by Desmond Hall
Frankie half nodded like it didn’t matter, but felt his heart quickening. “Which posse he’s in?”
“Taqwan’s. He—”
Frankie drew in a breath. He had read the newspapers, followed the killings. Taqwan’s name was attached to a lot of shit, all over Kingston. “Yeah, I heard about Taqwan.” If Garnett was part of Taqwan’s posse, then he had even more to prove than Frankie had guessed. Pride was everything. There were killing reprisals between posses all the time. Not good. Not good at all. And now Winston was getting caught up in all this mess? “Winston, how ’bout you? Tell me ’bout the—”
“Hello, Franklyn!” a voice called out. Aunt Jenny, Samson’s sister, swept into the store, breezing right past Winston, who was totally checking her out.
Frankie flicked the back of Winston’s ear, motioning for him to keep his damn eyes in check.
Over Aunt Jenny’s shoulder were two large handbags, one stuffed full, the other empty. She placed the full one on the counter. Frankie suspected it was stuffed with cash, payment from one of Mr. Brown’s distributors. His aunt used many covers to avoid police while acting as a courier for Mr. Brown and for Uncle Joe. No one would suspect that at her waist was a Glock 41, a weapon made to remove chunks of flesh with a single round, a gun so appropriate for her, the weapon’s logo could be a picture of her face. Ice Box and Buck-Buck were his uncle Joe’s muscle in the posse, but Aunt Jenny was just as dangerous and way smarter.
Always full of airs, she sauntered over to the discount vegetables, chose two St. Vincent yams, and deposited them into her empty handbag as if taking perfume samples in a mall. She continued shoplifting: two star apples, a tin of Ovaltine, and a can of butter beans. Frankie watched without watching—how much could fit in that bag, anyway?
Mr. Brown poked his head out of the back room. Now Frankie watch-watched. Considering Mr. Brown’s high blood pressure, Aunt Jenny’s appearance could be a life-threatening situation. Mr. Brown was hiking his belt up so high he looked like Black Santa. Then he lowered it until it slipped under the shade of a significant overhang of fat. Then, like an eager teenage boy, he beelined straight to Frankie’s aunt.
“Lawd God, you batty well round, Jenny.” He craned his neck to check her out.
Aunt Jenny let a slow smile cross her face, and Frankie knew she was computing fast.
“You think so?” Aunt Jenny brushed back her shoulder-length dreads.
“Every man knows it, I swear.”
“I’m just happy you do.” Aunt Jenny shifted the grocery-packed handbag to rest on the curve of her hip. Mr. Brown pressed up against her for a hug, overlong. Nauseating hip grinds. This was his aunt’s front, the deception she used to give her an edge over the men who saw women as hip grinds, which by Frankie’s count, was just about all of them. He’d seen it again and again—she let them think they were in charge, that she sought their attention. But she was in charge the whole while.
Mr. Brown finally released Jenny, only then noticing Winston, who was back to ogling Aunt Jenny. His face went blood-pressure red. “What you doing here, boy? You steal anything from me? Get out my store!”
“Don’t talk to me like that!” Winston fronted, all outraged.
At that, Mr. Brown lifted his shirt a mere inch—enough, however, to display a gun handle.
Frankie had witnessed this transformation before in Mr. Brown. Time to leave. He laid a hand on Winston’s shoulder. “Mr. Brown, is this a good time for me to take my break?”
Mr. Brown, giving Winston the stink-eye, said, “Sure, go ahead.”
Over his boss’s shoulder, Frankie could see Aunt Jenny take the opportunity to lift a box of water crackers and slide it into her bag. She winked at him. The wink felt less conspiratorial, more like she was bragging. He waved goodbye.
* * *
Through the woods, Frankie and Winston reached a concave clearing in the mountain slope—their private meeting spot. Just past a Jamaican doctorbird sticking its long beak deep into a hibiscus plant’s business, they sat. Frankie dug into his brown lunch bag, unwrapped the tinfoil around his sandwich—a thick spread of bully beef between two hunks of buttered hard-dough bread—and chomped. A mongoose and a skinny field rat trashed through the dried leaves.
Frankie held out the sandwich. “You want half?”
Winston shook his head, patted his belly. “Watching my figure.” He laughed.
Frankie laughed too but got straight to the point. “You think gang business is right for you, Winston?”
“How you mean?” There was an instant defensive edge in his friend’s voice.
Frankie stared at his sandwich. Winston’s skin was as thin as kite paper, and he had used the wrong words, sounded like a parent.
Winston thrust his chin out. “You’re not smarter than me. You’re book smart, and you talk better than me, but me know the street. And me know gang runnings better than you too.” With that, he oh so casually pulled out a pocket Beretta and oh so casually aimed it at a tree.
Frankie tried to hide his surprise. And did Winston know the street? Really? Frankie remembered a blazing-hot day, back when they were twelve or something, and Winston had talked him into playing hooky, going down to Kingston. On a dare from Winston, they’d checked out a bad neighborhood in West Kingston. On this one street, a man grabbed a woman in a black leather skirt and knee-high boots, probably his prostitute, and shook her hard. Winston had yelled, “Hey!” The pimp immediately let go of the woman and came stalking, digging in his pocket for something. Frankie had quick-scanned the area. There weren’t many people on the street, at least no accomplices. He broke into a run. After a few strides he looked back. Winston was still standing there on the corner, the pimp, a switchblade now in his hand, closing in. “Winston!” Frankie had yelled. Winston turned, eyes so wide. Frankie shouted, “Run, mon!” And only then had Winston finally taken off. The pimp, thank God, turned like an airplane doubling back on its direction. When Winston caught up to Frankie, he’d said, disappointment in his voice, “Me think me was going to see you use your fast hands, and punch him up.” Winston was thinking that Frankie had been a coward, but actually, Winston hadn’t understood what to do in moments like that one. Big difference.
A click brought Frankie back to the moment. Winston had removed the clip from his gun. Shit. The only other people in Troy who owned guns were Aunt Jenny and Mr. Brown. His uncle’s crew had plenty, sure, but they lived at the encampment at the top of the mountain. Joe. Wait—was Winston in Joe’s gang? No way. Noooo—
“How much is Joe paying you?” Frankie asked, and pretended to wipe his brow just to cover his shock. Joe had to have given Winston the gun. This wasn’t good. What the hell was Joe thinking? No telling what kind of trouble Winston could get into with a gun.
Winston refused to look Frankie’s way. “Don’t know yet, but Joe says it’s going to be good money.”
“So you’re going to sell ganja?” Frankie took a bite of his sandwich, like the question was no biggie. Just conversation. He could have shoved it all in his mouth and chewed forever.
Winston shook his gun like a pointer. “No, mon. He wants us to do some jobs for the PNP. If we do okay, we will get better pay, even get to go live up at his camp.”
Winston suddenly raised his gun, braced his shooting hand with the other, and fired a shot. It didn’t look like he hit what he was aiming at. Still, he nodded, clearly pleased with himself. “We been getting some practice with Buck-Buck.”
Frankie’s ears were ringing. “Well, practice a little farther away from me next time.” He pointed at the gun. “You have that thing on you the other day when you were fighting Garnett?”
“No, mon. Him lucky, too.” Winston offered it to Frankie. “Want to try?”
Frankie shook his head. He’d fired a gun before; Joe had taken him for target practice once. Frankie had emptied half the magazine, but only hit the tree he’d been aiming at a couple of times. Joe had joked that he must be a tree lover. Irritated, Fra
nkie aimed again. As Joe leaned close and whispered that he missed because he was aiming at the target instead of using the sights, Frankie adjusted, used the sights, and blasted chunks of bark off the tree. Then he felt stupid. What was he doing out there anyway? He’d let himself be pranked into feeling he had to be Joe’s kind of tough guy—out there shooting when he didn’t want to.
Winston was admiring his gun like it was a new girlfriend. “Who else joined?” Frankie asked now, even more casually.
Winston looked through the sight. “Marshal, Baxter, Greg, Big Pelton, and some others.”
Whoa. Frankie had been hitting the books crazy hard the last few weeks, but how had he not known all this? “Why didn’t anybody tell me?”
Winston shrugged. “Joe said we shouldn’t talk about it.”
“I get that, but I’m not exactly a stranger, Winston.”
Winston looked away again. “We in a posse now, mon. You’re not.”
Frankie threw the rest of his sandwich into a bush. Folded the tinfoil into smaller and smaller triangles.
“Joe probably didn’t want to distract you from your studies, you know?” Winston said at last.
Winston’s words were genuine enough, but there was a layer of condescension there. The idea that Frankie couldn’t handle the news, that he couldn’t rise above it. “He asks me to join the posse all the time,” Frankie felt compelled to say.
Winston leaned forward, his shoulder almost touching Frankie’s. “Hey, you want me to talk to Joe about it? Maybe get you inna the posse?”
“What did I just tell you? If I wanted to be in the posse, I would be. He’s my uncle, Winston.” What the hell. It was like Winston was saying he was closer to Frankie’s family than Frankie was.
Winston threw his hands up. “Okay, you go talk to him, then.”
“I don’t want to talk to him—it’s not the right thing for me,” Frankie said, thinking, How can Winston not get that? And then he realized: he had the perfect segue to say what he most wanted to say. “It’s not right for you, either.”
Winston sucked his teeth. “Me all right.”
Frankie rolled up his bag, stuck it in his back pocket to use again tomorrow. “I don’t mean it in a bad way, Winston. It’s just—”
Winston waved him off. “Listen, Frankie. You join, and you get a gun. You going to need one if Garnett is looking for you.”
And who the hell’s fault was that, Winston? It was useless talking to him. Frankie got up. “Later, mon.” Slapping leaves away from his face, he descended the slope toward the street. Not thirty seconds later, he heard a twig crack, then something like leaves rustling. He turned to see Garnett atop the slope, a long kitchen knife in his hand. Shit.
“Me tell you me no done with you,” Garnett called out.
Frankie’s stomach fell and kept falling. Part of him knew that to run would be smart, but the other part wanted to get this over with now. Maybe there was a soul somewhere inside Garnett.
“Winston didn’t mean what he said to you the other day.”
Garnett swayed back and forth like a tree in pre-storm wind. “Bullshit.” He took a few steps closer.
Frankie reached behind his back, pretending he was going for a gun. “You want this smoke?”
Garnett paused, uncertain, but he didn’t look scared. He probably wanted to make a name for himself in his new posse.
A gun slide clicked. “Me know you don’t want this.” Garnett whipped around. Winston appeared on the slope above Garnett, Beretta aimed directly at him.
Smirking, Garnett turned back to Frankie. “Me with Taqwan. You hear me? And me going to tell him ’bout this.” And with that, Garnett slipped back into the bush.
Frankie stared after him, his hand still on his back pocket, maintaining his bluff. But his mind was spinning: Had he just provoked a gang war?
Winston skid-stepped down the decline to Frankie’s side. “Still think you don’t need a gun?”
Four
the full moon sliced through charcoal-dark clouds, and Frankie was glad for the beaming light—he could actually see where he was going as he hiked up the deserted mountain road to Joe’s camp. Passing two of Joe’s men—lookouts—he continued another ten minutes up to the top, to where the road emptied into a wide circular driveway. Fifteen one-bedroom wooden houses and a handful of shacks lined up in a curving row along the edge of the mountain, thick brush and trees everywhere. The silhouetted peaks of the rest of the Blue Mountains behind them seemed to go on forever. A fast synth rhythm, matched up with Sizzla’s voice, and coursed out of a portable system, haunting the night with raspy meditations. There was no electricity this high up the mountain, so kerosene lamps dangled all over, providing the only light the camp had.
Like always, Frankie got a warm welcome from Joe’s posse members, their wives and girlfriends, too. In an odd way, the camp always felt enchanted to Frankie; it was as if he’d stepped back into a simpler time, where rebels lived off the land, free from all rules but their own.
They were just sitting down for dinner, and beckoned Frankie to join them. Large singed pots sitting on the rock fire pit were simmering with a Rastafarian stew of okra, pumpkin, and coconut milk, much better than his half a sandwich. Frankie filled a huge bowlful.
After he ate, he leaned into the flickering light to watch the Ludi game his uncle, Ice Box, and Buck-Buck were playing at the far end of the table. Though practically everybody had a Ludi board, Frankie had never seen one like this—painted in the red, black, and green Rasta colors. His uncle noticed and invited him to a game. That was cool, given that he wasn’t part of the posse. Still, he shook his head. He needed to stay on task… get a quiet moment to talk to Joe about Garnett. But Joe had already handed the dice to Buck-Buck and nodded to Ice Box, and soon they were well into their game.
Nearly as soon, Buck-Buck was ahead. He scooped the dice. A lucky roll would hand him victory; Frankie hoped he would win fast and end the game.
Aunt Jenny strolled up, in baggy jeans and a denim shirt—a different look for a different occasion. She took a seat beside Joe, staring down at her cell phone.
“You think Buck-Buck is going to win?” Joe asked her.
“You know I don’t play games,” she said. Her voice was flat, the flirt packed away as tightly as the bag she’d stuffed with groceries earlier.
Ice Box, the furthest from victory, tapped his red game piece. “Buck-Buck, you nah go win this time.”
“No, mon. Me going to win this game now,” Buck-Buck said.
“Want to bet?” Ice Box challenged.
Ice Box always reminded Frankie of one of those kids at school who never opened his books, but was super insightful when it came to people.
Aunt Jenny looked up from her phone. “A fool and his money don’t know each other for a long time.”
“Who you calling fool, Jenny?” Ice Box folded his arms, his muscles rippling.
“You, fool,” Buck-Buck said, laughing.
Joe lit a spliff, took a long draw. “Roll, mon, and please roll a six and finish di game. Me can’t listen to you two all night.” He exhaled.
In Troy, people only bonded together when a river flooded or a fire raged; it took mass destruction to pull people together. But here, there was a genuine spirit of camaraderie. Joe had told Frankie on one of their many walks that the posse had to be a real family, with Rasta values. Not like the Kingston posses, where everyone sat around lazy, or went robbing and marauding to get some petty revenge on another posse. When Joe told him that he sometimes had them all go over Bible study topics, Frankie had been floored. The light was always burning here at camp, Frankie thought wryly. At his father’s house, the light went out with his mother. That was when Frankie started coming up to the camp more often. Hanging with Joe and Aunt Jenny made him feel less… alone. Yeah. They were always glad to see him, have him around, a stark contrast to his father’s silence. Not that Samson and Frankie had ever really gotten along when his mother was alive, but t
hey’d been, at least, more cordial, less distant than they were now.
Buck-Buck rolled. The dice tapped across the board. “Six, me win it!” Buck-Buck turned to Ice Box. “See, you should never bet against me.”
Frankie smiled—they could have been him and Winston. He smiled also because his uncle looked to be in a good mood. “So,” he said low. “Uncle, can I talk to you a minute?”
“Come, Nephew.”
Frankie followed Joe along a path that led away from the shacks and into the bush, legs brushing against waist-high ferns. Joe always liked to talk and walk. Even at night. Frankie wondered, not for the first time, what his life would have been like if Joe had been his father and not Samson. The thing was, while Joe could be fierce, Frankie could talk to him about things—learn things—that Samson would never know. Joe was also powerful, and though he didn’t flaunt his money, he had to be pretty wealthy. Frankie wouldn’t even need the scholarship to do the things he wanted to do—
“So, what’s on your mind, Nephew?” But Joe was already smiling knowingly. “Garnett?”
Frankie froze. Had Winston already spilled about the fight?
“Don’t worry, Nephew.” Joe stretched his arms, turning them in small circles. “My eyes is long.”
Frankie nodded. “I think… I’m pretty sure he might be looking for revenge.” He stopped short of asking for help. He wasn’t about to get himself in a situation where he was indebted to his uncle. Asking for advice was as far as he could go.
Joe dismissed Frankie’s concern with a pffft. “Garnett works for Taqwan, but Taqwan isn’t going to cross me over some little fight. Other things, maybe.”
Frankie remembered the scowl on Garnett’s face, the eyes that didn’t seem to have any life to them. “But Uncle—”
“Is no problem, Nephew.”
Frankie wasn’t going to push; Joe knew his business. “Okay.”
“So, how is you father?” He didn’t ask about his brother very often. “Him find a job yet?”
