Through Her Eyes: Revised

Interactive photos

Chapter Two

Same but different.

Jay always professed himself to be my brother, but he was no brother of mine. Mother died without me giving her credit for her perception of my so-called best friend, whom I considered my brother. She had constantly hammered at me, ‘He is no good; lose him.’ Hard-headed as I was, I stuck with him to the edge of calamity. We were inseparable, as tight as Abbott and Costello, and in almost every class together. After school, we took the Number Four train, where we did our homework to Forty-second Street. From there, we walked to 666 5th Ave, where we worked full-time at a five-star restaurant. There, we jockeyed positions as pastry chefs and grill chefs.

Going to school and working full-time was very taxing, but we didn’t care; it put good money in our pockets which allowed us to dress like pimps and party like we were rich and famous. Besides textbooks, we only read Gentleman’s Quarterly, the leading fashion magazine for men,  Ebony and Jet magazines. We dressed G.Q. going to school; we wouldn’t be caught dead with holes in our jeans; only the poor haters came to school with holes in their clothes. We dressed better than our teachers, who thought we were uppity; we were hated by blacks and whites, all thinking that we were uppity and drug dealers. We had the most extraordinary weed connections; one worked for the airlines and traveled the world; we smoked a lot of it but never sold any.