Read Tales from da Hood Online
Authors: Nikki Turner
“Sure thing, baby,” I called right back out to him.
“Who dat?” Chicago asked.
“Oh, that's my baby, Angel.”
“Oh, that's the new eye candy you was telling us about over at Tabby's. The one you met at the court building?”
“Right, right,” Dee said.
Chicago paused. “Man, you up over there talkin’ business in front of that broad? You ain't no playa.”
“Nigga, you high or something? You know how I get down. And know that I ain't no playa. I'm a pimp. Players get played and pimps get paid.”
“Okay, Bishop Magic Juan.” Chicago laughed.
“You know it. Well, nigga, I'm about to take flight. So, be at the boarding gate in about ten.”
“Okay, my nigga. One!”
Dee hung up the phone and then he started talking to me as if I hadn't been listening the whole time. “I gotta go make this move. Since I've been off da radar for two days, I gotta go hit my little shorty, Chicago, off with some work. I was s'pose to be going up top and I didn't cuz I was wit’ you. And niggas ain't got nothing. So, I'm going to go up to New York to re-up first thing in the morning.”
All of a sudden I felt like a hoochie that he had used and was finished with. I think he could tell I was disappointed by the look on my face.
“Come here, ma,” he said in a comforting tone. I just stood there with the duffel bag in hand. He repeated, “Come here.”
I sat down next to him. He puckered his lips, and I leaned over and gave him a kiss. He grabbed me by the face then and kissed me hard and passionately.
“Okay, well, I know you gotta get going and all,” I said, as if that would be the last time I ever saw him. “I guess I'll see you whenever.”
“You ain't going home.” He leaned in and began to kiss and suck on me, quickly making his way down to my titty. “Just stay here until I get back. And just leave and go home from here in the morning when I get up to go to NY.”
“Okay,” I happily agreed, glad that he trusted me in his house.
“I should be back in an hour or so. Since I don't keep shit here, I gotta go 'cross town and get it. Then I gotta come back this way and meet Chicago.”
“I'll be waiting for you,” I said softly. “You and I have some business we need to finish up.” I winked. “Be careful, baby.”
When Dee left, I got up and made something to drink. For some reason, I couldn't help myself. I began snooping through his things. I wanted to know more about Dee. I was basically searching for female items, underwear under the bed, bobby pins, another toothbrush, anything, but I found nothing. The only thing I came across was the gun in his night table drawer. I wanted so badly to find some more things, but I didn't. See, that's us women, always want to find some shit, but when we do, we can't take it. Since his place had passed the ho inspection, all that was left for me to do was to wait for Dee to return home to me.
I lay up in that house like I had been his bitch from day one, walking around the place like I owned that shit. I flipped through the channels thinking that I would be up all night since I had been lying around in the bed all day. However, after sucking and fucking
around the clock, I was dog-ass tired. Before I knew it I had fell off to sleep.
BOOM, BOOM.
I was awakened by a kicking sound on the door. It sounded like somebody trying to break into the house. Don't you know some dudes was trying to run up in Dee's spot? Was these dudes crazy or what? They were trying to kick the door in like the police.
Now, let me tell you the past couple of nights, I had played the role of gangsta bitch to the fullest, and if I must say so, I did the damn thing, too. But knowing that a nigga or some niggas was on the other side of the door trying to kick it in and do God only knows what to me was something else. I wasn't at home, where I had a baseball bat right beside my bed. I was in a real gangsta's house, where there was a big gun. But the problem was I didn't know how to fire no gun. Daddy took me camping, not hunting.
All that gangsta bitch shit went straight out the window! You best believe that I bitched all up. Let's get this straight, I wasn't born into this. I was sworn into it. I gave an oath, a promise to Dee, but without even thinking, I did what was natural for me, or anybody else with good common sense. I grabbed the phone, and I called 911. That's right! My life was on the line. A square bitch like me wasn't saying, “Fuck da police.” Helllll no! At that point, I needed them. I'm a taxpayer, and the police were here to protect and serve. I needed them to be Johnny on the damn spot.
As soon as the operator said, “Nine-one-one operator, what's your emergency?”
Boom!
I heard the last, final and the loudest sound. I knew the hinges on the door were off. I could hear the door scrape the hardwood floors. Two dudes in black ski masks came charging through the door. For a minute they couldn't see me, but I could see them. I placed the phone under the bed so that the 911 operator could hear what was going on. I tiptoed over to the bathroom that was connected to the bedroom. I quietly got into the
bathtub. My heart was racing like two motorcycles. I cried like I had never cried before, only there were no sounds proceeding from my mouth. I was scared and shaking like a leaf. I had not been in the bathtub a good minute before one of the men came in and snatched the shower curtain down.
“Look a here, look a here,” he yelled. He snatched me out of the tub mercilessly.
The other dude came into the bathroom and in a cold voice said, “Tie that bitch up.”
Following his croney's orders, the first one dragged me into the bedroom, snatched the phone cord out of the wall, and tied me up with it. It was apparent by the way they tied me up in such a flash that this was something they had done before. While I was being tied up, I don't know why, but I guess it was from watching too many Lifetime movies, I said, “You better get out of here. Dee will be back any minute now.”
The dude who had found me in the bathtub, the one tying me up, gave me a cunning look. Then he said, with such pride in his voice, “No, he won't because that lame muthafucka is waiting for me somewhere.”
That's when I recognized his voice. It hit me, and it really hit home. That shit really blew me away because I realized at that moment it was Chicago, his homeboy, his man, and his friend since the sandbox, who was robbing Dee's spot.
As I sat there tied up, Chicago and his accomplice methodically emptied out Dee's safe. Chicago was the same guy who started the beef in the club. If Dee wouldn't have been in the club showing Chicago a good time, then that fight wouldn't have escalated to the shootout at the carnival. Damn, they always say it's the closest ones that get you every time. I suppose that's why you keep your enemies close and your friends even closer.
Chicago came back in the room and started yelling at me, “Where da flav at?”
Shaking and crying with snot running down my face, I replied, “I don't know.”
“Bitch, you lying because when I was on the phone with that nigga, he said he could only give me half and had promised the rest of his shit to someone else, so I know dat nigga got some shit up in here. Where the fuck it at?” I shrugged my shoulders because I really didn't know where the drugs were. “Oh, you gon’ play dumb, huh?” he asked. He paused for a moment as if he expected me to reply, so I obliged him.
“He don't keep it here,” I said between tears. “He just told me that he had to go get it from where he keeps it, then he had to meet you.”
“What da fuck?” he screamed and then paused, shaking his head because Dee was two steps ahead of him. “Guyd damn, that nigga always told me never let yo right hand know what yo left hand is doing. Damn. How da fuck I slept on dat nigga? Can't shit where you eat. Ain't this a bitch?”
I could see that Chicago knew that Dee had played him. He'd thought he had the upper hand on Dee. He'd been sure that Dee was like the average nigga and never took his own advice. I'd been learning over the past couple of days that Dee was far from being the average drug boy.
I was smiling inside, so much that I didn't realize the smile had seeped from my thoughts and covered my face. This must have angered Chicago because the next thing I knew he hit me on the head with the butt of the gun. The pain was like electricity running through my body. By that time it had been a good fifteen minutes, and I had given up on the police. If I hadn't realized that I was in the hood before, I knew that shit now. As I sat there with blood dripping
from my forehead, I thought about all those statistics that I had reported. It was really true about the police taking their time to respond to trouble in the hood. They wouldn't do this in the suburbs. Every second felt like an hour because I didn't know exactly what Chicago's plans for me were.
As Chicago joined his accomplice in getting the money out of Dee's safe, I heard sirens, and at that moment I knew I was scot-free. I prayed that they would simply go and leave me alive. I had seen too many movies where they shot the witness just on general principle. The sirens startled them, and they jumped across furniture to flee.
The first officer on the scene called for backup while the other ran to try to apprehend Chicago and his boy. The police officer untied me, and I ran to the bedroom to slip on my jeans because I was only wearing one of Dee's T-shirts. I guess somehow Dee and I really were connected because I don't know why, but for some reason I thought about the gun in the night table drawer. It was a bigass chrome gun, the same one from the carnival shooting. I wiped it off and went into the bathroom and hummed it out of the window as hard as I could.
As I exited the bathroom, a female police officer entered the room. She wanted to ask me some questions. I told her I was too upset to answer any questions right now. She insisted on escorting me out to the ambulance so that they could check my head where Chicago had hit me with the gun.
Blue lights and blue suits were everywhere. They had even set up a roadblock down the street from Dee's house. Dee had got caught up in the roadblock. One of the fuckin’ cops recognized Dee's truck from a description at an incident reported at the Jefferson Hotel. They snatched his ass, and, of course, he was riding dirty because of the sale he had planned on making to Chicago.
The police asked me a zillion and one questions. It was hard for them to believe, hell, it was even hard for me to believe, that I couldn't give them much information on Dee because I had just met him. And even if I had known anything, I wouldn't give them anything on him anyway. I needed him to trust me. I couldn't help thinking about crazy stuff like whether or not Dee would even remember my last name to put me on his visitors’ list. Then I realized that fuck, I didn't even know his last name. He had so many of them. I'm not even sure if he really gave me his government name or not. He doesn't know my address so he can't write me. All he has is a cell phone number for me and hell, they can't get collect calls. Damn, how could this be? My girls wouldn't believe me if I told them. I have no proof that the past nights even happened. Hell, did it? Maybe I was just living out one of those court cases I had sat in on. Everything seemed so crazy and surreal.
An officer walked me to my car. He asked if I needed an escort home but I told him that I would be fine. As I got in my car, parked outside of Dee's house, I gazed up at his house, which was covered in crime scene tape. Then I drove off.
On my way home my mind was filled with thoughts. I put on my Kirk Franklin CD. After all I had experienced, I needed Jesus. All I could do was keep thanking God for sparing my life.
In the midst of trying to start one particular song over because it was really touching my heart, I made a mistake and hit the wrong button, putting it on Power 92.1 FM. Blaring from my speakers was “Soldier” by Destiny's Child. You know, every superhero has a theme song and so does a down-ass bitch and that just happened to be mine. I listened to all the words, and it was my inspiration. Once the song went off, I looked at the clock in my car. It read 1:36 A
.
M
.
I knew without a doubt that Brandon was probably worried sick about me. I bet he had blown my cell phone up, filling my voice
message box. I started to feel bad about putting him through so much worry. He was a good man. Sweet, kind, and gentle. Maybe he was what I needed in my life. Then I thought again.
As I exited the heart of the hood, I drove by a building that had a line down the street. The top of the building had a neon sign that read Club Zipendale's.
I looked in the mirror and fixed my hair to cover up the bruise from the gun. Without even thinking, I busted an illegal U-turn in the middle of the street. I thought that if I hurried up, I could make it inside the club by two A
.
M
.
before it closed its doors. I knew that at that particular club I could find what I wanted in my life. Fuck that, what I needed! That move right there proved that I, the new and improved bad-ass bitch Angel Delaney, from here on out,
gotta have a ruffneck!
Seven
I was asked to keep my acknowledgments short and simple. At first I laughed because as a writer it's hard for me not to editorialize. Then I thought, how can I thank everybody without leaving anyone out? Then my Lord and Saviour came to mind. He is the reason for everyone in my life, whether for a reason, a season, or a lifetime. He's blessed me with a strong mother and two beautiful black boys. He's blessed me with friends who love me no matter what. He's also placed situations in my path in order to see how I would handle them, and when I thought I couldn't go anymore, it was God who had my back! Having lost my father, brother, nephew, sister, brother-in-law, and several close friends—all to the streets, and having a brother on lockdown for eighteen years, believe me when I say, there were many times when I thought I was going to lose my mind. But late in the midnight hour He saved me! So, for all that I am, for all that I have, for every gift or talent, for every story I write and sell (regardless of how gangsta), for every character I create, I give all praises to God!
The Ghost
I would first like to thank the “Most High” for blessing me with such a wonderful gift. Next, my family and close friends for staying real from the beginning to the end (I got you). “Ms. Lavern,” my dear friend. Last but not least, the Queen, Ms. Nikki Turner. When I called, you answered. I thank you for giving me the opportunity to be heard. You'll always have a friend in me.
Y. Blak Moore
I have to acknowledge The Creator for affording me safe passage thus far. To Lasheka Hasan, Akilah (Killah) Hasan, Briana (Taco) Hasan, Loony, Moo-Moo, and Ham. Thanks, Nikki, for the love. Peace.
Akbar Pray
Although I thought it unusual to make acknowledgments for a short story, I nonetheless knew on some level that I would be remiss if I didn't take this occasion to thank a few of the people, though not all of them, who have been the core of my support both personally and professionally in my literary endeavors. Not necessarily in order of importance I would like to thank and acknowledge Khadijah Ahmid. You have been often my staunchest literary critic but have grown to be one of my dearest friends. On both fronts I thank you. To Valarie Paschall. On the other side of the gun tower you have been my eyes and ears and have helped to bring many of my visions to fruition. You have also been a sweetheart and a reliable friend. Thank you, Val.
To Dirtman (my cellee), you read the reread then read once again the various drafts of this story as I tried to pull it together. Thanks for tolerating the glare of the lights as I wrote in the wee hours of the morning. To Yusuf (my homey), I've been away from the streets for a while and the name of some streets and the locals of some places have often escaped me. Yet, they seem to never have escaped you. Thanks, Sef, for helping me keep my facts straight.
To Julia P. Robinson. To say that you have been invaluable would understate all that you have done and continue to do, albeit slowly. (smile) Last but certainly not least, Attorney Cassandra Savoy, without whom none of my literary endeavors would have been possible, as you have been a constant inspiration in my literary endeavors and my legal pursuits. From the depth of my heart, thank you.