But oh, how she cried.

They said he wasn’t worth a thing. A thirty year-old drug addict and dealer living five houses down, he only left home at night to do his dirty business and to play his dirty games. During the day he had little touch with the outside world; so little that, after hearing of his death, his own nephew went to school and played the afternoon as if nothing had happened. No, no one was surprised it happened.

But oh, how she cried.

They said he smoked pot, inhaled cocaine, and even burnt crack. After a while, his drug addiction took the best years of his life and all of his money, leading him to petty thievery of cell phones, fancy shoes, and of more serious breaking into homes for blenders, televisions, and jewelry. I heard it said that he once even stole a camera from a pastor to pay for his ravenous addictions. Stealing from a pastor? No, he definitely wasn’t worth a thing.

But oh, how she cried.

They said he left behind a ten-year old son, although no one knew about the boy or his mother. His own sister said she had no idea where the pair lived, but she did know for sure that her family hadn’t contacted either of them about his death. Not that they would have cared about it anyways; after all, the two never received a penny of support from his deadbeat days. Now that he’s gone, nothing will really change for them.

But oh, how she cried.

They said he was murdered in a nearby city around three a.m in the morning: shot five times, three in the head and two in the chest. It was a quick, easy, and efficient job right next to a popular soccer field, in a narrow passageway where there wasn’t much room to argue. People whispered that it was done to finish off a business transaction turned bad, a sort of life payment in the place of some missing cash. They put a doily over his forehead to cover the wound and cotton balls in his nose so the fluids wouldn’t leak out. It was all a very practical matter.

But oh, how she cried.

They said he went to the morgue early in the morning and finally came home in a hearse at three o’clock in the afternoon. His messed-up friends came by to visit him later on in the evening for one last time, not even knowing if this house was the right one. He’s the brown one, they said. Is that his funeral there? Yeah, I’m pretty certain that’s him inside.

But oh, how she cried.

They said that when she heard the news she went crazy, startling the neighborhood out of its siesta with her screaming and wailing. Five hours later she was the chief mourner and most pitiable of all seated around the coffin. Although considerably comforted by so many little pink pills, she still cried out at regular intervals, “Oh, my only son, my only son. My beloved son. God, why have you abandoned me?”

But oh, how she cried. My, how his momma cried.