by Nicety
Running down the back stairs, I quickly took out my cell, frantically dialing and watching my back in the process. No answer. That was very unusual. My poppa never let the phone ring more than twice when he saw my call on the screen. So immediately I began to panic despite the fact that I knew he was sick and he was probably sleeping. My family was dropping around me quicker than electric zappers hitting flies and I just didn’t think that my heart could take another loss that close to me. I tried the call again.
“Is the job done?” He asked coughing and wheezing into the phone.
“Oh my God, poppa! Don’t scare me like that.” I said walking down the side street headed for a well populated area of the neighborhood. "You sound as if you're getting worse."
“You're concerned about the wrong things. Is the job done, mija?” He asked again even more sternly this time.
“No poppa but I found—“
“I thought I told you NOT to call me until you have done the job. I don’t want to hear your voice until you’ve done what I’ve asked of you and not a minute more. You are wasting too much time.”
“Poppa wait! Calm down, please.” I shook my head at the fact that he was only concerned with one thing. "I found Drake. I've found him, poppa. But I did get here too late. He's, he's dead."
"Oh no, no, no. See I told you! Didn't I tell you he was dead?" He whimpered heavily. "I told you my son was dead. You don't listen."
"But poppa he was alive and I found him in Miami. I tracked him down just as I said I would but I just reached him too late. He was just killed a few minutes ago. He’s still warm. There was nothing I could do. I rushed down here to help him but I was late by minutes." I explained.
"My only son; gone. Mija you do what you gotta do to this prick and you do it today!" Anger activated louder octaves in his rather raspy sickly voice. "You wanted to be a hit man so you complete the job. That's what they do. That's what you'll do!" He snapped struggling to keep his anger from sending his illness into overdrive.
“But Drake never wanted help from anybody. He was too damned stubborn to tell anybody when he was in trouble. I tried poppa, I really did try.”
“My son would still be alive if you hadn’t been up there playing around with simple things instead of doing your job!” He yelled through the phone forcing my eyes to the ground in disappointment. “You disappoint me, greatly. But you can redeem yourself by completing your job today…or do not return home, Ever!”
“But Poppa—“
“Do you understand?”
"Yes poppa. I understand now." I said slowly hanging up the phone, feeling as if I wanted to cry some more.
My feet sped up walking across the main street hailing a cab in the process. When I finally caught one I hopped in with the quickness not hesitating to tell the cabby to take me to the airport. I needed to get back to Chicago and fast. Time was of the essence and I didn't have anymore of it to dick around. Cesar was a lovely distraction but not one I was willing to allow me to forget the sole purpose of my being here. I had played in his ass for too long, leading with my hot pretty ass unscathed pussy instead of my fucking brain. I let his aura captivate and lock me into some shit, his web of love. That shit was so sweet and seemed so pure but it was could prove down right deadly if I couldn't keep my head on as straight.
Do I love him? Of course I do. But just like money, once you're dead, you can't take love with you so it’s worthless.
Chapter 2— Mink
Somebody was ringing the shit out of the doorbell like they had lost their damn minds. I mean really leaning on the damn thing like we didn’t hear the shit the first time around. Even though my legs stood right away allowing my body to rise and peek around the corner towards the front door, my body felt like it was moving in slow motion. My heart was pounding hard and roughly like the sound of a big bass drum in a loud college marching band. I wanted it to stop, tried to slow my breathing and calm down so that it would but it was no use. The more that asshole leaned on that doorbell the faster my heart fluttered sending thoughts of jumping out the window and never coming back through my mind.
“Momma, you don’t hear the doorbell ringing like that? Dang, I see I gotta do everything around here.” CJ said waltzing past the bedroom door headed for the living room.
“CJ, no!” I screamed silently as I ran out quickly snatching him up with my hand around his mouth, pulling him back into the room before anyone could see him.
“What? What’s going on momma?” He asked seemingly annoyed by my sudden need to jolt him into the room.
“Uh, nothing. I just don’t want you opening the door because you’re so young. Anything could happen to you.” I huffed and lied still unable to calm down.
“C’mon momma you gon’ play me like that? You know grandma let me do whatever I want including answer the door.” He smirked jerking his arm from my grasp. “Come to think of it, you’re the only one that still treats me like a baby.”
“Shut up boy. You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”
“Ugh, are you going to open the door or am I? Cause whoever it is doesn’t seem like they will stop ringing the bell.” He asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Don’t worry about if I’m going to answer the door or not. Just sit your ass right here and don’t move.” I snapped as I pointed to the bed.
CJ plopped down on the bed with the shittiest facial expression, one that inclined me to slap the shit out of the back of his head. I was dead sick of his shit and I would be damned it I let him grow up to turn out like everybody else, hating me and treating me like shit for no damn reason. I tiptoed to the living room trying to remain in the shadows of the objects around so as not to give way to the fact that someone was approaching. I had begged my mother years ago to get a regular wooden door and not the glass one that anyone could see anything through. She was trying to damn hard to be fancier than the rest of the houses on the block.
I approached the side of the door with just as much caution as a police officer about to kick the door in. My heart thought that was what was just about to happen as it thumped harder and faster the more I leaned against the wall. I peeked through the pink sheer curtain tightly pressed against the door. Why she thought the curtain was good enough to block people from seeing in through the rippled patterned glass, I would never know. But when I peeked, all I could see was a distorted figure of a man wearing some sort of ugly brown suit.
“Uh, I can see your shadow standing there; you wanna open the door or what?” The man said seeming as if he was dancing around outside the door like he had been holding his piss for hours.
“I’m a minor. I can’t open the door for you.” I lied putting on my greatest impression of a young adolescent girl.
“Well I just got off the phone with the lady of the house and she told me there was an adult here to sign for this package and if I left without leaving it that she would make my life a living hell. I don’t want any trouble, lady. I’m new to this job and I’m just trying to keep it.” The man recited loud enough for the neighbors and possibly China to hear him.
“What kind of package?” I asked looking out the door past the ripples even further.
“Do you wanna open up the door and sign for it?” He asked.
I opened up the door looking around making sure this wasn’t some sort of set up that the feds were trying to pull on me. For some reason, I felt like them muthafuckas were watching, even though there wasn’t one car parked on the street or even in the surrounding houses’ driveways. The entire neighborhood was at work. I could have robbed everybody on the block and been back home in no time and they would have been none the wiser.
“Here, please take this damn package.” The man said shoving it into my face. “Now sign this.”
“Damn. That shit looks too heavy. CJ! Come out and grab this package for your grandma.” I yelled as he whisked around in front of me fast as hell while I signed the man’s electronic device. “Thanks.”
“Y
eah, thank you. Next time please just answer the door. This is my route so I always deliver to this woman and she gets upset when she doesn’t get her packages. I hate jumping through hoops just to give ‘em to her. Okay?” The man stated seemingly annoyed with my performance earlier.
“Yeah, whatever.” I snarled curling my lip up and letting my foot slam the door in his face.
“This fucking UPS guy at the door losing his mind on the damn doorbell because he’s afraid of my mother. My mother? That bitch could barely hurt a fly let alone be brave enough to trip on that man and make him lose his job. The whole thing was too funny to me, chuckling inside like a young schoolgirl. Back in the room, I grabbed my phone noticing the missed calls on it. My finger couldn’t have shuffled through the phone’s call log quick enough, hoping it was Cash or Cesar coming to run back up in this pussy. My eyes lowered when I noticed it was my fucking mother, calling back to back four times in a row. I rolled my eyes, smacking my lips and plopped back on the bed in repulsion as the phone rang for a fifth time and I reluctantly answered.
“Yeah, yeah you old bat. Your freaking package is here. And why you got that man thinking you gon’ get him fired from his little minimum wage ass job. You know you are really starting to be—“
“Mink! Shut the hell up! You and CJ put some clothes on. I’m on my way to come you get y’all. Something’s happened to Flava.” My mother interrupted me through sobs. “We’ve gotta get to the hospital right away!”
“Oh…uh. What’s happening momma?”
“It was all on the news. You didn’t see it?” She whimpered.
“No…I, uh, CJ’s been playing the game all morning.” I lied sitting up feeling that rush of nervousness shoot through me once more.
“She’s been shot, Mink, and left for dead. A truck driver found her and now she’s at the hospital. She had to be airlifted.” Her sobs increased heavily. “Look, don’t tell CJ. I don’t want him to get upset until we know what’s going on and how serious her injuries are. I’m…I’m going to try and pull myself together before I get there.”
“Ok, ok. I’m sure she’ll be just fine.” I said before hanging up.
“What’s wrong with auntie?” CJ asked coming into the room with his hand stuck in a huge bag of Dill Pickle Lays potato chips with little crusties still attached to his lips.
“Um, nothing. We just need to go. Grandma is coming to get us so get your jeans and your Nikes on.” I replied nervously sliding my jeans over my booty shorts and frantically looking for a tank top.
“I heard grandma say she got shot. Is that true?”
“Boy, don’t be eavesdropping on my conversations! Now get your ass dressed, damn!” I yelled, unable to focus on his bullshit.
I needed to calm down and think logically about my next move in all this without anyone being on to me. Somehow I needed to get some cash and leave town, maybe even the damn country but I didn’t know where I was going to get that kind of cash from since I was steady being played to the left by muthafuckas. I hated the fact that I had to be seen at this hospital but if I didn’t I would only seem suspect. My hands were trembling as if it were thirty degrees inside the house. I needed to tighten up fast.
While CJ angrily searched for the pair of jean shorts he wanted to put on, I scurried to the kitchen to open my mother’s white zinfandel that she had stored in the back of the refrigerator. She would be pissed when she found out but I didn’t give a fuck as I quickly poured the fluid into a shabby red plastic cup and downed it quickly filling up another. CJ walked in staring dead at me with accusing squinted eyes as he walked away picking out his Mohawk. Nothing that people thought of me mattered and if they thought it did that was their problem.
I flipped my long brown curls around to my back as I poured another cup before strategically placing the bottle back in the precise place she had it in. Hopefully by the time she went in for it she would be too stricken with grief to care that it was half empty. The feeling of the cold wine soothed the middle of my soul as I felt its coolness trickle down into my stomach. I loved the way if made my brain slightly woozy not wanting to give a fuck about any of the bullshit around me. All I needed now was a blunt to complete the task of calming down and forgetting and I would be all good. But as my mother’s car tires screeched outside and her hand pressed down blowing the horn erratically I knew that calming feeling was going to be short lived.
CJ ran out the door and out to the car with his cell in hand texting away with somebody sliding into the backseat before I could tell him to wait for me. I hated that that boy didn’t listen to me. It really tore me up inside. I came out seconds later locking the door behind me and stuffing my cell into my tight jeans back pocket before sliding in the passenger’s seat. Just as she said, she had pulled herself together in time to face CJ with no questions or concerns being raised. She was a damn good actress.
“So what all do we know?” I asked taking a deep breath and leaning my head against the headrest slapping some Mac gloss on.
“Grandma, momma drank your special drink you told me never to touch in the back of the refrigerator.” CJ blurted in the middle of the conversation.
“Boy!” I barked, frowning and smacking my juicy glossed lips. “Mind your own damn business.”
“Okay hold on now. We aren’t about to argue over something as trivial as that right now. But Mink you can’t fault the boy for telling the truth. That’s what he’s supposed to do.” My momma stated in the calmest of voices.
It was unlike her. I turned looking at her in the strangest way. She didn’t even comment about me drinking up her shit. That’s when I knew she was deeper in thought about this situation than I had anticipated. It was like she was secretly mourning Flava behind my back, refusing to show any real emotion. It got me to thinking. If I had been nearly killed, if what happened to Flava had happened to me, would she still be feeling the same way? I bet she would have sang a song and danced at my funeral. Ugh! It was beyond annoying to see her lost in thought like that as we drove on. Meanwhile, I could have slapped the shit out of the snitch in the back seat; sweet boy, my ass.
Fifteen minutes later, we arrived at the hospital racing through the revolving glass doors like one of us was on fire. I refused to speak. I felt that anything I said could be used against in me in the court of law, or some random shit like that. So I decided not to incriminate myself. My mother did all the talking. She asked the receptionist what room Flava was in and how to get to the ICU. She escorted us quickly in the elevator and up to the fourth floor.
“Excuse me. Where can I find room 211?” She asked the blonde haired nurse sitting at the desk, her voice crackling.
“Yes. Um, may I ask who you’re here to see?” The Caucasian woman asked in the most pleasant of voices.
“That’s my daughter in there. I need to see her—“
“Calm down ma’am and let me help you to the proper area. Okay?” The woman said as she signaled for someone to come over towards us.
“Hello. I’m Dr. Foster and I am the attending surgeon who operated on your daughter. I’d like to update you on her status before you go in to see her.” Dr. Foster spoke sternly yet soothingly allowing my mother a few deep breaths before she answered.
“Okay. First of all is she going to be okay?”
“You need to know that she’s lost a lot of blood and she was out there on that road for a long time. She was even awake when we brought her in here. We were amazed that she held on that long.” The doctor responded.
“But will she be okay?” My mother asked again.
“She suffered multiple gun shot wounds to the abdomen that we were able to recover and remove. She was bleeding very much internally but we were able to stop the bleeding. Basically we just have to wait to see if she pulls through this. Her vitals all look good and the surgery was very routine and successful.” Dr. Foster continued as sweat droplets formed on his forehead.
“Doc, I gotta tell ya. I feel like there’s something you’re av
oiding trying to tell me.” My mother said becoming a bit agitated.
“Well before you see her you should know that she’s in a coma right now. She also has some swelling to her face and arms but that’s normal. So to you she might not resemble the same person you’re used to seeing everyday.” Dr. Foster explained.
“Oh my God! My baby! Who could’ve done this to my precious child?” My mother bellowed as she put her hand on her mouth and stomped her foot in a torrent.
“You can see her but I advise that the young man sit out here in the lobby.” The doctor said as he walked away with the most concerned look on his face.
It was then that I knew what we were about to see could not have been good. I actually didn’t want to go in. I would have much rather sat out in the lobby with CJ, but when my mother grabbed my hand tightly squeezing for dear life, I knew she wanted me there. If for nothing else, I was there for moral support. Not because she wanted me there or needed me, but because there was no one else there she could use to cry on their shoulder. I didn’t want to see her whimper over this bitch, especially not since I was the one who tried to dispose of her ass. Bang up job I did.
