My sister contacts me.

I arrive in the humid city of Miami, Florida at the airport. Once I set my feet on solid American asphalt, I find that I'm a million miles away from home with nobody I can trust and that my lifestyle is awkward in the American atmosphere. The most obvious factor of myself is my speech and vocabulary. I talk with a young, sweet voice in a small, but distinct accent. Most people that I speak to in the airport, like restaurant employees and clerks seem to not notice my accent and carry on with their day.

Speaking of which, I do have somebody I was going to talk to. I remember packing my cell phone in my small carry-on purse. I look into it once I get back inside the air conditioned terminal. Walking towards the baggage claim, I take out my phone and wake it up from its hibernation. I know I turned it on once the pilot or the flight attendant said it was okay to turn it on. I was going to make it so it wasn't on silent but the pilot maneuvered the plane onto the tarmac and at the terminal in a short time interval that I couldn't take the silent off. Now looking at my phone as I walked towards the baggage claim, I find that I have several missed calls. I push the left button to open the call list and only one name was listed under missed calls.

I find that my sister had called me six times. She must be wondering when I got off the plane. She might also have some information about America since she has been here the last five years. So I decide to call her back. I push a button to redial the phone and place the receiver at my ear. The typical ring is heard. After thirty seconds, my call goes straight to voicemail. I have gotten used to hanging up once I hear the familiar recording of the voicemail and at once I hang up the phone. I put the phone back into my purse and continue to walk on.

Looking at the signs hanging from the ceiling, I follow the sign written "Baggage Claim." The signs lead me past restaurants flowing with smells I haven't recognized before, past tourists looking at souvenirs, and businesspeople reading newspapers and attending to their electronic notebooks. I assume it's morning here in Miami, but the weather feels like it's the afternoon. I finally realize it is in the morning when I turn a corner and ride an elevator down into a plaza that resembles a food court. At the other end of this plaza was the front doors of the airport. Above the doors, embedded into the decorative brickwork, was a clock with a group of stone palm trees to each side of it. The clock read 9:20 and the light outside made it in the A.M. hours. To contribute to my realization, the smell of eggs, bacon, sausage, hash browns, and McGriddles waft from the McDonald's in the food court.

Facing the doors leading outside, to my left are the ticket booths and the conveyor belts taking people's luggage to their designated planes. To my right I find the baggage claim. I quickly jog my way to the area and check my ticket, that I had tucked in my purse for safekeeping, for the flight number. I pass one flight that was departing from New York and another flight departing from Mississippi. I come to a third one and check the number. In the red scrolling marquee, six letters forming the country name of London and the number that matches the one from my ticket appear and at once I knew that I was at the right place. It seems I got here early, since no baggage has started sliding from a chute in the middle of the machine and luggage hasn't made its way around the circular-shaped track. I see people already gathering around this place such as families and elderly people. I also see individuals waiting for their luggage all alone, just like me.

The other baggage claims I see were already packed with people reaching and searching for their bags and suitcases. A red rotating light like the ones that police put on their police cars flashes, making the people waiting aware that their baggage is coming. That same light is near the chute near the claim I'm waiting at. But instead of flashing and rotating simultaneously, the light stays idle in its red plastic casing.

I wait for three more minutes and I get bored. I get tired just standing here anxious or maybe paranoid that something bad happened to my luggage. So I walk to the rim of the baggage claim and take a seat there, crossing my legs for I had a skirt on. In actuality, all the clothes I'm wearing either came directly from my sister or was recommended by it. In a crowd of American girls, I guess that it would be pretty hard to locate me camouflaged in American apparel. I know for a fact that girls in London dress much differently than girls in America. Right now I'm wearing simple summer clothes. Nothing too revealing, but still fitting and cool in hot weather.

On my upper body and torso, I am wearing a tight, short-sleeve shirt with glittery sequins on the chest area in a design awfully familiar. The design is of a simple, line drawn into a female cat. The brand name "Baby Phat" is written under the cat and is also in sequins. Under I wear a white bikini top which you have to tie behind the neck and behind the back to make sure it doesn't fall off while your wearing it. The ties are tied tight due to gravity pulling my breasts down. My breasts, to be honest isn't like the typical breasts of European girls. Since I have mixed blood in me, my breasts are medium to large in size but has a nice form to them. There is indeed no sagging or unevenness to the look of my breasts.

For my lower body, I wear a black pleated mini skirt long enough to hide my buttocks by one or two inches. Under I wear a black thong. My sister told me that since I'm an adult now, I should start wearing thongs and more revealing things to attract the opposite sex. To be honest, I don't really have the same confidence she has.

The last two pieces of my current outfit are my shades and my shoes. Firstly, my shades, like my shirt, is a glossy white around tinted lenses. I think the style of shades people call these are "Stunna's." An emblem of a the Gucci logo is embedded on each side and is silver plated. These shades were one of the last things that my sister gave me for my birthdays. Actually, this is the second the the last thing that my sister gave me for my birthdays. The most recent item my sister gave me as a gift were my shoes. My adorn feet are slipped into a black cross-strap, high heel, 6-inch stilettos. These high heels weren't just ordinary high heeled sandals but they also came with seductivity in mind. There was a platform under the ball of my foot and my toes that measured from half an inch to one inch. Both the platform and the heel were one piece, fashioned in clear acrylic.

Walking in these heels are hard, but I have gotten used to it. In the summer in the year before this year, my sister taught me how to walk in these heels. She would teach me to wear these heels for long periods of time and told me never to take them off. She also taught me to train my feet to fit into pumps and high heeled boots. If we would go out, I would be in heels. If I stayed at my sister's apartment all day, I would still be in heels. The only time I wasn't in heels was when I slept. I can remember that I didn't wear any socks or shoes or slippers in that summer. For those three months or so in that summer in the last year, I was only barefoot or heeled.

Now that I remember, my sister changed in that last year, and also in the year before that. In the third to last year, she started wearing dresses only when she went out. She would never wear any pants or shorts. The only time she would wear something that covered her crotch was when she was at her apartment. Her hair color changed as well. Before she had the typical dark brown hair color of Asian girls. When I saw her at the start of the summer, she had put in blonde highlights in random places in her hair. At the end of the summer I would see more blonde highlights in her hair. In last year's summer, her hair was completely blonde. It wasn't the shade of blond that was close to Caucasian females in America. I would guess it could be called dirty blonde, since Sasha's root color is natural blackish brown.

Since my sister changed over the years, I have also rearranged my lifestyle similar to hear. Back then I would never wear skirts or dresses. But now I wear them every other day. I wouldn't go too far as to change my hair color though. To this day, my hair color hasn't changed and it's still the dark auburn it has always been. Only the style of my hair has changed over the years. When I was young, my mother **** my hair to flow straight down. Now that I'm getting older and getting more independent, I've had my hairstyle in such as way that from my roots my hair is straight, but when the strands pass my shoulder or neck they curl into large curls and then small curls. I guess I'm going through the adult phase in my life, just like my sister Sasha.

A minute passes by as I sit on the cold stainless steel surface of the rim of the baggage claim. Still the claim hasn't started yet and I can hear and see people complaining to the airport services why the baggage claim won't start giving out their luggage. I patiently wait as I gather my skirt and place it under my butt to keep my ass from getting cold. When I sit down and look to the crowd, I can hear distinctly, my name being called but could have been somebody else or just my imagination.

Three minutes later, the baggage wonderfully starts revolving around it track and the first of a load of luggage slide from the overhead chute. I stand up to avoid getting my skirt caught in the track. Turning to face the revolving steel machine, I hear my name being called out again. For a second I think it's me being called but it could be anybody. I know for sure that "Marianne" is not a common name for girl born and raised in London.

In a flash, I see the bright yellow luggage slide from the chute and without a doubt I know that it's mine. I find that it is indeed mine due to all the writing of thank you's and farewells from my friends written in black Sharpie on the yellow surfaces. I try to reach for the first, but my heels stop me from grabbing the handle.

That's when I hear my name being called out again. Instead of just my name "Marianne," the voice calling it out says it in conversational voices, as if he, definitely a male voice, is near me. My name isn't all that the voice says, but says it at the end of a question.

"Excuse me, are you Marianne?" the deep male voice calls out to me from behind me. I turn to find a black man measuring at least six feet in height standing behind me. I say yes with my mouth closed and with a nod. The man smiles and offers his hand to me. "Great, hello, I'm Roman Pierce." I respond by shaking his hand but look at him with a nervous. When he says, "I'm a good friend of your sister, Sasha," my nervous look changes into a glad expression with a bright smile. Roman smiles back with an even brighter smile.

From what I can see, Roman appears dressed much like a mechanic without his jumpsuit. His boots are dirty, meaning that he changes the oil of his car, and I can see several tattoos on his arms of American muscle cars and Japanese import cars. Speaking of his arm, he wear a blue button-up shirt much like a vest which shows his strong arm muscles and his broad and firm shoulders. His skin is dark black but light enough for me to distinguish the tattoos on his arms. His head is round, having being clean shaven or just naturally bald. Even though he presumably looks like he works as a mechanic, his facial skin is smooth and clean. Fastened at his waist with a belt, Roman wears baggy dark denim jeans which bunch up at the ankle.

"You know Sasha?" I ask him, wanting to know how is she since she hasn't contacted me.

"Yes, I do and we're still good friends. We met each other in New York about four years ago. We went to the same clubs but went to different schools. After two years we went off our different ways. She went to New Denali but I went to Miami."

I can remember the time Sasha called my mother who told me she arrived in New York. But I didn't know that she was in New Denali when I was in tenth grade. She probably must've went to east coast and rented a summer apartment so I can stay with her during the summers.

While Roman continued talking about the friendly relationship between him and Sasha, I turned my back for a moment to try and catch my luggage. There were two bags, one smaller than the other, sitting next to each other. They had slid next to each other by chance and they weren't put there on purpose. Every time I try to reach for one, my heels get stuck or I try to maintain my balance while trying to grab the handle. Roman notices my struggle with my bags and asks me, "Do you need help?"

I confirm by saying, "Yes, " and quickly, like in record time, Roman grabs both bags by grabbing one on each revolution.

"Wow, these baggage claims get faster every year," Roman mentions and we both laugh at the same time. After I grab one bag and Roman pulls the other. We both leave the airport and head to the parking garage across the road where people's cars unload passengers and luggage as well as buses taking people from their airport to different places.

We have a deep but not so deep conversation as we may our way to the parking garage entrance. Roman takes the initiative to ask me questions and I get the privilege to answer them the best that I can.

"So what brings you to America, Marianne," Roman asks in a silly, suave way.

I answer him, "Well if I could say one word, I would just say life."

Immediately, wanting to know what my response meant, Roman pushes in, "What do mean by that?" Having to stop at a crosswalk to let automobile traffic through puts me in an position where I can tell Roman the details.

"Well, what I mean is that my life in London was good but I wanted to come to America to experience life in such a way, that I'm....well....uncomfortable," I say, uncomfortably.

Pushing me on, Roman says, "Go on."

"I guess I can say that I want to follow the path that my sister took," I answer. After the last word comes out, the light green 'walk' sign lights up and both side of the traffic on the roads stop at the limit line. People from our side begin crossing as well as some individuals on the other side ofthe crosswalk begin to cross as well. Like a leader or an escort, Roman takes the initiative to start crossing the road. I'm made to follow close by, walking in such a way, that I'm almost speed walking in a glamorous sense in my high heels.

As Roman crosses he restarts the conversation. "Well, what Sasha tells me that there has been problems in her family life that when she turned 18, she made the decision to leave her home and cross and ocean to start a new life. Is that what you were trying to say?" Roman tells me. After knowing Sasha for two years, I can see that Sasha and Roman were confidants to one another.

"Pretty much, yes," and I smile at Roman for his amazing deducing skills, if he had any. We finish crossing the crosswalk and enter the elevator at the entrance of the parking garage. Roman pushes the lit "3" button and the door quickly closes.

A lit "G" in the overhead panel changes to a lit "2" and then into a lit "3." The elevator comes to a stop with the occasional bounce and jiggling. The door opens after and when it does open, Roman walks out first and I follow him. He turns a corner and continues walking up the incline on the right side where cars are parked at, pulling my rolling suitcase behind him.

I try to call out to him, saying, "Hey Roman, wait up," but it seems like he ignores me even though the concrete walls and floor of the garage can easily have sounds bounce off them. I can even hear all the engine sounds from the ground floor. I try to catch up to him but I don't have any good experience in running in my heels. I guess he will try to wait up but I wish too soon. He disappears to the right and it takes me thirty seconds to get up to that point. When I finally get up there, I see Roman at his nice ride opening the trunk and heaving my heavy suitcase up and into the trunk. I get to him in time to give my second suitcase and he gladly take it and heave it in after the first.

When Roman closes the trunk, I get somewhat of a panoramic view of Roman's car. I don't know much about American muscle car but I do know some. I can say that I know more about European cars than American ones. The light blue gloss paintjob catches my eye as well as the shiny chrome glistening the in the sunlight entering through the windowless spaces of the parking garage. Roman, like a gentleman, opens my door for me and I gladly step inside and sit in the comfy seat. Roman closes my door and climbs into the driver's seat. We drive off from the airport and travel to the city beachside.

Around noon we arrive near a resort type place, having tall hotels and small hotels alike, as well as clubs and the beachside boardwalk. Around this time there are a menagerie of people ranging from locals to tourists. Roman drives to an area that isn't beside a beach but beside a waterway, like a canal. The hotels sitting next to each doesn't seem to stop. Roman's place is beside a road and a white and red hotel is seen across from it.

At first glance, Roman's place looks like a car shop, having cars being tuned and repaired in garages and flashy cars showcased outside, parked diagonally. When we arrive he parks his car alongside the area of the shop which looks like a showcase at car dealership, large pane windows with white frames.

After opening the trunk and helping me with my luggage, Roman brings me around the front of the shop, where mechanics work on the cars that are lifted up high so that they can do what they need to do to the undercarriage of the cars. A Chinese mechanic measuring about 5' 8" in height with a bald head comes out to greet Roman. To me he is shorter because of my heels elevating me up by 5 inches.

"Yo, Roman!" the short mechanic stops looking for wrenches in the tall red toolbox and shakes Roman's hand and then hugging him in the way men hug.

"Wassup, man," Roman nervously responds. The short mechanic's eyes dart from Roman to me, standing behind the big body of my driver.

"So, who's this?" the short mechanic tilts his head in a silly way asking Roman who I am.

"Oh this is Marianne," I offer my hand after Roman introduces me. Directed to me, Roman introduces his loyal mechanic, "Marianne, this is Chen."

Chen offers her hand in response and I say, "Nice to meet you." Seconds after a call from the back of the garage calls Chen, and the short mechanic leaves Roman and I to our business.

Roman takes the time to introduce everybody and tell more them. To me, Roman is a friendly character who has a lot of trust with everybody he has in contact with. Just by talking to him, I feel like I can trust him with my business.

Continuing to walk to the other side of the garage, Roman sparks a conversation. "That Chen guy really knows his stuff. Take it from me, he tuned up at least 5 cars, all Imports, this past week," Roman shows praise for Chen. It seems I'm beginning to enjoy everything that Roman has to say. I feel like a little kid being told fairy tales and amazing stories. We continue to walk and when we get to the other side of the garage, an intimate scene is brewing as we turn the corner.

A black mechanic, much lighter than Roman, who has a large afro with a afro pick embedded in his head, sits leisurely on the side of the hood of what looks like a lowrider. The car looks like a classic but having gold chrome instead of silver. The paintjob of the car is unique as well. The base color of the paintjob is a bright candy orange and yellow, gold, and brown lowrider decals run the length of the car and the hood. To it off, the roof is a light brown leather and the rims are small, all-gold wire wheels.

The intimate scene brewing is a short pure-Chinese woman with honey-colored hair flowing straight from the top of her head seductively kissing the black mechanic, simultaneously unzipping his brown jumpsuit in the process. Even though I can't see his expression, Roman looks disappointed and moves to talk it through with the two.

"Can't you wait until nighttime, guys?" Roman asks, getting both the girl's and the mechanic's attention.

"Shit, it's Roman," the Chinese woman says in hearing distance of me, even though I'm a meter behind Roman. She turns around to face Roman and then turns back around to face the mechanic, who has his face darting Roman's face and back the Chinese woman's face. When the woman turns back around to face the mechanic she backslaps him with her long nailed hands as she turn back around. "You told me he was gonna be out all day!"

Roman right now looks pissed, turning his head to the side and briefly, just briefly, looking at me through the corner of his eye. I try not to notice his action and try to pay attention to mechanic and the Chinese woman. The woman looks disgusted at the mechanic for not knowing about Roman's whereabouts and pushes herself of him. She turns her back and walks off away from Roman and mechanic and walks towards a pink convertible, tuned with body kits, rims, and a unique paintjob. She gets in and turns on the car, making it rev up with a typical Import engine sound. She directs the car out of the garage parking lot, and gets on the street, burning rubber and speeding off.

Roman now starts to walk past the mechanic and the car he's sitting on. He orders the man, saying "Get back to work, fool!" The mechanic angrily gets up and takes out his afro pick and fixes a portion of his afro. He walks past Roman going towards the garage without saying a word. I start to follow Roman to the back of the garage. In this area, fenced in by a gate, lay different shaped boxes and racks of unused tires. Past the boxes and the racks was a pier extending from the ashalt and concrete. The pier was made of the typical wood and had a semi-glossy finish to it. The pier itself didn't extend out much, probably about twenty to thirty feet or so. At the end of the pier was a plaform that went to the left and to the right. This platform stopped ten feet to the right, but to the left extended past the other end of Roman's garage.

We both walked onto the pier that purposely had and incline instead of stairs to get things that rolls easier to get down on the pier and basically made lifting and carrying thing easier than on stairs. We walked onto the platform connected to it, pulling my rolling suitcases behind us and making the typical stuttering thud sounds. Situated next to this plaform, floating in the water, were two large houseboats. These houseboat looked like they were made to stay docked at the pier and were not used for leaving this area.

And they were flashy houseboats two. They didn't have the basic white color and water color design stripes on their sides. These houseboats had an almost glossy paintjob that had graffiti of the same or darker or light colors. The houseboat on the leftmost part of the platform had a red paintjob, that had graffiti which looked like fire and brimstone. The houseboat right in front of us, which sat docked on the rightmost part of the platform, was colored in a dark blue, like the ocean water. The graffiti on it looked much like a large tsunami. On both houseboats, huge awning were installed over the platform area.

At the ends of both houseboats, as well as in between them, lay small piers that connected to the platform. These small piers were the means of getting into the houseboat, for there were no doors on the long sides. On the short sides of the houseboats were small patios that also had a permanent awning over them.

Roman led me to the left toward the small pier in between the two houseboats. He led me onto the small pier and helped me onto the patio of the blue houseboat. He opened the door for me and he followed me in. I enter into a small hallway made of cabinets big and small. A doorframe up ahead connects the hallway to the room inside. Entering the room, I notice I'm walking on firm carpet. There are two rugs in the room that are more softer, but the carpet is just firm fabric only made to be a floor. Like the outside, the room's walls are blue but in a lighter shade, much like the color of pool water.

Roman wastes no time in getting me settled. He tells me, "Sasha tells me to give you this room to start. Your first and second month's rent is already covered by your sister," and when he tells me about rent, my heart and the smile I have once entering the room sinks. "Umm, what else? Oh, yea, bathroom is through that door and then what else?" Roman points to the bathroom door, but when he does, he spaces out, like he is searching for something in his deep mind. "Oh, yea that's right." Roman quickly goes to the bed and uncovers the blanket so that the underside of the single cot is reveal. He reaches under it and pulls out a suitcase. Placing it on the bed he tells me, "Sasha sent this case here and she says it's for you. Unfortunately, I don't know what's inside because she told me not to open it. Well, I'll be in the garage if you need me."

Roman exits the room and by the mellow vibrations you can feel on this houseboat, I feel that Roman has indeed stepped off the boat. I sit on the bed next to the case sitting upon it. I take a deep breath to let the excitement settle in. Suddenly, a familiar tune, although muffled is heard. It sounds close to me, and it is indeed in the room. That familiar tune I hear is the ringtone to my phone. I go to my purse where I stored it, take it out, and the ringtone now is no longer muffled. I check the sub-LCD of the phone to see who's calling.