While I do think being in a relationship with Axl lead me to indulge in unhealthy behavior, being his lover at the height of his music career was nothing short of remarkable. The bad times had its consequences but the good times I will always remember.

                                                                         Los Angeles Strip, 1987

Appetite had just been released. Axl had only just begun, he still had to hold a 9-5 while he was out singing...just waiting for the money to flow. So he picked up job at tower video, and I was in school and working part time at the Whiskey.

How did I even get here? After my moms second divorce she had had enough of Yonkers  and flew us across the country to Los Angeles. I was sixteen. Things seemed to start out fine, but then she was building up her drug trafficking career with her boyfriend at the time again. She was making good money from it, but when I was old enough to realize what the hell was going on, I could have killed her for it. I resented her so much, and knew that if she wasn't careful, CPS would take me away in the blink of an eye. 

By the time she had gotten arrested, I was already 18. So I moved in with some high school friends and picked up a waitress job. A year later, I had saved up enough money to enroll in the Los Angeles beauty program.  Finally, I felt like I was getting my life together. And before too long, I met this sexy redheaded specimen at sunset strip tattoo in the summer of '85. He insisted on having my number, and after a year of dating we moved in together.

We were crazy about each other, mainly because we really were each other's biggest fans. From the minute we were official it felt...unreal. I nearly melted every time he introduced as his girlfriend. And I had become pretty popular in the sunset strip area after high school. Axl would perform at clubs there a couple times a week. Everyone knew who we were and what we were about.

We lived in a complex in Compton, and since he was working full time as a store manager and I was still making it in school, some of the financial issues he picked up the slack for, but I would always make sure to make it up to him with other financial needs. He didn't seem to mind at all.  

Steven, who was like a second dad and a close friend wrapped in one, had just started his rehab program. Seeing as my mom went back in '81  I honestly was not sure how it was going to go for him. I knew that he had to really want to get better for it to work.

 I was determined to show him, Axl, myself...even my own mother that after graduation I would launch my cosmetology career. And I would be a huge success.  In the end, if Steven could turn himself around, get his band back, and I could make him proud of me, thats all I could ever ask for.