks on in horror “Please don’t hurt me.” Ebony can only stare at the woman who birthed her. The woman who combed her hair and braided it up almost every night no matter how late it was. The woman who let her fall asleep in her dads lap and placed a warm fuzzy blanket over them both, then crawled into bed alone. What lies had they told her all these years on where Ebony was and how she was doing? Who told my parents I was dead?! It just doesn’t make sense. Ebony gasps for air filled with so much adrenaline that it feels like her heart will burst. Hatred for those cops who took her away from her family runs like ice through her veins. The memory of the day she was dragged away from them come back in full force. Launching itself at her sending the broken mirror crashing to the floor. In defeat she addresses her drug addicted mother, “that’s all I wanted you to say momma.”

Mikey intervenes by picking Ebony up and carrying her to the bedroom. Her arms and legs dangle like a rag doll in utter defeat. Once inside he gently places her on the king size bed. The room is furnished with a bachelor’s taste. The walls are covered with wood paneling and wide plank hardwood floors. When you move into Tilden there are plastered walls covered in off-white paint and linoleum floors throughout. Mikey has spent a pretty penny to create his man cave. Everything is clean and pristine like the fridge while the rest of the apartment looks like the hounds of hell swept in and never left. Mikey stands over the bed as Prince Charming looking down over his sleeping beauty. In less than a day he has fallen in love with Ebony and vows to protect her. Cutthroat was his drug mentor and with that came much respect plus loyalty. But with this woman who is the offspring of that mentor, Mikey loves. He has never wanted to build a family of his own because of his fucked up childhood. His goal was always to advance the family that he already had. All the brothers and sisters he left behind down south to pursue a better life. Coming to Brooklyn every summer all those years ago made him into a man. Once he learned how to fight he never stopped, just changed the weapons he fought with be it his fists, guns or knives. Watching this beautiful woman on his bed, looking devastated and heartbroken makes him want to protect her. He will build her up to greatness or die trying because that’s what her father did for him. But first a reality check. He will break her down in order to build her back up and hope she still loves him in the end. Mikey sits down on the edge of the bed and leans over to kiss her lips. “You can’t come in here and ruin my business, little one. Its better you join in on the fun. Tomorrow is another day.” Ebony rolls away from him to place her face against the wall and breathe.

The next afternoon in the courtyard of the Tilden Housing projects, low income residents wander around in the heat. There is an ice cream truck surrounded by neighborhood kids begging for a discount. The Mr. Softee truck plays its usual jingle from a set of broken speakers strapped to the top of the truck. The blue and white delivery van converted into an ice cream truck has a small sliding glass window on the side where you place orders. Below that is a picture diagram of the ice cream combinations you can order which include a single cone vanilla ice cream covered in rainbow sprinkles for $1. An elderly woman walks past pushing a red shopping cart overloaded with groceries and laundry bags. The wheels on the cart shake and squeak as she makes her way down the uneven pavement leading to the front of one of the buildings. Local News Helicopters often fly overhead of the Tilden Houses. The violence in this part of Brownsville has reached a crescendo. A dead body was just found on the corner of Rockaway and Dumont Avenue in front of the Houses. Turns out it was an elected official looking to score some coke but the deal went wrong. Mikey wasn’t involved but he knows who was and isn’t saying a thing. Snitches get stitches in the hood and besides that asshole official was always wheeling and dealing a discount. Things will die down soon so the local thugs just give the police helicopters a middle finger and continue drinking their beers. If you were in that news helicopter you would see that the buildings are not just laid out randomly but laid out in a grid pattern with the buildings in an “X” formation. There are concrete pathways winding in and out of over a dozen buildings. Around the perimeter of these buildings are waist high black metal fences. Some are chipped and rusting but they help keep up the appearance of what the borough of Brooklyn has to offer. An army of housing authority workers walk through the property once a week to clean up any messes. It’s always increased when a new mayor is elected into office because they are sometimes tasked with touring different projects throughout the city. These buildings built on a foundation of politics have come full circle. The large structures are made of brick with square windows surrounded by patches of grass, fences and evergreen colored park benches. The landscape was designed to keep the residents milling about within the apartment complex. Getting to know one another and love thy neighbor. Since the 80s that has become shoot first and ask forgiveness later. As soon as the weather permits you will see people dangle a leg or limbs out a window. The body attached to those limbs watch the courtyard like snipers waiting on secret mission. Even the elderly do it as an escape from their drab apartments. But it’s the local hustlers who really utilize it as an alert system. Depending on who has entered the property a set of whistles or cat calls can be heard at all times of the night as a form of communication to prevent incriminating themselves.

Hundreds of people are jam packed into this grouping of buildings. The good, the bad and the ugly make this place home where everyone actually does know your name. When you invite outside visitors to Tilden it must be known or local thugs will bum rush your visitors. These men and some very hardcore women are posted up outside of the buildings day and night. Some hang out for a while before heading to work but most consider it their full time job. Inside the hallways and elevators used to reek of piss from the drug addicts and homeless people squatting in empty apartments. But in the building Mikey occupies no one dares to piss anywhere but in the bathroom. Male outsiders also know to never casually stroll up to any building in Tilden without getting permission first. They are screened by getting a pat down for guns or robbed at gunpoint for resisting. One day a man was stripped butt naked and marched through the courtyard for refusing to say who he was visiting. The woman he wanted to creep around with was married and couldn’t reveal he should actually be there. So while she laid in bed with platform heels and a red teddy on, her lover was pissing himself hoping to survive. Before the police swarmed in, for many years Cutthroat was the king of his castle in apartment 613. When he was arrested a few of his loyal subjects held down the fortress but eventually were forced out by more powerful drug dealers. Mikey still maintains the stronghold on his building but even he answers to someone now. In the courtyard Mikey and Ebony lounge on a wooden bench covered in graffiti. “So this is the fun part? Copping a squat in the blazing heat all day while you have my mother running around for you?” Ebony rolls her eyes. Mikey smirks “Nah girl, it ain’t even like that. She like to harass everybody. It wouldn’t be the same without Patty.” Pat buzzes past on a mission “Ya’ll Negroes don’t know nothing about making money!” He glances over to the Mr. Softee ice cream truck and his mouth waters, “I’m trying to put your daughter up on the game and how we making cash hand over fist out here! Damn it is hot as fuck today. You want an ice cream cone girl?” “I hope you are joking. No I don’t want no damn ice cream. But let me run it down for you real quick. You got a mix of crack rocks and an ounce of weed in that crumpled up brown bag at your feet. Undercover cops have passed three times to scope you out and Patty’s been skimming off the top all day. Plus you short at least $50 from the drug fiends crumpling up Monopoly money and passing them off as dollar bills. Good job, boy genius! You sure you even got enough to buy me that ice cream?” He leaps to his feet “What the fuck! You kidding me right??” “I told you crunching numbers is how I survived all those years. Plus they bounced me around in foster homes. You pick up a lot of shit that you never want to know but learn anyway.” She winks at Mikey. In the background, Pat fights with a potential customer over price. They wrestle over something in her right hand. Ebony continues, “And now that we are in a recession, people are even more desperate to make money.” Mikey paces back and forth “New York is always in a recession shorty. These greedy ass cops and robbers keep us off balance. But hustlers like me getting that tax free money out here so I’m not complaining. But I could always use a little more. You seem to know your shit. But I’m still on the fence about you youngin’.”

The sun is slowly setting in the East, dropping the oppressive summer temperature down to something more manageable. Pat plops down on a wooden bench across from Mikey and Ebony. A needle hangs out her arm. In her hand, a bag of crack rocks. “You think she will let me help her?” Ebony directs her statement to Mikey. “Help her do what?” Ebony continues, “What do you think? Sell some dope stupid, so we can really get paid. Plus how in the hell you got a dope fiend bringing you customers and using half your product at the same time?” A deep sadness washes over Ebony. Even as a kid she knew her mom had a drug problem. She used to run screaming to her dad when mommy passed out by the toilet. Ebony knew it wasn’t from her mom drinking because she couldn’t stand the smell of alcohol. Every time her dad came in reeking of vodka Pat would brush him away in disgust. Pat grew up in a house full of alcoholics. So she swore it off a long time ago. Sadly addiction is passed down from generation to generation, especially when your mama still drank like a fish with you in the womb. Ebony remembers her mom explaining why she doesn’t celebrate her birthday. Being born a preemie not expected to live and having to be weaned off of alcohol as a baby is enough to not want a birthday cake ever. The grandmother she never met died long ago of Cirrhosis of the liver. Pat suffered alone as an only child, no siblings or cousins to speak of. Stuck in a hospital room watching her mother slowly slip away after doing the same thing a year earlier for her father. Pat spared her daughter much of those details but it became way easier than she even thought to get strung out on drugs. The first time she smoked a joint something in her changed. A portal opened to another world that she has never stepped back through. Pat has tried once or twice to clean herself up but what’s the point? Ebony makes her way over to Pat and sits down, “Momma.” Pat bobs her head in a drug stupor “Huh? What you want?” Ebony reaches out to her mom but thinks better of it, “let me show you something real quick. But first, please take that damn needle out your arm.” Her mom simply states, “child, I wouldn’t even know how.” Ebony grabs the bag of crack rocks while Pat protests. “So if you tie it like this, it looks like there’s a lot more in the baggie.” Ebony demonstrates and Pat pays close attention. “Damn, girl, we have to give these crack heads more hope than that! You want them to come back right?” Ebony glares, “look, it doesn’t matter how many rocks you put in the bag. They always come back. You, of all people, should know that.” Pat sucks her teeth and shakes her head “you think you know every damn thing. I swear, I’m gonna prove you wrong one day.” Mother and daughter face off with each other. Ebony yells “well how about it! Let’s try momma to get you well so you no longer prove me right. Ok?” Pat yells right back, “if it makes you shut the hell up about my business then yeah, let’s do it!” Mikey watches as the women walk away into the sunset still arguing with each other. He shakes his head and walks over to the ice cream truck.

From the slight bonding talk Ebony had yesterday with her mom, it’s time. No more stalling or trying to put a band aid on something that will just keep bleeding through. It’s time to get Pat sober the hard way. There is a lot of rage boiling just below the surface of Ebony and the majority is directed at her mom. What scared her most was the coldness she felt the other day. It’s almost indescribable the place that she went. A please that is pitch black and devoid of sound. In her mind she felt every bad emotion rolled into one being slathered onto her skin and rubbed in roughly by calloused hands. A cold place where you could fall and fall waiting for something or someone to catch you, only to never hit the ground. Ebony can admit that her childhood wasn’t too bad; aside from the cops bursting in on her family and her dad’s perverted friends. But then again that’s not your average childhood either. Sometimes Ebony wakes up drenched in sweat knowing that she’s experienced a nightmare but not being able to recall what it was. A tortured soldier in a battle that’s replayed nightly but the horrific details can’t be recollected. She does remember the way Pat looked past her. Instead of looking into her

eyes and seeing her pain, the woman who gave birth to her looked right through her. She remembers her best friend Renae standing there with their hands clenched together. They remained anchored like a buoy on an ocean tormented by a rising Tsunami. She hasn’t thought about Renae in a long time. Just like she didn’t think about her parents until High School was coming to an end. She made Esther find the number to social services and track down a number and address for her parents. They wouldn’t provide more concrete information on Cutthroat unless parental rights had been established from him. Not sure if he gave the permission or if they even told him. Ebony never put it past city workers making ten bucks an hour to have loyalty to a kid no longer in their care. They say you can’t cry over spilled milk, whatever the hell that means. She has cried over a lot more since the day she watched the system drag her parents away. That day Pat kept up her façade until those shots rang out. Chaos ensued and Ebony saw her mother break. She remembers seeing Pat rock back and forth in the back of that van. The more she recalls that day the more hurt she becomes. So what does a wounded animal do when things get close? It lashes out and puts up a fight to the death or succumbs to their injuries. Ebony is far from defeated and she is use to tending to those wounds. She has decided to take action starting today. Ebony leads Pat into a sparsely decorated room and locks the door. A quick scan of the room reveals canned foods and bottles of water stocked on top of a dresser. In one corner is a makeshift cot with a bare and lumpy mattress. On top of that is a wool blanket and a flat pillow. There are two windows haphazardly covered with newspaper clippings. There is a metal folding chair that has seen better days and a boxy television with a rabbit ear antenna on top. Pat looks around the room confused. She has lived in squalor for a long time but seeing her bedroom transformed into a makeshift jail cell takes the fucking cake. Pat vehemently addresses her daughter, “you think you funny bitch? Trying to make me relive what your daddy is going through.” She turns her back on the room and faces off with her daughter. Ebony strolls into the room ignoring the venom being spewed around. She takes a tour of what she worked on all night. Her mom doesn’t realize what is about to happen. You are talking over a decade of drugs being purged from the body. But without it she can’t have a real conversation with this woman. She won’t be able to get the answers needed about her dad, so it’s game on!

Back in the day her mom’s drug of choice was cocaine. Her arrest and conviction for the same charges applied to Cutthroat was overturned years ago by the high powered lawyers her husband kept on retainer. Just because they were married didn’t mean the spouse knew about any illegal activities even if they were done at times under her own roof. It had to be physical evidence presented which is why the circumstantial evidence was thrown out. Pat’s first rodeo in the court system she was high as a kite! She was out on bail and had access to Cutthroats drug suppliers from the south. They just plied her with

more and more coke to keep the pipeline moving along. She snorted so much one night that the next day at court her nose started bleeding. Pat was sitting in court with a cream colored suit on smiling for the local news cameras allowed into the courtroom. She waved and blew them a kiss then her nose bled like a faucet. Her attorney spun it as a hot summer day and the stress of the trial being the cause but everyone could tell something was up. I mean when your pupils are dilated like saucers and you barely blink, it kind of is a dead giveaway. Cutthroat paid them handsomely to make sure his family was okay no matter what the charges were against him. What he didn’t predict were the consequences of having a druggie for a wife. Once the state found out about Pat’s drug problem they never returned Ebony. Her child was thrown into the system without a care in the world. The prosecutor’s got what they wanted, which was a conviction of a well-known drug dealer pushing poison into his community. It took almost a year to spring Pat from jail altogether and by then she had moved on to better drugs. Coke was a great high but Heroin took it into the stratosphere. Heroin is a naturally occurring opiate processed from morphine. There are a lot of mad scientists or rather drug dealers highly skilled at purifying the drug. It’s funny how you purify a drug using harmful ass chemicals that can kill you. Similar to the tobacco trade where cigarettes are filtered with substances containing fiber glass that are highly toxic so you won’t inhale the essence of the plant that you actually want to smoke. Synthesizing Heroin from morphine can be traced back to the 1800s and was even marketed by Bayer, the German pharmaceutical company under the trademark name of Heroin. It was quickly exported and distributed to over 23 countries as a cough suppressant and non-addictive morphine substitute. The majority of Heroin is produced in Afghanistan but is smuggled into the states mainly from South America. Impurities are added to street heroin giving the drug a white to dark brown appearance depending on what it was cut with. Those cuts are often sugar, starch, powdered milk and most times other drugs to provide a filler or a plateau to the drug. Pat first sniffed Heroin in jail where it was smuggled in by a lesbian who fell in love with the sexy mulatto woman married to a hustler. Pat was desperate to get high again and willing to use her body to pay the dyke bitch that wanted to get into her panties. Snorting Heroin like it was an 8 ball of cocaine almost killed her. She was rushed to the hospital foaming at the mouth and the doctors gave her the news. What she had taken was Heroin and she was given the option of meds to wean her off of it. Being that it was the best high she ever had, Pat enthusiastically declined. From then she was hooked and later learned how to inject the drug into a vein by a close associate of Cutthroat. The same man who tipped off the Police to his former business partner in the first place. That man is now the Drug Kingpin of Brooklyn running shit. But he comes a little later in this story…

the saga continues…Part 3 coming soon

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