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I can’ even bring myself back to the place I was
wheu I heard what Lappened lo Proof, | have never
felt so much pain in my life, It's a pain that ie with me
to this day. A pain that has become a part of who I
am. + I got in my car at 7 o'clock in the morning to
go see Proof in the hospital, and he was just laid out.
Tb was the worst day of my life. I just remember
thinking, NOT PROOF, NOT PROOF, NOT
PROOF. + Proof was kind of my rock, you know?
His death brought me to my knees. I've had death
in my family before—two of my uncles committed
suicide and it took chunks out of my life then.
Hverybdody’s gol. somébody they've lost in their life
who was everything fothem, » Twasn’t at that elub
when Proof got shot, but I gather that the incidens
was a toral misunderstanding that got blown way
oul of proportion, T iy Wo slay away frou places like
that, but Proof was a real regular dude. He hung out
in the “hood even after all of his success, and thar
kind of success in any “hood can lead to jealousy
problems. I wish the fight would have stopped with
just fists. But it escalated, and Proof took the hit.
Proof had a very strong personality, He wasn’t one to
back down. If you pushed the wrong button, some-
thing could go off in him. Still, he was a funny dude
who wasn’t gangsta all the time, He had a silly side, like all of us
in Di2 dv. * So dlluough Proof lad this dual personality, what I
remember most is his kindness. This is the dude who, when I was
broke as fuck, came by my house and made me get rid of the thrift-
store loafers my mother. had bought me. We're both size 10. He
came over to she crib and was like, “What the fuck is on your fect?”
‘Then he handed over a pair of Nikes that were pretty much brand
new. It was one of those moments where | wanted to cry. * Just
like all triends do, Proof and | went through our up and down
phases, On the voad we'd be with cach other 24/7, and when we'd
et back to The D, we would lake Lime off. Because, you know, Ian,
be an annoying motherfucker ju didn’t
like everybody else. If
see him for a while we would at least talk on the phone a couple
times a week. We
both become family men, too, and we'd be busy
wilh our kide. + After he passed. il was 4 year before I could
really do anything normally again. It was tough for me to even get
out of bed, and T had days when I couldn't walk, let alone write a
rhyme, When I tried to put my thoughts together well, I wasn't
making sense when I spoke, so everyone was Leying to keep me off
(V and sway from the press. My b
sin was sosttered, especially for
the first couple of months after his death. * It's been only two
years and change now since he left, so it’s still a tough thing to
deal with. Now, when I think shout touring, wonder who's going
to come onstage with me. This is the biggest tragedy I could
imagine, aside from something happening to one of my kids. +
Proof played the fall guy in the video tor “Like Toy Soldicrs.” The
guy shot and in the hospital. The point I was trying to make with
that video was that rappers got imto becls, but it’s really the
opposing vamps—the entourages—who wind up getting hurt. Not
too long afver that, it unfortunately became reality. + In the year
after he died, I would stare al the ceiling and think about that
video, Did karma cause that to happen in real life? Did I? You
always want to point the finger at somebody else when something
like that happens, you know? + Prouf was the key to my whole
game. He was the only reason I stopped getting my ass whipped.
T'm not going to sugarcoat ithe was my ghetto pass, Idon't know
if anybody reslizes it; that’s why I'm saying it now. He didn’t give a
fuck about being called an Uncle Tom for being down with me. He
stuck up for me like we were literally broltiers. Before I was
famous, before | had anything, really, Kim and T were living in her
mom's attic beranse we had nowhere else to go. If Proof hadn’t
gotten me out of there, if he hadn't goilen me down to The Ilip Hop
Shop and into the rap game, I don’t know where I'd be. I certainly
wouldn't be somebody you've heard of. * Te was a brilliawt cal who
saw things in me that | didn’t see yet, and 1 guess T was smart
enough ta understand that he was the dude who could somehow
savo my lifo. [had been drowning for so long. Proof was like a hip-
hop life raft and a true brother from another mother. He had this
ability to not only nurture my talent, but to see thal diamond in
the rough when million people could be looking at the sume
