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conversation by reflecting back on the book signing and the author’s book. The story line had struck a chord with her, as she turned and said, “You know, Juanita. When I think back on it, it wasn’t until I was damn near twenty-four years old, myself, before I found the courage to leave the nest. I’m sure most people leave home much earlier.”
    “Twenty-four? Damn girlfriend! Why did it take you so long to leave?”
    “Little Terence was the reason why. Being young and with an unplanned addition, I just wasn’t prepared to take care of a child on my own at that time. So I stayed at home with my mother. Just the same, I wouldn’t trade my little man for the world.”
    “I hear you, girl. I have a sister who went through a similar situation, so believe me, I know where you are coming from.”
    “I just hope your sister wasn’t fifteen and as naïve as I was then,” Yvette said with a somber expression. “You know, someone wanting and desiring love and needing the affection of a man.”
    “Try thirteen.”
    “Thirteen!” Yvette snapped back. “Your sister was thirteen when she had her first child? And I thought I was out there.”
    “Well, actually that’s the age she got knocked up. She had the baby four days after her fourteenth birthday. Unfortunately, you could never tell her anything. She was so sure she was in love and that he was too. Just down right adamant about it.”
    “But he wasn’t?”
    “Not by a long shot,” Juanita replied wearily. “He was nothing more than a sexual predator, if you ask me. A damned pencil dick.”
    “A pencil dick?” Yvette echoed, as she chuckled.
    “Yes, a pencil dick.”
    “And how old was this pencil dick, Juanita?”
    “Thirty-one.”
    “Nooo!Thirty-one!” Yvette nearly choked on her mint.
    “Yeah. And his ass should have gone to jail over this.”
    “Why didn’t he?”
    “My father couldn’t find out where he lived and my sister claimed she didn’t know his last name or where he lived. I’m tell’n you, my dad was so pissed off and to the point that he spent five full days canvassing the neighborhood for that joker.”
    “Somebody in the neighborhood knew something, I’m sure,” Yvette reasoned aloud.
    “I’m sure, too. Hell, I wanted to kill that sonavabitch, myself. Believe me, that asshole was only in the picture because he saw an opportunity to get some young and dumb and available coochie, who just happened to be my little sister. I know that’s kind’a forward but hell, it’s the truth. And she was all too eager to please him because she thought the sun rose and set with that man. After a while, I think it was all about the dick for her. Made her feel all grown up to be doing grown up things.”
    “That’s somewhat the way it happened with me, I suppose,” Yvette said, lowering her head slightly during this retrospective moment. “My son’s father was very tall and handsome and very charming and much older and more experienced than I ever gave him credit for. Somehow, he seemed to know all the right words to say.”
    “Yeah, and all the right moves to make, I’m sure. Believe me, one would think all of those playas read from the same damn sex manual,” Juanita added. “All smooth talking and all.”
    “Thinking back on those days, I have to give most of them credit for being well polished lady-charmers,” Yvette added. “Hell, it only took one to pop my damn cherry.”
    “Pussy snatchers are what I refer to them as, if you want to ask me.”
    “Gal! Anyone ever tell you how vulgar you can be at times?” Yvette said with a bemused smile.
    “Like I always say, I just tells it like it is, girlfriend.”
    “So I hear.”
    “Anyway, as you said…you know the type.”
    Yvette continued. “Yeah. And it took me a while to figure it out. Seducing untouched teenaged girls was part game, part occupation, and part hobby for T-Rex . That was his nickname,” Yvette explained, a gang banger name he was known as by men around