The next day, I went to Eastpointe high to clear my locker. As I walked through the metal detectors, one of the guards stopped me. “What you doing here, Prince? Heard you got kicked out.”
“Yeah. I gotta clear out my locker.”
He waved me in.
I got there just before the bell rang to end first period. On the way to my locker, lots of kids passed me in the hallway, some actually trying not to be late for their next class. When I saw Stacy, she looked at me with sad eyes.
“I heard you got kicked out.”
“Yeah. It was my third strike.”
“You always did have a temper.”
“Well, what can I say? That pussy-ass nigga, Fish disrespected me. I had to teach him a lesson.”
“I’m gonna miss you, Prince,” she said getting teary-eyed.
“Don’t go crying now on me. You know we still gonna see each other in the hood.”
“So what will you do now?”
“I’m going to Trinity. I start there next week.”
“I hear it’s a good school.”
“Yeah it is.”
“Anyway see ya later. I gotta get to class,” she said then hugged me. I hugged her back, breathing in the scent of her perfume. When she finally let go, I watched her swing her ass as she went down the hallway, shaking my head at what I was missing. I emptied my locker and put the contents into a rug sack. Then I headed for the gym.
I found Malik and some guys in the gym playing a basketball game. I took off my shirt and joined the game. Malik was the same age as me and almost the same height. He had a buzz cut and was dark skinned like most of the kids at Eastpointe High. He was a good friend and a guy to go to if you needed the latest gossip. He stuck his nose in everybody’s business. He knew who was doing what, where, when, and who their mother was screwing.
“Didn’t think I’d be seeing you here today, Prince,” Malik said while he was trying to cover me. “Thought you was kicked out.”
Another thing about Malik: he spent most of his time at school hanging around the guidance offices, keeping his ears open.”
“I was.” I caught a pass, dribbled twice and sank a jump shot.
“Nice shot!” one of the guys said.
“Wow!” Malik clapped his hands looking like a jackass.
“You gotta join the Disciples, ya know?” Malik told me after the game.
“Why do I gotta get jumped into a gang?”
“You went after a Gutta Boy yesterday. You’re gonna need protection. In fact not just you but your family too.”
“And you think joining the Disciples will protect me?”
“Hell yeah.”
“You know I ain’t no gangbanger like you. Yeah, I’m just a square guy I suppose. And I can protect myself,” I said and left the gym. As I got outta the school building, a black Dodge Charger pulled up beside me. At first I thought it might have been a drive-by planned by the Gutta Boyz. I looked to see who was inside but the windows were tinted, but then the driver's window came down and I saw Scatter behind the wheel. I was relieved. “Get in,” he said.
I got into the passenger seat and he drove off. Death to My Enemies by 50 Cent was playing in the car. I Bopped my head to the lyrics but stopped when Scatter turned it down. “I heard what went down yesterday at your school,” he began. “You’re gonna need protection. There’s word on the street that the Gutta Boyz are out for your blood.” He added.
They got some of it when Fish cut my shoulder.
“And you want me to join the Disciples, right?”
“Of course. You ain’t got any other option.”
“You’re the second person who’s told me that today. But my answer remains the same. No.”
“Nigga, you got a death wish or what?”
“I can protect myself.”
“Well then you’re gonna need a gat. Pass by my crib in the evening and I’ll give you one.”
“A’ight.”
I’mma drop you at the projects but I gotta make a stop first,” he said.
A few minutes later, he pulled up in a corner in Brush Park. Three niggaz in black bandannas were on shift slinging. A runner, a lookout and a moneyman. That was how most drug crews were set up. But they could be more corner boys working a corner if it had many customers. Scatter stepped out of the car and went towards the corner boys.
“’S’up niggaz? How you niggaz living? You all a’ight?” He asked in quick succession.
They nodded.
“Everything good out here? You got that money for me man? I gotta make moves” Scatter told the moneyman who was also the crew chief.
“Yeah, I got it. But not all of it, yo,” the crew chief said handing Scatter a small wad of bills.”
“What you mean? You guys ain’t finished with the G-pack?”
“We got robbed, yo.”
“The fuck you mean you got robbed, man? Who robbed you?”
“That nigga, Bone.”
“Nigga Bone? Let this nigga Bone up on you, man, and take your shit?”
“And my piece, man.”
“You had your fucking gat on you, man? What the fuck is wrong with y’all niggaz? You niggaz stand out here like the three stooges of Brush Park or something, B? You gonna let this nigga come and take your shit? Ain’t you muthafucking men? You gonna let another man take your shit? You done lost your privileges as crew chief until you find me that nigga Bone. Go find that nigga, B. And give me a call when you find him. As for the rest of you niggaz, you wait for Jewels to come with the re-up.” Scatter said angrily and came back to the car. “That muthafucker Bone need to get got,” he said but more to himself.
He dropped me off in the projects and I got out. I thanked him and was walking to my building when he stopped me and said, “Stay around the projects. It’s our territory. Bone and his goons can’t touch you here.” Then he drove off.
I met Dog in front of the building. I wasn’t ready for another lecture by a Disciple so I tried to avoid him but he called me.
“Yo, for the umpteenth time, I ain’t joining no gang, or working with you,” I said before he got a chance to say anything.
“Ump…what?”
“Means I’ve been told many times today already, I ain’t ready to hear it from you.”
“This ain’t about no gangs, Prince. It’s about your Moms, yo.”
“What about my Moms? What happened?” I asked, suddenly alarmed.
“She copped drugs from me last night and again this morning. I think she is using, Prince.”
“Nah. That ain’t possible.”
“I’m telling you. You can ask Slick, he served her both times.”
Slick was a dropout kid who worked as Dog’s drug runner and was always posted behind the building. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. No way Ma was using drugs. But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. I heard that crack got the user so high that it took him/her to another world. Dad’s death had hit Ma the highest. She’d stopped going to work and spent her days locked up in her room crying. Maybe she started smoking crack to hide from her pain and grief.
“This shit we pushing ain’t nothing nice,” Dog said. “Once you hooked on it, there’s no turning back.”
“’Listen, if she comes to buy from you again, don’t sell to her.”
“When she starts chasing her next high nobody can stop her. I may refuse to sell to her but she’ll just buy from someone else on another corner.”
Fuck! This was Bone’s fault. Another reason he needed to get got.
That evening, I went to Scatter’s apartment on the eighth floor of the 304 building. I knocked on his door twice. From the outside, it was just like any other project apartment; the door was riddled with dents and the paint was chipping. When Scatter opened the door, I was totally unprepared for what I saw.
The apartment floor, for as far as I could see, was covered with a plush, money-green carpet. The sofa was designed in a green and gold blend and was soft as a cloud. A large oak entertainment system, by itself, took up one whole wall. Inside of it, sat a forty-two inch flat screen television showing season three of The Wire. The most impressive thing in the apartment was the far wall. It was decorated with mug shots of some of America’s notorious criminals. It had all black gangstas from Bumpy Johnson to Larry Davis.
“I thought you wouldn’t come,” Scatter said once he’d opened the door. He was topless and wearing boxers.
“I couldn’t pass up the chance of getting a gat.”
He ushered me in and locked the door. He told me to sit in the parlor while he went to get the gat from wherever he stashed his weapons. I sat watching The Wire. I had binged watched it before but it never got old to me. It was the scene where Cutty and Slim walked up to Fruit’s corner and shot a kid. Cutty froze when he had the chance to kill Fruit. As I watched it, I hoped I wouldn’t freeze when the time came to kill Bone. It could cost me my life.
Scatter returned a few minutes later and handed me a handgun. I felt a rush of power when the cold steel made contact with my hand. It was the kind of power only a gun could bring. “That’s a Glock. It don’t jam,” Scatter said. “Know how to use it?”
I shook my head.
“Well, it’s easy,” he said taking the gun from me. “You just turn off the safety and pull the trigger,” he added, showing me how to do it. Then he showed me how to reload the gun. When he was done with his demonstration, he gave the Glock back to me and I repeated what he’d done.
“You a natural,” he said with a smile.
I tucked the Glock into my pants and returned to my apartment below. I was one step closer to killing Bone.
