Young Junius, page 27
part #4 of Jack Palms Series
And that was when Junius understood there was no revenge or payback or evening out the pain.
There would always be new mourning in the long fucked-up war that was these towers, all of their projects, everything he knew.
It didn’t matter.
In the bigger sense it was all a circle, just a snake eating itself; all the people he knew killing one another—his brother gone, Lamar’s brothers losing him, and now anyone who was close to Black Jesus had lost one of theirs. Same for Jason, killed on the roof because Elf fucked up. Should someone come after Elf and take him down because he caused that?
Probably not.
There wasn’t any taking things back.
Maybe if he waited—and lived—long enough he’d have a chance to take out Rock. And maybe that’d be worth something.
Or maybe it wouldn’t.
Rough stepped toward Mike Only.
“The fuck!” Mike yelled, with tears in his voice. Junius heard a shot, and Rough spun half-around, fell against the railing holding his shoulder.
“Fuck you!” Mike was saying, standing now and shooting up the stairs.
Junius broke to his left, unconsciously shooting in Mike’s direction. Then the Tec clicked on nothing and the bolt shot forward. The trigger wouldn’t pull.
Mike started up the stairs at him, shooting, but Rough tripped him up. He grabbed Mike Only, and they both went down backward toward the landing below them, Mike still firing as he fell.
Junius heard himself say, “Shit,” and then he saw Hammer.
First Hammer ducked into the hall and fired, then he started to turn Junius’s way. He yanked at the clip in his Tec and it was stuck. He pulled it again, then found the release. Now the clip came free. With it in his hand, Junius didn’t waste any time: he threw the magazine at Hammer with all he had, his best pitcher’s motion, but it spun wild and barely glanced off his shoulder.
Hammer shrugged and pumped another cartridge into the shotgun’s breech. He shook his head in what looked like disgust.
Junius patted at his pants with his left hand until he came across another clip. He jammed it into the Tec and the bolt shot forward.
Hammer shook his head and leveled the shotgun at Junius’s chest.
77
Clarence lay on the floor at the foot of his bed. He’d managed to crawl as far as that, just drag his body, really; with the pain in his chest, what felt like a broken collarbone, and a bullet in one of his shins, he couldn’t do much more than pull with one arm and push with the one good leg. He was moving, though, and what more could anyone ask of him.
That he still had one rock in his pocket was getting him through.
It hadn’t been an entirely bad day. He’d beaten the shit out of his first cop, ever, payback for a lifetime of anger at any shit a pig had ever put on him—beat-downs, eye-fuckings, interrogations, arrests, and general bullshit. All of it. This was for that.
He’d taken that much out on the pig, and that motherfucker would not be walking right for a long time. He’d seen the pain in his eyes. Shit, he’d even dragged that bitch out of the lobby unconscious, leaving a trail of cop’s blood on the tiles.
The truth was, this shit they called the Ready—the Ready Rock—this shit was a ride like no other. And he still had one piece left.
All he had to do was get to the nightstand, find his Brillo and something to cook it in, and he’d be chalked up on another ride—something he knew would get him over the pain enough so he could get to the phone, call himself an ambulance, and get some help.
But then he froze. What if he did go to the hospital? When they saw this shit, they’d know something bad went down and then maybe he’d have to hit the lockup. None of the sweet Ready in that piece.
“Fuck,” he said. Then he had the best idea of the whole day: police brutality. That was all it had been, that asshole cop just beating on him for no reason. He did his best to protect himself, in self-defense of course, and look where it had left him. Just look at him: he was fucked up.
Just trying to protect himself from the cop who’d laid out Pooh.
It was as good a start as any, and all that was after he smoked the rock he had. Maybe just doing that would open up a whole new world of options.
He dug his right forearm into the floor, the thin red carpet worn smooth from years of getting in and out of bed. At the same time, he kicked with his leg, trying to dig his toes in to push toward the nightstand. In his right hand, he held the little baggie with its precious content.
“This your ass on my dick,” he said, and laughed. He’d said that to the cop before that motherfucker left. No, it was more like that egg-in-the-frying-pan TV commercial. “This is your brain. This your brain on drugs. Any questions?” That was it.
“This your brain on my dick.”
Pausing to laugh made him feel just a little bit better.
Laughter, if it couldn’t get you through, what could?
“Niggah, who your ass talking to?”
He looked up and saw Sheila, precious Sheila, returned from the far and gone.
“My baby,” Clarence said. “You are a sight for sore motherfucking eyes! Where you been at?”
She held a hand up and sucked her teeth. “I ain’t staying up in here with no cop around. That motherfucker gone?”
Clarence nodded. “He gone. Now give my ass that pipe and help me smoke this.”
“Smoke what?”
“Bitch, what you talking about?”
Now Sheila put her hands on her hips and slid her head side to side. “Bitch, that what you calling me now? Because I don’t see nobody else here you talking to.”
Clarence closed his eyes. He breathed in, an act that actually hurt. Something got caught in his chest and he couldn’t catch a full breath. But he had to calm down.
“Forget it, baby. Forget that, ok? You got my pipe? Baby? I thought I saw you walk out with it back when.”
“You mean this?” Sheila produced the glass pipe out of her jeans jacket. “This what you want?”
Clarence rolled back onto his side against the bed, relieved. He reached out to her with his good hand. “Pass it here.”
“What you gonna do with it?”
“Smoke this rock.” He showed her the little baggie in his hand, gripping it tight between his thumb and his palm. She’d have to kill him to take it. Before she could start to bargain, he said, “Bit—Baby, you let me hold that pipe and get mines. I definitely give you a hit of this sweetness, but you have to help old Clarence out. Clarence a bit fucked up here, you see?”
“Yeah, I see it,” she said. “And momma gonna be good to you now.” She came over and sat on the floor next to him, her back against the bed. She held the pipe out in front of him, even showed him his lighter in her other hand. “I’m ready for you, baby. Let’s smoke this.”
“You gonna be good to me?” Clarence asked her. He looked in her eyes and knew he couldn’t trust whatever she’d say.
She winked at him. “I’m with you, baby,” she said, and that was it: as good a comfort as he would get.
“Just help me smoke this. I only need a taste, girl. Old Clarence be hurting.”
She smoothed her thumb across his temple and brushed it over his ear. His back and neck were starting to hurt. He opened his hand to her, held out the baggie. “Just—” But that was all he said.
She took it from him and squeezed the rock out its open end, broke off a piece and slid it down on the Brillo. He watched her heat it with the lighter.
Whatever was there on the other side of this ride, Clarence wasn’t sure he wanted to know. But the ride, that was all he needed.
“I’m here now,” Sheila said. She kissed the top of his head. “Momma be here for you now. Everything gonna be ok.”
When she melted the rock and it started to run, she held the pipe up to his mouth. She brushed a thumb across his cheek and brought the lighter up under the pipe. She flicked it once, then again and it caught, danced a little flame along the bottom of the glass.
Clarence could see the smoke.
Then he tasted the subtle change, the first touches of vapor along the back of his tongue. He sucked harder, taking in the smoke with everything he had.
78
Seven heard the shotgun blast at the end of the hall. He’d heard a lot of shots from that stairwell: everything from a semi-auto to a revolver and, finally, somewhere in the middle of it all, the whistle of Junius’s Tec. He heard yelling and more than one cry of pain. But what he hadn’t heard again until now was the sound he’d been waiting for: Hammer shooting his shotgun down the hall.
Hammer wouldn’t forget him, couldn’t possibly now that he’d come this far. When he heard the shot tear down his hall, he knew it was worth a look out, that Hammer just might have fired to scare him back. If that was true, then this was his time to act.
He pushed up against the frame of the apartment door and looked out: first down toward Hammer’s end and then back down the other. Nothing either way.
Then he leaned out even farther, watching for Hammer to be waiting. Instead he saw Hammer’s back, the shotgun barrel coming up over his shoulder as he cocked it, and Seven took his chance.
Being right-handed, he had to come all the way out of the door to shoot down that end of the hall. He leaned out, stepping out of cover, and brought the Tec up fast to shoulder height with his arm extended. All he knew at the other end was Hammer and possibly Rock, and if Junius was lucky, he’d be down the stairs and out of the line of fire.
Seven pulled the trigger.
Time slowed as he watched the individual bullets punch into Hammer’s back and cut through the black cotton of his sweatshirt, letting up a patch of fabric and a burst of blood with each entry. Two shots went across Hammer’s left shoulder, and then another shot, then two and three crossed across his back.
Hammer stumbled forward, and that was when Seven heard the loudest shot he’d ever heard: the report from a handgun that sounded like it came from just a few feet behind him, echoing into his ear. As soon as he heard it, he wondered if it had just come, or if it had come a few seconds ago, when his world started to slow. All of a sudden, he didn’t know how time worked anymore.
He fell hard against the doorframe, his Tec cutting a line of shots across the opposite wall, then fell into the apartment, rolled onto his back, and looked up to see Dee step into the doorframe—Dee, the one who rolled with Ness, who he’d shot on the stairs. The first thing he thought was he should have known better: where there was one, there was always the other.
But that wasn’t as important as the second thing in his head: that he’d been shot—shot bad.
79
Junius was still raising his gun when the shots tore through Hammer. From the quip, quip, quip of the silencer, he knew it had to be Seven shooting, Seven taking Hammer down. Then he heard a louder shot from above, and the silenced Tec stopped firing.
But it had already done its damage. Junius could see the dead, torn-up look on Hammer’s face: like he had touched a state of shock, begun to experience the kind of pain his body wouldn’t allow him to feel. Some of the shots came straight through his shoulders, one of his arms, even his neck. He shuddered in pain, stumbled toward the stairs.
The barrel of his shotgun fell as if the strength to hold it had passed right out of Hammer’s arms. He started to smile, then he coughed and blood brimmed up over his lips. With his free hand, he tried to catch some of it. As the blood slipped through his fingers, he turned his eyes to Junius and winked.
Then Hammer started to fall. It happened so slowly, like Junius could watch the different events going on around him, all of them, without missing anything. Another set of shots echoed from an automatic above.
Halfway up the steps below, Mike Only struggled to free himself from Roughneck’s grasp. “Let me go, motherfucker,” he yelled, clubbing at Rough with the butt of his gun.
Roughneck pushed him back into the wall, his forearm at Mike’s neck. They slid down as Mike groped his way farther up the stairs toward Junius.
“Motherfucker, chill,” Rough said.
The shotgun dropped out of Hammer’s hand and clattered down the stairs, falling end over end. Its butt hit a step and it changed trajectory, angling so its barrel faced diagonally up. It flipped again, then slid down the rest of the stairs and came to a stop.
Junius compared his Tec-9 to the much bigger shotgun and immediately wanted to trade up.
Above him, Hammer pitched forward, his head angling toward the steps and the rest of his body following. His hands were at his waist, his face already dark. For the first part of his fall, his body stayed straight, then he bent at the hips and knees. He fell forward and hit the steps with the top of his head. His body crumpled on contact, neck bending chin toward his chest. He somersaulted, hit the steps with his back, then on the next rotation his face hit a stair hard, and Junius thought he heard teeth break.
“He dead,” Mike called out. “Jesus dead, motherfucker!”
He flailed at Rough’s arms, hitting him about the shoulders until Roughneck caught his wrists and leaned his weight onto Mike’s body. They were stretched out, almost at the top of the stairs. Junius could see a red hole in the back of Roughneck’s jacket where the feathers were stained with blood. The big man was favoring his right side, but still outweighed Mike Only by enough to hold him.
He had saved Junius once already and was trying to do it again. Junius pointed his Tec at Mike and tried out the phrase “Freeze, motherfucker.” It didn’t sound right, didn’t fit in his mouth.
“You bitch!” Mike Only tried to point his gun at Junius. “I’m a kill you!”
Rough rolled over onto Mike, pinning one arm down and wrestling for his gun. Mike shot a bullet at the stairs and Junius cringed away.
“What you doing?” Rough said, his eyes meeting Junius’s. “Waiting on what?”
Junius picked up the shotgun and, holding it by the pump, stepped to Mike and swung it up over his head. He chopped the stock down hard into Mike’s forehead.
“Fuck!” Junius saw blood spray out onto the wall. The look in Mike’s eyes as he brought it down—one of pure anger, panic, and disbelief—seemed carved onto the back of Junius’s head. “Fuck,” he said again, louder, as he hit Mike with a straight jab from the shotgun’s stock.
“Goddamn.” Rough let Mike Only go limp in his hands. “You shoot his boy and then beat his head in with a shotgun?”
“You said move. What I’m supposed to do?” Junius turned the shotgun around in his hands.
Rough took the gun by its barrel and settled the stock against his side, under his good arm. When Junius met his eyes, he shook his head. “Lucky you didn’t kill yourself. This thing cut you in half.”
Junius picked up his Tec.
Hammer’s crushed face almost made him feel sorry. He was upside down, blood running up from his broken mouth into his nose.
“Fucking mess,” Roughneck said, shaking his left hand. Junius could see the hole in the front of his jacket now, marked with red feathers like the one in the back.
A single shot, then a series of silenced ones came down from the floor above, somewhere just past the doorless entrance to the hall.
“Come on,” Junius said. “We going up.”
80
Aldo Posey knocked on the door of the apartment Emma Lawrence had given him over the phone. He’d seen Junius’s friend going up in the elevator and he knew the worst was the case: that he’d have to go up there himself if he was really going to do what he came for. But it made sense to check with Miss Lawrence first, didn’t it? Of course it did.
He knocked again.
“Come in.”
Aldo rubbed his face with his hand, wished he’d taken the time to shave. He suddenly felt bad he hadn’t. But he couldn’t do anything about it now, so he turned the knob and opened the door. Just as he did, he heard gunshots from somewhere higher up in the building. He cringed. Even with all he’d been through, things could always somehow get worse.
Inside the apartment, Miss Lawrence sat erect in a glider with her hands in her lap, like an animal who was focused only on hearing.
“You heard that?” she said. Aldo nodded. “Not the first, either. Been going on like this.” She shook her head, her body slumping down into a normal sitting position. “Like it’s a war going on.”
“Is my son in that?”
She sighed, nodding, and he closed the door behind him. Suddenly he had the strong urge to sit down.
“Thought you come to get him?”
“I have.” On the couch now, he put his head in his hands. Another string of shots echoed from above, softer now that he was inside. “Why don’t you put some music on, or something?”
She buttoned her lip and shook her white-curled head. “This my life,” she said. “I won’t tune it out. Those boys up there? The ones doing the shooting? I seen them come up, gave them Kool-Aid on that couch you on now.”
Aldo waited but that was all she said. He needed a drink. “Could I—”
“Bottom cupboard,” she said. “To the left of the stove. That’s where I keep it and don’t go telling me any stupidity about how the oven could make it warm up and ruin the taste. Been keeping it there for long enough and I ain’t never had a bottle go bad.”
He nodded at the kitchen, pulled down on his cheeks. “I told myself I wouldn’t drink today.”
“Then don’t. But if you do, don’t look at me for no explanation or sympathy. You hear?”
“Yes, ma’am.” He stood up and then sat right back down. “I can weather this.”
“Damn right you can! Drinking? Nothing but a crutch. You want to live your whole life that way, limping on the help of a bottle? You do, you no better than them.” She pointed up. “Drugs, all the same,” she said.
He returned his head to his hands. “Guess I just need to go up there and get my son.”
“Just sent two his friends to go up and do it. Was trying to tell you that on the phone.” She shrugged. “They probably better suited to the task, being young and a part of it all.”
