A Struggle Within: Part One

By Jena Williams

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From a broken home, crippled by abuse and addiction Montana Wilese was forced to grow up rapidly. Often left alone to make decisions, she had to be savvy enough to navigate her way through the roughest streets of Philadelphia. She learned quickly how to hold her own, as she made a name for herself. Montana wanted so desperately to be adored by her mother and loved by her father, but lacking both she turned to outsiders for guidance. Being plagued with confusion, frustration, despair and anger at such an early age, she vowed that she would make it out.
However the more she was pulled in one direction the firm grip of her environment pulled her in another. Before she knew it she had become a mastermind and in love with the life of crime, when she had promised herself to be better than her family and neighborhood. The once sweet beautiful young child was now a stranger and what lived in her was a cold calculating soul. The rage and venom was built up and so deep that there was a daily battle going on inside her mind. Montana was not poor financially, but the decisions she made would cost her gravely. Will Montana began to fully accept who she was becoming? Being taken in by some of the most ruthless murderers and drug lords, has Montana found her home? Is it in her blood? She looked in the mirror and saw the darkness of her eyes, knowing there was no turning back.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 24, 2020
• ISBN: 9781098331726

Jena Williams

Thomas Williams is a former private security contractor and consultant. He was born in Denver, and now resides in Boulder, Colorado with his wife and daughter. He began fishing with his father, and has since traveled all over the western US and Canada in search of the perfect waters. Fishing has always been an unescapable outlet for me and I have traveled throughout the United States and Southeastern British Colombia in search of the perfect waters. When I was younger, fishing was an epic game of hide and seek. Growing up, I cherished the time I spent with my father. I learned to fish as well as how to be a man, all under the guidance of a man who never said more than a handful of words at a time. However, my daughter brought a different kind of magic to the sport that I had never experienced before. For me, fishing used to be about the take but it’s become more about the company you keep and the memories you take home with you. After working as a civilian contractor in the security industry for years, I know that the patience and persistence I developed as a fisherman has helped me find balance in my career as well. I have truly loved this life and doing what makes me happy.

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©2020 All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Print ISBN: 978-1-09833-171-9 | eBook ISBN: 978-1-09833-172-6

Chapters

Your Pain of Choice

Created out of love, lust or angel dust

How can your light be dimmed by a friend?

Time to Form but not into the Norm

What is a childhood and when does it end?

All or nothing

Does what others think of you matter more than

who you truly are?

Looking at what you do not want to see,

will set you free

Is family blood or a person who shows you love?

Tough Times can make or break you

How much is your soul worth?

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

What is new a phase in life if you have not

figured the last one?

Setting yourself up for failure or success

either way it’s a test

Part One

Chapter One

Your Pain of Choice

Jacky Patterson walking down the hallways of Bartram High School in the 70’s, with her sisters of course. There were a total of eight children, six girls and two boys in the Patterson family and all of them went to Bartram at one point or another, so they were well known. Jacky was the showstopper, she was five foot five with a light honey complexion, a body from hell and she knew it! The Patterson’s had relocated from North Philadelphia in 1970. North filthy as Gurt their mother would call it, to Southwest Philadelphia, which at the time was mainly populated by whites. To the Patterson family they had moved up in the world and began to look down on the relatives still living down North Philadelphia.

Daddy Willy was in the music business singing back up with some of the best acts in the business and was making a pretty penny, when he met Gurt. A petite, sexy, cocoa brown woman with a face that would melt the icebergs in Alaska. She already had eight children when they met, but Daddy Willy didn’t care because he was head over hills in love with her. He decided to take her away from North Philadelphia and all her children too! When the Patterson’s came to Bartram High, people could tell they were not from around the neighborhood. The girls were all different shapes, sizes and complexions, but were thick as thieves. The type of family not to be messed with. They were pretty, dressed well and had a famous stepfather. They were born and raised down North Philadelphia where none of that made one difference in the hood, but it’s where their hearts were.

Jacky was the fifth child, and she had Gurt’s attitude. She could be the sweetest person, but in a split-second rip your head off. Jacky was fine with her full hair in a flip, her tight shirts to accent her full breast and a sassy sway, the true definition of a brick house. It would always be the second youngest Terri, the baby girl Gilly and Jacky walking down the halls with their noses in the air. The Patterson girls were admired by boys but resented by the cliquish Southwest girls because they didn’t need anyone to hang with because they had each other. They didn’t have to share clothes and switch outfits with friends. None of that hating which causes separation issues which females go through. If they had a problem with one another they waited until they got home. If someone had a problem with one of them, that person got chased home with Gilly catching them, Terri looking down hawk spitting in their face and Jacky daring them to bother them again. The younger Patterson’s didn’t care what they did outside of the home because they had five older siblings who had their backs. They were wild outside but while inside the home Daddy Willy and Gurt were in charge.

It was almost like jail and the rules were strict! The children did all the house cleaning, cooking and watched over each other because if one of them got in trouble they all would get beat. They would try extra hard to ride each other’s backs to stay in line because with eight children, that chain reaction ass whipping system was no fun. The disciplining of the children did two things to them along with individual side effects: one, it made them stick together when it came to outsiders and two would eventually pull them extremely far apart with resentment. Everything seemed normal because that’s how families raised their children back then, but the beatings were scaring the young children deep in places not visible.

Gurt was trying her best but being a mother of eight at such a young age was taking its toll on her, along with being the wife of a well-known musician. Although Daddy Willy treated her like a queen, riding her around in a 1973 Cadillac, wearing fine furs and having good times, he was always traveling with different groups. Which meant that she no longer had to work in the clothing factory to survive, but now be unhappy being a lonely well to do housewife. She went from being her parent’s child, to a single parent, to her husband’s wife, to a soon to be grandmother with no time in between to do anything with her own life. The only excitement she had now were the parties they would have where she would get all dolled up like a movie star and strut around on Daddy Willy’s arms. After that, it was back to serving hot dogs, baked beans with sugar filled Kool aid. Back to making brown bag lunches and homework assignments. All she could do was deal with it because her family mattered more to her than anything else as they were all she had. For the most part she had the children under control but as with any mother with daughters, hell was going to come her way six times.

Jane, the eldest daughter was always considered the goody two shoes out of the bunch. She was only fourteen years younger than Gurt. By the time Jane was in eleventh grade she had a son, a year later she graduated, joined the Marines and left him with Gurt to raise. Gurt would always bump heads with the girls, but Jacky would try her luck constantly. By twelfth grade Jacky was dating several boys. Well what she called dating because Daddy Willy would not allow any of the girls to date.

There was one guy in particular that really took a liking to Jacky, Clifton Wilese. He would watch her in the hallways while standing with his crew. The curly tops, that was the nickname for Clifton, his brothers and cousins because they were Puerto Rican, Brazilian and Black. They were handsome brothers, the guys to have, light skinned and really thick hair. Jacky never really paid any attention to Clifton or any boy for that matter. Her motto was getting attention, she was not in the business of giving it! But Clifton had a craving for Jacky that was not going to stop until she was his. He would bump into her purposely and he even tried to get close to her brothers, but they weren’t hanging with any pretty boys.

One day he just got up the nerve to say something to her because he was tired of watching day after day and smelling her sweet perfume for an entire year. He knew it was nearing graduation, so he walked over to her in the lunchroom, what a mistake. She was sitting at the table with her sisters. As he approached, they started talking. What is the curly top coming this way for? Did somebody order a short Puerto Rican? Hey, Terri you need to find out what perm he uses because you need it bad! As soon as Jacky stopped laughing and looked up Clifton was in front of her kneeled down with a little box in his hand, the first words he ever said to her was, Will you marry me? Jacky looked at the ring, then into his eyes and at her sisters, whose mouths were on the floor then said, You don’t even know me! He replied, I know everything about you. Where you live, how old you are, your full name, your shoe size, your favorite color, what perfume you wear… Before he could go on Terri just burst out, Damn how many times does she fart and is it loud or silent? The girls started laughing. He just ignored them and said, Now is the time for you to get to know me. Jacky took a deep breath and said, Yes, but you will have to ask my father.

Now that was the only problem for Clifton because the Wilese family were dealing major angel dust and heroin. Clifton had served several parties that Daddy Willy attended so he knew Clifton’s face very well and the reputation of his family. Daddy Willy could drink you under the table, but no drugs were allowed! Jacky knew this and hoped that it would scare Clifton off but to him and the way he felt about her, it was well worth the chance. Although, he was quite sure of himself, they decided to date for a little while before making it official. He wanted to save up enough money hustling to buy them a house to then show Daddy Willy that he was legit.

Everything was going fine between them, they would meet up after school, go shopping and hang out at Clifton’s aunt Minnie’s house. Minnie was raising her children along with Clifton and his siblings because his father murdered his mother. His father went to jail for life and was killed in jail by one of his mother’s brothers that was locked up already. This all happened when Clifton was only a toddler. Aunt Minnie was the only mother he had and she accepted Jacky with open arms. He felt as though she would be safe with him over there but he didn’t really want Jacky to be seen with him in the streets because a lot of gangs didn’t like the Wilese’s. They had a name in the streets for having a lot of drug money, but being also as crooked murderers.

Clifton would pick her up in different spots all the time to keep his enemies guessing. He wouldn’t tell Jacky in detail what he did, because he lied to her stating that he was not like his family. He would share that he just wanted to get away from the streets. Clifton not only sold a lot of drugs, but he was also a hired hand for the mobs in South Philadelphia. The way the Wilese’s were raised, Clifton didn’t see anything wrong with taking a life if it meant he could make good money. He didn’t want to lose Jacky but if he would have told her everything, he would jeopardize his own life and broke street code. He was always told to be a good crime lord; you leave what goes on in streets in the streets. Then you leave it all in the streets when you go home. You show your woman what happiness is, but not how you get there. With the venom already in his blood, young Clifton lived by these rules. At the time, his family was at war with so many gangs over who would control the latest drug wave. He didn’t want it to even seem as if Jacky knew anything, for fear they would do something to her to get back at him.

As soon as he had enough money saved, he got drafted into the Marines as many young men were at the time. Jacky was devastated, but he promised her nothing would change or come between them. Not even a month later he was gone. Within a year his family spent his money leaving him barely enough to survive on whenever he returned. Jacky and Clifton were in constant contact but out of nowhere he stopped writing Jacky completely. She tried seeing other guys to keep her mind off what Clifton may be doing. She would envision that he was somewhere getting drunk and having wild sex with foreign prostitutes. Once he did return from battle, he was stationed in California and was being processed due to for a medical discharge. Clifton had become addicted to pain killers after he suffered a serious back injury. They tried to help him out so he could stay in the military; however, his addiction grew into a monster. He was ashamed of himself and coming back to Jacky meant he would have to come back to Philadelphia and he could not do it. He hooked up with a girl he had met in a bar and as long as he could supply her with painkillers, he could stay with her. Jacky tried to be patient, but she would write and get no response. She even flew out