True stood there, finishing off his blunt while Don B. returned to his post behind the board. He understood what Don B. was saying, but at the same time he didn’t. Niggaz loved their camp on the streets and they were making paper, but their paper didn’t match up to Don B.’s. He was a wise young cat, and so far everything he had told True had been right on the money. The kid knew the business. If Don B. believed that the verse could be better, then it probably could. With this thought in his mind, True grabbed the microphone and did the verse over.

Don B. smiled at the newfound vigor that True used to attack the track. The lazy, smoked-out look in True’s eyes was replaced with that fire Don B. knew still burned within the young MC. Pain and Lex even stopped what they were doing to admire their partner in the booth killing it.

Don B. kept all the members of the group on a short leash, but he was always hardest on True. The youngster reminded Don B. of himself when he was starting out. The difference was that while Don B. had to learn the game, True was born into it. In the eighties, his mother Gloria ran one of the busiest shooting galleries on Lenox Avenue. It was originally established by her brother Mack and his crew, but when he went to prison, she took over and ran it just as her brother had. With a warm smile and a cold razor game, all the hustlers respected Gloria.

In the summer of 1985, two things happened that would change Gloria’s life. The first was she had gotten knocked, thanks to a snitch who was jealous of her wealth. The DA had a shitload of charges against her and the feds were trying to add their two cents to the mix to pin a RICO charge on the young woman. The second was she found out that she was pregnant with True.

Gloria suddenly found her life very complicated, with impending parenthood and fighting a case, but she was a soldier and was determined to handle it. Feeling the heat that was closing in around her, True’s father disappeared, never to be seen again. It didn’t make much of a difference because Gloria was used to holding herself down anyway. Running back and forth to court in addition to being pregnant forced Gloria to slow down, but she refused to close up shop. She’d be damned if her baby would come into the world with nothing. She herself had had enough hungry nights for the both of them, so it was something she couldn’t see for her seed.