MOTHA

Thank y’all all for coming out. You know it’s your favorite spot to be, Motha’s! Trixie, TRIXIE, GIRL, where you GOING to? You done came here, up in my club, tonight and damn near drunk all the alcohol. Mhm, by yourself, and that new little man you with…hot ass. You remember what I said, I want you to be safe. Them streets will abuse you and lose you...be safe.

Mama may have, and papa may have, but God bless that childdddd. Mama may haveee...Mama may have, Papa may have...what you looking like that for? You KNOW the bar is closed, looking at me all thirsty and shit, but since I own this mf and you done had your one-too-more, I’ll poor you up another one...and while I’m at it, I just might pour myself up one too. You know I think that song right there is so beautiful, the sound, the vibe, the hymn (hums song). My mother would sing it to herself every time while getting dressed to hit the streets. Like the old folks would say, my mother was a “rolling stone.” Never in the house much, but she loved me and my brother to death. My father, well, he was addicted to crack, like every man or pimp in savanna Georgia. He never wanted me to be the way I am, you know, a TRANSEXUAL woman. But hell, my mother always wanted a daughter, and the man above always has the last say on things, and in my dad’s case, he definitely got the last laugh too. I was their daughter.

Now, my brother’s name is Marvin, and would you believe what the hell my father named me? Monte…mhmm like the mf car. But you can call me Motha. This here is my very own club. Took me 37 years to get it, but we here, and this club is mine. And it’s Motha’s job to make sure every punk, bitch, queen, dike, and faggot feel like they have a home. I mean what else really does a trans woman do in this world? Another drink?

You know that young girl who was up at the bar earlier? Yaaa. That’s her. Trixie’s her name. You know she is in here almost every night looking and picking these men who come thru here. And you know what I mean by pickin? Sex for money. I watched her go on date after date, sometimes 5, 6 men a night. I’d watch the men slide her 40, 50, sometimes $60. Not enough for the bullshit she have to go thru with these not-shit-junkey-jive-ass niggas here who only care about their Cadillacs and beating women, I know. I had a mother, and I also have a past.

I try to reitterate to Trixie the importance of being safe out here in these streets so nothing bad doesnt happen to her. I’ve seen bad things happen to my trans sisters right here in Savannah. Every year, a new name. Another one of us, gone. Dead. Killed. My friends, family, regulars, people I watched dance their night away here at Motha’s, lose their life. And it’s my job as Motha to protect this here place. But when everyone leaves, I am scared bc the world out there dont wait on anyone. It’s cruel, it’s fast, and it will chew you up and spit you out, it did me. If only my mother’s body language spoke words when I watched her, so I could have learned something more than just her beauty. And more about this cruel world.

I remember when I was out in those streets. I was only 22 years old and I was out at a local “hole in the wall” in the upper, east side of Durham, outside of Savannah. It was one of the areas known for the girls. As we would say, “money was everywhere on the streets” and my young, hot ass just wanted a little of it. So I waddled my tall, fine ass to the bar and asked for my regular Js and Coke, with a extra shot. DJ began playing my favorite song, and I began swaying in cognac until I saw a man looking at me from the corner of the bar, but the look he had wasn’t pleasant like most. But hell, I was there for a good time, not a long time, so I didn’t think nothing of it. I walked out 15 minutes before the club closed and I was walking up 17 ave, what we called “the strip,” and I was trying to pull a last-minute trick before I went in. Whenever a car rolled up in front of me as if they were going to hit me. “What the hell was that for?” I asked them with my hands touching the hood of their car, blinded by their bright lights. And that’s when I noticed these eyes, eyes that I had seen before, eyes from the corner of the bar, and it didn’t look like they wanted a good time or a quick visit. He hollered, “You think you fooling somebody or sumthin? Well, we gonna teach you a lesson.” Suddenly all four doors were opening and instead of one nightmare there was four and all the men had things in their hand like they were going to change a tire, but I had no car, and they were no flats. And that’s when I knew there was a chance I wasn’t gonna make it home alive. I was grabbed by the first man and pushed into the fence. Hands began to pullin at my clothes, exposing me, stretching and restraining my arms out as if I was being crucified on a cross. The men began taking blows at my face and the man I recognized from the bar began to yell out that “a good tranny was a dead one.” I noticed the eyes thru the mask of blood on my face walking up to me with the tire jack in his hands.

All I could think about was my mother and how she wouldn’t bare being able to clean up the bloodied, lifeless body of her child. I laid there with a mere last breath in me, naked on the Georgia concrete, with all of my belongings bloodied and scattered around me. BEAT It wasn’t until that morning an old woman found me. So whenever Trixie walk thru those doors and I ask her where and when and why she went it’s bc I don’t want anything to happen to her. Hell, it’s all a mother’s love.