Free The Education of a Very Young Madam by Ma-Ling Lee Page A

he probably wouldn't make it home in one piece that night. He looked at me for just a moment before he took the can. Andre made him get down on his hands and knees and eat out of the can right in front of us. After that, Andre just ignored him, like he never even existed. That guy never spoke to me again. I knew then just how powerful it can really be to let everyone know you're not afraid of a little violence.
    In fact, Andre earned respect in a third, unusual way, which was just by being a straight-up guy. He never talked about it, but I know people respected him because he wasn't a bullshitter. If he told you the drugs he was selling you were going to be a certain price, then that was the price they would be. He didn't change the deal on you at the last minute or take advantage of you just because he could if he wanted to. He was no petty thief. He was too big for that, and as a result people respected him even more. What's more, they wanted to deal with him.
    Andre was the one who set me up in my very first business. My partner was Suzie, a Thai woman who was the cutest little thing you've ever seen. She was older than me but looked really young. She must have been about twenty-one, because she always got served at the bars and clubs we went to. But then again, maybe not. She didn't look a day over eighteen, and no bartender would ever card a girl that adorable.
    Andre and I used travel back and forth between Boston and New York City all the time back then. Andre would say it was "for Business," but I didn't really know what his business was in the beginning. All I knew was that every time we went to New York, we had the best time. We'd eat in great restaurants all over the city and hang out with cool people who dressed just like Andre. He hung out with a group of rappers, and we'd go to their concerts and video shoots and drink bottles of Dom P that were always on ice in the backs of their big cars. Andre would dress me in furs and drape me in diamonds to take me to clubs where we'd sit at private tables like superstars. I was tiny compared with him—a full ten inches shorter and still rail thin—but we dressed to match and made quite an impression whenever we walked into a room together.
    The first time I met Suzie she tried to pick me up. She just walked up to me in one of the New York clubs, this tiny girl with spiky black hair who was totally butch yet feminine and sweet-looking at the same time. She had all the confidence in the world, so naturally I liked her right away. Hooking up wasn't going to happen—I was very attached to Andre, and besides, I'm not gay— so instead we decided to become business partners. I was about seventeen.
    Suzie was from Thailand, but she had married a powerful businessman, a founder and owner of a major Japanese corporation, when she was thirteen. The marriage had been arranged by her parents, and she was his fifth wife. Naturally she hated him and got away from him as soon as she could. I always thought one of the reasons she became a lesbian was that she hated him so much. I never knew exactly how she got away or why he didn't come after her. Maybe he did, but she never seemed to be afraid that he'd catch up to her.
    Andre was always looking for new business opportunities, and he wanted to find something for me to do with myself. I was so young and thought he was the- best thing in the whole world. I doted on him, followed him around, and generally annoyed the hell out of him. He was a decent guy, so he would never throw me out or tell me to just get lost—he cared about me, and besides, where would I go? But he was feeling crowded and thought I needed a project, something to keep me busy and out of his hair. So when Suzie came up with the idea, he gave me the money to start up a brothel with her.
    By that time we were living in Fort Lee, New Jersey, and I had worked my way up to being Andre's personal money manager. I had also learned a lot about the drug business he was