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Another day, another puff of this cig — little swirls of smoke gliding between my fingers.
Here in South Central I sit, on the curb, seeing.
Today’s story is that of a young man, twenty-two years of age, soon to be twenty-three —
a young man caught between two worlds.
We’ll call him V — a tall kid, six-foot-two, hair combed to the side.
He was born in December of 2002.
Usually, a birth is a day of celebration — but on this day, many didn’t celebrate.
His first moments of seeing this world.
“Oh, why am I here?”
Well, his father and mother did — but still.
His father stood beside V’s mother in those first hours.
Yes, they were happy — but there’s always a but.
V was born out of wedlock.
His father had been unfaithful with his own employee —
the woman who worked behind the counter of his mini-market.
Father Mexican. Mother Salvadoran.
V — American by birth.
His father’s family would find out the truth in a way no one expected: through a tape recorder hidden in his van.
His wife had a feeling — that instinct women get when something’s off.
So she decided to investigate.
One night, while everyone slept, she snuck outside to retrieve the recorder she’d planted.
She pressed play.
“I’m pregnant.”
“What do you mean? I can’t—”
That’s all it took.
The wife froze. Shivers down her spine.
Distraught. Heartbroken. Angry.
In that moment, she knew — her life, and her family’s, would never be the same.
She confronted her husband, to which he responded, “Don’t tell the kids.”
She screamed, “You have to go!”
He said, “No.” Because this is my home too.
Oh, legalities.
Oh, don’t you hate when they get in the way?
Poor, poor wife — she didn’t trust her voice enough to carry its weight and throw him to the streets.
During V’s first few years, the wife — the man’s real wife — would sometimes take care of him, saying he was a friend’s child she was helping with.
Why would a wife take care of her husband’s mistress’s son?
Well, the story deepens, I guess.
When V was three, he and his mother were living in an apartment in East L.A.
One night, there was a loud knock on the door.
His mother opened it — and there stood her own mother, with immigration officers behind her.
V’s grandmother didn’t approve of her daughter’s relationship with a married man,
nor of having a child out of wedlock.
She’d taken it upon herself to call immigration to have her daughter deported back to El Salvador.
She also hoped to get a financial reward for turning her in.
As they took her daughter away, the grandmother kept asking about the reward.
She was told, “You’ll get nothing.”
And the boy? He cried.
The grandmother looked at him and said,
“I don’t care.”
From that day, his father took care of him while trying to keep his mother from being sent back to El Salvador.
But the father had his moments of rage.
V — just a boy wanting to play. Any mistake — leaving his bike in the driveway,
taking too long in the restroom of the mini-market, asking too many questions —
would set him off.
His father would beat him.
One day, the boy didn’t want to go with his father to see his mother at immigration.
The man grabbed him and took him to the restroom for what was about to be another beating.
His father’s real wife followed them, and as he was about to strike, she stepped in —
took the brunt of it.
She said, “Enough. He’s just a boy.”
So what became of V?
His mother was deported. Yes — V was sent to her.
They ended up in Tijuana for a couple of years.
Every weekend, the father would cross with money — always drunk.
Always the same pattern.
Eventually they moved to a small town in Mexico.
There, young V finished high school.
Made friends — and those friends would play a huge part in his life.
His mother’s family cut ties with them, and so did his father’s.
His father’s mother wouldn’t even recognize him —
to her, he was a bastard, not of true lineage.
But young V built a circle of friends so strong
that one day, he was surprised with his birthday being celebrated in a ballroom —
the kind of party that didn’t prove you belong,
it showed you always did.
Time to put this cig down. Let it cease to be.
Life is a trip.
MAMA.
🥷 You don’t have to believe. You can ignore it. But if you knew… would you believe it happens?
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