The subway angel.

In 2018, Saturday before Christmas, I was out on a birthday bar call on the Lower East

Side.

We were all getting a bit bored with the crowd and decided to go back to one of our

friends' apartments to take a breather, listen to music, and decide what to move on to

next.

Cut to me realizing I had missed 10 calls from various members of my family.

My uncle had been rushed to the hospital and didn't make it.

My uncle was the youngest of my mom's siblings and was more like an older teenage brother

to me than an uncle.

We grew up together in a very close family.

I don't think I realized how quickly grief hits when you get news like that.

The sound of my father's voice cracking and straining to get the words he didn't make

it out of his mouth was more than I could handle.

I crumbled into a pile of tears right in the middle of the kitchen.

In a days I made my way back up to Harlem, trying to pull myself together and figure out

what to do.

I couldn't get anyone in the city on the phone, I couldn't get myself to call anyone

in my family, so I needed to suck it up and get home that night.

Mission accomplished.

I changed, bags packed with the help of my neighbor and a couple of clonopin to get me the

hell home.

...