It was the summer of 2003 when bullets snatched all 26 years of Trav’s life. Trav was my aunt Lisa’s boyfriend, and my uncle Neil’s best friend. Trav treated me like I was one of his own, and the love was mutual.

I was 10 years old, and school had just ended for the year. I was chilling with Uncle Neil at his crib, waiting for him to get dressed, so we could go back around my way and meet up with Trav. I was awakened out of my sleep by a loud, “Nooooooo, not my nigga!,” an introduction to a phrase that inevitably became commonplace as I grew older. His shriek suppressed the lyrics of 50 Cent ’s Get Rich or Die Tryin’ that was blasting through the speakers. I woke up and saw Uncle Neil pacing back and forth throughout the living room while veins bulged out of his sweaty forehead. I was afraid to ask what was wrong. But my childlike curiosity burned. “Unc, what happened?”

A minute or two passed, and he sat on the couch beside me and cried. I didn’t know what was going on, but I felt his pain, and I started to cry, too.

“They killed Trav,” Uncle Neil said, as he struggled to get the three words out. This was also my introduction to “they.” “They” is a person or person(s) that I too would hear stories about for a lifetime.

Uncle Neil and I walked on Hillen Road and flagged down a hack, and were driven to my house, two blocks over from where Trav was murdered.

When we arrived, the entire neighborhood was in shambles. I can’t remember a soul who wasn’t crying. For the next few weeks I witnessed how Trav’s death tore Uncle Neil apart. The harsh smell of rotten teeth mixed with Steele Reserve 211 was rushing out of Uncle Neil’s mouth every time he spoke. Liquor was his fling turned wife.

This is my earliest memory of being spiritually and emotionally connected to death in Baltimore, and also my first time seeing how it affected the people around me.

However, this wasn’t my last. My aunt Lisa on the other hand, has had three of her significant others slaughtered in my city. Because her chin is always parked in the air, she doesn’t ever show the slightest glimpse of grief, but I’m sure she’s afflicted with pain.

My second encounter with death was later that same year of Trav’s farewell. This time, it wasn’t a close friend, and it wasn’t murder. It was my seven-year-old little brother Fidel and his 11-year-old brother Davon.

It was approximately 4:00 am when ambulances and fire trucks rushed the block. A firefighter pulled a limp salmon pink object from the hell-fire which ended up being Fidel. Some minutes later, they yanked out Davon.

The following day I walked to Johns Hopkins Hospital to visit Fidel. At this point, Davon had already succumbed to his injuries and died in the hospital before I had chance to see him a final time.

All of Fidel’s hair, gone. His head was swollen. Blisters the size of boiled eggs covered his baby face. Large tubes took an excursion through his throat, nose, penis, and other body parts. I shook his body with my small palms, as I whispered, “Fidel…Fidel.”

He didn’t budge so I shook him a little harder and my voice got a little louder. “FIDEL!…FIDEL!”

He didn’t respond or budge.

Later the next day, I received a call from my grandmother. She said, “Fidel died…We had to pull the plug.”

I wasn’t familiar with the word ‘suicide,’ but I knew that I didn’t want to live any longer, and I was coming up with all sorts of ways to make that happen.

After Trav, Fidel, and Davon all died a few months apart, I knew for sure that I was gonna bite the dust soon.