Edited: Changed some people’s names out of respect for their privacy
I’m on my own. Thinking I’m grown. I live with my high school buddy, Barry, his mom and his little brother. This world is totally different from where I grew up. Barry’s mom is a heavy drug user; she does crack. Barry seems to be oblivious to it. I guess it’s similar to my roaches at the homeless shelter. From everyone on the outside looking in, it may seem crazy, exotic or strange, but when you live in a situation, it’s just.. .. normal. Barry’s mom often had friends coming over. Older people in their late 30’s or 40’s. Or at least that’s what they LOOKED like. Knowing what I know now, the drugs probably had them looking older than they really were. Crack does something strange to a person. It sorta dries them out. Like a grape turning into a raisin. They turn skinny usually, though some fat crack heads stay fat. But they look dry. Worn. Like old car leather.
When her friends would come over they would commandeer the kitchen. Us kids would be told to leave the room and stay upstairs so that her and her friends could have some privacy. To this day, I’ve only ever seen anyone put a crack pipe to their mouth on TV. I’ve never seen it in person. But I remember the smell. There is no way to describe what crack smoke smells like. it’s just something you’d have to experience. It’s strong though, at least it was to my virgin nose. Very pugnant. It often gave me headaches, as I could smell it all the way upstairs. Barry never mentioned anything about what his mom did. neither did his younger brother. Neither did I. (I think it should be noted here that Barry’s mom now a days is no longer a crack head. She holds down a good job, has a car, and an apartment. She really cleaned up. But then again, she was never that bad. She always took care of her kids.)
I only mention the crack smoking because it was new to me. In actuality, staying with Barry and his familly was fun! I had a ball. it was a totally new thing to be able to come in and out of the house WHENEVER I wanted to. We stayed out all night with the neighborhood kids. It was my first time hanging out with thugs. There was Snook, small kat, about 5′5″. He wore a thick beard and braids in his head. Usually, the braids were half done, and the other half of his hair was puffed out in a half afro. Snook seemed to be the most charismatic, and swore up and down he ran all the stones in the nighborhood. I don’t know what his real title was, but he was definately plugged for a little kid.
There was lil BWe called him lil B because his name was Barry too. He was shorter than my friend Barry but definately not smaller. Lil B was swole. 50 cent wasn’t out at the time, but when 50 dropped his 1st albulm some years later, everybody noticed the uncanny resemblence he had to lil B. they look like twins. I teas Lil B to this day about that whenever I see him.
There was CeeCee. A half white half black kid who’s sister (Sonya) had gotten me beat up some years ago. She lied to a bunch of boys and told them that I had jumped on her. They waited for me after school one day as I was walking home. Must’ve been 10 of em. All I remember was the first punch. Anyway, CeeCee’s stand out characteristic was his hair. It was long as hell, way past his shoulder. Kind of a dirty blonde color. We all had butta’s back then, and CeeCee’s was the longest. Personally I didn’t think he deserved as much props about the length of his hair as he got, seeing as how he WAS half white. I mean, white people’s hair is always longer.
There were other’s in that neighbor hood. All stones. But these were the guys Barry and I hung around most. Everyday, was pretty much the same thing. Wake up, wash up. Lay out your clothes. Iron your clothes (back then ironing our pants was an artform that took about 1 hour and 1/4 a can of starch. best crease wins). head outside and see who’s out there. and from then on, we kicked around stories about what happened yesterday, who fucked who, who beat who up, and so on. Oh, yeah, and we argued all day aobut who was going to buy the weed, and the beer. that was the whole day. Hanging out, smoking weed, and drinking beer. I didn’t do any weed smoking though. Was never really my thing.
Like I said, living with Barry was fun. It’s funny just how much can happen, and how much trouble you can get into within the confines of the 2 block radius that is your hood. I attended highschool most days. Some days, I didn’t go though. Unfortunately, the more days I missed, the more I felt like I was being left behind when I was in school. I really could feel this in my math class. I would stroll in after not being in there for like a week, and they were already 3 or for lessons ahead of me. So whatever the hell Mr. Taylor was trying to explain to me about exponents or whatever, I surely couldn’t understand it. It’s hard to feel like you’re stupid, when you’ve spent most of your life in gifted class rooms. I’m used to being at the absolute head of every class, and breezing through everything. but for the first time in my life, I couldn’t answer the questions the teacher was asking me. And the other kids was looking at me like I was stupid.
But life went on as normal until one day when I met a girl who would change me for a long time. Her name was Cassandra.
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