Payback Ain't Enough (10 page)

I bit my bottom lip and said, “My tag fell off.” The way he looked at me when I said that had me shook and feeling like I should have left the shit right there. “I went back for it, and it was gone,” I told him that part under my breath.

“Damn, Shan!” he mumbled. I could hear the disappointment in his voice.

“What was I supposed to do, Nick? The shit fell right into my lap. I wasn’t going to leave it. Would you have left it? Can you help me or not? I need your help,” I pleaded after just showing him all of my cards.

CHAPTER SEVEN

It took me a few days, but I finally got put on. I didn’t meet with Cisco himself, but with one of his lieutenants named Dreamer. I bought a key of coke and told him I needed to speak to Cisco because I heard that he was hurtin’ ’em out here.

“Hurtin’? Hurtin’, muthafucka? Who the fuck is you? Looks like you the one hurtin’ if all you can afford is one key! And you wanna talk to the boss? You better get yo’ broke ass the fuck outta here with that bullshit.” Dreamer gritted his teeth, pushing me like I was some feen who just sucked his dick for a rock. I stumbled back, but as soon as I caught my ground, I pulled out my burner and shot him in the leg.

“Ouch, muthafucka! Owwwshit!” he hollered and groaned as he fell to the ground. “What the fuck is the matter with you?”

“Your ignorant ass must be tired of living!” I snapped as I stood over him and grinded my boot into the fresh bullet wound. I wanted to torture this muthafucka but had to remind myself to chill. I was on an important mission and couldn’t allow my temper to fuck it up.

“AAAAH!” he let out a painful scream as I snatched the pouch that held the loot I had just used to cop the key. “Oh, so now you gonna rob me? You’s a dead nigga!” he yelled at me.

Before he could say another word I applied more pressure to his leg.

“AAAAH, shit, man! What the fuck?”

“You must be the dumbest dope dealer in the ‘D’. Your bitch ass don’t even have a burner or a lookout. I could kill you right now! Get your boss on the phone. Tell him I want to give him his money personally,” I commanded.

“Is you the police?” he asked.

“Hell no, I ain’t the muthafuckin’ police. My ass just got done finishing up a bid,” I told this stupid muthafucka.

“Well, I can tell you right now, he ain’t coming down here to see you.”

“Nigga, you got two choices. I’ll shoot you again and let you lay here and bleed to death, or you can get him down here. It’s up to you.”

We were in the back of a storefront, and it wasn’t even eleven o’clock in the morning. This clown was all by himself, and somebody was ringing the buzzer, probably another customer trying to get some dope.

“Yo, hit the buzzer and tell them to come back later,” this clown had the nerve to tell me.

“Later?” I could only laugh to myself at this fool. I went to the wall and hit the silver button. “Come back later!” I roared into it. Whoever was there buzzed again. “I said come back later! Damn,” I roared again, hoping that whoever it was got the message.

Dreamer had taken off his white tee and wrapped it around his wound. “I’m fuckin’ bleeding, yo!” he bawled out.

“What the fuck do you think you should be doing? Get Cisco down here. Tell him to come alone. Now, muthafucka!” I instructed.

He started laughing as he took his cell out and pressed a button. “He ain’t gonna come here, and if he do, he damn sure ain’t gonna come alone,” he said with confidence.

“Just get the nigga on the phone.” He was really starting to piss me off.

“Ay, I need you to come to the store. This nigga here say he took your money. He said if you want it come and—”

I snatched the phone from this bitch-ass faggot. “Look, dawg, I ain’t trying to beef with you. I’m trying to eat with you. I just came off a seven-year stretch. And once you hear what I have to say, you won’t be mad. Plus, I got your bread and I ain’t giving it to this pussy.” Dude was quiet on the other end. I wasn’t sure if he had hung up or what.

“So you thinkin’ you just gonna take my shit?” he asked me.

“Nah, playboy. I told you it ain’t like that.”

“He shot me!” Dreamer yelled in the background like a bitch in a bedroom.

“I’m here, solo. I got yo’ money. You can either come get it, or I can drop if off to you. You da man. It’s your call.”

“He shot me!” Dreamer yelled out again. “I’m shot!”

“Did he say you shot him? Is that what I keep hearing him say?” he questioned.

“Yeah, that’s what he said. Ya man needed to learn some respect, so I taught him some. He better be glad I needed to holla at you or he wouldn’t be breathing.”

Cisco burst out laughing and asked, “You shot him? Hey, Mook, some nigga shot Dreamer!” he told another dude.

I refused to laugh with him because this nigga was definitely a clown.

“Just to show him how shit is done,” I reiterated.

“Aww, man! I gots to see this! Since you got my attention I’ma check you out,” Cisco said.

That was exactly what I needed to hear so I hung up.

“Nigga, you watch. He ain’t gonna give you no job. Only thing you gonna get is a bullet through your head,” Dreamer called out warning me.

“Man, shut the fuck up before I tape yo’ mouth shut!” I threatened.

“Fuck you, nigga,” he said in his best tough guy voice. So I got up and shot him in the other leg just in case he was thinking about trying something. I found some black electrical tape and some cords. I tied his hands behind his back and taped up his mouth. He was screaming at me as the buzzer and his cell kept ringing. I knew I would have to kill this nigga.

Finally, after about an hour of waiting on “tha boss,” the back door opened and a nigga with dreads stepped in, burners waving in each hand.

“Eat the floor, muthafucka!” he yelled at me.

“Naw, my man. I ain’t the laying-down type nigga. I will
lay my gun down, but that’s about it,” I said standing my ground.

“I said eat the floor, muthafucka!” he spat, and I heard one slip into the chamber.

I slowly slid my gat on the desk. “It’s only peace with me, man. I just want to pay the man what I owe him,” I explained and got on the floor. I would get with this nigga another time.

“I said eat it!” he exclaimed furiously.

As I lay thinking about my face touching this dirty-ass floor, I heard the laugh. I recognized it to be Cisco’s. He was over by Dreamer and pulling the tape off his mouth. Dreamer wasted no time giving his half-assed version of why he was lying on the floor, both legs shot up. I got a little shook when I realized Cisco was no longer laughing. And I no longer had my burner. I had made myself a sitting duck.

The dude with the dreads came over to me, kicked my foot and told me to get up. I did and he frisked me and told me to get against the wall. Out the corner of my eye I saw Cisco approaching wearing a shiny platinum and diamond necklace. He walked over, bent down and got my gat.

The silence in the room was thick until Cisco spoke. “You know what? The only thing worse than a nigga is an incompetent mutherfucker.” Then he walked back over to Dreamer and shot him once in his dome. His brains splattered against the wall.

Point taken.

“The nigga recently made me lose some money,” Cisco said before turning his attention my way. “My man, what’s your story?” he asked me.

“I’ve been home for almost three weeks. I just did seven in
the Feds for trafficking and possession, and I have no time to waste. As you can see with that muthafucka over there. Your money for the key is sitting right there. That’s it, and that’s all,” I explained.

“A key, huh? Who you work for?” Cisco asked.

“I don’t work for anybody. I’m hungry out here,” I told him.

Then after about a half hour of him grillin’ me about what hood I was from, what I did time for, where I did time, who I ran with, he finally got down to business. But not before he had the dread get on the phone and check me out some more.

“Where you set up at?” he asked.

“Nowhere yet.”

“Then how you gonna move a key?”

“I got soldiers waitin’ on this. As a matter a fact, I can come see you in a couple of days. From what I can see, you short on muscle and brains. That cat over there shouldn’t have been here by himself,” I informed him.

“This my spot. I run this all up and down here,” Cisco said, waving his hand as if it were a magic wand referring to the block.

“That’s what’s up. I wouldn’t mind getting in on the action. Plus, word on this same street here is you just suffered a major loss and you know that should have never happened,” I said.

The way Cisco was looking at me, I wasn’t sure if he was going to take me out or what. But I had to put it out there.

Finally he said to his dread, “Yo, Dread! Call Duke and y’all get this nigga’s shit cleaned up.” He pointed to the mess he made from blowing Dreamer’s brains out. “Me and this hungry nigga here gonna make a run.”

My key was in a box inside of a brown shopping bag. I
pointed to it. “That’s mine, and the money is right there,” I had to remind this nigga.

Cisco headed for the door and said to me, “Leave that shit there. It ain’t going nowhere. I damn sure ain’t gonna be ridin’ around dirty. And for the record, I’m only giving you a pass this once for shooting a team member. So, today is your lucky day, hungry man.”

My plan was falling into place perfectly. Dark hadn’t been out a month, and he was already on Cisco’s team. It was on and poppin’. Hooking them two niggas up was like me creating my own Frankenstein monster. Dark had it fixed in his mind that it was going to be a slow grind where he would be moving a key here and there. But hell no! Once Cisco saw how fearless he really was, the shit was over. Cisco kept Dark with him, but they were making things hot because now Cisco felt even more invincible now that the whole Eastside was his. He took over every nigga’s block. The dread who ran the weed spot… dead. Papi who was selling E and coke out of the back of the bodega… dead. The niggas who had the clothes and bootleg DVD’s, CD’s and crack spot were the only ones who bowed down and joined his team. Cisco wanted all the business and all the money. He was greedy. He had Dark working night and day, putting the fear in niggas and putting his own people up in those same spots.

Dark was bringing me bags of cash every single day. He tried to bring me dope, but I told him ‘no thanks’. Then that nigga dropped off a license plate and told me to find out who
it belonged to. I told him I ain’t no damn Department of Motor Vehicles employee and tossed that shit in the garage somewhere.

As I walked up to the door that I had not visited in over seven years I tried to run through my mind how I was going to deal with the woman that would be on the other side. Each step reminded me of the pain that rested behind these walls. My mom, Sandra, was the type of woman that could push ’em out and then kick ’em out in one breath. I love my mom no doubt, but she ain’t shit. I seen more niggas go in and out of this door than go through a prison reception area, and each one of them either beat on us, tried to fuck one of us or just held her attention and distracted her to the point where she neglected to feed and clothe us. No matter what, all five of us still loved and respected her. Now here I was, getting ready to pay my respects. As I walked up the steps I took a deep breath and prepared my mind and my heart.

Buzz. Buzz.
I rang the bell as I stood there with a knot in my stomach and throat.

“Who is it?” I heard the familiar scratchy voice yell from the other side.

“It’s me, Ma,” I answered.

I heard the door opening and then I saw her standing there with one hand on the doorknob and the other up to her mouth as she pulled hard on a Newport long.

“You just coming by here to see me?” She blew the cancerous
smoke in my face. I put my head down and prepared for the bullshit she was getting ready to take me through.

“I just got out. I had to get right before I came to see you.”

“Mmmmmhmmm,” she mumbled as if she didn’t believe me. “Who did you kill
right before
you came to see me?”

“Nobody, Ma.”

“Mmmmhmmm. Didn’t I tell you that temper of yours was gonna land you in somebody’s jail?” She took another drag of her cancer stick. I stared at my moms who looked like she had aged an extra ten years. When I last saw her, she had a few strands of gray hair. Now she had a whole head of gray. “Well, come in, I ain’t trying to cool the whole damn block.”

I stepped up into the house and she closed the door behind me. She turned and headed for the kitchen. I followed as she went to her favorite spot, the same raggedy, cheap, black kitchen table we had since before I could remember. I sat in the chair across from her.

“So what’s up? What you got for me?” she sat and continued to smoke her cigarette as she took a mug to her lips that I was sure was filled with vodka and no frills coffee. I reached into the inside pocket of my jacket and pulled the envelope of money out and slid it across the table.

I watched her take it and look through it with her nose turned up. “This will do for now.”