Life After Death

by Sister Souljah

  “The BOOK is an English translation of the ‘Book of Guidance,’ the most important words revealed and written to the living. On its pages are the answers to every question you have and any one of us has ever had. Keep it in case you have a change of heart. The answers and the straight way will be right at your fingertips. There is a tiny dictionary in the bottom of the bag in case you don’t understand a word, just look it up.” She handed it back to me. I didn’t take hold of it.

  “Bitch, you said I was dead. Why do I need a Book of Guidance with all of the answers to questions for the living?” I knew I trumped her, showed her how smart she isn’t.

  “Because the soul is eternal. You need to know what the difference is between good and evil, right and wrong. Once you read these pages, you will be able to distinguish and understand and most importantly self-reflect. Don’t you care to know how come you are here at the Last Stop Before the Drop? Once you read, you will see the error in your choices and feel responsible for your missteps. Then you will will yourself to pray. Sincere prayers are the only path out of complete darkness.”

  “Beep-beep.” A red G wagon rolled up, fully AMG kitted and rims glistening. It parked a short distance away. It had me mesmerized. Of course I had seen a Benz G Wagon before, but never a red one. It was so mean it seemed to glow. The tinted windows dropped down. “What are you waiting for? Get in!” Lucifer 66, Dat Nigga, said. He was calling for me. My forever nigga showed up just like I knew he would.

  “Momma Lana Santiaga is not down here with you. She is in Heaven,” Bomber Girl said quickly. She thought she knew my weakness and tried to stab me in it. She stepped in close to me, trying to block him from my line of vision. She placed the strap of the bag over my shoulder. Maybe she thought that heavy-ass book would make it impossible for me to speed off. “Excuse me, Miss Winter,” she said, downshifting her tone now that I obviously had a better option. “Before you decide which path to take, I want you to know who I am and why it might matter to you.” In my mind I was like, You are a non-fucking-factor.

  Real bitches like bad boys. I’m the realest bitch, so I strutted right over to my forever nigga and hopped in. Through the blackened window, I could still see the spark of the Diamond Rain girl. Then poof! She suddenly exploded and disappeared. She left a trace of her hilab. The lavender sky and green atmosphere all faded to black. As me and him sped into the complete darkness, I opened the saddle bag, admiring the grade and texture of the leather, as well as the detail of the stitching. I decided to keep it. I lowered my window and tossed that heavy-ass book right out.

  There was a foul breeze rushing into the rugged whip. Still, I kept my window down. I needed the air. I was concentrating on reducing my temperature. I had to prevent myself from suddenly turning into a blob of heat, especially before I got the dick-down that I was anticipating like a motherfucker. The only interruption to my thorough excitement about being back to human, and my pure enticement with him, was my fury with that little bomber bitch, who stood there with her bullet-lined waistline and a hand grenade around her neck. Yet, she tried to come off like she was some kind of fucking innocent angel. She needed to be armed and she knew it. Without her ammunition and weapon, I would have never hesitated to whoop her ass for mentioning Momma and reminding me of shit I worked hard to forget.

  “I’m gonna need a drink,” I told my forever nigga. “Something strong,” I added.

  “I got whatever you need. Whatever I ain’t got, I’ll get it,” he said solemnly, and I loved it.

  “What did UBS say that got you upset?” he asked me calmly, to which I replied, “Don’t ever ask me about any other bitch. And when I’m with you, don’t say no other bitch’s name.”

  8.

  “I got an idea,” he said in a more like a thinking-to-himself tone. He pulled the G wagon to a stop. I don’t know what he was thinking but we were still surrounded by pitch black. He opened his car door and got out. “Stay right there,” he commanded me. I wasn’t going anywhere without him anyway. And as far as I know, there is nowhere to go. I was still tight ’cause the teenage bitch’s voice was revolving in my mind. For some bullshit reason, I couldn’t push it out. “Funny you should mention Momma. Funny you should mention Momma. Funny you should mention Momma.” Her words and her voice were on a loop in my head.

  Bomber bitch was forcing me into deep thought when in fact I think that, dead or alive, there are subjects and topics and things that a person should never have to think about. A dead person should be dead and without thoughts. I am dead and thinking about precisely the things that I never want to think about.

  Bet all of the assholes who committed suicide were shocked and angry as hell when they found out that dead is not dead and they would be the same person after death, with the same thoughts that they had thought they were ending, getting rid of, silencing.

  Now Momma was dead center in my mental line of vision. In that freeze-frame she was Brooklyn Momma, before the move to our luxurious Long Island mansion. Before some nigga who was jelly shot her in her face and permanently altered her perfect look. But most importantly, the picture of Momma in my mind was before she ever toked a hit of that crack pipe. I knew, after having fifteen years on lock to just sit and think about it, that for me to accept my mother, aka Momma, aka Lana Santiaga, aka the Baddest Bitch on the Planet, after her crack breakdown would be the same as rejecting myself. No! It would be the same as destroying myself. Brooklyn Momma was the voice in my head. She was the image in my eyes, my pattern, my fabric, my fashion. She was all of the ingredients mixed together that made me, me.

  Momma was the most. She was the beautifulest, the livest, the baddest, the funniest, the finest, everything. I didn’t need no books. Momma was all show-and-tell. She told me and showed me while she was telling me all that a bitch needs to know.

  “Ooh now, that’s not cool,” she would say when I shitted in my diaper at age two. That’s how way back my earliest memory of Momma goes. It is my first and earliest memory of anyone or anything, including myself. After Momma said that, she taught me how to pee and poop, where to pee and poop, and how to clean myself thoroughly and smell like a lady always should smell. “Come in the bathroom,” she would wave me in. “Always close the door while you do your private business. And remember your private business and your business-business both ain’t nobody else’s business!” She would talk to me like I was an adult, and then laugh at herself. But I knew she meant it and I understood her perfectly. “No potty,” she would say, kicking the baby toilet into a corner. “Sit on the real seat like I do,” she would say, pointing. I would be trying my best to balance my little body on the adult toilet with the humongous hole. “Now tinkle!” she would say, like it was a magical thing, not just pissing in the bowl. While I tinkled, Momma would turn away and look at herself in the bathroom mirror while singing a song, which relaxed me. Momma had the dopest music collection of original singles and albums. She knew every song ever made from the oldest to the newest. In my first memory, she was singing “All I Need,” an old joint that she loved. She was doing Marvin Gaye’s part and Tammi Terrell’s twisting and turning her body while fixed on her own reflection. She was singing so passionately I wondered. Is she singing to Poppa? Or, is she singing to me? Or is she singing to herself? After that first memory, I remember Momma singing “Everybody Is a Star” to me in the scented bubble bath as we bathed at the same time in the same tub. Momma was musical and Poppa had the whole house wired with speakers in every room, including the kitchen and the bathroom, so that Momma could be happy at home.

  All fresh and clean, Momma is carrying me wrapped in the thickest, softest white terry-cloth towel to her bedroom. Both of us sitting on her king-sized bed, Momma would oil and powder and dress me. She’d comb through my silky hair like each strand was a thread of pure gold. “All good!” She would leap up and rush into her clothing closet, to the top shelf where she kept her collection of eye-catchers, show-stoppers, high-fashion hats. She would carefully select
one and put it on my little head, drowning me in it. “Tilt it like this! Lay it to the side!” she would cheer, as my little fingers attempted to adjust the hat to the style that was the only way a fashionable supastar like Momma would approve. Soon as I caught the right angle, Momma would be clicking her Kodak, or pressing out Polaroids of me that would end up on her wall of photos of everything Momma loved the most. That was us, family.

  By the time I was six, Momma would play-dress me in her real clothes, with real bitch accessories, so that I could walk down the runway that Momma made in the apartment corridor which she lit up with colorful lamps and lights. I’d be killing the red carpet while the overhead speakers would be pouring out the sounds of Rod Stewart’s “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy.” I worked the runway to all Momma’s music picks, which could be anything ’cause she knew everything musical. Donna Summer’s “Hot Stuff,” Grace Jones’s “La Vie en Rose” or “Slave to the Rhythm.” Momma loved Grace Jones. Momma loved anyone and everything that she loved to the fullest. She was the loyalest woman on Earth to anything or anyone who she chose. Momma marked time and her favorite memories through music. She loved to tell me her coming-up stories. When she would be narrating them to me it seemed she was more excited hearing the stories she was telling, even though she knew them all already, and had told them to me or Poppa more than once before. She never sat still when she was saying her stories. She was all movement, demonstrating, gesturing, and reenacting. She told me I was born a product of two songs, Betty Wright’s “Tonight Is the Night.” She wouldn’t sing the whole song, just certain lines to highlight and prove that this song was her story. Momma said Betty Wright’s song was the soundtrack to her fourteen-years-young first love, first intimacy, first sexual experience with the one and only Poppa. She’d be acting like she could feel herself giving up her virginity right while she was telling the story. She squeezed her eyes tight in anticipation, clamped her legs together like she was really nervous, and even had sound effects like ooooh and wooo and oh yeah! The other record that made me happen, according to Momma, was Rod Stewart’s “Tonight’s the Night,” ’cause he was cool, sexy, and smooth, and only Santiaga was sexier, smoother, and cooler than Rod without having to sing one note.

  Momma had more style, got more looks, and had more wigs than the Supremes. She could rock it long and silky to the back of her thighs, or wear blunt cuts, short beautiful bobs, or her own hair in swirls of finger waves. She threw me big birthday parties, which could not be called just “parties” cause they were major events that niggas from Bk to Bx fought to get invited to. Many of the people who showed up I did not even know, even though the celebration was for me! After the huge crowd went home, when only family remained gathered in the ballroom, Momma would emerge dressed up on some karaoke-type vibe. She’d be Tina Turner and somehow lured Poppa into dressing like he was Ike. He didn’t sing though, he just laid back and let Momma mesmerize him with her high energy and vibrant personality. No matter how she freaked it, Momma was larger than life and glowed more than any worldwide superstar.

  That’s right. Momma taught me how to talk, by always talking to me and singing to me. Come to think of it, hip-hop was Momma remixed, sampled, looped, slowed down and sped up with a dope-ass beat beneath it. Momma is the reason why I love hip-hop, memorized it like I memorized Momma, and moved my hips to it, up until this day, dead or alive.

  Momma taught me how to walk, whether it was on her homemade runway, up and down the project steps, or on the stoops, cement streets, or curbs. Momma taught me how to stand, style, and strike a pose. Momma taught me body and style language. How to talk without ever saying a word. How to capture and wear the prettiest, most stylish meanest fashions, so I would never have to tell a next bitch anything. She would just stay the fuck back or back the fuck off because she knew beside me is not where she belonged. Momma taught me how to choose friends, and be so badass that they would choose to bow down to my look without me asking or having to be snobby or shitty about it. What to share and not share. What to give away and never accept back. What to keep and never allow anyone to touch, beg for, or borrow.

  Momma ranked and ruled everything, even her own real-life sisters who were my aunts. She didn’t say “So-and-so is number one, and this one is number two,” or anything like that. But I could see Momma’s words through her actions. Barbara, aka Aunt B, was her oldest sister. Momma had her babysit me from time to time. Aunt Barbara was appointed and paid to be babysitter to all of the family’s kids even though she hated children. The fact that we all could feel that Aunt Barbara didn’t want to watch even her own kids was proof that Momma, even though she was the youngest sister of her family, was boss. Barbara did what Momma “asked” her to do. My Aunt Lori cooked the dinner meals for Momma. Momma would speed down the hall to her apartment, pick up the prepared foods, run back, set the table at our place and pretend like she cooked everything herself. Aunt Lori knew better than to mention it. And she never did. Me and Poppa knew the deal, of course (and so did Momma, really), but we went along with it because Momma was so cute in all of her ways. Momma’s sister Lilah got down on her knees and scrubbed our toilets and bathtub. She was our Brooklyn project apartment housekeeper. She waxed our floors on her knees without a mop. She vacuumed the carpeted floors, and she made our beds, and did dishes and windows!

  In addition to paying her sisters, Momma treated them to spas and clubs, hair salons, concerts, sports events, and parties and Broadway shows. Places they could never have afforded on their own dollar. Momma’s brothers all worked for Poppa. Momma made Poppa commander over them. Usually men don’t like that type of thing. But for baby sister Lana (who kinged and hooked the hottest hustler), everybody would do it her way, because she was her. Besides, Poppa made them capable, decent, and most importantly, hood wealthy. All of my cousins, my same age and of course older, kissed my ass because I was Lana’s golden child. So I learned how to rank everything and put everyone and everything in its proper place where it belonged, beneath me.

  By thirteen, I was nine-millimeter dangerous and I knew it. I didn’t need no more instructions, homemade runways, or private concerts. I had watched and listened to and loved Momma so much I was Momma, the young version. And, because I was naturally a Momma-Poppa combo, I was considered an upgraded version, a limited edition of Momma. Poppa gave me that light-skin-and-long-black-wavy-hair look and pretty eyes with the long lashes that I didn’t have to buy from the cosmetics counter or wigs or weaves from the hair store.

  Still, deep-brown, flawless-skinned, brick-house-bodied, long-legged, forever-young-faced, sultry Momma topped all, any- and everyone everywhere we went. I would see boys to men of all ages’ eyes dance back and forth, up down and all around as they tried to choose between us. For me, Momma was the queen and obvious best. My most luxurious, stylish, lovely one. She was hands down my most incredible possession. And Momma was my mirror.

  It was great becoming best friends with Momma. Having someone in your teen-young years who is not trying to stop you from living, feeling, running wild a little bit, just for the experience and for the hell of it, is diamond class. She wouldn’t expect anything stupid that other parents expected, like for me to be all in love with and enslaved to going to school, earning stupid-ass best-attendance awards or even getting good grades and studying. We had plenty paper! Poppa earned it. We spent it. We had no reason to take the long bullshit route that lower-ranked, less-prepared families and people had to take. We weren’t mad or mean to any of those people. Many of them were our friends, neighbors, family, and workers. Besides, like I said, they bowed down, voluntarily.

  Brooklyn Momma would smoke a blunt, and might sneak some lines of cocaine while running with her sisters. She would throw back a glass or two of champagne at our huge events, parties and celebrations. Still she could be overheard reminding all in our close family circle, “Crack makes us rich. Crack makes them crackheads!” Then she would laugh her laugh that would trigger anybody listening to laugh along wit
h her. “Seriously though,” she would say while they were still laughing and she had switched her mood. “Crack is wack, don’t let it bring you down!” Momma used to tell me when choosing my friends, not to choose the children of the “customers,” because customers are crackheads who can never ever be trusted. Besides, they are beneath us and they don’t get the privilege to come into our family circle, apartments, or our luxurious world.

  Crackhead Momma erased Brooklyn Momma, the phenom, who I thought would shine and live forever. Crackhead Momma caused Brooklyn Momma to drop down through all of the ranks that she set up. Crackhead Momma unlocked the doors and let in all that was beneath us. The crackhead was doing every single thing that Brooklyn Momma taught and showed me a real bitch should and would never do. Momma fucked up her currency. Her currency was her look. If she was my mirror, and she was, and smoking crack fucked up her look, which it did, what was that supposed to do for me, to me?

  Seventeen and a stunner, surrounded by my Brooklyn friends I had, since day one. Friends who competed with one another to be the closest to me, friends who looked up to Momma and who wished she was their momma. Friends who either never met their fathers, hated their fathers or ain’t seen that nigga in a decade, admired, sweated, and studied Momma because Poppa wifed her, gave her everything and stayed. Crackhead Momma gave these same friends of mine, who quietly worshipped me and eagerly bowed down, the advantage and the opportunity to talk behind my back. Laugh right up in my face. Step right up to my rank and act like we was all, all of a sudden equal.

  In the Santiaga family, Santiaga and me stayed true to the game. Even my sisters Porsche, Lexy, and Mercedes all rebounded, landed on their feet, and kept it royal. I never ever said it out loud, but that’s why I pushed Momma way to the back of my mind, and deleted her from my talk, mention, and memory. And even if there is a Jannah or whatever, and Momma is there in Heaven, if she don’t look and feel and talk and act familiar like Brooklyn Momma, I don’t need or want to see her. To see her would be to kill my own self. And I never ever been a suicidal bitch. Crackhead Momma was and is an unacceptable complete fucking embarrassment to me.