Concrete Rose, page 23
I hope that wherever Dre is, he hear the gunshot when I pull the trigger and know that his li’l cousin always got his back.
The sun gone down by the time I make it to Rose, and darkness taking over the park. Most of the light poles been shot out by the set. You can’t do the kinda work they do under a light or the cops might see.
The only pole that works is at the basketball court. I stare that way too long, and I swear there go me, Dre, King, and Shawn hooping a few months ago. That seem like another lifetime.
In this one, I got unfinished business to handle. I watch from behind a tree as Red load his trunk up with merchandise in the parking lot. He whistle a li’l cheery-ass tune that got no business coming from a killer’s lips. His last customer pulled off a few minutes ago, leaving just me and him in the park.
I’m meant to do this.
I wrap my bandana around my face from the nose down and take my gun from my waist. It’s cold and heavy; so is the feeling in my gut.
But when it comes to the streets, there’s rules.
Nobody will ever write them down, and you’ll never find them in a book. It’s stuff you need in order to survive the moment your momma let you out the house. Kinda like how you gotta breathe even when it’s hard to.
If there was a book, the most important section would be on family, and the first rule would be:
When somebody kills your family, you kill them.
My heart race like I’m on the run from something. Instead, I walk to it.
Red don’t see me coming up behind him. He lift a box of CDs off the ground. As he straighten up, I press the Glock to the back of his head.
“Don’t make a fucking move,” I growl.
The box fall outta Red’s hands. He raise his arms high, like he praising the Lord. “Shit! Don’t shoot, don’t shoot!”
“Shut up!” I say, deeper than I normally talk “Get on your goddamn knees and keep your hands up.”
He slowly drop down with his hands raised above him. “Please, don’t shoot me,” he whimpers. “I’ll give you whatever you want. I got a kid, man.”
The shakiness in my legs find its way to my fingers. I grip the gun tighter. “You should’ve thought of your kid before you killed the homie!”
I can’t say Dre’s name or my voice might give me away.
“I don’t know what you talking about!”
“You shot the homie in the head!”
“Nah, man! I – I – I – I didn’t – I didn’t—”
I cock my gun and press it harder against his skull. “You gon’ stand there and lie to me?”
Red let out an ugly sob. “Please, don’t shoot me! I got a kid!”
“The homie had a kid, too!” He also had a brother. “You took him over some dough and a watch! Matter of fact, hand me that watch now. I swear to God if you make a wrong move, I’ll blow your brains out.”
Red shake from all the crying. He slip the watch off his wrist and hold it up. I snatch it outta his hand.
“Your time’s up,” I tell him.
“Oh God,” he cries. “Please, God. Please, Jesus.”
While he beg for mercy, I pray that God let me forget this.
I rest my finger against the trigger. I got the power to make Red stare at nothing. Have his blood and his brains leaking onto the concrete.
I just gotta do it.
I just gotta finally be my father’s son.
I.
Just.
Gotta.
Squeeze.
CHAPTER 28
Even killers can get their prayers answered.
CHAPTER 29
The neighborhood blur past me as I run with tears in my eyes. The gun, back on my waist. The bandana, I ripped it off a block ago. Red…
Gone.
The lights glow in Lisa’s window at Ms. Rosalie’s house, and muffled R&B music play inside. I knock against the glass twice.
The curtain pull back, revealing Lisa with a frown. “Maverick?”
She lift her window. I pull myself up and climb through, headfirst. I scramble to my feet and hug her, sobbing.
“Maverick,” she croaks. “What’s wrong?”
I cry too hard to talk. Lisa lead me to her bed, and we sit down together. All I can do is bawl my eyes out.
“Mav, talk to me,” she pleads. “I’ve never seen you like this. What happened?”
“I can’t,” I hiccup. “Ms. Rosalie and Tammy might hear—”
“They’re at a church program,” she says. “It’s just you and me. Talk to me. Please?”
It’s the “please” that break me. I swallow hard. “I … Lisa I … I know who killed Dre.”
Her eyes widen. “What? Oh my God, who?”
“Red.”
Lisa just blink at first. “Wait, hold on. Do you mean – Red as in Brenda’s—”
“Yeah.”
Silence.
I wipe my face on my sleeve. “That day he came over here with Brenda and Khalil, I noticed he was wearing Dre’s watch. I went and did my own investigation. He did it, Lisa. He killed my cousin. So tonight, I walked up on him in the park.”
She take in a sharp breath. “Did you—”
I stare at my kicks. “I had the gun pointed to his head and everything. And I…” My voice crack. “I couldn’t pull the trigger.”
Silence again.
Ain’t no coming back from this one. I’m worse than she thought. I’m the thug her momma and her brother always make me out to be. I’ll be lucky if she ever look me in the eye again.
Minutes that seem like days pass.
Lisa fold her arms under her chest. “Why didn’t you do it?”
“I thought of my kids, my momma, and … and you. What it would do to y’all if I got caught or killed.” I close my eyes. Tears slip outta them. “I’m such a fucking coward.”
“No,” Lisa murmurs. “You sound like a man to me.”
I look at her. “How? That fool murdered Dre, Lisa. And what I do? I let him run away. What kinda justice is that?”
“It wouldn’t have been justice if you threw your life away to kill him.”
I almost laugh. “My life ain’t worth much. I just didn’t wanna put my babies through that. I know what it’s like not to have a father around.”
“So, you’re saying your kids deserve to have you?” Lisa asks.
“Straight up? They deserve better.”
Lisa take a deep breath and rub her little bump. “You know … I still believe in you, Maverick. I – we need you to believe in yourself.”
I look at her. “You do?”
“I do.”
It trip me out that she can say that after what I almost did tonight. It’s like Lisa see this version of me that nobody else do. This Maverick who ain’t worried ’bout the set or the streets, and who do something worthwhile with his life. I wanna be that dude. Not the one sitting in a prison, telling my kids that I got regrets.
I guess it’s like Mr. Wyatt says. The apple don’t fall far from the tree, but it can roll away from it. It simply need a little push.
I place my hand on Lisa’s stomach. It’s quivering again, like a fish swimming around in it. My lips turn up a little. “He real active tonight, huh?”
“Yeah, she is.”
I laugh and roll my eyes. “Yeah, a’ight.”
I rub her belly. Months ago, Dre told me the story of the first time he held Andreanna. He said he cried, ’cause she was stuck with him for a father. I understand that more every day.
He also said he wanted to be the father she deserved.
I think I get that now, too.
I got some things to handle.
Ma and Moe asleep on the couch where I left them.
Moe stretched out with her back against the arm of the sofa, and Ma cuddled up alongside her. Their arms tangled up like they fell asleep hugging. I grab the throw blanket from the recliner and lay it over them. Then I head to the bathroom and close the door behind me.
My drug stash should be under the cabinet where I left it. I get on my hands and knees, and I grab the Ziploc bag from behind the pipe. It’s full of smaller Ziplocs that have coke, crack, and weed in them.
I may not be shit, but there’s some shit I don’t wanna do anymore. Selling drugs at the top of that list. I’ll give this back to—
Two loud knocks rattle the bathroom door.
They scare the shit outta me.
The Ziploc bag fall from my hands.
And land in the toilet.
Weed start to float around in the toilet bowl.
And some of the coke and crack rocks start to dissolve.
“Shit!” I hiss.
“Maverick?” Ma calls on the other side of the door. “You all right?”
Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit.
I fake a moan. “Yeah. Give me a minute. My stomach kinda to’e up.”
“I keep telling you to eat more vegetables,” she says. “Don’t forget to spray. Other people use this bathroom besides you.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I say as I stick my hand in the toilet. Half the goddamn bag either floating or dissolving. I save what’s left and dry the Ziploc off with paper towels.
I can’t just walk outta here with it. I stick it in the front of my pants and pull my hoodie over it. God, please don’t let Ma notice.
I flush the toilet, sending half my stash swirling down the pipe, and I spray the air freshener. I open the door with the best smile I can manage. “My bad, Ma.”
“You’re fine,” she says.
We stare at each other. She raise her eyebrows.
“Oh, my bad.” I step aside and let her in.
I’m frozen outside the bathroom. I swear, my lungs done stopped working. Please God. Please, please, please don’t let her see anything.
The toilet flush again. The bathroom door open. Ma come out, wiping her hands with a paper towel. “Why are you still standing here?” she asks.
I breathe again. “Nothing. I wanted to say good night.”
“Oh, all right. You sure were gone a while. What took so long?”
“Lisa needed me,” I say, which is the truth. She still do.
“Is she okay. Is the baby—”
“Everything’s fine, Ma. You can go back to sleep.” I kiss her cheek. “Good night.”
“Good night, baby.”
I watch her go back to the living room. I’ll let her get her rest tonight. Tomorrow, I’ll tell her I can’t graduate. It’s time to own up to that.
I carefully open my bedroom door, so I don’t wake Seven. It don’t matter, he standing in his crib, sucking his pacifier. He see me and start bouncing, reaching his arms out.
I tear up. Man, I done turned into a crybaby. I need to get my shit together, for real.
I pick him up. “Hey, man. What you doing awake, huh?” I kiss his temple. “You waiting on Daddy?”
He play with the string on my hoodie. Can’t lie, I’m as scared as I was that first day I held him. Don’t know if that feeling gon’ ever go away. Forget the world; he should have the sun, the moon, and all the stars, and they wouldn’t be enough.
I’m definitely not. I’m a gangbanging, high school flunk-out who only seventeen. But you can bet that I’m gon’ do my best to be whatever he need.
I press my forehead against his. “Daddy almost messed up tonight. You saved me, man. You and your li’l brother – or sister. I thought of y’all and I couldn’t do it.”
Seven more into my hoodie string than anything I’m saying. Good. He shouldn’t know how close I came to failing him.
I kiss his eyebrows. “I won’t let you down. You got my word.”
I lay him back in his crib and turn on his mobile, so he can watch a moon and stars like the ones that should be his.
Damn, I’m tired. The adrenaline rush from earlier must’ve drained me. I untuck the Glock and the Ziploc bag from my waist, and I hide them in the shoebox in my closet. I throw myself onto my bed and close my eyes, but they quickly open again.
I gotta tell King what happened to his drugs.
The sun not fully out when King park in front of my house. I called him last night and asked him to meet me first thing this morning.
He gon’ be beyond pissed that I flushed his drugs. I doubt pissed even the right word. That had to be a couple grand’s worth of product. If this was anybody else but King, I might end up six feet deep. He probably gon’ beat my ass, homies or not.
Goddamn. I’ll have to pay him back, but I got no idea how the hell I can get that kinda money. I’m in deep shit.
I wipe my clammy hands on my shorts and close the front door behind me. Ma, Moe, and Seven asleep. There’s a damp spot on my tank top from where Seven drooled on me. He didn’t wanna stay in his crib last night, and I let him lay on my chest. It was the only way either of us was gonna fall asleep.
I hop in King’s Crown Vic and dap him up. “Thanks for coming over so early.”
“Fa’sho,” he says hoarsely. He must not’ve been woke long. “I need to be up and at it anyway.”
Pops used to get up before the sun rose. He’d say, “Fiends don’t sleep, and neither can I.” It’s wild how normal he made some stuff for me.
“So what’s up?” King asks. “You said it’s important.”
“Yeah. First, I wanna return this to you.” I set the Glock in the cupholder. “I don’t need it anymore.”
King pick it up and examine it. “Did you use it?”
“Red didn’t do it,” I say.
“What? But you—”
“Drop it, King.” I look at him. “Red didn’t do it.”
Don’t get it twisted – I’m not doing this for that coward. Red gon’ get his one way or another, that’s how karma work.
“If you say so.” King set the gun on his leg. “I’m honestly glad you hit me up. I wanted to talk to you.”
“Word?”
“Yeah. I want us to take over the set’s drug operations.”
I do a double take. “What?”
“P-Nut don’t know what he doing, Mav. That’s fact. He running everything Shawn did into the ground. We can go to the supplier ourselves, tell him we can handle it better than P-Nut, then bam! We move the product and make the money.”
I stare at him for a long time. “You tryna be the crown?”
King shrug and lean back in his seat. “Whatever come with it, come with it. I got a baby on the way. I need to make major moves.”
“Dawg, this a death wish,” I say.
“I dare any of them to come after us.”
Us.
“Nah. Count me out,” I say.
“Aw, hell! C’mon, Mav! We can pull this off!” King says. “It would take a little time, but a year from now, we’d run the whole Garden just like our daddies. Li’l Zeke and Li’l Don, doing the damn thing.”
Yeah, and Big Zeke in a grave with his wife while Big Don in a prison.
I shake my head. “I’m done selling drugs. For good this time.”
King chuckles. “Here we go again. You talking big shit for somebody who got their second baby on the way. What you gon’ do for money? Work that sorry job for Mr. Wyatt?”
“I guess so. I’m sorry, but I gotta do it, dawg.”
“This not the Mav I know talking. My best friend down for whatever. Let me guess, your momma found out you were slinging. Or was it Mr. Wyatt’s old ass? Wait, nah.” He snap his finger and point at me. “It was Lisa, wasn’t it? That ho say jump, you say how high.”
“What the hell you call her?” I yell.
King bust out laughing. “Damn, you whipped!”
“I’ll show you whipped, keep talking!”
“A’ight, a’ight.” He put his hands up. “Chill, Li’l Don. Getting pissed over a female that don’t want you. You’ll be begging me to let you back in the game soon enough. Watch. I’ll take your stash for now.”
This the part I dread the most. I take the Ziploc bag from my pocket and pass it to King.
He look from it to me. “Where the rest?”
“There was an accident. I dropped it in the toilet.”
King slowly sit up. “It’s too early for April Fool’s ’cause I know – I know – ain’t no goddamn way you flushed my stuff, Mav!”
“I said it was an accident, a’ight? Give me a couple of months, and I’ll pay you back every penny. You got my word.”
“Your word ain’t worth nothing! I did you a favor” – he poke my chest with the Glock – “by bringing you on, and you repay me by flushing my money?”
I eye the gun, then him. “I get that you mad, but you better get that thing off of me.”
King cock it and point it sideways. “Or what? You won’t do nothing! Everybody know you a bitch. I bet Red did kill Dre. You was probably too scared to shoot him.”
“Stop. Pointing. That. Gun. At. Me,” I growl.
A smile slowly form on King’s face. “Chill, Maverick.” He says my name like it’s a joke. “I’m messing with you, homie. Goddamn, you on edge.” He snickers as he put the gun down.
“Don’t you ever point a gun at me again in your goddamn life!”
“Don’t give me a reason to,” he says through his teeth.
I don’t know the person staring at me. It damn sure ain’t my best friend.
If I’m honest with myself, me and King done had a crack between us for a while, ever since the DNA tests proved Seven not his. That crack feel like a canyon now.
I think I’m losing another brother, and this hurt just as bad as putting one in the ground.
I stare ahead. “Don’t worry,” I murmur. “I’ll get your money back.”
King suck his teeth. “It’s all good, Mav. I’m willing to let bygones be bygones. I don’t want no money.”
I look at him. “You don’t?”
“Nah.” King’s lips turn up again with a dark glint in his eyes. “You’ll pay me back another way one day.”
Whatever he got in mind, it ain’t good. That’s real clear now.
I swallow the lump in my throat and get out the car. “See you around, King.”
