Sweet 16 to Life

by Kimberly Reid

  Chapter 21

  I sleep in Monday morning, even though Lana came in to tell me she was leaving for work. Here it is, the official start of Thanksgiving break, and I’m actually wishing I had a class to go to. At least then I’d have a distraction. So I decide to just stay in bed a few hours longer, delaying the start of everything I don’t want to deal with. Even my new dress, hanging on the back of my bedroom door, bums me out. I was so happy when I picked it out, imagining what it would be like the night I’d wear it. It’s been longer than a minute since I had a reason to smile, but I do when I see Marco’s number come up on my phone.

  “I didn’t read anything about a mother/daughter showdown in the paper yesterday, but I still wanted to make sure things were good with you.”

  “I’m fine . . . well, better than I was Saturday night. I’m really sorry—and a little embarrassed—about all that. I shouldn’t have called out of the blue and dropped all my drama on you.”

  “I’m glad you did. You can always call me.”

  “I don’t think your girlfriend would agree. Was she mad about you picking her up late for your date?”

  “She knows you and I are friends. Friends help each other out sometimes, which is another reason I’m calling. I was thinking if you need cheering up, we could go to this Dashiell Hammett film festival playing downtown.”

  “Who?”

  “Dashiell Hammett. He wrote detective novels that were made into films back in the day when movies were still in black and white. You know—Sam Spade, Nick and Nora? I figured you might like the film festival since you like cop shows.”

  “Not from the old days, I don’t.”

  “That’s when the directors had to rely on the writing and actors—no special effects and CGI. It was all about building suspense.”

  “I don’t have anything against old movies. I’ve seen a bunch of them.”

  “Oh yeah?”Marco says, getting way too excited. “Do you have a favorite director?”

  “Okay, I’ve seen maybe three old movies. But I do have a favorite—Roman Holiday.”

  “Is it a detective movie?”

  “Some film buff you are. And not everything I like is about detective stuff.”

  “So tell me why you like it.”

  “This girl, she’s a princess but not very happy about it so she escapes her fairy-tale life for a day. Because she spends it with the right guy, that ordinary day becomes the fairy tale. I don’t know—kind of silly, right?”

  “Seems perfect to me.”

  I can’t help but wish this conversation was happening in person because who knows what would happen next. We’d probably break our agreement, that’s what would happen next.

  “You make watching ancient movies sound tempting, but there’s still the problem of you having a girlfriend. If I were Angelique, I might be okay with friends talking on the phone ”—not—“but seeing a movie is a whole different thing.”

  “I told you, she knows how it is between us.”

  “Does she know we sort of went out? Or definitely kissed once?”

  Only the best kiss ever, although that’s probably beside the point. When Marco doesn’t say something right away, I take him off the hot seat.

  “I can’t make it anyway, as much as I’d like to. For you, I’d spend the whole day watching ancient movies, but I have some major stuff going on right now.”

  “You always have major stuff going on.”

  “I know. My crazy life, right? My mom isn’t even the crazy-making part, at least not right now.”

  “Well, the doctor is in.”

  “I don’t think you want to hear about this particular problem. It’s the reason you’ll probably be taking Angelique to the film festival instead of me.”

  I immediately wish I hadn’t said that. It sounds like I assume we’d be together if we didn’t have to worry about me inadvertently getting his cousin deported and I know that isn’t the only reason. Even if I had Marco, I’d still be worried about what I’m supposed to do with him.

  “Probably not—she doesn’t like any detective movies, ancient or new.”

  “Your parents must love her,” I say, wishing I could take that back, too. Snarky always sounds bitter when it comes to broken relationships.

  “Are you still trying to solve MJ’s problems?”

  “Busted.”

  “Okay, but since we’re on school break and I won’t see you for a week, will you at least call or text me once in a while so I know you aren’t in trouble?”

  Before I hang up, I promise him I will, another addition to my growing list of promises I probably won’t keep.

  I’m standing next to Big Mama’s car waiting for MJ to come outside. When I texted her that we needed to talk, this is where she told me to meet her at three o’clock. It’s five after, feels like five degrees below freezing, and I’m cursing MJ for making me wait because I didn’t wear my big coat. I’m about to go ring her doorbell when she finally emerges from her warm—make that sauna-like since her grandmother keeps it like Death Valley in there—house. I wouldn’t mind being in Death Valley right now, at least long enough to warm up.

  “You’re late,” I greet her, “and why’d you make me wait out here, anyway?”

  “I don’t want to talk about all this Lux business in the house. Big Mama is hanging around all the time, scared to leave me alone and even more afraid for me to go out. But she let up when I told her I’m just getting something to eat with you. She thinks you’re a good influence.”

  Funny how perspective changes everything. Marco’s mom wouldn’t let us date because she thinks I might get his cousin kicked out of the country and Marco killed. Or at least turn him into a delinquent. Big Mama won’t let MJ out of the house unless it’s with me because she thinks I can improve the life of her granddaughter—an actual delinquent.

  A few minutes later, we pull into Sonic and park at one of the eat-in-your car booths.

  “Uh, MJ? Do you realize how cold it is out here? We need to go inside.”

  “I don’t want anyone hearing anything about Lux or Tragic or my case. You want to talk? We eat in the car. I’ll keep it running.”

  “That’s dangerous, and they’ll probably make you turn it off. Nobody wants to inhale gas fumes while they eat.”

  “I’m dangerous, and I’ll tell them to go to hell.”

  “Yeah, that’s just what you need—the Sonic people calling the police on you.”

  I guess MJ is tired of arguing with me because she goes to the drive-through window and orders. After we get the food, she parks in the mall parking lot across the street and keeps the engine running.

  “You happy now?” MJ asks, unwrapping her burger.

  Her tone suggests she really doesn’t care about my state of happiness. I know better than to say I’d be happier eating inside somewhere, so I just nod and draw on my chocolate shake. I know I’ve been complaining about the cold, but I can drink a chocolate shake in any weather conditions.

  “Next time, feel free to come to my house. It’s hovering-grandmother-free and it’s warm.”

  “I’m not talking in any cop’s house, even your mother’s. And I’m not talking at my house even when Big Mama is gone. Lux probably bugged it.”

  “That seems unlikely.”

  “You don’t know everything, Chanti.”

  “You’re right, which is why we’re here. I need you to tell me everything you know about Tragic’s last arrest, the one that got him serious time.”

  MJ looks straight ahead and I can tell she’s thinking about whether to answer. She hates talking about anything from her old gang life, especially anything that might come back to bite her. Or kill her, when you consider she’ll be narcing on gang members.

  I try to coax her along. “I’m not asking for entertainment purposes. I think the reason Lux set you up, why he’s afraid of you, has something to do with Tragic’s arrest. I think Lux is the real snitch, but he told Tragic it was you.”

 
MJ looks at me like this idea had never occurred to her. “If you’re right, Lux had better be scared of me.”

  “Let’s figure out if I’m right.”

  “What do you need to know?” she asks before she polishes off the last bit of her second burger. MJ can go through a meal faster than any boy I know.

  “Okay, so I know Tragic was thinking about starting a Down Homes operation in Denver and that he sent Lux here to scope it out, using Donnell as his Denver tour guide. Why Lux and not someone else from the gang? Was Lux his second man?”

  “Hell, Lux ain’t even a tenth man. Tragic sent him because Lux is from Denver originally. He did a year in JD when he was, like sixteen or seventeen. When he got out, he moved to L.A.”

  “Ha, that’s funny,” I say. “You and Lux did something like a juvenile delinquent exchange program—he went to California, you came to Denver.”

  “Ain’t nothing about this situation funny, Chanti. Anyway, Tragic was liking the Denver idea and sent Lux out to do some scouting.”

  “What does a gang leader scout for? Number of available bad guys to recruit, potential customer base?” I say, hoping I don’t sound amused because I sort of am. Not about MJ’s situation because it’s mad serious, but about how she makes the whole gang life sound like it’s just another business, like a corporation or a sports team. Maybe it is.

  “Something like that. He needed to know if there’d be competition from existing gangs, whether they’d be easy to take out or tough enough to leave alone. Will people in the neighborhoods he set up be able to afford his services? Can he use local distributors, should he relocate some of his own, or should he hire locals? Stuff like that.”

  Wow, it really does sound like a startup business, except I’m guessing the local distributors MJ is talking about are drug dealers, though I don’t interrupt her to ask.

  “Lux met with some locals to set up a meet for Tragic. If things went okay, Tragic was hoping to make a sale.”

  “Sell what?”

  “I never knew that part, but whatever it was, only Tragic was there to sell it—to undercover cops, it turned out. At the last minute, Lux couldn’t make it.”

  So Tragic was based in L.A., but was arrested here. Good to know—maybe I can use my sources to get more information about his arrest.

  “That’s real convenient for Lux. My Lux-as-the-real-snitch theory is starting to look good, huh?”

  “Naw, Lux had a good reason to bail on Tragic. He was in the hospital emergency room.”

  “Did it have something to do with his left leg?” Lux could have been born with an odd gait, but I’m taking a guess.

  “Yeah. How did you know?”

  “I noticed he has a limp and favors his right side. So what happened—some kind of gangland turf war gone bad?”

  “You watch too much TV, Chanti. Lux accidentally shot himself in the foot.”

  I had figured dude wasn’t that bright, but I underestimated him. Being in the emergency room with a bullet in your foot is a pretty good alibi. I’m about to ask MJ some more questions when she gets a text. She reads it, then bangs her fist against the steering wheel.

  “What is it, MJ?”

  “Lux says he just told Tragic I was the one who set him up. That fool is going to make me hurt him.”

  Chapter 22

  When MJ tears out of the mall parking lot, she doesn’t go in the direction of Aurora Avenue, which I point out to her.

  “That’s because I need to visit someone first.”

  “Not Lux.”

  “Hell yeah, Lux.”

  “This is a really bad idea, MJ. For one, I gotta believe it violates the conditions of your bail. For two, Lux is kinda scary.”

  MJ looks over at me, a second too long considering the speed she’s going, and says, “And I ain’t?”

  “Oh, no—you’re really scary, especially right now when you’re going sixty in a thirty-five, which I’m certain is another violation of your parole and bail.”

  That gets her to slow down, but she still keeps driving toward Lux’s place, which I see now isn’t too far from the mall because we’re turning into an apartment complex. MJ pulls in front of one of the buildings, parking in a numbered space. When I open my door to get out, she tells me to wait here, but she can barely get out of the car before some woman runs up on her. I get out, too.

  “Look, heffa, you’re in my parking space again,” the woman tells MJ. I don’t know where this chick came from, but she must be like my neighbor Mrs. Jenkins, watching for people to park in her space just so she can run outside and go off on them. I don’t think she just happened to be leaving her apartment when we arrived because she doesn’t have a purse. According to Lana, the only women who don’t carry some kind of bag are hookers and joggers, at least in her experience.

  “It’ll only be there for a second. My friend will move the car if you need the space,” MJ says, throwing me the keys as she continues toward the apartment building.

  The parking space chick blocks MJ’s path. Oh, that isn’t good.

  “That’s not the point. The point is that’s my space and I told you the last time that if you did it again, I was calling the police.”

  “Excuse me, but the police wouldn’t write a ticket for this, since you’re on private property.” Both MJ and the pissed-off woman look at me like it’s their first time seeing me. “Um, I’m just saying . . .”

  “I ain’t got time for this. Get the hell out of my way,” MJ says, shoving the woman. Okay, now the woman would have a reason to call the police since MJ’s shove might be construed as assault. Time for me to do more than just cite the law.

  “Hey now, MJ. This nice lady isn’t who you’re mad at,” I say, stepping between them. I doubt the lady is all that nice given the teardrop tattoo under her right eye.

  “Like hell. I’m mad at her too, now.”

  “Well, she isn’t who you came to see. One issue at a time, right?”

  “Yeah, you right. I need to stay focused so I can handle my business,” she says, leaving me and the angry woman on the sidewalk.

  I get in the driver’s side of the car and back out of the woman’s space while she watches, hands on her hips and looking like she wants to hurt somebody. But by the time I parallel park the car in the fire lane right behind her parking space, the woman is gone. She’s like a spy in stealth mode with all the sneaking up on you and sneaking away. I get out of the car to see where she could possibly have gone in five seconds.

  That’s when I hear all the yelling. I look up to see MJ outside Lux’s apartment door and from what I can tell, it’s Lux doing all the hysterical yelling. Maybe he isn’t as tough as I thought, although MJ has more than a few pounds and inches on him. Then she throws him up against the wall, her right forearm rammed up against his chest and dangerously close to his windpipe. That’s my cue to get up there before she commits about twenty violations against her parole and her bail.

  I reach Lux’s door just in time to hear MJ tell Lux, “I’m gonna kill you.” I drag her away before she can.

  I’m surprised to find Lana in the kitchen when I get home. Hopefully she won’t notice I’m still wound up from our visit to Lux’s place. Even though I didn’t actually fight anyone, I feel like I could have if anyone stepped to me. It’s sort of the way I always want to fight someone whenever I leave a Jason Bourne movie. I feel like I’m a badass just from watching someone else be one.

  “You’re home early,” I say.

  “I’m not really home yet. I was in the neighborhood running down a suspect and figured I’d grab some lunch—ham sandwiches. Want me to make you one?”

  Speaking of badass. I know Lana’s been a cop for a long time, but it never stops sounding weird to have your mother say stuff like that—I was chasing a murderer, then thought I’d grab a sandwich. Although in this case, it probably wasn’t a murderer. Homicide arrests always require a boatload of paperwork and she probably wouldn’t be home until the middle of the night if
she’d gotten a lead on a killer this morning.

  “That’s okay. MJ and I just came back from Sonic.” No need to tell her what happened between the restaurant and home. “Kind of close to home to be making an arrest. What about your cover?”

  “If I locate the guy, I’ll have a uniform make the arrest. So how’s MJ doing?”

  “Um . . . she’s dealing with it as best she can.”

  “It’s been crazy this morning, but when I go back to the department, I’ll see if there have been any new developments on her case.”

  I just hope any new developments don’t include Lux charging MJ with assault, but I’m banking on the typical bad guy M.O.—that Lux has enough dirt to hide that he wouldn’t willingly get the police involved in his life.

  Lana finishes making her sandwich but doesn’t bring it with her when she joins me at the kitchen table.

  “Chanti, I really did hear what you said the other morning—that your father should know about you. You’re completely right about that, and he will, just as soon as I’ve checked him out.”

  “What is it you have to check? You’re hiding something else, because I know you aren’t this worried about a sixteen-year-old B and E charge.”

  Lana stays quiet, which confirms my accusation, but I’m still in the dark.

  “Okay, if you won’t tell me that, I have another question about him, and it’s pre-arrest so you should be able to tell me.”

  “What is it?”

  “The few times you ever talked about him, you said it was just a one-time thing, that he was just someone you met at a spring break party and that you barely knew him.”

  “Right” is all she says, but I read more in the way her body language changes. The story isn’t “right” at all.

  “First off, that so isn’t you—meeting a guy at a party, hooking up with him like that. Even before you became a cop and trusted no one, that just isn’t you.”

  “I was a girl, not the person you know now. You’re going to be a whole different person when you’re my age. You’ll see.”