My coming of age story is about the time I found out my mother had been shot and killed in Chicago on Saturday, May 1st, 2010 at 3:00am. I received a devastating phone call. After that night, I knew my life would never be the same ever again. 

Late Saturday morning, my sisters, Latrice and Angel were off doing their own thing around the house as usual. My younger brother, Tireh, was upstairs playing video games. My mom was outside with her friend smoking a cigarette on the front porch with her friend,Lisa, while I was behind the screen door playing with my baby sister, Karma, who was in her carseat. The day turned noon and my mom began to invite friends over to have a small party. All of her friends came over and even people she has never met or even talked to before came over. She could never say no to anyone. She was too kind-hearted and couldn’t even say no to her enemies.
The party was in action and everyone was having fun. The noon, pink-orange colored sky turned into a black-blue darkness as people left in groups and the noise simmered down to only low mumbles.The night sky was a dark-blue and my mom had to go run an errand. Everyone in the house was sleeping. With everyone asleep in the house, I had always pleaded with my mom to let me watch Karma. She finally allowed me to. My mom left and said she would be back in 30 minutes. It was around 1:50 am and My mom was still not back from her errand. So I used our house phone and called her cell phone but after a couple of rings I heard her cell phone ringing next to me. I grabbed her cell phone and called her friends. Every friend I called had said she either didn’t come to their place or she left 5 to 10 minutes ago. So I stopped calling and Karma kept crying so I decided to fix her a bottle and she drank it all in about 15 minutes. She stopped crying for about 30 minutes and when she began again I didn’t know what to do so I turned on the T.V. and we watched Family Guy to pass time.  I began to get really sleepy but my mom wasn’t back yet and it was 2:47 am. After about 30 minutes passed, my moms phone began to ring, I answered it.
“Hello” I said.
“Who is this? Where Tricey?! (Latrice)” He said panickingly into the phone.
“This is Shnayia and Tricey is sleeping. Why?” I said.
“Just go give her the phone!” He yelled.
“Why? She’s sleeping.” I said.
I was always somewhat afraid of my oldest sister because last time I woke her up in the middle of the night she yelled at me, and I’m a really sensitive person so I  would cry if anyone would yell at me.
“IT’S AN EMERGENCY!”  He yelled, sounding like he was on the verge of crying. So I ran downstairs speedy fast and woke my sister up and gave her the phone. She took it and gave me a death stare, looking like,
“Why did you just wake me up at 3:00 in the morning?”
She was talking to him and all I was hearing  was “No!” “Stop playing?” and “You’re lying.” She was talking for a couple more minutes then she screamed, her brown eyes turned glassy and shiny then a transparent drop of saltiness came rolling down her cheek, without listening to what else he had to say she hung up the phone.
“Momma got shot.” She said in a still, unbelieving voice. “Go wake up, Angel and bring Karma downstairs.”
“Okay.” I ran not fully understanding what she meant by shot, I ran speeding to wake up Angel. I ran downstairs and immediately they snatched Karma from my arms and told me exactly what happened and what the meant by mom getting shot.
That dawn was breaking. The colors of the sky were pink-orange, Everyone had soon found out the news that my mom had been shot and killed. When friends and family found out, they came over to try and comfort us but for me nothing really worked, I just wanted to be alone. We all sat at the table with blank, sad and confused expressions on our faces. No one spoke a single word,just the sound of sniffles, soft cries, birds chirping and tears falling onto the table.
“Is anybody hungry?” asked my cousin.
No one replied. Just silence.
Dawn turned to a bright yellow sunny day. You would think that, oh blue sky, sunny day means everyone is happy. Well no. That’s not how it went. Some people lost the only person that would help them, their best friend, a sister and some people lost a mother. I was one of five people that lost a mother. Many people came to find answers, many people came to mourn, and many people came to give pity. Pity isn't what I wanted, nor what I needed. I needed answers, and I wanted answers. That’s something that I never got. The days passed.