S
HARELL SAT
on a plastic lawn chair in the backyard, trying to relax, but it wasn't working. Gutter had surprised her with the dream house they'd always wanted, but the circumstances surrounding her being there are what had her on edge. In all the years she'd known Gutter he'd been gang-related, but he never brought it home to her. His street life was kept in the streets, but they should've known it'd only be a matter of time before the two worlds collided.
It had all happened so fast that she hadn't fully had a chance to process it. She had just known that she and Satin were living their last night when that man had them at gunpoint, but through the grace of God she was able to get to her equalizer. She felt bad about shooting that boy, but he was lucky she didn't finish his ass for punching her in the face. Her jaw was swollen and bruised, but in time the wound would heal. What troubled her was that two more young men were dead.
Just thinking about Mohammad made her sad. When Sharif
had taken him she was sure that Mohammad was dead, but there was hope in Sharif's eyes. Even if he was still hanging on, the amount of blood Mohammad had lost would've surely sealed his fate before they could get him medical attention. She would never forget his act of selflessness and would keep Mohammad in her prayers.
“You okay?” Satin asked, coming out into the backyard, carrying a platter with two teacups and a kettle on it.
“I should be asking you that.” Sharell smiled. “Satin, you should be resting, not trying to mother me; I get enough of that from Gutter.”
“It's okay.” Satin took the chair next to hers and sat the platter on the ground between them. “I'm just trying to get back into the swing of life. Besides, you're eating for two.” She reached out and touched Sharell's stomach.
“I'm not the only one.” Sharell pointed at Satin's stomach. “Looks like we'll be fat and ugly together.”
“Yeah,” Satin said weakly, and rubbed her stomach.
“What's wrong?”
Satin shook her head. “I don't know. When Lou-Loc was killed I felt like my will to live died with him. I wanted to curl up into my mind and never come out, and then I find out about this.” She gestured toward her stomach. “The same man who gave me a reason to die turns around and gives me a reason to live.”
Sharell smiled at her. “Lou-Loc was always trying to help people; even in death he's proved that.”
Satin lowered her head for a minute. When she looked back up to Sharell there were tears in her eyes. “I miss him so much, Sharell, that it hurts.”
“I know, baby.” She patted her hand. “Lord knows that men like Lou-Loc are a blessing, but at the same time the lifestyles we lead
always hold consequences. He lived by the gun and so it was by the gun that he died. We will all miss him, but thanks to your love his legacy will live on.”
“You ladies, okay?” Pop Top stuck his head out the sliding glass doors. He and Hollywood had arrived that morning.
“We're good, Pop Top, thank you,” Sharell told him.
“A'ight, let me know if you need anything.” He smiled and disappeared back into the house. Gutter had sent him to relieve Anwar and his men from guard duty. The young Prince offered to leave some of his soldiers at the house, but Pop Top assured him that he and Hollywood would be okay without them.
“That one gives me the creeps,” Satin told Sharell, thinking how every time he smiled it reminded her of a crocodile before it yanked some unsuspecting prey under the water.
“Pop Top is kind of crazy, but he's a loyal soldier. If he wasn't Gutter wouldn't have even sent him.”
“Speaking of which, when is he due back?”
Sharell looked at her watch. “Sometime tonight. He, Danny, and his nephew are supposed to be flying back after the funeral but they might have to catch a later flight because something else came up.” She thought back to the conversation she'd had with Gutter a few hours prior when he notified her that Rahkim had been murdered. He didn't offer any details, but Sharell had an idea of what had happened.
“That man has been through so much, I don't know how he holds up under it all,” Satin voiced.
“Gutter is a warrior. For as many times as I thought the Lord was going to call him home he's still with me.”
“That's love.”
“Not love so much, Satin, as God's will. For as fucked-up a person as Gutter may seem to be, he's here for a purpose, this I'm sure
of. It's gonna take some time, but he'll find his way. We're gonna see to that because we're family and family looks out for family, right?”
Satin smiled. “Right.”
“Now, let me go in here and see what we're gonna have for dinner. If we leave it up to Pop Top or Hollywood we'll be eating from the cat kitchen.” Sharell got up and went into the house, leaving Satin to contemplate the rest of her new life.
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“EVERYTHING A'IGHT?”
Hollywood asked Pop Top, who had just come in from checking on the ladies.
“Yeah, they having a tea party or some shit.” He flopped on the couch. “You got any more of that purp on you?”
“You know that, fam. I stopped through five-six before I shot out.” Hollywood produced a White Owl from his pants pocket and a fifty sack. He tossed the cigar to Pop Top and proceeded to break the sticky weed up on a magazine.
“Fuck is up wit you and these White Owls, you don't smoke Dutches no more?” Pop Top teased him.
“Man, you know the proper way to smoke piff is in a White Owl,” Hollywood informed him. “Say man, when are the rest of the homeys getting here?”
“I don't know, sometime this afternoon. What, you scared or something?” Pop Top joked.
“Never that, but I thought this was the rally point? Ain't too much of a rally if it's just us two.”
“Young Wood, you don't need no army to win a war. All you need is two or three niggaz down to ride and a few of these.” He held up a chrome pistol. “Now hurry up wit the bud, I'm ready to get high.” Pop Top reclined in the chair, cracking the blunt over a
paper bag. There would be a rally in Long Island, but not the kind Hollywood's bitch ass was expecting.
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THAT MORNING
was a slow one in Harlem. The normally active streets of Harlem were still and quiet. Between the police and the escalating gang feud, people had made themselves scarce. Bruticus was dead, along with Young Rob and China. C-style was nowhere to be found and Pop Top had disappeared to Long Island. He'd tried to persuade High Side to come along, but he wasn't trying to hear it. Being that there was no one on the streets they were wide-open for him. At his usual post, on a crate in front of the bodega on 142nd and Lenox, High Side watched the traffic for a potential sale and the ever-present police.
“Young Side, what it is?” Don B. asked, ambling up to the corner. Don B. was a former hustler who had turned rapper-CEO. Back then, before the events in
Hood Rat, Still Hood,
or
Section 8,
Big Dawg Entertainment was still a fledgling company with Don B. as its only act. But little did either of them know at the time that Big Dawg would not only grow into a multimillion-dollar label, but it would be in the center of a controversy surrounding several murders.
“Don, what da deal my nigga.” High Side slapped him five. “I'm surprised to see you on the streets of Harlem. I thought you moved to Switzerland or some shit since you a rapper now,” High Side teased him.
Don B. wiped his nose with his thumb. “Switzerland is my summer home, young'n, Harlem is my kingdom. Speaking of niggaz getting ghost, I'm surprised to see you out here.”
“I'm on my grind, fam, you know how I do.”
“I hear that, but the way I hear it Harlem has been having some
problems. They say that Gutter is done and it's about to be a new day.” Don B. said smugly. He had never had much love for Gutter or his blue-clad soldiers.
“Don't believe everything you hear, Don. Harlem is still as strong as ever. But fuck the socializing, what you need?”
Don B. smiled, knowing that he had plucked High Side's nerves. “I need an ounce of that Barney.”
“Is that right? What's the matter, them Spanish niggaz up the hill ain't taking your money no more?” High Side asked.
“Son, my money is universal but my man ain't around right now, so I gotta settle for the shit y'all slinging.”
“I hear that hot shit, cuz.”
“Watch that cuz shit, High Side. You already know I ride under the five.”
“But yo ass is spending money under the six,” High Side pointed out.
“Whatever, duke. You got what I need or what?”
“We always got that, but you gotta give me few ticks for an ounce, homey,” High Side told him, pulling out his cell to bleep his man.
“Fuck kinda drug dealer is you where the customers gotta wait? Nigga, when I was out here we had it clicking twenty-four seven.”
“Well, you ain't on the block no more. Lou-Loc and them niggaz ran all the tampons outta Harlem.” High Side said it in a joking manner, but there was a taunting undertone to his voice. Don B. was a Blood, but that wasn't the reason High Side hated him; he hated Don B. because he'd managed to put the hood behind him and make something of himself. In Don B. he saw two things that he would never become: legitimate and successful.
In a rare show of anger Don B. removed his sunglasses and glared down at High Side. “First of all, little nigga, can't nobody
run me outta nowhere. And second of all, before Lou-Loc and Gutter came on the scene, you and Pop Top was two bum-ass niggaz begging for somebody to give you a pack to pump. Don't try to play me, son.”
“Times have changed, baby boy, and a nigga all grown up.” High Side flashed his burner.
Don B. wasn't a sucker, but he wasn't stupid. He knew how cats like High Side were on it. A hating muthafucka didn't need much of a reason to try and kill you. “I hear you talking, fam. Tell you what, why don't I come back in about twenty minutes to pick that up.”
“Yeah, why don't you do that,” High Side said as he watched Don B. walk away. He knew good and well that Don B. wasn't coming back and he didn't care. He might've passed up five hundred dollars on the sale, but at least he got to chump Don B. He couldn't wait to tell the homeys.
High Side's attention was drawn from Don B. when a Black Lincoln rolled to the curb. The Senegalese taxi driver kept his eyes straight ahead while the tinted back window rolled down a bit. High Side was about to go for his gun until he saw the pretty Latino girl's face in the back. “How do we get to Harlem Hospital?” she asked in deep, yet sultry voice.
He smiled and got off the crate to get a better look at the girl, neglecting to pick up his gun. “Yeah, baby. Just keep going down Lenox and you'll run right into it.” When High Side raised his arm to point, he saw a swift movement behind the girl. By the time he realized what was about to go down the bullet had passed through his armpit and out his shoulder. Soon the pain would come, but right then the fear and adrenaline made him numb. Spinning on his heels, High Side took off down Lenox Avenue.
“Move, bitch!” Major Blood snarled, crawling over the Spanish girl's lap and spilling awkwardly to the sidewalk. High Side had a
good head start, but he was a wounded animal with a predator on his trail.
High Side could have won the hundred-yard dash for the way he bolted down Lenox. He had made it to 140th before the cigarettes and the damage to his arm kicked in. He went from a full-out sprint to a jog, seeming to get slower every few yards. Normally there was always a police presence uptown, but when he needed them they were nowhere to be found. As he darted out into the street and a car put him in orbit he wished he'd listened to Pop Top and had went to Long Island. By that time his arm had gone completely numb so when he landed on it he didn't feel much, but when his head bounced off the concrete the world swam.
High Side found himself in a pretty place. The prettiest green buds sprouted from the streetlights, which had become giant Dutch Masters. He was admiring a cognac waterfall, contemplating a drink, when another sharp blow brought him back to the real world. When his vision cleared he found himself staring at what looked like a yellow-skinned devil.
Major Blood yanked High Side to his feet by the front of his shirt. “Y'all should've listened when I told you to shut it down.”
High Side swayed like a rag doll in Major Blood's grasp. “Fuck you, chili bean. Pop Top is gonna smoke your ass for this!” he spat.
Major Blood sneered at him. “How the fuck do you think I knew where to find you?” he lied.
Hearing of his friend's betrayal gave High Side renewed strength. He thrashed about, trying to shake Major Blood off, and only when he was slapped viciously across the face did he go still again. “I'll see you in hell!” High Side literally spat at Major Blood. A line of bloody phlegm ran down the side of Major's face, but he didn't seem to mind.