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I took a deep breath. "I need to tell you something."
She started to sit up and cut the lights on, but I stopped her.
"No, leave'em off."
"Okay...tell me what's wrong."
"When my dad died it was like he took me right along with him 6ft under. The world got so dark and left me with no signs of light. My dad had taught me everything. How to cook, how to protect, how to care and how to love. But what he never taught me was what to do if he was no longer hure. He left a lil'niggah lost. My mama started strugglin'. She was gone mentally, she didn't kno if she was comin or goin' and that left us going days without food and with the threat of not having a roof over our head. So, what was I supposed to do?"
"LaMarques..."
"I was fifteen, left with tha pressure of steppin' up and becoming a man. I felt as if I had no other choice. So yeah one thing led to another, and I started doing sexual favors with older men. I didn't think nothin' of it. I just saw tha money. Saw that I had food in our belly, clothes on our back, and a roof over our head. I saw it as a way of tryin' to ease tha financial stress my mama was goin' through. But now it's a video circling around and it's got tha streets whispering'"
"Wait, so you- "
"I should've been told you this but I'm tellin' you now cause shit about to blow up for me and I would understand if you didn't want me- "
Cliff got up and turned on the lights. She came back to tha bed and straddled me. She wiped my tears and lifted my head so that I was lookin' directly into her beautiful eyes.
"LaMarques I. Love. You. and I'm gon choose you Every. Single. Time. I'm gon choose lil'murda, big murda, LaMarques and damn sure gon choose Big Daddy Murda." I laughed a little.
"If it comes out, my career could be over, and I don't want you to be- "
She kissed me a couple of times before she started talkin' again.
"If it comes out then we gon handle it ... together. It's gon be what it's gon be. Either people gon ride with you or not. You can't let what happen in the past haunt you in the future. You a star and ain't no room for no darkness."
"I got another meetin' with tha record label and she's gonna want to kno how we wanna go about comin' out to tha world."
"Only tell her what you want her to kno. I'll be fine with whatever you want. Just kno that I love you and I'm not goin' anywhere. I'm ten toes down fah you."
"I wanna hear you say it again." She looked at me and caressed my face.
