12 Day's In December

by Roy Glenn

  I thought back to a December celebration a few years ago, to the time when the four of us were at a club and somebody slapped Vickie and me and Bobby damn near killed him and we probably would have if Wanda didn’t stop us.

  We were all pretty high when we got there, so it didn’t take much to set us off. It started when some guy tried talking to Wanda and her, being drunk and talking shit, told him to kiss her ass. When he grabbed her ass, she slapped the fuck outta him. When he went to hit her back, Wanda moved, and he hit Vickie.

  Before her first tear had a chance to make it down her cheek, Bobby was on the guy. Slamming his face into the bar. And when his body slumped to the floor, me and Bobby stomped him until Wanda yelled, “You’re gonna kill him!”

  It reminded me how Vickie wasn’t like us. If the situation was reversed and it was Vickie who moved and Wanda that got slapped, Wanda would have pulled her gun and we’d have to stop her from killing the guy. Not Vickie, she cried. Knowing this about her and caring for her the way that I claimed to, I should have done everything that I could to protect her from the world that me, Bobby and Wanda have decided to exist in, a world that was too dangerous for Vickie. But instead of protecting her from it, I was the one that killed her … I mean I allowed something very bad to happen to her.

  “Look, Mike,” Bobby began abruptly. “There’s something that’s been on my mind and I need to get it out.”

  “What’s on your mind?”

  “You.”

  “Me.”

  “You and how much you’ve changed.”

  “For the better, I hope.”

  “Yeah, yeah, whatever, and I understand why you felt you needed to change. This is serious shit we’re doing. I get that. And I get that you think you gotta be on top of everything all the time.”

  “I do.” It was about Vickie, like everything else. I missed some shit. Shit I shoulda been on top of and Vickie died for it.

  “I get that you feel like that, Mike. But you’re wrong. You don’t have to be on top of everything all the time, because you’re not alone in this. I got you. Always have, always will.”

  “I know that, Bobby.” I laughed. “You sound like Wanda. She pretty much said the same shit to me.”

  “Well if Wanda said it, then it must be law.” We laughed. “Just know that you’re not alone. Vickie dyin’ made me realize that all we have is each other and in the business we’re in, it ain’t promised to you. I just don’t want you to lose prospective and not enjoy everything that we work so hard for.”

  I laughed. “You still on that shit from the other night?”

  “Yeah.” He laughed. “That shit bothered me.”

  “Why?”

  “I’ve known you a long time, Mike, and in that time, I have never, not even once seen you turn down some pussy,” Bobby said.

  “Well, there was that time at the Constellation.”

  “That don’t count, she was drunk and funny bodied.”

  “And she stank too; breath smelled like she had just threw up or some shit.”

  “You were supposed to turn that down,” Bobby said as we got to Wanda’s apartment building. She was standing in the doorway and came out as soon as she saw us. When I got out and let Wanda have the front seat, Bobby got out too and tossed her the keys.

  “You can drive.”

  Once she adjusted the seat and poured herself a drink, Wanda dropped the car in drive and we were off again. “Where we going?” Wanda asked.

  “You’re driving,” Bobby said and relaxed.

  Since Wanda likes wheeling the caddy, she just drove around for a while and it was a little after one in the morning when Wanda parked the car at the bodega run by Sherman Williams.

  He was one of our captains. He was a number runner by trade, but he had his hands in everything. Sherman knew everybody, and everybody talked to Sherman, so he knew a little about everything. He’d hear things, things that I needed to know so for that reason alone, he was one of my most valuable men.

  “Hey, Wanda,” Sherman said to her when she came through the door.

  “Hi, Sherman. How are you, Ester?”

  “I’m fine, Wanda,” Ester, Sherman’s wife said. “And how are you two?” she asked when me and Bobby followed Wanda in.

  “There they are. The gruesome twosome,” he laughed. “Come on back,” Sherman said and came from behind the counter. While Ester ran the store, Sherman led us back to his office.

  “What you drinking?” Bobby asked and sat down.

  Sherman sat down at his desk, open the drawer and pulled out a bottle of Remy XO. “I been expecting you,” Sherman said as he pulled out four plastic cups and poured up four shots.

  He stood up. “Happy birthday, gentlemen,” Sherman said and raised his cup.

  “I’ll drink to that,” Wanda said and we all shot our drinks. Sherman poured another round and we shot those too before we sat down.

  “So what’s been going on?”

  “We were kinda hoping that you would tell us,” Wanda said.

  “What you need to know?”

  “We’re looking for Gun,” Bobby said.

  “And we’re looking for O, so I can kill him,” I said.

  “And a guy named Simon Parrish owes us a hundred thousand dollars and he’s been ghost for the last two weeks,” Wanda added.

  “I guess it’s safe to say that you guys have a full plate.” Sherman picked up the bottle and poured himself another.

  Bobby drained his cup. “Make it two.”

  “I never heard of Simon Parrish, but I can put you on to a job that you can run tomorrow morning that will make you an easy two hundred thousand.”

  I looked at Bobby and then at Wanda. “Tell us about it,” I said.

  “You ever hear of a company called Diamond Source?” Sherman asked and went on to explain that they were a diamond wholesaler and they have a shipment of loose, uncut diamonds that were coming into the country from Africa in the morning and told us the plan.

  “How much is the shipment actually worth?” Wanda asked, and I knew her well enough to know that she was thinking that if we ran the job, we should make the money, all the money.

  “Well over three quarters of a million dollars,” Sherman said.

  “You got a fence in place?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I got all that lined up. I just need two good men to run the job,” Sherman said.

  “What do you think, Bobby?”

  “Sounds like something we can do.”

  “I know you can,” Sherman said quickly.

  “As long as Parrish still gotta pay us our money,” Bobby said and nodded.

  I looked at Wanda. “I’d like to hear the details,” she said and nodded her approval as well.

  “We’re in,” I said, and Sherman got into those details that Wanda wanted to hear. When he finished, I looked at Bobby.

  “Sounds like a simple hit and grab to me,” I said and sat back.

  “Nothing we haven’t done before,” Bobby co-signed.

  I looked at Wanda. “I don’t know. Seems like we’re missing something.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “I don’t know.” She shrugged her shoulders. “You’re right, it sounds like a simple hit and grab, nothing the two of you haven’t done a bunch of times.”

  “Then what’s the problem?” Bobby asked.

  “I told you, I don’t know. It’s just a feeling. If I think of what it is, I’ll let you know.”

  “Do it before morning, please,” I said.

  “Naturally.”

  “Now,” Bobby said. “You hear anything that can help us out with finding Gun and O?”

  “I heard about O, but what rock he’s hiding under, I couldn’t tell you. Now the Gunner, that’s another matter. I heard he tried to hit y’all a second time tonight.”

  “Yeah,” I said and thought again about how I fucked up. Probably all this weed I’m smoking. Maybe if I hadn’t been blasted for damn near a month I’da seen that coming
.

  “I hear that after the hit, Barrett told him to get out of the city and lay low while he tries to square things with you and Bobby.”

  “Barrett’s smart,” Wanda said. “He doesn’t want any bad blood with us. Maybe it’s Barrett that we need to be looking for.”

  “We find Barrett and make him tell us where Gun is hiding. And if he won’t give him up, we’ll kill him too,” Bobby said.

  Wanda shook her head. “All this over some woman you aren’t even serious about.”

  I laughed. “He may not even like her.”

  “I like her enough to fuck her,” Bobby said.

  Wanda shook her head and then she pointed at me. “This is what I was talking about the other night.”

  “What?”

  “The two of you …” Wanda turned and looked at Bobby. “Make too many decisions with your dicks,” Wanda said and me and Bobby dropped our heads. “Bobby, what if Gun had killed Mike today? While you were inside fucking, what if Gun had killed Mike?” Wanda asked and held up her hand. “I’ll tell you what would happen, you’d be ready to take us all to war and I’d be right along with you. Especially now,” Wanda said, and I knew she was talking about Vickie. “And for what, some bitch that you like just enough to fuck? Please,” Wanda said, and Bobby reached for the bottle.

  “Y’all need a minute alone?” Sherman said, and he started to get up.

  “No, Sherman, you don’t have to go, I’ll shut up,” Wanda said as Bobby poured her another drink. “Thank you.” She picked up the cup and looked at me. “But you know I’m right, Mike. If anything ever happened to me or Bobby, you’d kill everybody you thought was involved.”

  “You’re right,” I said.

  “I didn’t start this, Wanda,” Bobby said. “They came after us.”

  “I know. I was there. But does that really matter that they would have started it if Mike’s dead.”

  “You’re right,” Bobby admitted.

  “I know I’m right.” Wanda took a swallow of her drink. “What’s done is done. Nothing we can do about it now but kill Gun, and Barrett if he won’t give him up, but this can’t happen again.”

  Bobby leaned close to me. “You wanna burn one, don’t you?” he whispered. He raised the drink in his hand. “I drink, you smoke weed and—”

  We both looked at Wanda.

  “What?”

  “Nothing, Wanda,” I said and stood up. “We gone, Sherman. We’ll see you tomorrow afternoon sometime.”

  “Good luck,” Sherman said, and we left there because we had a couple of cars to steal and then we went home. The day was going to start early.

  As promised, Bobby was at my apartment at seven sharp. We had to be at JFK to pick up our mark. He was arriving on Norwegian Air flight 7013 that was arriving from London’s Gatwick Airport. I wanted to go over the plan again before we left, because now I had the feeling that we were missing something.

  I kissed Lo-Lo and Anya goodbye and came out of the room. As soon as I saw Bobby, I knew what we were missing.

  “Wanda got me thinking last night,” Bobby began. “And I know what we’re missing.”

  “Another man,” I said.

  “Would make the whole thing easier,” Bobby said and there was a loud knock at the door.

  “You expecting somebody?” Bobby asked and took out his gun.

  I shook my head, raised my gun and moved toward the door slowly. They banged on the door again and I looked through the peek hole. I lowered my gun and opened the door.

  “I know what we’re missing,” Wanda said and walked by me dressed in all black.

  “Another man,” Bobby said.

  “Would make the whole thing easier,” I said, and it stopped her in her tracks.

  “Yeah,” she said and looked at me and Bobby. “Yeah, much easier. Think about it, the other person could pick them up at the airport and follow them while the two of you setup the ambush.”

  “That’s what I was thinking, Mike,” Bobby said.

  “The third man could come in behind us and pick us up,” I said, and I looked at Wanda. It wasn’t just that she was wearing all black that let me know that she planned on being the third man. It was, the other person could pick them up at the airport. Other person, not other man. I looked at Bobby. He was shaking his head, so I guess he knew it too.

  “Bobby?”

  “I don’t like it, but if we gonna do this, we need to go now, so we really don’t have a choice,” Bobby said and dropped his head.

  “Guess you’re the third man today,” I said. Wanda smiled, and I shook my head and hoped that I wouldn’t regret this decision later.

  So, to prove once again that saying about the best laid plans often going awry, and this wasn’t the best of plans already, when Bobby called his girl at the airport and told her that Wanda was coming she wasn’t having it. She said something about some other bitch, I don’t know, but we needed a new plan.

  “Okay, new plan. You and Wanda go to the airport. Your girl gets y’all to the gate. No,” I began and thought of a better plan. One where Wanda would be safer. “You go to the gate by yourself, you have the airline page the mark with a message, so you can identify him.”

  “He’ll be the little bitty guy with two big muscle bound guys on either side of him. But paging works too,” Bobby laughed.

  “Once you pick up the mark and you follow him, see how they’re traveling and you call Wanda.”

  I looked at her. “You pick Bobby up and you both follow them.”

  “I like that a lot better,” Bobby said, because he was just as protective of Wanda as I was. “You set up the ambush and I come in behind you and clean up.”

  We both looked at Wanda. “While you stay in the car. I’m serious, Wanda, stay the fuck in the car,” I said knowing that she wouldn’t.

  “I am.”

  “Give her a gun, Mike,” Bobby said. I guess he didn’t believe that she was gonna stay in the car either.

  “I have mine,” Wanda protested.

  “You got a pea shooter.” Bobby looked at me. “Give her a gun, Mike.”

  I thought for a second and then went in the kitchen and got the three-eighty from the cabinet and the three-eighty from under the sink and gave them to Wanda.

  “Easier to handle than a nine,” I said.

  “Give Mike your phone, Bobby,” Wanda said.

  “I need my phone to call you to pick me up.”

  “Lo-Lo!” I shouted and went toward the room. She opened the door and came out. “I need your phone.”

  Lo-Lo went in the room, she came back with Anya and she handed me her phone. “Thank you, Lo-Lo.”

  “You be careful,” Anya said, she and Lo-Lo kissed me, Lo-Lo winked at Wanda and they went back in the room.

  “You three are so cute,” Wanda said. “I’ll call you and let you know what’s going on.”

  “Let’s go,” Bobby said.

  We switched keys, I picked up the M79 single-shot grenade launcher and we left the building, got in the cars we’d stolen the night before and went our separate ways.

  That’s right, I got a grenade launcher. I won it off some guy playing poker with Angee. I’d always wondered when I’d ever have a use for it. I guess today is the day. It was about nine-thirty when I got Wanda’s call that everything was going as planned so far.

  “We got the mark. The case is handcuffed to his wrist, so I hope somebody has bolt cutters.” I heard Bobby say, I got them, and Wanda continued. “They had a limo waiting outside and they’re on the Southern States heading for Hempstead. You ready?”

  “And waiting.”

  “I’ll call you when we’re getting ready to make the turn.”

  “I’ll be ready.”

  The next time the phone rang it was Wanda telling me that the mark was making the turn. I stepped out in the street and raised the grenade launcher and fired.

  The limo swerved at the last second and the grenade hit another car. The limo came roaring through the fla
mes and I watched Wanda and Bobby speed after them as I ran to the car.

  “Why can’t shit ever go the way we plan it?” I said aloud and got in the car. “Not planning shit at the last minute might help,” I said and sped off after them.

  By the time I caught up, Wanda was right on their tail and Bobby was firing. I pulled up alongside them and began firing out the window as I drove. When my gun was empty, I stepped on the gas and rammed the limo from the back. The limo swerved but recovered quickly and kept going.

  As Bobby continued firing, Wanda pulled up alongside the limo and rammed it. I rammed it again from the back and when Wanda hit it again, the limo fish tailed and crashed in to the cars parked along the street.

  When the driver opened his door, Bobby shot him. I brought the car to a screeching halt and jumped out firing. I hit one of the bodyguards and Bobby shot the other. As we approached the car, I saw Wanda get out with the bolt cutters, but she stopped when I looked at her crazy and held up my hand. The mark was still in the limo and there was no telling if he was armed.

  I came up on one side and Bobby came up on the other and we both looked in the limo at just about the same time. What we saw was the mark, slumped in the seat with the case on his lap.

  “He’s dead,” I said, and Bobby shot him.

  “Just making sure,” he said and went to get the bolt cutters from Wanda. Bobby cut the chain and got the case, we got in the car I was driving, and Bobby drove us away from there, fast. He drove us to Wanda’s car and then we ditched the car we’d stolen. Once that was out of the way, we went to Sherman’s to get paid.

  “Tell the truth, Wanda, that’s why you wanted in,” Bobby said once we were at The Late Night and I gave Wanda her share.

  “Maybe,” Wanda said and smiled as she counted her money. It was her first big pay day.

  “What you going to do with all that money?” he asked.

  “Invest it.” She stacked her money in three neat piles. “What are you gonna do with yours?”

  “The celebration continues!” Bobby said and raised his glass.

  “To the celebration,” I said and raised my glass.