Another Man's Treasure (Joey Bada$$ Story)

Part Ventidue

I didn’t feel okay.

I could still hear the gunshots in my ears when we got into the car and drove back home. My feet were cold and Dessy kept tapping his fingers against the briefcase. The million-dollar briefcase.

We now had one-million dollars.

I didn’t know why we had the money. Clearly, it belonged to whatever ‘client’ Rahim was going to see. That person knew by now that their money was gone, and it was only a matter of time before he found out who had it. What then? By the time he found out, would we have spent it? On what? Why didn’t we just leave it where we found it? Was this dirty money? How did the boys even know it was there?

What exactly was happening?

I couldn’t ask these questions on the way home. The problem didn’t lie with me; I was fully capable of verbalizing my concerns, and had a whole reel of questions for the boys. It was them. They looked incapable of answering. They looked like a bunch of dry-mouthed, wary-eyed criminals. They looked like they just stole something.

They did.

After what felt like forever, we reached Joey’s apartment. The boys specifically stated that CJ, Kirk and Dirty exit the car first, then Dessy with the briefcase, then me, and then Joey. I guessed this was to make sure that the one with the case was well protected, but of course, I couldn’t figure out from who. We went upstairs safely to find T’nah watching Dora with Latara, helping her answer Dora’s questions and pointing out the colors and pictures on the TV. She looked relieved when she saw us walk in, as if she was almost at her boiling point.

“That’ll be sixty dollars,” T’nah said to me.

“For what?”

“Babysitting.”

“She’s joking,” Joey told me, glaring at T’nah. She hadn’t been joking, but the look Joey gave her changed her opinion.

“Where’s everybody else?” CJ asked her.

“The other boys are on their ways here.”

Dessy whispered something in Joey’s ear, he whispered back, and then Dessy swiftly went to the back of the apartment with the briefcase and came back without it. He’d hidden it, maybe from T’nah and the other boys. I wished they wouldn’t come, because of the fact that I was too tired for any more drama and because I still wanted to see what the guys would do with the money, how they would share it out amongst themselves (or if they even would).

I held Latara in my lap on the couch, bouncing her on my leg. We watched the others in the house shuffle around from the kitchen to the living room and to the bathroom. They couldn’t stay still - all of them except Joey. It seemed he couldn’t move, how frozen he was in the couch next to me. His eyes were closed and his chin was resting on his folded hands. He dug his elbows into his knees, like he was trying to burn a hole, to start a fire. I watched him intently, waiting for the right thing to say, the right time to say it.

Miraculously, the shuffling continued, and there was a pocket of time when the only ones in the living room were me, Tara and Joey. Perfect.

“Are you okay?” I asked him. It was the only thing that would come to mind. He didn’t answer. “I know that whatever happened at the hotel might’ve been kind of traumatizing for you. It was for me, but you were there up-close and personal.”

Still, Joey didn’t respond, only began to bite on his thumb nails.

“I really don’t know what to say to you because I don’t know what happened. The only way I can talk about this is by asking questions, and by the way you look that probably won’t be a good idea.” I said. “So let’s change the subject. What do you want to talk about? We can talk about music, or Brooklyn, or clothes, good times in high school -