Damn I fucked up again. Ben hung his head in shame.
“Gimme my fuckin’ money and get the fuck away from my fuckin’ car!” Deezo belted out.
Baby Keon started crying from his stroller at the sound of Deezo’s deep, booming baritone. Ben dug down into the baby bag and handed Deezo all the money. He waited by the car window a few minutes waiting for Deezo to give him his cut of the money.
Deezo flipped through the stacks of bills. Then he gave Ben an evil look. “What the fuck is you waitin’ for? You ain’t gettin’ shit off this run. You better be lucky I don’t fuck ya ass up for having that fuckin’ baby out here,” Deezo said.
Ben stood up straight, gathered himself and began pushing baby Keon towards home. As soon as he and Keon were almost at their building, Ben spotted Celeste. She had her arms folded and her face was curled into a monstrous snarl.
“Where the hell did you have my baby at?” Celeste erupted, her voice high-pitched and shrill. Ben ignored her, he was too angry to deal with this shit right now. “I asked you a fuckin’ question Benjamin,” Celeste continued, calling Ben by his Government name, which told him that she was really upset.
“I was fuckin’ at work!” Ben screamed back.
Celeste hadn’t expected his defiance so she was quiet for a second. “You didn’t take my baby to no newspaper route!” she continued to scream. By now, some of their ghetto ass neighbors were watching their altercation. “You think I didn’t see you talking to Deezo!” Celeste belted out, dropping a bomb on Ben.
His eyes widened and he started to feel hot with embarrassment. “So what?” he spat, getting on the defensive.
“So he is a fuckin’ drug dealer and I told you ain’t no child of mine selling no drugs . . . not living up in my house!” Celese screamed.
“Just because I was talkin’ to him now I’m a drug dealer . . . whatever,” Ben replied. He pushed the stroller towards Celeste and turned his back on her.
“Don’t you fuckin’ walk away from me when I’m speaking to you!” Celeste screamed at Ben’s back.
He ignored her ranting and headed in the opposite direction. He needed to get his thoughts together. He didn’t know what he was going to do if Deezo completely cut him off.
Celeste stormed into the building. When she got into the apartment she couldn’t help herself. She was very angry with Ben, but she was more worried that her sixteen year old son might be into hustling drugs. She went into Ben’s room and began tearing it up. “You wanna play with me? I am not to be played with,” she said to herself as she pulled out Ben’s dresser drawers. She sifted through all of his stuff that fell onto the floor. She didn’t find anything accept a few sealed condoms.
Celeste continued her whirlwind destruction of Ben’s room. She emptied every last one of his sneaker boxes. She shook the sneakers out and tossed them onto the floor if they were empty. “This boy thinks his mother is a joke,” she continued talking to herself.
She went to Ben’s tiny closet and started pulling stuff off the hangers and top shelf. She still didn’t find anything that suggested that Ben was selling drugs. “I know where to look!” she beamed, having an ah-ha moment. She rushed over to the bed and struggled with the heavy mattress as she turned it over.
“This bastard thinks I’m stupid! His ass probably ain’t been to no fuckin’ newspaper job,” Celeste stated as she strained to get the mattress off the bed. When it finally fell over, Celeste was disappointed that she didn’t find anything under it. She was on a mission. She continued to destroy Ben’s room. She walked over to his nightstand and picked up his newspaper bag. She examined it. She peeked inside, but there was nothing inside the bag except an empty, balled up plastic baggie. She balled the bag up and put it under her arm.
“How he go to work and his newspaper bag laying right here. I’ma keep this shit and let me see how long it take him to look for it,” Celeste said to herself out loud. She had seen Ben leave everyday with his bag, but not today. “Just because he took the baby wouldn’t mean he wouldn’t need his bag . . . he think he slick,” Celeste continued.
She had made herself exhausted going through Ben’s room and belongings. She hadn’t found anything of substance that pointed to Ben selling or using drugs. “He better be lucky I ain’t find no bullshit up in here,” she said.
She took Ben’s bag and hid it in the closet in her room. She wanted to see how long it was going to take before Ben asked or looked for it. Although she expected to find drugs, Celeste was really secretly relieved deep down inside that Ben might’ve been telling her the truth. She reminded herself that the next time she saw her no-good ex-boyfriend, Deezo, she would be sure to tell him to stay the fuck away from her son. Celeste and Deezo had history and she hated the very ground he walked on.
It had taken a few days but Deezo finally started speaking to Ben again. When he calmed down, Deezo realized that taking a baby with him to do drops wasn’t the worst thing Ben could’ve done. At least Ben was focused and determined enough to still go after the loot.
“Yo son, I’ma give your little ass this last chance. That baby shit was your second chance . . . one more strike and your ass is out,” Deezo said, his tone grave and serious. He couldn’t let Ben know that it was all good. Deezo would never admit he reacted too fast and harsh and made a mistake.
Ben immediately felt better. When he had taken the baby out with him, all Ben was trying to do was make sure he met his commitment to Deezo. “I’m sorry Deezo, I was just tryna make sure your paper got collected and the shit got out there,” Ben explained apologetically.
Deezo nodded in agreement. “We back on track and shit. Instead of every couple of days, I need you to stash and bag and get that shit out every day now. These niggas won’t let me rest over that good good,” Deezo told Ben.
Ben was happy as hell inside, but he tried to play it cool.
“You got the potential of making some real good paper off this lick right here. You better getcha mind right and stay focused,” Deezo said, playfully slapping Ben upside his head. Ben gave Deezo a half-hearted smile. “Go get a new package from Quan. I’m sure you hungrier than a muthfucka since you ain’t made no loot in a few days.”
Ben shook his head. He didn’t have much to say. When he got out of Deezo’s car, he felt like he would vomit. How the fuck am I going to handle stashing and bagging every single day? Ben thought to himself. He knew his mother was already growing more and more suspicious of his “work” since he was doing a lot more shopping. He was going to have to be very, very careful. He was caught up now. He felt like he was in the middle. If he got caught with drugs in the house his mother was going to call the police on him herself, as she had threatened more than fifty times. If he didn’t agree to stash, bag and drop the heroin for Deezo, he knew he’d be considered a sucker and Deezo would stop letting him get money.
Ben was at a crossroads in his life and unfortunately, he had nobody to turn to for advice on which road to take. He did what he knew best, he took the road he thought was going to keep him fed and clothed. He met up with Quan and picked up another large package of heroin. This time the gallon sized baggie was almost full.
“Deezo said to bag these small nicks and dimes with only a few twenties here and there. Deezo is upping the price on this shit,” Quan told Ben. Ben nodded his agreement but didn’t say much more. “Deezo said you can possibly make fifteen stacks off this one bag alone, so you better not fuck nothin’ up,” Quan warned Ben.
Fifteen stacks! Ben screamed inside of his head. That was more money than he had ever dreamed of making in his short life. He grew excited. He was sure nothing would go wrong. He stuck the bag down into the front of his pants and gave Quan a pound.
“Tomorrow, have that shit bagged and ready to go,” Quan continued. “Deezo ain’t gon care if you gotta sit up all night and bag that shit up. Just have it ready. Remember that is raw, uncut shit, straight from Asia, and it ain’t no fuckin’ joke.”
Ben left and went straight home. It was time to start the stash and bag process all over again. He could only hope that things go smoothly. He wanted to please both his mother and Deezo, but they were polar opposites. Speed walking on his way home, Ben was kind of proud that Deezo didn’t really trust any of his other younger workers to handle such a large amount of weight. He knew that Quan was Deezo’s right hand man, but Quan had moved too far up to be stashing, bagging and dropping weight off. He smiled a little bit when he thought about his new role. He was officially Deezo’s heroin boy.
A Sucker 4 Candy Amaleka McCall
Chapter 5
Present Day
“Let’s go!” one of the detectives’ voice boomed from behind Ben. The deep, base filled sound snapped Ben out of his daydream. He had been reflecting on how this entire nightmare had gotten started. He shook his head left to right trying to get the memories to go away.
“I need to put my clothes and shoes on,” he complained to the detective.
Ben was trying to buy some time. He needed to get into his bedroom and grab all of the money he had stashed away. He had heard one of the cops say something about a search warrant and Ben knew if he didn’t grab the money he’d been stashing away, those cops would get it and act like they had never seen it before.
“Hurry up and get your clothes on fast! We need to get out of here,” the detective instructed.
“Why I gotta go with ya’ll anyway?” Ben nervously protested.
There was no way he could leave his building with detectives and let Quan and the rest of the corner boys see him. Ben knew the word in the hood traveled fast and that him being seen with cops would get out to Deezo faster that the speed of light.
“Look, don’t ask no more questions. Get your clothes on before I make you go like that,” the detective answered irritated.
Ben rushed into his room. The detective stood by the door while Ben got dressed. Ben was able to secretly get all of his money before the detective noticed.
“We didn’t do shit! How could ya’ll treat a grieving mother like this,” Celeste cried as they prepared to escort her out of her apartment.
“Look, if both of you wanna get froggy we can slap these cuffs on you for our own security. It doesn’t have to be an arrest for us to do that, you know. Right now, we just wanna talk to you both down at the station . . . just questioning,” one of the detectives said deceitfully.
Ben rushed back into the living room. He had put on a pair of jeans, a new pair of kicks and his money had been split between each shoe, and his jeans pocket.
“Hmm, those jeans look pretty expensive for a boy whose mother is on welfare,” the same lead detective commented.
Ben squinted his eyes. He didn’t have any respect for cops. Shut the fuck up, you hater, he thought to himself. Like most boys in his neighborhood and all over Brooklyn, he had been taught to despise and never trust cops. It had been drilled in his head that all cops were crooked, even if they were members of your immediate family. Ben believed it too. He had witnessed many of his friends get stopped and frisked on the streets for absolutely nothing. Even if they were drug dealers, in his eyes, the cops had no reason to constantly harass his buddies. Now they were harassing him and his mother, which only made his feelings toward them worse.
“Like I said before, let’s get the fuck out of here. You two can either go the nice way or the hard way,” the other detective chimed in.
With tears soaking her face, Celeste followed the first detective out of the apartment. She didn’t have any energy to fight them. She kept thinking about her dead baby, Keon, and she didn’t have anything to hide.
Ben stood stoic, ice grilling the cop like he was a tough guy. The second detective pushed his trench coat aside and showed Ben his gun. The detective rested his hand on the top of the gun and looked at Ben with an evil glare.
“It don’t matter . . . if you don’t kill me, somebody else will anyway,” Ben said gravely in response to seeing the gun.
“Just c’mon Ben. I can’t stand to lose another child, my only child left,” Celeste pleaded, noticing Ben’s defiance. His mother’s words spurned Ben into action. He stepped out of his apartment and the detective was right behind him.
When they got outside, Celeste noticed that the word about Keon’s death had already spread throughout the neighborhood. There was a makeshift shrine of balloons, teddy bears and candles set up outside of her building with little signs saying Rest In Peace. That made Celeste break down even more.
“Oh God! My baby is gone!” Celeste cried out. She doubled over like she was in pain, the fresh cut of her grief rushing back. Her sedatives had fully worn off. The detectives helped her up, by placing their hands on her and helping her to the car.
Ben followed them with his head down. He didn’t want to look up or look around. He was too scared that he would see some of Deezo’s boys or worse, Deezo himself. There was a small crowd gathered outside. Once Celeste was in the car, one of the detectives grabbed Ben and put him in next. Although Celeste or Ben weren’t in handcuffs, the way the detectives placed them in the police car, it looked to everybody in the neighborhood like Celeste and Ben had been arrested. Hushed murmurs of speculation wafted through the growing crowd. People started whispering things like, I think she killed her baby, and maybe the other son killed the baby and she allowed it. The entire incident was like a major tragedy in the eyes of their neighbors. First, her baby dies, and now, Celeste and her older son get arrested. The rumors were flying for sure.
Ben could feel the eyes of his ghetto neighbors on him. He felt as if he was in a big fish bowl on display for everyone to see.
“Ben, what happened? Did you have something you wasn’t supposed to have?” Celeste leaned over and whispered to him in the back of the police car. Ben shook his head in the negative, while he watched the backs of the detective’s heads. After he thought back on his start in the drug game and recounted all the warnings and close calls he’d had with Deezo, he realized this would be his third strike with Deezo. Something Deezo had already warned him about.