Gloria moved with quickness, now really fearing for her life. She scrambled to her feet and bolted out the room. She stumbled through the apartment, bumping into everything in her path.

“¡Gloria, ven par tras! (Gloria, come back here!)” her mother cried. The girl could not hear her now.

•   •   •

GLORIA RAN STRAIGHT to Green Eyes’s room. “I can’t believe ya own mother did this to you!” He cleaned up her wounds. “She loco fa real! Man, I wish I wuz there. I woulda … Dat ain’t ya fuckin’ mother if she did you like that. Dat’s a fuckin’ monster.”

“Green Eyes, don’t say those things,” she begged. “She didn’t mean to do it. I know she didn’t. She snapped. She’s still my mother,” Gloria cried.

Green Eyes’s blood was boiling. From the moment Gloria walked in the door and collapsed in his arms, he wanted to punish whoever did this to his girl. This situation called for revenge.

“Nah, Gloria,” he insisted. “I don’t care what you say, dat bitch ain’t ya mother. Not doin’ shit like dat. Fa Christ sake, ya her only child and she do you like that? Hell fuckin’ no! …”

Green Eyes jumped off the bed and stormed to his closet. Then he began to frantically search for something. Going through old sneaker boxes, he discarded each one till he finally found what he was looking for. He pulled out a black .380 semi-automatic handgun. He gripped the weapon and turned around, walking back toward his girlfriend.

“Here!” he said, as he extended the gun toward her.

Gloria froze up, as if she were hypnotized by the gun. She stared blankly at it for what seemed to be an eternity, unsure of what to say or do.

“Wha, what’s dat for?” she stuttered.

“Here!” he repeated angrily, as he stared evilly at her. “Dis for you. Go straighten out ya mother.”

“What?” Gloria asked unbelievably. “I can’t …”

Green Eyes wasn’t gonna take no for an answer. He wanted her out of his way, for once and for all. “Either you do it or I’ll do it,” he told her. “If I do it, I’ma use a knife. I’ma poke so many holes in her, she’s gonna look like Swiss cheese. I’m gonna make her suffer for all the bad things she ever had to say about me ….”

Numb, out of her mind, Gloria took the gun and marched out the door. She rather than Green Eyes. He was as crazy as her mom.