A Hustler's Journey to Finally Making Love

FIRST TIME

H ave you ever heard the saying, Young, dumb, and full of cum. Let me tell you: it is true. Growing up in the Bronx, inside of the housing projects, I can say I had a pretty decent childhood. In my family,there are my two brothers, me the youngest, and my single mom. Times were hard early on, but it was fun. I always wished I had a sister, just to have another female personality around to offset three boys’ testosterone would have been nice. And she could have answered some of my questions to help me with girls socially.

Growing up, I had friends who had sisters. They didn’t get along at that age, but whenever she had a problem with a guy, they would not hesitate to help her every need. And I guess I wanted someone to protect also. But as I got older, I know having one would have helped me communicate and be more sensitive to females. I remember a girlfriend of mine named Monifah. She told me how she and her brother would talk and exchange information about the opposite sex. He would tell her about a dude’s game and how to satisfy them. She would tell him how to please a woman sexually and what they were looking for in a man, and I admired that because I never had that information. Of course, I would ask women, did you like that or am I doing it right? and things of that nature. Occasionally, I ask a female friend what and how can I please a woman. They would tell me little stuff, but at that time, I didn’t want to reach, too much. You don’t want to look totally lost. They might gossip, and you don’t want girls to think you suck in bed, and hey, you might want to fuck the girl your asking. But the questions were basic and the answers were short. When you have a sibling you can talk to, you know they’re going to keep it real. They have nothing to lose or gain, and it’s family that’s the best.

I guess having a sister would have made it easier. My first experience was with a girl named Myra. It was our last year in middle school. She was a year older than me with a little more experience. I remember we planned to hook up/hang out after school. Myra and I, at that point, have been together for about two months. It wasn’t exactly spoken about, but this was the sex date. It was planned the day before by Myra and her friend Angela. She told me Angela’s mother would be away, and she had the house to herself. So the next day, in school, I was nervous and thinking to myself, I hope I do well, not knowing what the hell I was supposed to do. At the end of the eighth period, we met in the hallway by the lockers. Myra says to me, You ready? Angela waiting for us.

I said, Okay. Let’s go.

My brother Sam was outside the school. He didn’t go to the school, but he hung out around it. I saw him when we were leaving and asked him to come with us. He knew Angela and Myra from previous introductions, so he came with us.

When we got to the house Myra and I went into the bedroom. Sam and Angela stayed in the living room. As I entered the room, I remember clearly I was like, Oh shit! It’s about to go down. I must have been contemplating really hard and had a dazed look on my face. I remember Myra asking me, You okay?

I said, Yeah, yeah, and shook that feeling off real quick.

She sat on the bed. I know now that she was waiting for me to make my move. I walked over to a rap magazine that was on the dresser and started talking about that, making small talk. That’s when Myra stood up and started untangling her belt. She looked at me and said, So what’s up?

I played it off like I knew what I was doing and said, What’s up!

I started to take my pants off. She pulled her pants down and laid on the bed. Afterward, I pulled my pants down and sat on the bed. I remember looking at her for about a minute, thinking to myself, Oh shit! Then I gently laid on top of her.

My penis was hard as a rock, and I tried to stick it in her vagina. After about three minutes of her saying that’s not it and directing me, I finally got it. After about five minutes of humping her, I pulled out and laid next to her on the bed. She asked me, Did you cum?

I looked under the cover at my penis and said yes, but I did not know what she was talking about. I had no idea. Sex to me before this was rubbing on girls, dry humping in the schoolyard or in my building. I started grabbing my clothes to get dressed, and I remember her looking at me kind of weird like, He doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing. So we got dressed. I started walking toward the bedroom door.

As I opened the door, Angela and my brother damn near fell on the floor. Their nosey asses were listening. After that day, Myra and I had more sex episodes, and my skills got better for that moment, but nowhere near what they should be. That I know now.

NOT KNOWING

A fter my first time, you couldn’t tell me anything. I thought I was the shit. Now knowing I didn’t know what the hell I was doing, I give a lot of gratitude to Myra for not only taking my virginity but for dealing with my unorthodox and awful way of making love. Even though she was one year older than me, I know she had way better.

So Myra and I went on for about a year. By school break, we had broken up. In high school, I was with Keisha. Keisha was my age but still more knowledgeable about sex than me. Keisha was the one I credited for teaching me to squeeze inside when humping. Before her, I was fucking like a rabbit, in and out, real fast. After about three or four times having sex with Keisha, she said to me, Whoa! Will you slow the fuck down! She said, Listen. When you press against me, squeeze your penis inside, so I can feel it. Then she showed me by grabbing my butt. As I pushed in, she held it for about two seconds and let go. Then in a sexy, satisfied tone, she said, Yeah. Like that. Keep that motion going just like that."

Hey, it was something new, and it felt good. I remember feeling the deepest of her warm vagina; it was a feeling I never felt before. The problem I had with that was it felt so good that I came fast. And that started my cumming too fast episode, which lasted about twelve years, but I didn’t know it was a problem; and the truth is, I didn’t care, as you will read.

So Keisha and I rocked out for about a year, sneaking in the stairwells, doing it on the roofs of the neighborhood buildings. Wherever we could get it in, we did. We were young, and we would do it anywhere and often.

Keisha transferred to a different high school. So we decided to leave on good terms, knowing it would be difficult to continue. That was the summer of ’85.

That summer of ’85, my mother was planning a trip to Maryland to visit my aunt Kathy and my cousins. We usually go down there every summer. That year, I asked my mother if I could bring my friend Chris. Chris and I have been friends since Head Start. We lived on the same floor, and I consider him my best friend.

My mother agreed that he could come. So, one day, in the first week of July of that summer, we woke up and early grabbed our bags. My mother made some sandwiches, and we were out.

As my family was waiting for the elevator, I ran down the hall and got Chris. He was ready, but he looked tired; he wasn’t used to the four in the morning wakeup to beat the traffic flow. On our way to Maryland, we made more stops than normal because Chris got car sick. He was one of those guys from the projects who never went anywhere so a four-hour car ride didn’t agree with him.

When we got to Maryland, my aunt and four cousins greeted us at the car and they asked, Who’s your friend? I introduced them.

After we got settled and unwound from the ride, I took Chris outside to see my Maryland friends. I had a few friends who I hung out with and who were expecting me ever summer. Their names were Monkey and Troy. Cool kids. I have known them since we were kids.

The first thing Chris noticed was their accents and told me right in front of them, Yo! They sound funny.

And they said, No, y’all sound funny. They said we sound proper, and we thought they sound country.

We started kicking it. They asked me how I’ve been, what’s up with New York (they were fascinated with New York, at least in ’85; that would change). They asked me to say a rhyme. They thought I was the best rapper ever. They didn’t know I was using other guys’ raps, that who were really, really good from my projects. They asked Chris to say a rhyme, but he couldn’t rap. We were trying to urge him on. I remember saying Chris, say that Superman rhyme. Oooh! Why did I do that?

They went crazy. Yeah, yeah. Say that Superman rhyme!

Mind you there was no Superman rhyme. I just was putting him on the spot. That was so funny.

As we were walking around, a friend of mine named Kenny pulled out a bag of weed. Chris saw the bag. (Chris was a weed smoker). He asked Ken, Hey, Ken. What’s that?

Some herbs, Ken replied.

Yea. Chris asked to see it. Kenny passed Chris the bag. He opened it, took a whiff, and said, Not bad. How much is that?

People, the answer to this question I believe messed my sex life up for the next twenty-plus years. Kenny said that right there were twenty dollars. Chris looked at me and said, Dee, can you believe that shit?

I said, What?

That’s $5 around our way.

I don’t smoke, but I had an idea. I looked at it and said, Yeah, you’re right.

Then he pulled me to the side and said, Yo! We got to come back down here with some nickel bags from New York and move them for twenties. We can make some money.

I said, Ahhhh, I don’t know. Remember I’m fifteen, still in school, and he’s only a month older than me. Chris figured by the time we returned home with my mother, there’ll still be some summer left. He said he can bring his cousin Kevin, who at the time wasn’t doing shit, He lived in our building on the tenth floor. The plan was to go home, find a way to get some money, buy weed, and come back down. We’ll set Kevin up before school starts. it’s time to make money. Let’s go.

HUSTLING

W hen we got back to New York, we figured our only way to make money was to break into video games. Chris had a friend named Willy who can break into any video game. The catch is to break into the ones that had a lot of quarters, so if you get caught, it will be worth it. The way we find out if it’s loaded is by dropping a quarter in the machine. If it makes a nice, soft landing, that means it’s loaded. It would be about four to five kids listening for that sound when it landed on a bed full of quarters it sounds so sweet. So we need about five guys to do a game room.

We got Willy, who was the machine tech; Joe, who was a big husky guy, good for blocking or what we called throwing the block, meaning to block the store owner; and little buddy. We used him to grab the coins because he was so small. Buddy was about eleven at the time; the rest of us was about fifteen or sixteen.

So it’s me, Chris, Buddy, Willy, and Joe. We’re on a mission, every day about 1:00 p.m. We’ll meet up and hit the local game rooms. Joe and I would throw the block, Chris would play the games, and Willy does his thing, twisting bolts using screwdrivers, pliers, or whatever it took. While he’s doing that, we’re yelling loudly so the game store owner can’t hear the noise. Oooh-wooow-heyyyy! That was a dope move.

By the time we left, Willy and Buddy’s jackets were full of quarters and the machines were empty. Chris’s and my goal was to buy a hundred nickel bags that cost $500. We’ve been doing the game thing for a week and have about $170 apiece. We decided the local area game rooms were too hot; they were on to us. So we said, Let’s go to Brooklyn.

Joe had a cousin who used to live out there. He moved to North Carolina, but he said he remembered a game room they used to go to that was on Newkirk Avenue. We said okay.

We took the no. 3 train down to Newkirk on a Saturday. We walk in the game room, and the local kids look straight at us like, Who the hell are these guys? Anyway, we stuck with the routine. Chris dropped a quarter in the machine, and it was loaded. Cool.

Joe and I threw the block, Buddy stayed close, watching the game making noise, and Willy was going in.

After a couple of minutes of getting started, a local kid came over. He must have seen something; he walked over to the owner, who was a big heavy West Indian lady. I told Willy, Yo! Shorty told on us. The owner knows. Let’s go.

We waited for him to put the bar back on the front of the machine, and we ran out of the store. I heard Miss Joanne’s voice say, Get them, and about twenty local kids who love Miss Joanne started chasing us. I ran so fucking fast, it felt like my heart was going to drop out.

We split up. Everybody knew to meet at the train station. I got to Newkirk 3 train station. Chris was there, Buddy was there, Willy was there, but no Joe. We were saying to each other, Where’s Joe? Where’s Joe? Nobody wanted to go back.

Later that night, Joe came back to the block fucked up. He said they caught him, about twenty of them. He said they tried to fucking kill him. The only thing that stopped them was Miss Joanne; she walked down the block and told them to stop. He got up, walked to the train, and came home. To this day, he’ll tell you that’s the worst ass-whooping he had in his life.

The next day, Chris and I said, Fuck it! Let’s get what we can get with what we got. School’s about to start.

We went to go see Eric. Eric was the neighborhood weed seller. I said, E, what’s up?

He said, Hey, little niggas. What’s up?

Nothing. We want to holler at you about buying some weed.

He looked at me and said, You don’t even smoke, Dee.

I know. I’m going to take this to another side of town. How many bags can we get for $400?

He said, That’s eighty bags, but I will give you eighty-four. Throw you four mo.

Alright. Cool. We’ll take it.

See, Eric was a friend of my oldest brother, so he always treated me like a little brother. We got the bags. I went home and told my mother I would like to visit Aunt Kathy one more time before the summer is up. She said, I don’t know.

I told her I have the money for the bus from packing groceries at the supermarket. She thought about it for a minute and said, Okay. Be safe.

Chris, Kevin, and I got on the bus the next day. Chris had forty-two bags and I had the same. We took a $15 cab ride to my aunt’s complex from the DC bus station. I couldn’t bring Kevin to my aunt’s house, so Monkey said he could stay at his house. His mom didn’t give a dam.

After talking with my aunt and cousins, Chris and I met up with Kevin and Monkey to plan how we were going to move the work. We observed how the other hustlers were doing it. From what we saw, the cars drove into the complex and the hustlers would walk to them and serve them the drugs. We thought that was too hot because we can easily get spotted by undercover cops. In New York, we called them jumpouts. So we decided to sell out of Monkey’s building. One person would walk to the car and tell the customers to go into the building, one person would stand in front for protection and as a lookout, and one person would sell the product. I would stay in the apartment with the work.

After setting up, Chris went into the hallway with his forty-two bags. About two hours later, he came back upstairs. I’m done.

I said, Word. Get the fuck outta here! That was fast.

He asked for the rest. About an hour and a half later, he said, I’m done.

What! Are you serious?

He said yep.

I couldn’t believe it. I sold a couple of bags in the Bronx before, but for three hours and some change. Eighty-four bags of weed seemed pretty good. He said, People that came back were like, ‘Ohh! That’s that New York shit.’ Your Kathy’s Ken?

He said yes. I found out that when people smoke the same weed in their area for so long, their palates get used to it, so when they get something different, their palates change. They enjoy different shit. So word got out: Kathy’s nephew was out here with some fire. People were coming back buying four five bags, and bringing people with them. That’s how it went so fast.

We spend $400 and made $1,680. After expenses, giving Monkey and Kevin $100 a piece, Chris and I had $1,200. Chris and I decided to go back to New York that night. We left Kevin down there he stayed at Monkeys house.

On the bus back home, we talked about buying half a pound or a pound; we did not know the prices so we weren’t sure. When we hit the projects, we saw E. Yo, E! What’s up?

Yo, what up, little niggas. I know y’all not done with that already? he asked.

Yeah, we are, we said as we laughed a little bit.

He said, Wow! Where y’all at?

We said, We got a spot.

He laughed. Y’all got a spot, huh. But anyway, I said, How much is a pound?

He said, Nine hundred.

I said, Okay, cool. When can we get it?

He said, Holddddd up! How y’all little muthafuckers go from eighty bags to a whole joint?

We looked at him again, chuckling, and said, We got a spot.

C’mon, man. Stop playing, he asked. Put me on.

Can’t do, E.

Okay. I’ll meet y’all here tomorrow around 1:00 p.m.

Cool.

We met him the next day and was out. We went to talk to Ms. Jenkins from the eighth floor in my building, a heavy, older, dark-skinned lady. We knew that she got high and wasn’t doing nothing, so it would be easy to convince her to come with us, so we asked her. We told her we’ll buy her a round-trip ticket and give her $100 just to ride the bus with us and drop it off. She agreed.

We dressed her up in all white like she’s an usher at church, and we were out. We got to Maryland and met up with Kevin and Monkey at his house. As soon as I walked into the living room, I threw the pound on the bed. We about to get paid (not knowing the sexual animal the money would make of me).

Monkey smoked the product looked at me and said, This is some good shit.

So we started bagging. We bagged up about four hundred nice bags which came to about $8,000. In New York, that would have been about $2,000; we were loving it. It took us about a week to smash that pound off. We came to find out that word got out that we had that New York fire even more while we were gone—Yeah, Kathy’s nephew out here with that New York shit. Not that Maryland doesn’t have good weed, but this was just something different.

They had a fresh breeze of weed coming to the area, and the potheads wanted a taste. We were in a good situation; there was not too much animosity or jealousy from other hustlers because the majority of them smoke, and they came to holler at us for some. Plus, most, if not all, were selling Love Boat. In New York, we call it dust. Love Boat is embalming fluid poured over dirt weed. Dust is embalming fluid poured over mint leaves. Same shit but the mint leaves hit you