They say the hood don't raise boys it baptizes men early.
Kane was born on a night bullets wrote lullabies. His mama used to say he didn't cry at birth, he just stared cold, wide eyed like he already knew the world was a lie. His father, Big Renz, was a street OG. Not by choice by blood.
"Boy," Big Renz told him once, wiping blood off his knuckles, "life don't give medals for being soft. You either stand or you crawl."
That was Kane's first gospel. Not from a preacher, but from a man whose rosary was his gun strap.
In the block of Forty-Five a place too hard for dreams, too loud for peace everyone had a story, but not everyone had a voice. And if you did, it better come with respect. Respect was currency. Fear was protection. Loyalty was everything.
Kane grew up seeing men die for reputation, women cry for survival, and children play in the shadow of crimes they didn't commit. He once asked his grandmother, Mama Zee, why people called his father "OG."
She smiled, toothless but wise. "Original Gangsta, baby. Means your daddy don't copy nobody. He live by his own rules and die by 'em too. That's rare in this fake-ass world."
Years later, Kane would understand being an OG wasn't about the crime. It was about the code.
You handle yours. You protect yours. You never snitch. You never bow.
And if death come, you greet it like an old friend.
Kane was twelve when he saw his first body.
Fourteen when he first fought with a knife.
Sixteen when he first held a gun.
Eighteen when he learned silence was louder than words.
The OG code was simple: Love real, hate realer.