I loved hanging out with the gangsters. I called them all my uncles, but Remmey was my favorite. I thought he was cool. He was from New Orleans and would say things like "Huh, bruh," after every sentence. He had gold teeth, too, like Slick Rick, which I also thought was cool. He was younger than the rest of the uncles, but I couldn't tell by how much. I knew he was young, though, because he always seemed more fun to me than the rest of them. Remmey thought I was fun, too...I think. He would watch me and just start grinning every time I cursed, like he thought it was funny. But he had this way of smiling at you that let you know you could easily go from amusing him to pissing him off without warning.

And you just didn't want to do that.

At all.

Remmey was Nawlins fa' real. He did stuff to people that I ain't never heard of before. You just didn't want to mess with Remmey. Not even a little bit. He was still my favorite besides Rico, though. I just wasn't about to cross him. Ever. Believe that.

I liked all of my uncles and would try to run with them as much as possible. I was just a little kid, but Uncle Rico would take me almost everywhere with them. And he would let me see all kinds of stuff.

Like when they would beat people up.

Or when they would have sex with girls.

When I turned eight, he started letting me watch. One day Remmey had this lady down in front of him on her knees and he pointed to her and said to me, "Gone getch ya' dick wet, juvie." I just looked at him. I had no idea what he meant by that, but he kept watching me, waiting for me to come over to them. When all I did was look up at Uncle Rico and shake my head no, Uncle Rico put his hand on my shoulder and all my other uncles started laughing. Remmey laughed the hardest.

Then Rico said "Come on, nephew," and steered me away from Remmey and the lady. Remmey watched us walk away, grinning the whole time, and gave Uncle Rico a look when we walked past.

"He still young, huh bruh?"

Rico just grinned wider and kept walking.

That night at dinner I asked what "get your dick wet" meant. Mama dropped her fork, Sammy spit out her food and started choking, and Charity looked over at daddy like "Yeah, what does that mean?"

Daddy just looked pissed and wouldn't let me hang out with Uncle Rico alone anymore from then on.