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My mother had an addiction to money, and she got it in all the “wrong ways.” To this day, I still don’t know what that meant, but everyone said it when speaking of her. She went to school to be a nurse of some sort and met my father while he was recovering from a car accident. Whenever he told the story of him and my mother meeting, he would smile and say, “Trisha nursed me back to health.”

  Trisha, a.k.a., my mother was gone before my first birthday, so I don’t have any fond memories to hold on to. If I knew more about her, I would tell more, but that’s all the information my daddy ever gave us about her besides she had a love for the South and lived down there for many years before she moved to California. That’s why I was named Savannah, and my older brother, Memphis. My uncle, Steve, would joke with my daddy and say things like, “Trisha had to go back South to her real life” and smart shit like that. I hated the fact that he knew more about my mother than I did.

  Memphis had made the mistake of asking my father if our mama was a prostitute before becoming a nurse, and that question got him slapped in the mouth. “Boy, don’t you ever speak poorly of your mother! She is a damn good woman. There are just some things you will never understand.” My mama must have told him that line, because he used it whenever people asked him, “What happen to Trisha?”

  He always called my mama a good woman, but what kind of good woman leaves her two small children to be raised by their daddy while she lived her dreams? It wasn’t long before I realized my mother would never come back. Whatever life she had in the South must have been better than raising her kids and being married to my daddy. I decided if I ever were to meet her, I’d kick her ass for leaving us the way she did.

  I raised myself to be a woman. I didn’t have a positive black woman in my life. My grandmother was around, but she was very sick and didn’t have the energy to help my daddy raise us.

  I didn’t get the “period talk” or the one about the “birds and the bees.” I learned how to be a woman by incidents that occurred. I started my period at twelve years old. I thought I was dying, like any other girl would if no one told her she was going to bleed for five days and live to see another five days of bleeding twenty-eight days later. Lucky for me, Uncle Steve was a ladies’ man and just so happened to have one of his boy toys at the house that gave me a pad and explained it to me. I could point fingers, but I don’t blame anyone for the way I am. Maybe I would have turned out differently if I had a strong, positive black mother in my life, but I didn’t. Why should I dwell on it?

  Since our mother was still alive, my daddy didn’t date. He never said it, but I think he was waiting on her to get herself together and come back, which never happened. In addition, there wasn’t room in that house for another adult. My daddy’s brothers, Uncle Steve and Uncle Johnny, lived with us too. Uncle Johnny was my favorite uncle when I was a child. He was a basketball coach at the park down the street, hence, my love for basketball.

  At the age of eight, he started me as his point guard on his all-boys basketball team, and I kept that position or shooting guard throughout high school. My basketball talents put me on the “Do Not Date” list by the fellas, and it kept girls from being my friends because I was too boyish. They assumed I was a lesbian, and, because we were poor and I couldn’t keep up with the latest fashions, I sometimes wore my brother’s clothes. It did look like I wanted to be a boy.

  With so many memories to block out, I remember telling my father that I would make it to the pros and we would never live poor again. He looked me dead in my eyes when he told me he couldn’t afford to send me to college, whenever that time came. How in the hell can you look in your ten-year-old daughter’s face and tell her she has no future? I didn’t let that hold me back, and I still promised to get a full scholarship and get us out of the hood.

  After hearing my dreams of being someone one day get shot down by my own father, I decided to let whatever people thought of me become my reality. I started wearing cornrows straight back, basketball shorts everywhere I went, and carrying my basketball with me like it was my lifeline. I had a goal, and I was going to reach it, even if I was the only person to believe in it. No one’s thoughts of me were going to stop me, so why should I put energy into impressing them?

  Hanging out with the boys on my team who accepted me landed me into kissing Kim on my sixteenth birthday. This made everyone’s thoughts of me being a lesbian correct. Kim was on a rival high school basketball team and was a known lesbian, she didn’t try to hide it. She had dated every lesbian or bisexual girl in her high school and in our league.

  Kim invited me skating to celebrate my birthday, and since I didn’t have any friends to celebrate it with, I took her up on the offer. At the end of the night on our ride back to my house, she pulled over and told me that we should hook up. Not wanting to seem like I wasn’t with it, I agreed by sealing the deal with a kiss. Kissing soon became fingering, and finally, full-blown sex with hours of amazing head. If there was something I didn’t know how to do sexually, Kim would teach me, and made sure I was the best at it.

  I had never given head, not even to a boy before, and had no clue what I had gotten into. She showed me how to eat her using an orange to help teach her lesson. Cutting the orange into four slices, she peeled all the skin off one slice and placed it on a plate vertically. “This is the pearl tongue,” she said, while she took the next unpeeled slice and laid it horizontally on the plate under the first slice.

  “The top half of this piece is the skin between the pearl tongue and the entrance. The peel around the orange is the lips, and the bottom half is the entrance.”

  I watched her suck and lick on the pretend pearl tongue; then she licked the skin in between the pearl tongue and entrance over and over again. She stuck her tongue in the part of the orange that acted as the entrance and placed her mouth over the whole thing.

  While kissing the orange peel, she said, “When you’re making love to a girl you really like, don’t rush it. Kiss her lips and pearl tongue first. Make her crave you.”

  I watched for two minutes or more, and then said, “I’m ready.”

  From the way Kim reacted, I knew I was a fast learner. I had her scooting away from me, saying, “You sure you ain’t done this before?” That made me want to keep going, and I did. Giving her head not only turned me on, I soon began to come from it. There is something about the taste of it that turns me on. I can’t explain it, but I now know why men can’t live without it.

  In our first year of dating, the rumors of me being a lesbian circulated around my neighborhood and got to my uncle Steve. I’ll never forget that night. It was after one of my basketball games. Uncle Johnny and I sat outside on my granny’s porch going over my stats like we always did.

  “Look, Na-Na, if you want to get picked up by a college, you have to be a team player. Get your assist up. Nobody likes a hot dog. Those rumors of there being a professional women’s league are true. I’d hate for it to pass you up because you won’t pass the damn ball.”

  Right before I could defend my not passing the ball, Uncle Steve came out of the house, walked up to me, and grabbed me by the front of my jersey. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  Not understanding what he meant, I asked, “What are you talking about now, Uncle Steve?” He was a known liar and would go to any lengths to get someone to believe him. I think Uncle Johnny thought he was up to his old tricks again too. He grabbed Steve’s hand off me, making him release my jersey.

  “So, you’re having sex with that dyke girl, Kim, you always with, huh?”

  That was the first time I realized I was lesbian. It was also the first time I saw both of my uncles disappointed in me. I didn’t answer the question. I just looked at both of them hoping they would leave it alone. My uncle Johnny told me to go in the house and shower. When I got out, everyone, including my daddy, knew about it and wanted to talk to me about it. No one in that house had ever paid any attention to me except for Uncle Johnny, yet everyone thought they could yell at me
, including Memphis.

  I felt the words come out of my mouth. “Look, I’m seventeen years old and will be eighteen in two months. If I want to be a lesbian, there isn’t anything any of you can do about it, so deal with it.”

  The words came easily, but the slap across my face from my daddy made me wish I had thought about what I said before saying it.

  “I won’t have no lesbian for a daughter, do you hear me, Savannah?” I had gone seventeen years without him hitting me, but that night, it all changed. After twenty or more hits from his belt and everyone’s show of disappointment, I promised to act like a girl, date boys, and start making friends.

  It was too late for me when it came to my brother, Memphis, however. He disowned me completely and helped everyone in my neighborhood make fun of me and put me down. He even gave Keisha all the details of what happened between me and my daddy—in exchange for sex, of course. I prayed his dick would fall off. To this day, with all the changes I’ve made, Memphis still doesn’t talk to me. I saw him when he got out of jail and at my grandmother’s funeral, but he didn’t look my way. Oh well, fuck him too.

  My next task was to break up with Kim, and surprisingly, it was easy for me to do because I found out Kevin had a crush on me. I started dating him. I wanted to have sex with Kevin, but I wanted the fairy-tale sex where he took my virginity while the sun rose and soft music played. I knew Kevin wasn’t that kind of guy, so I decided he wasn’t the one. However, I was glad he was there to help me get over Kim.

  It wasn’t the same for Kim. She always had girls flirting with her, so I thought she would bounce back from me breaking up with her quickly. It didn’t happen that way at all. She drove past my house two and three times a day, called my phone all throughout the night, and even went as far as fouling me hard during a game, for which she was given a technical foul.

  I had to lie to her to get her to leave me alone. I told her I really wanted to continue dating her, but my father had gotten involved and was monitoring everything I was doing. I asked her if we could have sex one last time and go our separate ways in a better fashion than I had done it the first time, and it worked. When that was said and done, it was time to make friends.

  I went straight to Keisha because she was the most popular girl I knew. My father had heard the rumors of her sleeping around with different guys, so she wasn’t on his list of potential lesbians. It was sad that my father would prefer I be a slut than a lesbian, but whatever made him happy and kept me from getting beat again . . .

  Keisha, Christina, and Melinda accepted me into their crew because I provided them with someone to make fun of. They treated me like shit and talked about me to my face. I didn’t let it get to me because I had received acceptance letters from eight colleges and had started counting down to the day I left.

  Keisha wanted me to become a ho like her. I remember her leaving me to walk home from the skating rink because she met some guys that wanted to have sex with us, and I refused to go. The next day, she told me that I had left her to handle both of them by herself, and that I owed her big time.

  I didn’t even complain about my walk home. I just apologized and told her I wouldn’t do it again. I knew my future didn’t include her or the “Ho Squad”—the name I called them behind their backs. I had two months to go, and when I left, I wasn’t taking any of them with me.

  I would dream of Keisha getting AIDS and begging me for help. In my dreams, I would treat her like she was invisible and keep walking. That was evil of me to be excited about something horrible happening to her, but it made it easier to be her friend the next day. I felt like she was the shot caller in the daytime, and I was the shot caller at night, even if it was in dreamland.

  If Keisha’s ass would have ever caught fire, I wouldn’t have spit on her. Instead, I’d barbeque ribs on her ass and have a cookout.

  I didn’t think Keisha could do me any worse than the way she treated me until she broke the camel’s back by sleeping with Kevin. That was the final straw.

  Everybody knew about it too and expected me to fight her over it. I wasn’t scared, but what would I look like fighting her over some dick I had already decided I didn’t want?

  Keisha even assumed I was going to beat her up. She invited me to her house and asked if we were still cool. I played the role and said, “Yes.” It took everything in me not to knock her teeth down her throat.

  Keisha messed up, though. She told me she was sorry, and, I quote, “You can fuck any of my niggas you want. That way, we can be even.” That was consent in my eyes to have sex with Tyrone, her baby’s daddy, later in life.

  She never put any restrictions on him. When she gave me permission to “fuck one of her niggas,” she was sure none of them would ever pick me over her. Look how the tables have turned.

  Being cool with Keisha is what really led me to accepting a scholarship to whatever university was furthest away from California. I vowed never to come back to this hellhole until I could sit on my high horse and look down on them like ants . . . and that is just what I have done.

  I accepted an academic scholarship to Georgia Tech, in the heart of Atlanta, and graduated with a BA in business. I later received my master’s in business with a minor in accounting at Tennessee State University.

  Say what you must about Nashville, but if it was good enough for Oprah, it was good enough for Savannah. It made me feel like I was close to my mother living in Georgia and Tennessee, her two favorite places. I loved, and still love, both cities. Guess the apple didn’t fall that far from the tree.

  I was able to become someone new. No one knew me, so I didn’t have to hide what I was doing. For eight years, I managed to be in relationships with men and women without anyone knowing.

  I had become the top accountant at Williams and Williamson Accounting Firm in Atlanta and grossed 90K a year before my personal life started to catch up with me. I had also become a high-class ho. No one knew I was hoeing but me, and I’m my own best friend. Who would I tell?

  I started sleeping with old college professors, local policemen, city councilmen, business associates, and even clients from Interstate 75 to 24 and back. I rented an apartment in Bellevue, Tennessee, right outside of Nashville, and I owned a condo in Alpharetta, Georgia, which was twenty minutes from downtown Atlanta. I never invited anyone back to my house or to live with me. Even when my grandmother passed away, instead of moving my daddy, who was the only person still living in that house, to the South, I paid the house off, renovated it, and gave it to him.

  That’s another rule: Never play where you lay. If you can’t afford a hotel, then do it in the car. Never bring a sex partner back to your comfort zone. You have to have peace and privacy in your home. If you live by that rule, you’ll never have to worry about losing a night of sleep worrying about someone popping up uninvited or driving to your house to put your tires on flat.

  Everyone you meet is not going to be the one, so stop giving access to your kingdom to a court jester. They are in your life for entertainment purposes only. Let them perform for you onstage, not where you wear your crown.

  Bringing a sexual partner back to my house was out of the question. I had never done it before and never thought I ever would. I messed up and broke my own rule when I met Dre, which led to the reason why I moved back to Cali.

  Chapter 3

  Southern Hospitality

  Just because you start making money doesn’t mean bad habits stop. They are just easier to cover up with the money that is made. I was then, and am still, addicted to the smoke, which comes from beautiful Mary Jane leaves.

  In Atlanta, it was always easy to get weed. I had a coworker who had a connect that supplied me bimonthly. We met every other Friday for lunch at Houston’s and exchanged cash for a two-ounce package in the parking lot. It wasn’t the same for me in Nashville.

  Nashville experienced a lot of droughts. That is where your supplier’s supplier has run out of product, and you’re waiting on them to get more or “r
e-up,” like they call it. I met Dre during one of these droughts.

  It was Friday, and my Nashville connect told me he was out and wouldn’t re-up until Monday. With a name like MJ, he should have been ashamed of himself for not keeping weed on deck 24-7.

  I was fed up with him and had decided that I was going to find some weed even if that meant driving the streets of Nashville. I threw on a pair of Apple Bottom jeans, a white and gold Apple Bottom blouse, and gold pumps to try to blend in with the locals.

  I jumped on Briley Parkway and got off on Dickerson Road, which was out east. One thing that I have learned while living on this earth is that the East and South sides of major cities always seem to be the hood.

  I pulled up to the gas station at the intersection where Broadmoor meets Ewing Drive to get some gas. As I was walking out the door, the aroma of marijuana hit me. It was like Grannie’s Sunday dinners the way it hit my nose. Allowing my nose to lead the way, I ended up at a Grand Prix parked on the side of the gas station next to a pay phone.

  Not wanting to walk to my car and take the chance of him driving off, I approached him. “Where can I get some of that at?”

  He looked me up and down, checking me out completely. “My boy got some across the street. What you trying to get, sexy?”

  Oh my God! He had a mouth full of gold with a dollar sign on his front tooth. I almost forgot I needed his Mississippi pimp-looking ass, but I caught myself. “How much for an ounce?”

  He grabbed his phone and talked to someone in what sounded like a foreign language, which must have been Tennessee trap or drug dealer Morse code because it sure wasn’t English.

  “Baby girl, is that your silver 300?” I nodded yes. “Go across the street and park at the nail shop next to the chicken spot and my boy is going to pull up on you.”

  That’s the part I hated about using a new drug dealer. What if he was an undercover police officer? I made myself find comfort in the dollar sign on his tooth and the fact he kept smoking his blunt in public like it was a Newport cigarette.