When Shit Got Hard, I Stayed I Didn't Run!: Straight out of Brownsville, Brooklyn

By Joyce Bermudez

This powerful memoir will take you on an unforgettable journey to see through the author's eyes and experience life in a place called Brownsville, Brooklyn. This is a place referred to as the "jungle" because it's all about survival. It's a place where it's not normal for a young man to reach 25, and if he does, it's celebrated. Readers will feel the pain and understand what it takes to survive. The era was the 1990s, also known as the crack era. This book captures the full scope of human emotion – excitement, love, anger, sadness, happiness, and pain. Readers will feel as if they are right there, living it. There are lessons to be learned in this book. God uses us all as examples and the author's story is a powerful testimony.

No one chooses the life they are dealt. Everything in life comes down to how we respond to the circumstances we face. For the author, life involved frequent shootings and violence, as if she were living through a war. Life was filled with hardships and suffering. But she would see her life in dreams, and her soul knew that the dreams were God's way of communicating with her – bracing her, comforting her, and preparing her. Throughout this book, you will read about a young girl who begins to pay more attention to her dreams as they play out in real life. As you read and embark on this journey with the author, you'll see failure but also perseverance. You will see how God carried her through all the pain and hardships and led her with strength. You will see how God took a bunch of nobodies and turned them into somebodies in this world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 9, 2021
• ISBN: 9781098392697

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Copyright 2021

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.

ISBN: 978-1-09839-268-0 (print)

ISBN: 978-1-09839-269-7 (eBook)

Contents

New Years Eve, 1991

The Next Morning

The Phone Call

6 Months Later

The Month, Day, and Year Was;

Life Goes On!

Talking to a Older Guy.

Three Months Later

I Didn’t See Rico Anymore.

Life Lesson

Back to the Beginning of the Story

More Drama

Meeting Up at the Party to Fight.

I Thought I Knew What Love Was!

Magic Happens!

The Morning After

Questioning Myself.

Real Love!

The Pajama Party, Part I

The Pajama Party, Part II

Waking Up in the Middle of the Night

Taking Things a Step Further.

Telling My Secret for the 1st Time Ever!

The First Time I Saw the Other Side

Clubbing in a Club Called; The Past

April’s Birthday

Friendship Gone Bad.

Things Slowly Changing

A Week and a ½ Later.

The Healing Process Has Begun

More Drama

The Move to the Other, Side.

The Next Night

I had many questions for God. Asking Why? Why me? Then I asked myself, why not me? Am I more special than all his other children when he loves us all the same? Then I realized that if I didn’t go through what I went through I wouldn’t have this story to tell.

Instead of crying about my bad experiences, I decided to take my bad experience and make them work for me. By sharing my stories, I hope to help a lot of young men and young women from making the same mistakes we made. Thank-you God for waking me up in the mornings and giving me the will, and strength to write this book.

I would love to thank all of my HATERS for making this book possible. I want you to know I took all that hate you have for me and turned that energy into strength, thank-you from the heart, for the push. I couldn’t do this without all of you. I want to thank the people that didn’t think this book was going to happen, thank-you for the push.

I want to thank my parents for believing in me when I didn’t even believe in myself, thank-you.

Thank-you for being there! I would like to thank my three children, you guys made me want to write my story so you wouldn’t repeat our mistakes. And last but not least, my 3 brothers, thank-you for standing by my side and supporting me every step of the way, I couldn’t do this without you, thank-you.

Everybody has a story, here’s mine.

Chapter 1

New Years Eve, 1991

It was New Years Eve; we were trying to find something to get into. My friends and I were trying to figure out what party we are going to go to. We heard about a basement party someone I didn’t know was throwing on Hopkinson Street, (which is now known as Thomas Boyland) and that’s where we would be tonight.

I’m trying to figure out what I am going to wear. My baby daddy would be the one who was going to be with my daughter while I go to this New Year’s party. Rather, my baby’s sperm donor. That was the least he could do. This would be about the 4th time he saw his daughter and she was seven months. And he never even bought a bag of pampers or a can of milk.

My friends Dina, Keisha, and Tamara came to pick me up a little after 12am. After all the shooting stopped on the block and everybody was screaming, Happy New Year. See where I come from it was sort of traditional for the thugs. Gangsters, men or just anyone who owned a gun for that matter to just stand out there and just start shooting in the air once the clock hit 12am. So once the shooting stopped and the streets felt a little safe, they came and got me.

We were going to a party, not knowing this party would change my life forever, not knowing after this night everything will change. As we approach the party, we can see from a distance that the party is really crowed and there were so many people inside already and a lot more outside the door where we were trying to get in. As I stood behind the crowd, I spotted a young man, seemed like he had a lot on his mind. He held a gun, matter fact two guns, one in each hand. He threatened to shoot the party if the person at the door didn’t let him in. He kept saying over and over, if you don’t let me in the party is over!

This was our chance to just turn around and run, get away. There is this psycho nigga waving his guns, threaten to shoot the party. But I didn’t run, instead I stayed, I stayed in amaze, in shock. Just starring, looking at him wondering what exactly was going through his mind at the time, and in some strange but odd way I was actually falling in love with this guy. I don’t know why. I never saw him before and obviously he had some sort of problem.

But instead of feeling scared of him I felt sorry for him. I felt like he lacked love somewhere in his life. Somewhere down the road he needed love that was not given to him. All these things were running through my mind. I was in another world, my world. Oh, and did I leave out the fact that he also looked so good.

He stood there with his Carmel complexion; he wore a velour Fila suit, red, white and blue, with the hat to match, and a green Shearling, the long one that went to the ankle. I just looked at him and thought he was so cute but looked so confused. I wondered what he been experiencing, what did he go through to bring him to this point where he felt he had to have these two guns on him. I just wondered.

They eventually let the psycho nigga in the party, so the party was able to go on in peace. We eventually got in as well because it was so crowed. I just kept my eye on him the man in the green Shearling, not just because I thought he was cute, but because I wanted to know what direction to run in case he started shooting.

Now ask me; why would even I want to be in a party like that, with thugs in it. Danger anything could happen, but I can’t answer that at all. All I can say is to be young and stupid. Because at no time, did I tell myself I should leave. I didn’t feel as if I was in danger. I didn’t feel scared. And apparently neither did my friends because no one made the suggestion to leave. So, we stayed. Besides it was just about two or three blocks from where we all lived.

Come to find out it was actually someone’s house party it was not a basement party. It was a small apartment too. Real crowed you could barely walk. You couldn’t really dance, all you could do is just listen to the music and stand there, nod your head to the music and just stare at each other. But not too hard, staring in the hood could cause a whole lot of problems.

People moving around everybody is drunk, it’s just a wild night. When my friends and I felt like we had enough, we left. It was about 3:30 4am when we left. The party was still jumping but we decided we had enough, and we should leave while there were no fights going on and no one was outside shooting. Because house parties normally ended up in a shoot out. Someone getting shot, shot at, or just shooting in the air to let their enemies or any other person they may have some sort of beef with, know that they have a gun.

So, we all left safely that night. As we walked home, I asked my friend Dina who was the guy with the two guns in his hands. See I had to describe him as the guy with the two guns because if I said, the guy with the green Shearling I know she wouldn’t remember that. But a man holding, not one but two gun that just stands out in anyone’s minds.

So that was the description I used to describe him when I was trying to inquire. Because remember, I was literally falling in love, but I didn’t tell them that. I had to keep those feeling to myself. They would have thought I was CRAZY. So, I asked as if I wanted to know who that crazy person was. Not as if I was interested.

And that’s when Dina was like that is Divine. You don’t know who Divine is? And I told her, No, am I supposed to know who he is? She said, Everybody knows Divine. He is the one that shot Maliek. Mind you Maliek unvirginzied one of my best friends, Keisha. She was deeply in love with him, he was her first. Now the story begins to get complicated.

I am 17 my daughter is only about 6/ 7 months old. I am fresh out of the house. I don’t know who anybody is. The only reason why I got to start coming out the house and go to parties now, is because I recently had a baby. So, my parents knew there was nothing I could do that I didn’t already do. Far as have sex and get pregnant.

That is a parent’s worst nightmare for their teenage daughter. Unfortunately, I already lived that nightmare. So they stop being on my back as much and as hard as they once were. But I was just coming out the house I didn’t know who the known thugs on the street, as well as my friends did. I was limited to my block.

I could never leave off the block so if they didn’t live on the same street as me I didn’t know who they were. And that was the case with Divine; he wasn’t from Marcus Garvey Village. He was from Brownsville the same hood but not the same housing complex. So that would explain why my friends knew him rather knew of him and not me. They went around to different housing projects. Some of them had families that lived there, so they were able to go back and forth.

The run down they gave me of him was ugly but not enough to stop me from falling in love with someone I didn’t even know for some reason. The more she told me the more I wanted to find out about him and get to know him on a personal level. Because I felt like there is always two sides to a story, and I just didn’t know his. Everything I was hearing was hearsay because no one knew him personally they just knew of him, what they heard. Hear say didn’t hold any weight with me. They couldn’t tell me they knew him personally, none of them. But yet you are describing him like you know him.

I got all the information I needed about him from them, for now. We all went home and promise to continue partying the following day. We had children but none of us work, we all were still in high school. We were all young mothers except for Tamara, and we all stayed in school. There were rumors that Tamara was pregnant and had an abortion around the time that we had our children. But I wasn’t hanging out with her then, so I don’t know that for a fact. And I never asked her because it was none of my business. It was for her to tell me, if she wanted me to know.

Chapter 2

The Next Morning

The next morning, I got up and I fed my daughter gave her a bath. And got her ready for the day. Played with her, just wore her out. I played with her in the day so that she could go to sleep at a reasonable hour, and I could go to my house party as I normally did. It was really hard being a teenage parent. You have to be a mature adult in the day and be there for your baby. Then at night when your baby is sleep you can let the animal come out of you. If you have a responsible babysitter that is.

As long as I put the baby to bed at a reasonable hour it was ok with my parents for me to go out with my friends. I stayed in school and was not just being lazy; I took care of my baby. They respect the fact that I didn’t give up even after having my baby. I stayed in school and kept going. I didn’t use my baby as an excuse to do absolutely nothing. So, they helped me in every way that they could.

This party was just a few doors down from where I lived. Two doors to my right when I stepped out of my apartment to be exact. The girl China was having the party. China is this young girl in the muse that also grew up very fast. She had her first pregnancy at the age of 13 but had her first baby at 15. She’s a very pretty girl but fell into statistics, somewhat like, myself. Teenage parent, living in the hood, and wind up getting public assistance (Welfare) to help support your child. Well, this was her.

She was having this house party that the hood was talking about. She was only about 15 at the time, why was she having this party? And adults would be there! I couldn’t tell you why. You would have to ask her parent. Her father died of a heart attack when she was a little girl. Her mother has been left to raise her and her little sister alone.

I can’t say why her mother allowed her to have this party. My mother would NEVER allow me to have parties at 15 and have adults in my party. That would just be down- right crazy! But I guess that goes to show a little of what her mother may have been like. And the upbringing she had. The things she showed and taught her.

Silk suits were out, the year was 1992, and the month was January. Around 1am I went upstairs to the party. It was crowded with everyone from the neighborhood. So, everyone that was there, I knew. I met up with my friends, Dina, Tamara and Keisha in the party. As I walk through the party to see who was there, I spotted a guy in a white Fila suit. And he had the hat to match.

My heart began to beat so fast, then faster, and faster. I never expected him to be at this PARTY! I am excited, I am happy and, I am feeling all kinds of emotions. I wanted to say something to him before at the New Years Eve party last night but couldn’t find the right time in that crowed house party, or the right words to say. What do I say? He doesn’t know me. How do I even start the conversation?

I knew this was my chance my only chance to make my move, to strike a conversation. I never felt like this before. This was crazy. This feeling was so different. I thought I knew what love was, but I couldn’t explain these weird feelings I was feeling. I didn’t understand them. I just knew this was the night I had to say something to him. I had to get him to see that I at least exist.

It hit me, we are at a party, and I love to dance, especially winding to Reggae music. I said to myself, I would love to just wind my body all on his (with my cloths on of course). I just couldn’t find the words to ask him to dance with me. I couldn’t find the words to say hi, to say anything for that matter. I grabbed Dina’s arm as she walked past me and I ask her to, please ask him to dance with me.

So, my home-girl went to ask the brother could I have this dance with him. He looked at me than looked at her and smiled. When he smiled, I melted that smiled just lit my life up. He told her he didn’t know how to dance and started laughing. He was acting shock as if no one was never bold enough to step to his crazy ass, or just crazy enough to ask for a dance.

He noticed how shy I was, and I think he thought it was cute. He quickly agreed to dance with me it didn’t take him long to get on the dance floor. Since dancing was one of my first love. It’s something I did on a daily basis. I would just make up dances; it was something I did for fun. Music just feeds my soul in a way that I just cannot explain.

I knew I couldn’t miss a beat I had to wind like I never wind before. And I did, I enjoyed myself, I went somewhere else. I was in another world for a moment. I didn’t want the song to end. I felt like a new -born baby with its mother. And he smelled so good. He looked so good I could just scream. I felt like one, I felt like this is where I belong. Then the song ended. The dance was over! I felt like damn. At least I had that one dance.

But to my surprise he wanted to step out on the balcony and talked! I was so happy! I couldn’t believe he wants to talk to me! He cares! I wanted to just jump up and down up and down. But I had to brace myself. I had to pull myself together. Act mature or he really just going to think I’m a kid. So, I tried not to show how excited I really was, just so that I may have this moment with him.

He said, What’s your name? I answered, Joyce. I asked him what, was his name and he said, Divine, you don’t know who I am? I remember getting more excited like, oh shit I got me a rapper Is he a rapper? So I asked him I asked, Are you a rapper or something? So naïve to the streets, so stupid. He started laughing at me, he acknowledged my innocence. He thought it was cute. He realized I wasn’t a street girl. Someone who ran the streets, because if I was, I would have known who he was, or at least I would have heard about him. He was supposed to be one of those guys; they say were terrorizing the neighborhood. He said to me, no, I am not a rapper (laughing). With the cutest smile ever.

I didn’t waste any time I had to know, I asked him. Do you have a girlfriend? He said, Actually I am married. My heart just dropped, like he just stabbed me in the heart, like we already had a relationship and he cheated on me. The kid came out of me, my face got sad. And remember I didn’t know him I just felt this connection to him that I just couldn’t explain.

I NEVER even KISSED him before, I just felt the connection. He notices the sad look on my face. I didn’t want to push things any further, besides I am not that type of person. I just looked at him and said, She is a very lucky person. And turned my head to look the opposite direction so that he couldn’t see the sadness in my eyes.

He had to be feeling the same thing I was feeling, or I just hoped he was feeling what I was feeling, or he was just being a man who was being sensitive to my feelings. But he immediately told me that, we could still be friends. And I found that so strange because I said to myself, he doesn’t even know me, but he is willing to be my friend even though he has a wife. I felt like he strangely was feeling what I was feeling. But at no point, and never did I feel like I would come in between, nor was I going to try and come in between his or anyone else relationship.

One thing I am not is a home wrecker. I don’t brake happy homes, I don’t’ brake homes period. That’s not me; it’s just not what I do. So, the dream of ever having him went down the drain that night. I tried to continue to enjoy the party and try to act as if he didn’t even exist but that was really hard. And it wasn’t like he was dancing with other people. I was the only one he danced with that night.

He wasn’t talking to any other female, but I couldn’t take the news he just gave me. Please don’t ask why, when I didn’t even know him, and I did not have no type of relationship with him. I just couldn’t deal with the fact I was falling for this thug who just told me he was married, so I just left the party. It made me feel better to just leave then to stay and watch him.

Chapter 3

The Phone Call

When I went inside the house my mother, was walking back and forth looking very nervous. I could see it all in her face. I ask her right away, what was wrong. She told me she just received a phone call with some horrible news. A person called threatening to kill my older brother, the brother that is right above me. He is 2 years older than me. They had the nerve to give the message to my mother! She was so scared and freighting but who wouldn’t be?

Someone called her in the middle of the night to tell her that, she would be losing one of her sons soon. And he hadn’t come in yet, so I turned right back around to find him and make sure he was alright. And as I started to go in front of the muse he was standing right there talking to a few people. It looked as if he was about to come inside, so I stood on the side of the small circle of people waiting for him to finish talking.

Guess who was right in that very same circle! DIVINE the one I was falling rapidly in love with. I just can’t escape him, could I? Was this Faith or was it a coincidence that he was appearing everywhere I was? I pulled Franky to the side to let him know someone was terrifying our mother with death threats. He knew who it may be. Apparently, he owed someone money. Franky got mix up with the wrong crowd somewhere down the line and got into drugs.

Things were always missing from the house, mainly money and jewelry sometimes even coats. We knew it was Franky, but we could never catch him stealing. Nor could we prove it was him. But we knew it was him. After I finish talking to Franky, I was ready to go back inside, so I was saying my good nights. He asked me, could I come with you? I almost died! I couldn’t believe what I was hearing! Of course, of course you could come with me! And do what I don’t know; its wee hours of the morning, so I really don’t know.

I knew that I was feeling him but not enough to slut myself out. I wanted and needed his respect. Which means I had to respect myself. Which means if I wanted him, and I did from the very first time that I saw him. I wanted him, but I knew I had to brace myself. I knew I had to control myself, if I wanted his respect in the morning.

So, we went into my parent’s apartment, I walked in first and he followed. When you walk into the apartment. you’re in the dining room. Once you past the dining set and the stairs, which leads downstairs to all 5 of the bedrooms. Past the stairs is the living room, which has a door and staircase that leads to the backyard. My mother decorated the apartment really nice. She had wood panel throughout the entire house, my mother had chandler over her dining table, and she had carpet in the living room, with expensive furniture.

He seemed amazed when he walked into the apt. He was looking around at our furniture. Then he said, You have a nice apartment. I said, Thank-you. We went inside the living room; there was a love seat soon as you walk right in the door. Directly in front of it was the sofa, a little further from the sofa was the entertainment center, there was the wall unit with the TV, VCR, besides the love seat were fish tanks.

We sat in the love seat, right next to the living room door. It was so quiet, so peaceful; everyone that was in the house was sleep. Directly in front of the love seat was my daughter’s Mickey Mouse playpen. The play pen was in the middle of the love seat and the sofa. She was not in it. She was downstairs in my parent’s room sleeping.

Before he sat down, he took his coat off, I was admiring his Fila suit, and how well he dressed. And how well he matched his cloths. How neat he was. I was just impressed that a guy would take that much time to make his self look good. After he took his coat off, he pulled these two guns out of his waste. I was so scared, but tried so hard not to show it, I was like, Oh my GOD, he is going to kill me and my entire family. Who did I just let into my house? I let this stranger into my parent’s house. As I was finishing my thought and taking some breaths, because living in the hood you know, you learn that you are NEVER to show fear, even if you are scared.

I tried to remain as calm as I could, wondering to myself why does this individual, has not one, but two guns on him. He took the guns from his waist and as