I’Ve Got to Make It to Heaven for Going Through Hell: Part 1

By Tony J. Ward Jr.

Antoine Warren is a New York City kid who is looking for direction in life. Growing up in a dysfunctional family and looking for acceptance, Antoine decides to venture off into the street life by joining a notorious gang. In the beginning all seems well with his new lifestyle, until it leads him into places and situations he wasnt expecting to go. Antoine encounters one life threatening/changing circumstance after another some expected and some unexpected. Feeling all alone, struggling with life, and totally lost, is there light at the end of the tunnel for Antoine? Yet somehow through it all, divine intervention intercedes and Antoine figures out that he may not have been alone all along.
Part I

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Oct 22, 2007
• ISBN: 9781467086141

Tony J. Ward Jr.

Tony J. Ward was born in March of 1981 and raised on the rough streets of the Bronx, New York. In 1999, Tony moved from New York City to Pennsylvania to attend college and graduated with a Bachelors of Science degree in Electrical Engineering in 2004. He is currently pursuing a Masters degree in Electrical Engineering and Engineering Management while employed as an Electrical Engineer for one of the largest and technologically advanced defense contractors in the nation. Tony currently resides in the suburbs of eastern Pennsylvania with his college sweetheart Nicole whom he married in 2006. Tony and Nicole are proud parents of their son Tony Ryan and are currently expecting their second child this year. Tony has always had a passion and gift to write. He is now focused on using that gift to benefit and bless others as well as his own family. For more information please visit www.tonyjward.com

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2007 Tony J. Ward Jr. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse   10/22/2015

ISBN: 978-1-4343-0824-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4670-8614-1 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Dedication

Acknowledgement

Chapter 1 The Bait

Chapter 2 The Catch

Chapter 3 Reeling in the Catch

Chapter 4 The Beginning

Chapter 5 Half & Half

Chapter 6 The Jump-Off

Chapter 7 Making It Hot In the Summer

DEDICATION

This book is first of all dedicated to God, my Heavenly Father and my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Without You this book wouldn’t be possible. This book is next dedicated to my son Tony R. Ward. I hope and pray that our sacrifices will inspire you son, and your children and future Ward generations. I also hope that the life story of Antoine Warren will be both beneficial and influential to the reader that there is hope, there is another way.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I want to thank my wife and life partner Nicole G. Ward. I appreciate you more and more everyday. Thank you for being patient with me through the years; particularly through my years of maturation. I haven’t arrived yet but I needed and still need your love and stability more than you know it. I love you baby.

I want to also thank my Pastors – Terry M. and Pamela Davis. Thank you for taking me in; then taking my family in. Thank you for showing us what God really looks like – Love, Grace, and Forgiveness, and re-introducing me to Jesus Christ.

PART

ONE

THE CHARACTERS, GANG NAMES, AND PLACES IN THIS BOOK ARE STRICTLY FICTIONAL. ANY SIMILARITIES TO REAL LIFE ARE COINCIDENTAL.

CHAPTER 1

THE BAIT

T HREE YEARS OF high school were getting ready to pass by. I was at the point in life where I needed a change. Life just seemed so pointless, I felt as if something was missing. I was in my last period before school let out and was going to meet up with my two homies, Malcolm and Dre, and some girls. Dre had just transferred to Wilson from some school in downtown Manhattan. Wilson was located uptown in Harlem, NY. My boy Malcolm and I had met freshman year. We were in the same football league. There was one game where our teams were playing each other. Of course my team won. His team didn’t have anything for mine at the time. I had about 5 or 6 tackles or so. But this story isn’t about football. It’s about how I ended up going through some unfortunate situations and made some questionable decisions.

My mother had just had my little brother Isaac. That was my boy, even though he was my little brother. However, if you asked my moms she would tell you we didn’t like him. My brother Tyriq and I resented the way my mother was treating us, now that there was another sibling in the house. Tyriq was 15, and growing fast. In fact, he was almost as tall as I was. As far as my pops, who knew where he was? Last time I had spoken to him he had a daughter by some chick. He told us he had a whole other family. That really messed me up. I didn’t understand how he could take care of them and not us. Didn’t really care; he was never there anyway, and when he was, he didn’t teach me anything productive but how to hustle and make it on the streets. What I needed was someone who could warn me of how rampant drugs were around me before they entered my life.

As far as the rest of my fam, I had a lot of aunts. Brenda and Melinda, who were both in the army and based in other states right now, were the two youngest girls; then came Lesha who I considered to be my second mother. As a matter of fact, when I was younger, I used to live with her. So when it was really time for me to go home, I would tell my real mother that I wanted my mother and scream and cry like crazy. Then there was my aunt Sophia, who liked to really stay to herself. My mother was the oldest of the bunch, which was real crazy ’cause she looked like the youngest.

I had one uncle on my mother’s side. His name was Marlon. We didn’t speak that much but when we did we spoke for a few hours. It was like we picked up where we left off of the previous conversation. Marlon had lived on the west coast for some time now. In fact he ventured out over there when he was like 19 or 20. Right now he’s doing his thing. The last time I had spoken to him he was in a process of purchasing this big house somewhere out there. I kind of looked up to him in a way. I guess you can say my uncle Marlon was the only one I kind of looked up to.

I was only 17 and already getting tired of life. I had just smoked for the first time that summer, and I started doing that and drinking regularly. I mean it came to a point where I wouldn’t even go to school some days — just to go to my boy Dre’s crib to smoke. Malcolm would come too, but he didn’t smoke; at least not yet. I felt I couldn’t function unless I was high or tipsy. And to top it all, I would call my girl Alexis over while my mother wasn’t home - knowing very well that she didn’t want us to have any company while she wasn’t in the house. And especially when she was at work. So what? Who cares? I thought. She doesn’t know and I wasn’t going to tell her. And if she asked then I would’ve just denied it. No harm done. She was too busy caring about little Isaac to notice anything anyway. That’s sick isn’t it? My mind was twisted and I knew it. I couldn’t help it though. I just didn’t care. All I had was my dudes and some girls, but I never trusted them. They were all scandalous.

Finally the bell rang. Man I hated math class last period. I never paid attention. I was thinking that I might not even go tomorrow or better yet, for the rest of the week. I couldn’t stand the teacher, always breathing down my back with his hot breath. Plus that dude called my crib on Monday and left a message on the machine saying how I wasn’t in school. Now it’s time to find these two dudes and bounce and smoke. Speaking of boys, here they come. Whenever I went to math they would meet me outside of my class and we would bounce from there.

Yo, Preme, what’s good my dude? Dre said. Preme was my nickname. I never liked to use my real name, but it’s Toine, short for Antoine. Antoine Warren. I was also called Playboy on the block. I got that name from the ladies ‘cause besides chillin’ with my dudes, all I did was chill with girls, and every once in a while chase after one of them. I say every once in a while because most of the time there was no chasing involved. They just came around and I would scoop them up. However, this girl named Alexis was my main girl; she came before any of them.

Ayo, what’s good my dude, I yelled out.

Yo what’s good Preme, what you bout to get into? Dre asked.

Yo I don’t know, let’s spark up. How much you got?

I got two.

Aight, that’s all we need. Go get that, I’ma meet you at the hill, I said.

Aight then.

The hill was a steep hill right down from my school. It had a bunch of steps you could walk up and down, but we all walked straight down the grass area of it. While Dre went to cop the smoke Malcolm and I started down the hill. This wasn’t the way we went home everyday but this is where we smoked. We would go to this broken down building on the second floor.

Oh there go my cousin Liz, I yelled out.

Liz was my cousin from Southwick. I didn’t even know we were cousins till my moms told me. She and my uncle used to drop me off at school everyday, along with Alexis in the morning. We all lived in the same projects in the eastern section of the Bronx. We called the projects the PJ’s. We only had like 12 buildings, so it was one of the smaller pj’s in the Bronx. My pj’s were broken up into two sides. One side was the Road which is what we called it. I lived on the Road side and so did Alexis. The other side was the Lot. I know it sounds like crazy names, but only the people who lived there