Gangsta Bitch (3 page)

There was a small cluster of people standing outside the facility waiting for the bus. A woman clutched the hand of her unruly child as he screamed that he didn’t want to leave his daddy. Derrick thanked his lucky stars that he didn’t have children. There was no way he would’ve wanted his child to see him in prison. The moment his charges were rattled off and the iron door to his cell slammed shut he’d decided that any and all things associated with the outside world were as dead to him as he was to them. He even refused visits from those dearest to him. It was a hard pill to swallow, but it would’ve been even harder to do his bid with them on his mind. No, to suffer alone was better than to drag others into misery.

It would be a few minutes before the next bus to the Staten Island ferry came chugging along to pick up the passengers at the end of the line so the freed prisoner decided to do something constructive with his time. Pulling a piece of paper from the pocket of his faded jeans he dropped a quarter in the phone and punched in the number scribbled on it. By the fourth ring he was beginning to get discouraged, but on the fifth someone answered the phone.

“Yeah,” the voice said, as if the caller was disturbing him.

“Inmate Brown, what it be like?”

“Young blood, is that you?” Brown’s voice had lost its edge and was now pleasant.

“Yeah, man. I’m on the streets.”

“Damn, they really overturned your shit?” Brown asked jovially.

“I got the paperwork to prove it, baby boy. Besides, you know the word of a snitch can’t keep a stand up nigga down,” the young man boasted.

“At least in your case, Duce,” Brown joked. “How long you been on the streets?”

“About five minutes, but I’m ready to rock and roll.” Duce assured him.

“You don’t waste any time do you?”

“Dawg, they just stole five years of my life. I can’t afford to waste time when I’m still playing catch up.”

“I hear you, soldier. Tell you what, get yourself settled and give me a call. I got something lined up that you might be interested in, that’s if you’re ready to stomp with the big dawgz?”

“Nigga, you know my heart don’t pump nothing but ice water. Once I get in the town I’ll hit you back so we can set something up.”

“Say no more,” Brown said and hung up.

“One down,” Duce said to no one in particular as he fished around in his pocket for another quarter. He dropped the coin into the slot and punched in another number on the payphone. This time the phone had barely rung twice before someone picked up.

“Yeah?” a voice answered.

“Cousin Reggie, what’s good?” Duce said jovially.

“Who the fuck is this?” Reggie shot back.

“It’s me, Duce.”

“Oh, shit the notorious D-Murder,” Reggie said.

“Come on cuzo that D-Murder shit is for niggaz that ain’t fam, and that cat is laying in the cut until I call him out. You know I’ve always been Duce to you and auntie.”

“Duce, I ain’t heard from you in ages. How’s life on the inside?”

“Shit, I wouldn’t know. I’m on the streets.”

“The streets? I thought they gave you like a hundred years?” Reggie asked suspiciously. Duce was his family, but he’d been there when they handed him the
long walk
at the sentencing.

“It’s a long story, my nigga, but before you even run the risk of offending me with the question, let me give you the answer. I ain’t snitched on nobody,” Duce told him.

“Cousin, I didn’t mean it like…”

“It’s all good, Reg, but check it out, I need a favor from you, son.”

Reggie sucked his teeth. “Duce, I ain’t spoke to you in five years and the first thing you crack on me for is a favor? Damn, just like a nigga fresh out the pen. Look, I ain’t got no bread so…”

“Reggie, you should know better than anybody else that I ain’t ever been strapped for no cash. I had more than enough bread tucked away before I got knocked and my paper game is still up. I need you to get me a pair of them knockoff Timbs in a size nine, can you do that for me?”

By ‘Timbs’, Duce meant
guns
.

“I don’t know, D. You fresh out the joint so I know you’re hot as a fire cracker,” Reggie said.

“Cousin, you know I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t absolutely need it,” Duce said.

“Everything alright, or do I gotta come down and see something for you, cuz?” Reggie asked seriously. He was known to be an asshole, but you could always count on Reggie to step up where family was concerned. They were about the same age and tended to get paired at family gatherings. When Duce and his brother got caught in the double cross, Reggie took it the hardest. Quiet as kept, he played a big part in the increase of bodies in Harlem in the months after Duce’s arrest.

“Yes and no. Listen, it’s a little hard to explain so I ain’t even gonna try. All I’ll say is that I’m putting my brother’s affairs in order, smell me?”

The line momentarily went silent. Reggie had been a running partner of Duce’s brother years ago so he knew the tragic tail without Duce having to rehash it. “A’ight, come uptown and see me tonight and I got what you need, yo.”

“Bet,” Duce said with a smile. “I’ll come through the projects on the later side. Good looking, cuzo,” Duce placed the receiver back on the cradle and exhaled. He had been a free man for less than ten minutes and he was already back up to his old tricks. A smart man would’ve fell back and tried to feel the world out, but not him. There were scores to be settled and the sooner he did, the sooner he could reclaim his life.

“Oh, now this one is hot!”
Mo declared, holding up a cream colored Chanel clutch bag that boasted a gold clamp.

“It’s okay, but a little small for my taste,” Frankie told her, while eyeing a slightly larger bag equipped with a detachable shoulder sling. “This is more my speed.”

Mo placed the bag back on the rack and turned to Frankie. “Girl, you kill me with them big ass
grandma
bags. How you gonna step out in a mean dress with that big ass strap blowing the whole fit? A good clutch will always make a statement; you better get up on it, Frankie.”

“Well, a tiny bag works for those of us who ain’t got much to put in it,” Frankie shot back.

“Yeah, I forgot you got a fetish for chrome, Frankie Five Fingers,” Mo teased. She had acquired the nickname from her knack for making off with things that didn’t belong to her. Ever since they were young girls Frankie had been a skilled thief, a skill that she sharpened in adulthood.

“Don’t go there, bitch,” Frankie warned her playfully. The two childhood friends went back and forth like that all the time. Frankie and Mo had been friends since the eighth grade. Even back then Frankie had a very low key style about her, dressing tomboyish but maintaining a natural sex appeal. Her mind spent more time on money than guys, but Mo was the opposite. She was a high-yellow girl with pretty hair who carried herself as if the world owed her a debt. The way men fawned over her and females hated on her gave Mo a sense of power which she exercised quite a bit. Back in school, Frankie would find herself fighting just about every Friday because of something Mo had gotten them into.

As they matured and their personalities surfaced, the two girls remained thick as thieves but their lives went in two different directions. While Mo went off to school, Frankie found herself knee deep in the game. There was something about the allure and dangers of the underworld that attracted Frankie like a moth to a flame. There was something about fast money that appealed to her more than the life of a square. Frankie couldn’t see herself slaving at a job or being codependent on a man for her survival. Back then, her mind set was that nobody could do for her what she did for herself, but ironically enough it was a man who changed all that.

Their love for each other could’ve only been described as a blessing from God. Two tortured souls, seeking understanding in a world that had cast them aside as little more than statistics. She was the anvil and he the hammer that had formed an unbreakable bond, but foolish pride had done the seemingly impossible. For being his rider, his gangsta bitch, she was left holding the bag in one hand and a bleeding heart in the other. Frankie tried to forgive him and not curse his memory every day, but his mark was etched into her soul. The bitterness within her constantly fought with the love, but through it Frankie managed to keep her sanity, further showing that she was a stand up chick.

Frankie’s cell phone ringing interrupted the girls’ little debate over handbags, and her painful trip down memory lane. Placing her purse on one of the wooden benches, she began the task of retrieving her cell phone. Like most women Frankie kept a mess of things in her purse from lipstick to band aids, but unlike most women there was a nickel-plated .22 holstered in the zippered section of her bag that was reserved for wallets. By the fourth ring she had managed to snatch the phone from the bottom of the bag and answer it.

“Fuck took you so long to answer ya phone?” the caller barked.

“Well, hello to you too, big daddy,” Frankie said sarcastically.

“Frankie, don’t get cute. Where are you?”

“Me and Mo are on Madison Avenue.”

“Y’all broads love to spend cake, especially when it’s the next nigga’s,” the caller remarked.

“Boo, don’t even come at me sideways. You know Frankie makes her own way,” she said defensively.

“Damn, I’m only playing,” he said, softening his tone. “Did you take care of that thing?”

“Yeah, old boy was looking like Rupaul when I breezed up outta there,” Frankie went on to give him the short version of what had gone down with Pete.

“Damn that’s some cold shit, Frankie!” Cowboy doubled over with laughter on the other end.

“Yeah, well I should’ve killed him and
your
ass for me having to kiss that rank breath mutha fucka.”

“You gotta break a few eggs to make an omelet. But fuck all that, how much did you skin that nigga for?”

“Shorts,” she snorted. “You said that mutha fucka was holding, Cowboy, but his lame ass only had about ten thousand in the safe. You couple that with the few ounces of coke and it was barely worth the trouble.”

“Paper is paper, ma.”

“Money isn’t everything, Cowboy.”

“Shit, I can’t tell. You show me a broke nigga and I’ll show you a potential suicide that just ain’t happened yet. I can remember a time when ten stacks felt like a fortune.”

“That was a long time ago,” she replied.

“Wasn’t that long ago, ma. When we first hooked up didn’t neither one of us have much to call our own, but now we’re getting it!”

“If you say so,” Frankie said, thinking on the few hundred thousand she had stashed. It was a respectable nest egg, but hardly enough to pursue the kind of life she wanted. Cowboy was a product of his environment and as long as he had a few dollars coming in, he was content to stay in that environment, but Frankie saw the bigger picture. She knew there was life outside the hood and by hook or crook she was determined to make it.

“Say, before you come back uptown stop by One-Fish and snatch me some crab legs,” Cowboy said.

“And who said I was coming back uptown?” she teased him.

“Where else would you be going? Girl, don’t play wit me. You know I’d kill something over that.”

“I know all too well,” she said, thinking on some of his violent outbursts. “Anyway, we’re gonna be down here for a while so I hope you’re not starving?”

“Only for you, baby,” he said as if he was the coolest cat in the world. “Oh, before I forget, there’s been a change of plans for our date at that spot we were checking out.”

“Here you go with this shit,” she huffed.

“Why don’t you shut your mouth and listen for a minute,” he snapped. “Know-it-all ass female,” he mumbled before continuing. “Yo, we’re breaking Cos’ man in on the caper.”

“Hold on, you mentioned that Cos had somebody he wanted to put down but you never told me you were bringing him in so soon.”

“That’s because I’m running the show. You’re the queen, but I’m the king of this court, ma,” he reminded her. “Anyhow, we’re gonna pop the boy’s cherry on the lick.”

“Baby, I don’t know about this. I mean, Cos is a true soldier, but that doesn’t mean that his man is. There’s too much paper involved to have some rookie nigga fuck it up.”

“I hear you boo, but I trust Cos’ word. He did time with son, and says he’s official tissue.”

Frankie huffed again. “I still don’t like it.”

“It ain’t yo position to like it, Frankie,” he said like a parent reprimanding a rebellious child. “Duke is gonna handle things with us on the inside and you bring up the rear, feel me?” Frankie didn’t respond. “Woman, you hear me talking to you?”

She sucked her teeth. “Yeah, I hear you.”

“A’ight then, I don’t know what’s up with you, but you better get it together before game time. Don’t forget my crab legs when you come neither!” he said, before ending the call.

“Asshole,” she said into the now silent phone.

“Who was that that’s got you so uptight?” Mo asked, fumbling with the ankle strap of a pair of green stiletto heels she was thinking about buying.

“Dumb ass Cowboy,” she grunted, tossing the phone back into her purse. “Sometimes that nigga gets on my last nerve.”

“You sure know how to pick em, Frankie.”

“Tell me about it. Sometimes he can be so sweet, but other times…I don’t know, Mo. It seems like the majority of these niggaz ain’t got a clue.”

“Well, maybe you should bump your screening process up before you decide to get involved with these niggaz.”

“Bitch, I know you ain’t trying to pass judgment?” Frankie asked, with an edge to her voice.

Mo looked at her seriously. “You know me better than that. Look,” Mo stood up, slightly unbalanced because she was wearing one stiletto and one flat, “you’ve been my bitch since back in the days. We’ve seen each other at our highest and lowest points and we know each other’s personalities almost as well as our parents do. Baby girl, I can remember a time when you were on top of the world, because you had finally found someone to make you happy, but it’s like a dark cloud has been hovering over you for the last few years.”