Crackhead (23 page)

Several minutes had gone by, and her mother didn't come knocking at her door as expected. Perhaps she had already given up on her before she even asked to be saved.

Laci managed to go to the bathroom and make herself look half presentable. She threw on her favorite Troop jogging suit, which she'd forgotten she even had. She hadn't been the least bit concerned about making a fashion statement lately. Laci stopped in front of the full-length, freestanding mirror beside her closet door. She looked at her reflection for a few seconds until she couldn't stand the sight of herself. Her clear skin was becoming blotchy, her hair had lost its luster, and her eyes and teeth had a yellowish tint. She flipped the mirror so that it was facing the wall. Laci told herself that it would remain in that position until she changed and made herself worth looking at again. She exited her bedroom and began to search for her mother.

“Ma,” Laci called as she pushed her parents' bedroom door open. She stuck her head in, but her mother wasn't there. She then proceeded downstairs. “Ma,” Laci called again as she entered the kitchen. Still she got no answer. She knew damn well that she had heard her mother come in the house. She had to be there somewhere. Why hadn't she come upstairs to check on her? Why wasn't she answering her call?

Laci proceeded to the living room. When she got there she stopped in her tracks. “Ma,” she said in a confused tone. “Ma, what's wrong?”

Sitting on the couch, Margaret's face was flushed. She didn't respond to Laci. She didn't move. She didn't even look up at her.

“Ma, are you okay?” Laci said, slowly walking over to her mother. When she approached, she noticed an envelope and some pictures lying facedown on the couch next to her. There
were also a couple of pictures in her hand. “Ma, talk to me. What do you have here?”

“You left me no choice, Laci,” Margaret said in a faint voice. “I tried to talk to you. That's what I told him. I said ‘I tried to talk to my baby, but she wouldn't be honest and tell me what was going on.' ” Margaret's eyes began to well up with tears.

“Who, Mommy?” Laci asked, sitting down next to her. She took the pictures from her hand, looked at them, and turned pale as a ghost.

“Detective Logan,” Margaret said. “That's what I told the private eye I hired to see what was going on with you.” She finally looked up at Laci. Once Sonny was able to provide her with more info, he'd warned her not to take to the street herself and suggested she hire a professional.

Laci couldn't even look her mother in the eye. She covered her mouth with her hand as tears began falling down her cheeks. She began to sniff and snort, as she couldn't hold back the pain of what she saw in those pictures. It wasn't the fact that they revealed her copping crack, smoking crack, even giving head in parked cars for crack, it was the fact that her mother had seen them.

Laci began to wail as if she were in severe pain. Margaret was too done to even hold her daughter. She was all cried out. All she could do was sit there and face reality.

Laci managed to speak through all of her agony. “This girl doesn't even look like me. That detective played you, Mom.”

D
INK WAS PLEASED
with the way things were going.

Smurf was gonna dust Dame and Marco could take over his territory. Soon he would leave the business to Smurf and Marco. Them niggas couldn't fuck it up too bad. Since he was on a roll at handling shit on his “to do” list, Dink decided to call up his soon-to-be ex.

Crystal's phone rang twice before her answering machine picked up. Dink hated to leave her a message, but he didn't have time to keep trying to get at her to say the simple shit he needed to say.

“Uh, Crystal. It's me,” Dink said.

“Hello,” Crystal said, out of breath. “Dink?”

“Yeah, what you doin'?”

“I was in the bathroom. Where you been? I see less and less of you these days.”

“Yeah, you know how things are. I'm busy as hell. If I don't make the money, someone else will.”

“I hear that. Speakin' of money, I need some. When do you think you'll be able to stop by?”

“I don't know.”

“How about tonight?” Crystal suggested.

“I don't think that's gon' happen. I got a lot of shit I need to do. Maybe tomorrow. As a matter of fact, I'll see you tomorrow. I'll call you as soon as I can make a move.”

Dink could see Crystal's pout through the phone.

“All right,” Crystal whispered.

“What's the matter?” he asked.

“I just want to see you. It almost seems like you don't want to be with me anymore. You don't want to be with me, Dink?”

“Never mind, Crystal. I'll just talk to you tomorrow.” Dink couldn't bring himself to tell her over the phone. He thought a face-to-face might be in order. That way he could give her an opportunity to explain herself.

“I just miss you, Dink,” Crystal said, meaning every word of it.

“Yeah, I know.”

“You know?” Crystal said with a faint chuckle. “No, Dink, I don't think you do.”

“Yes, I do. Believe me, I do. Like I said, you'll see me, trust me. How are your girls?” Dink fished.

“They all right.” Crystal played into it.

“What about the ol' girl with the baby? What's her name?” he asked.

“Shaunna?”

“Yeah, Shaunna. How's she doin'?”

“She cool,” Crystal said nonchalantly.

“That's good. What about Dame's girl, Tonette?” Dink said, working his way down the list.

“She crazy, but she aiight,” Crystal said, allowing him to carry the conversation.

“What about the college girl?” Dink asked, finally getting to the point.

“Who, Laci? I haven't heard from her,” she lied.

“Seriously? Why?” Dink asked, giving Crystal the opportunity to tell him the truth.

“She's a stuck-up, bitch. That's why,” Crystal said, sucking her teeth.

“I thought that was your girl.”

“Hell, no!” Crystal said without hesitation.

“Why you say it like that?” Dink said, still fishing.

“'Cause stuck-up bitches make me sick. Laci's a stuck-up bitch, so she made me sick,” Crystal said with pure hatred in her voice.

“You sound like you have a personal problem with her.”

“She was the kind of girl who bragged about what she had, tryin' to make the rest of us feel bad. We just got sick of her shit and got even. That's all.”

“Got even?” Dink inquired, getting angrier and angrier with each word Crystal spoke.

“That's right,” Crystal said, not feeling the way he seemed to be so interested in Laci.

“How?” he asked.

“I don't want to talk about it,” Crystal said, deliberately leaving Dink on the edge of his seat.

“What? Tell me what you did, Crystal!” he demanded, no longer able to hide his emotions.

“Damn, why you gettin' all mad and shit?”

“You know I don't like it when you start that I-don't-wanna-talk-about-it shit, Crystal.”

“Fuck it then,” Crystal said, ready to get a rise out of Dink. “We hated her conceited ass, thinking she was smoking weed, when her dumb ass was really smoking crack,” Crystal blurted out.

Dink was silent. He didn't think Laci was lying about how she started smoking, but to hear the story come out of Crystal's own mouth made any thoughts of empathy for her go out the window.

“Now I hear that bitch is a strawberry,” Crystal laughed. “You wouldn't believe some of the nasty-ass niggas she done let run up in her for a hit of that pipe. You wouldn't believe some of the nasty shit that bitch has done. She'll never get a man now. Her rep is tainted. Anybody would be stupid to fuck with her.”

Crystal felt good twisting the knife into the pit of Dink's stomach. If he
was
thinking about fucking with Laci, she hoped she had just made him reconsider.

Dink allowed his anger to boil and continued his conversation with Crystal.

“You gave her crack?” Dink asked. “What kind of shit is that? Where the fuck did you get crack from?”

“Tonette got it from Dame,” Crystal giggled.

“From Dame! He gave her crack for that shit y'all pulled?”

“He didn't give it to her. She snuck it from his stash.”

“What?” Dink said. When one of the links in Dink's chain was weak, it burned him like gonorrhea. If Tonette could take Dame's shit from right up under his nose, then anyone could.

“Yeah. That's how we got the crack. We got it from Tonette, and Tonette got it from Dame.”

“You a cold-blooded bitch,” Dink spat. “To do the shit you did, you can't possibly have a heart. You also put all of your cronies in danger.”

“What? How?” Crystal said as a stroke of fear brushed over her.

“Laci could press charges on y'all. Did you ever think of that?”

“What are you flappin' about?” Crystal tried to brush it off.

“You do know that crack is illegal?”

“So is weed,” Crystal said, like she was telling Dink something new. “Laci ain't gonna say nothin' 'cause them muthafuckas is gonna know she was trying to get high regardless.”

“You crazy,” Dink said. “Let me paint a picture for you, Crystal. Let's say Laci's mother catches on that her daughter's got the itch and decides to get the authorities involved. They're gonna wanna know where she got the crack, and she's gonna point out all y'all stupid bitches,” Dink said in an attempt to scare Crystal. “Then the police will come after y'all, and of course y'all will break. But it doesn't stop there,” he continued. “They'd go after Dame, which would fuck up my money. You see how your little bullshit act of jealousy had the potential of fuckin' me?”

The cat had Crystal's tongue.

“You see where I'm going with this?” he asked. “You always do dumb shit that can come back to bite me!”

“I'm sorry,” Crystal cried. She had forgotten about her initial intention—to steer Dink away from Laci. “I didn't know that it could hurt you. Please believe that I wouldn't have done it if I knew that it would.”

“I don't know, Crystal,” Dink continued, sounding like he was her father. “Every time I turn around, there's something new with your ass.”

“C'mon, baby. You know I'd never do anything to hurt you. I'll make it up to you. I promise!”

“Make it up to me? How you gon' do that?” Dink asked. “And
I don't know if I can trust you anymore. That was some stupid-ass shit y'all did.”

“Don't act like that, daddy,” she pleaded.

“I don't know,” he sighed.

“Please, Dink. Give me one more chance.”

Dink paused as if he was deep in thought before replying. “All right, all right. I may have something that you can do to make it up to me.”

“Just name it, Dink,” Crystal said desperately.

“I might need you to make a delivery.”

“Is that all, daddy?” Crystal said, happy to do it. “Consider it done already.”

“I shouldn't even be talking to your ass, let alone giving you a job. But we just gon' start off with something small till I'm sure I can trust you.”

“Aiight, well, I'll be able to do that with my eyes closed,” Crystal assured him.

“We'll see,” Dink said. “Page me first thing in the morning so I can tell you everything you need to know.”

“Yes, Dink,” Crystal said, eager to please her man.

“Peace.”

“I love you, baby,” Crystal said, but Dink had already hung up the phone.

He had ended his call with Crystal, but he wasn't finished with her by far. Now he was certain that cutting her off on the phone would even be too good for her. She deserved more than that. Oh, hell, yeah. She deserved much more indeed.

S
MURF HADN'T KNOWN
Dame long, but he knew his style. He had arranged for some fresh-faced PYT named Tammi to get at him. He knew exactly how Dame fell prey to new pussy. That nigga would be all over her, trying to play the cool-ass pimp role. And Smurf was absolutely correct in his assumption, because it wasn't long before Dame began to front and offer to take Tammi into the city. He had a night of dinner and a little fun at an expensive hotel in mind. Tammi agreed, as she had planned to. She would get Dame drunk and then make her move.

Tammi was a fine, yellow chick from Yonkers. She was about 5′9″ and built like a stallion. Tammi was a girl that Smurf knew from going to the strip clubs. And she was a bitch that was always down to get money.

During their bar-hopping, Tammi noticed that Dame was carrying a huge knot of money. He kept flashing it, hoping that it would impress her enough to give him some pussy, but all it really did was motivate her to complete what she'd been hired
to do. After bar-hopping, the two ate dinner and headed for the Marriott.

SMURF STROLLED THE
streets of Manhattan trying to kill time. It would be a while before Tammi paged him. He had heard that The Village always held an assortment of females, so he headed down that way.

The West Village was like nothing Smurf had ever experienced. It was colorful and wide open. Same-sex couples walked the streets holding hands and kissing. It repulsed Smurf to see such displays of homosexuality. That was something his mother had always taught him was a sin. But then again, who was she to judge anybody? He blocked her from his mind and kept it moving.

Smurf was cutting across a back street when he thought he saw a familiar car in an alley. As he looked more closely, he confirmed that it was Marco's. He wondered what his fat ass was doing in this neck of the woods. He was just about to approach Marco's car when an unmarked Lumina pulled up behind it. The car didn't bear the markings, but Smurf knew pig when he smelled it. He just lay in the cut and watched.