Red Bull

Red Bull, Chapter 1

Chapter 1

I've always been the Red Bull in my family. I was member of the notorious blood gang and been once since I was 13. I'm the angry nigga. I am the violent nigga. I am the nigga who is anxiously waiting, heart beating, slow-breathing, desperately wishing black boy that they warned you about. I don't know when I became any of these adjectives, including a nigga, but I knew that was what I was. Deep inside you like to think that there is some pride, perhaps brought on from the last slave movie that won an award because America loves to see black ppeople suffering---but you know better. When I am alone at night I wonder which number I am and how I've raised every statistic. I am who they think I am, but maybe one day I'll be something more.

I don't know who needs to read this. Maybe it's you. Maybe it's not but hello, friend—-what's good? My name is Joyous Wallace and this is my testimony. I don't know if your religious and that's OK. There is plenty of sex, drugs and human shit in my testimony that we all go through. I'm not perfect. You may not be religious but I want to tell you a story about how I found my faith. But they thing is that's not all there is. There's something more. Some good news, I guess you can call it. That's what the word gospel means: Good news.

Sometimes you have to be like that where I'm from. I had to be tough and shit. I had two brothers who were both gay as fuck and a sister who was an on again/off again drug addict.

Let's just say dis. Shit ain't sweet.

Niggas dyin' out here everyday and the only light in the hood comes from the lights of my club. Club Marchioness.

And maybe that's why I think all the fucked up shit I go through is worth it. Feel me? Because in the end....Club Marchioness is what lights up the block. And my family keeps those lights on. Just like my grandmother intended. It's legacy. It was what we had. Let's just say my family is complicated. We own a club. It's called the Marchioness. It's the hottest club in South Central, LA. Ask anyone and they knew us.

In some ways we were hood fabulous. In other ways, my family was more drama than it was worth.

Once again, My name is Joyous Wallace. I'm the oldest of the Wallace brothers.

And it's time I tell my fucking story.

~

The danger on the streets of Compton were stark, brutal, and unrelenting. Something was stirring and it all starts with me being on the street corner when I see something that gets my attention. My hands slowly dig through lint to finger several keys in my slim-fitted khaki pants. I got on my jean jacket and underneath it a white t-shirt that says: keeping things "gangsta" on the front. I felt like the shit as I sported chains in the form of crystal crosses and pendant glittering with diamonds. My legs burn with the debilitating sameness of the day and a sharp noise disturbs the stillness of the Compton nights.

Across the street, It's a boy that I used to know from back in the day. A boy that I grew up with.

"Meek ..."

His name was Meek Lina and he was being suspicious. I knew suspicious behavior when I saw it. A man was sneaking out of his car and looking all sorts of ways wasn't up to any good. But it's the look of this man that makes me turn around. This is a blast from the past and when I say the past, I mean the very beginning.

I see him randomly after all these years crossing the street and I get a call. It's from my sister Jamila.

"Where are you?"

"Church," I lie.

"I know you ain't at church, Joyous. Lemme just get some dope off you."

The depiction of drugs in the black community have long been underappreciated. Jamila's sickness isn't unfamiliar from the struggle of millions of others. The difference with Jamila was her access. That access at that point is me. I think about it. My sister was a drug addict. I should care. I should turn her away from it but honestly, what do I care? She wants to do drugs? So be it. That was my motto. Rather she get the shit from me then from someone else.