Kupi Made Man (PS 2)

Today's a big day for me. When it's all over I'm either gonna be a Made Man or I'm gonna be dead. But before I get ahead of myself, let me tell you that if it's job security you're after, growing old and drawing a pension – a normal life – then you can stop reading right now. You'd be better off sticking to your nine-to-five job, day-time TV or whatever it is you normal people do all day. I guess I might have had a normal life, but then that would be a whole different story… They say that the Mafia has had more influence on the everyday 'normal' lives of New Yorkers than the government has ever had. It's also true that there was a time when absolutely nothing went down in New York that the Families didn't know about or didn't have a hand in. But over the last twenty years things have changed. Constant feuding and in-fighting has seen the Families grow weak and lose their grip on power. No one respects or fears them the way they used to, so that gap has been filled by newer, younger and hungrier players. The old ways are over. Organised crime has steadily become more ruthless and more deadly than ever it was, and guess what, I've been right in the middle of this change. And then there's Eggs. If it hadn't been for Johnny “Eggs” Biondo there's just a chance I'd have been living the normal life. If it hadn't have been for him and the gold, maybe I'd be a two-bit nobody just like you. But he showed me a different life, a life that once you step into you can never leave. So, you wanna know how an ordinary guy like me ends up living a very extraordinary life? OK then. Listen up. This is my story and it's quite a ride. Joey Verola July 1989, New York