by Coe Booth
The four guys I gotta collect from live in the Bronx, Washington Heights, and Harlem, so I don’t gotta go too far. I take the train to Harlem first, then work my way back uptown. Tell the truth, the whole thing is mad easy. Andre told the dudes I was coming and told them what I was wearing and shit. It wasn’t nothing. Most of the guys was, like, my age, living with they moms and sisters and brothers. Small-time guys trying to make a little money.
The last guy I collect from look like he thirteen or something. He live in the basement of this broke-down, need-to-be-tore-down building on 178th Street near Webster Avenue. Kid look mad starving too, all skinny, hair messed up, rotten teeth and shit. Sad.
Everybody give me they money in a plastic bag, all wrapped up in tape and rubber bands. I don’t even open nothing, just take it and leave. I mean, even though I’m doing this, I’m still trying not to be ’bout this. I’m only doing this so Andre will get off Cal back.
And for the money.
I’m back home ’round midnight. Cal still ’sleep on the couch. Damn, them pills is no joke. I should take one of them myself to get to sleep ’cause my mind can’t stop running, thinking ’bout everything, all at the same time. I’m thinking ’bout Adonna and how fucked up it got between us and it wasn’t even my fault. And thinking ’bout my pops and how he the reason I’m even in this situation in the first place.
But most of what I’m thinking ’bout is how Andre did it, got me into they business when I said I wasn’t gonna never do that. I don’t even know what I’m doing no more. I mean, even though everything worked out okay and I made some fast cash, still, I put my freedom on the line for two hundred dollars. And that shit is stupid.
THURSDAY, AUGUST 14
TWENTY-FOUR
I don’t know why, but the next day I go out to Astoria, to this DJ store my pops used to take me to all the time back in the day. They got everything, equipment and all the vinyl albums a DJ could want. All the expensive equipment is in the front of the store, and they got the best shit. Denon, Bose, Yamaha, Pioneer. Man, I wish I could afford any of it.
But I can’t. So I stop looking at that stuff and go to the back of the store where they got all the crap, shit no real DJ with any kinda respect for hisself would buy, only some dude trying to look like he something he ain’t. And that’s the kinda DJ I’ma look like at Jasmine party. Fake.
My pops fault, all of this.
I know I can use Patrick turntables and deck, but his bullshit amp ain’t gonna work with the big speakers I’ma need to get to make the music fill the room Emiliano rented for Jasmine party. And there’s a lot of other stuff I need for the DJ table, like some records I could mix with and a microphone and lights and shit. Adding up it all, I’ma need, least, a thou, and that’s for the cheapest gonna-break-in-two-days garbage.
Jasmine call me while I’m walking back to the train, and she ain’t just crying, she doing that nasty, snot kinda crying, and for three whole minutes, she don’t say nothing and I’m like, “Jasmine? Jasmine, what up? Jasmine, you a’ight?” Nothing.
Part of me know this just her being emotional, and that’s just who she is, but I been looking out for her for a while now, and the other part of me need to make sure nobody hurting her or nothing.
“I’m sorry, Ty,” she say finally, in this little-girl voice. “I, I don’t know why I called you. I—” She back to crying again.
I’m just ’bout to walk up the steps to the train, but she sound like she need to talk, so I light up a loose and lean up against the wall on the side of a cell phone store.
“Jasmine, c’mon, talk to me. What’s going on? You thinking ’bout Joanny?” Some days the whole thing just hit Jasmine again and she can’t get outta it.
“No, it’s not that.”
“Emiliano, then? He did something to you?”
“No,” she say. “No, it’s Reyna. I still can’t find her and I want—” More crying.
“C’mon, Jasmine. You know Reyna okay. She know how to handle herself.”
She sniff in all them boogers. “I know that, but I need to see her.”
“The party still gonna be hot, Jasmine, even if Reyna don’t come. Don’t worry ’bout that.” I’m saying all this but meanwhile I ain’t got no equipment or money, and if I don’t do something fast, this gonna be the kinda party where kids gonna hafta stand ’round talking and shit ’cause there ain’t gonna be no music.
“You don’t understand, Ty. I really need her.”
I don’t get it. Jasmine sound desperate all of a sudden. I ain’t think it was all that important to get Reyna to come to her party, but look like females take this Sweet Sixteen shit real serious.
“I wanna go look for her,” Jasmine say. “I’m gonna call in sick tomorrow and go to New Jersey, to the last place she lived to see if she’s still there.” I know the next thing she gonna say before she say it. “Come with me, Ty. Help me find her.”
Oh, damn. The day before her party when I need to be thinking of a way to get the speakers and shit, she gonna have me running ’round Jersey trying to find a woman like Reyna, who move from one guy to the next like it ain’t nothing. Like Jasmine ain’t her responsibility no more.
“A’ight,” I tell her. “I’ll go with you.”
Can’t say no to her.
When I get back to Bronxwood I spend a couple hours at Patrick apartment, practicing DJing with the Spanish music, and finding the right old-skool music that I can mix with it. Can’t just give up my style ’cause the music kinda different. Gotta turn this party out no matter what.
Then Andre text me and say he got another job for me. I don’t tell none of this to Patrick. Not like I need to keep shit from him, but the fact that I’m even doing this is embarrassing as hell. To be broke enough to hafta work for Andre mean I’m as hard up as I could get.
When I get downstairs, Tina there taking care of Cal. She got him to sit up a little on the couch and she trying to get him to use that machine thing he s’posed to use so his lungs could get stronger. Andre there sitting in the chair in the living room talking to Cal real serious, like what he saying is so important, shit like, “You need to get better so you can help out the family. Remember, it’s all us in this together. I take care of you and Greg, and Greg take care of me and you, and—”
“He get it, Andre!” Tina scream. “He ain’t stupid. Leave him alone already! How many times he gotta hear the same thing? God!”
Tina a pain in the ass sometimes, but she do speak her mind, which is a good thing when it come to Andre.
I go over to Cal and watch him use the machine. He gotta try and breathe in air for as long as he could so that this yellow thing on the side move up. But he can’t hardly get it halfway up, and he can’t hold it for more than half a second. “You doing good,” I tell him.
Tina roll her eyes. “You gotta keep working on this, Cal, even when I’m not here. Your child needs you to get better.”
Cal try the breathing thing again, but I can tell he exhausted from it. It’s hard seeing my boy like this, all helpless and shit.
Andre get up and come over to me. He hand me a list that got names and addresses on it. Some of the same dudes I went to yesterday, a couple new places, but they all still not that far. “A’ight,” I say. Then I tell Cal, “I’ma be over by that spot we got them ribs from, remember? I’ma bring you back some of them, long as you don’t get off that couch and you just chill ’til I get back.”
“He’s not going anywhere,” Tina say.
Andre shake his head. “Y’all need to stop treating him like a baby.”
“C’mon, man,” I say. “He just got out the hospital. Give him a little time. He can’t even hardly breathe good.” “I see that, Ty.”
“He need least a couple weeks to get back out there, Andre. I’m picking up his slack, right? The whole reason I’m doing this is so you could back up off him.”
Andre nod a couple times. “Okay, you right, Ty. Long as the work getting done. That’s what
matter, right?”
“Yeah.”
“You know what, Tyrell. I got a better job for you.” Andre lower his voice. “I’ma give you the job I give my best guys. It’s gonna take you more time, but it’s only one stop and I’ma give you five hundred. You down?”
All I hear really is the amount of money I’ma get and I’m in. With five hundred dollars I could probably put together what I need for the party. I’ma be straight. “Yeah,” I tell him. “Where I hafta go?”
“Brooklyn,” he say. “Bed-Stuy.”
It take me more than a hour to get to Bed-Stuy. I get off at the Kingston-Throop stop, deep in hard-core Brooklyn, and soon as I come up the steps to the street, I see all these dudes hanging ’round the subway station like they waiting for somebody. It’s after ten, but there’s still people out. They got a lot of stores on this block, all kinds of Jamaican patty and soul food restaurants, hair braiding and nail places. All the gates is down though. Only store still open is a bodega on the corner with bright lights, so the block ain’t all that dark. Still, the way them guys stare me down as I cross Fulton Street, I know something up. I can feel it.
Them dudes don’t follow me ’round the corner to Kingston Avenue or nothing, and I find the building real easy. It’s one of them low buildings, only four floors, with fire escapes and piles of garbage bags right in front. But getting there only half the problem. The front door locked and there used to be a buzzer, but the shit is busted with wires hanging outta it. I don’t got the guy phone number that I’m collecting from, so all I can do is stand there and wait. Meanwhile, I’m watching my back too.
It take ten minutes, then this female come up to the building and she must not live there neither ’cause she just start screaming up at one of the windows, “Tony! Throw down the key!” She wait half a second and scream again, “Tony! I need the key! Throw down the key!”
A window on the second floor open and a key on a thick string come flying down. She snatch it off the ground and open the door and don’t say nothing to me when I go in right behind her.
The guy I’m collecting from live on the top floor. Me and the girl take the elevator up together, but I don’t say nothing to her. When I get to the guy door I’m s’posed to collect from, there’s a big sticker on it that say JESUS LIVES HERE and I ain’t sure I’m at the right place ’cause that’s wild. But I knock anyway and this short dude in his twenties answer the door.
“Jimmy?” I ask.
“Come in,” he say, looking down the hall like he making sure I’m there by myself. “I got it in my room.” He close the door behind him, then go down the hall, and I’m standing there looking at a old lady in a sweatsuit watching TV. She gotta be his grandmother or great-grandmother or something. The apartment nice and clean and smell good too, like she just finished cooking something.
“Hi,” I say to her, but she don’t hear me. I ain’t even sure she know I’m standing here.
When the guy come back, he hand me the plastic bag and go, “You the new guy Andre got working for him?”
“Kinda.”
“How long you been with him?” “Not that long.”
“Watch your back,” he say. “You know how he could get.”
“Yeah, I know.” I stick the bag in my pocket. “I’ma go now.” I get out in the hall, still thinking ’bout what Jimmy said ’bout watching my back. This whole pickup giving me a bad feeling. Something ain’t right.
I take the stairs down ’cause I need time to think. When I get to the third floor, I stop and pull all the tape and shit off the bag and, damn, there gotta be, like, three thousand dollars in there. I take my five hundred out and stick it inside my sock and push it all the way down ’til it can’t go no more. Then I wrap the rest of the money up and put the tape back ’round it and stick it in a pocket in my backpack.
When I get to the first floor, I don’t see them dudes down there or out in front of the building, so I go outside and walk the other way this time. I don’t really know where I’m going, just not to the same train stop I got off at in case they waiting for me. I’m just trying to get back to Bronxwood with no kinda problems.
But that don’t work. I ain’t even halfway down the block when a dude come flying out one of them alleys and bum rush me. He a big dude, and the way he hit me feel like I been hit by a bull, but he don’t knock me down or nothing, he just knock me off balance. And that’s all it take for three other dudes to come outta nowhere and attack me.
Everything happening so fast. I’m getting punched in the head and pushed, but I don’t really feel none of it. And they all talking and saying shit that don’t make no sense. I can’t tell what the fuck is going on. I feel them going through my pockets and trying to grab my backpack, but I ain’t giving it up that easy. Yeah, there’s, like, four of them on me, but shit, I ain’t ’bout to pussy out now. Not ’cause of no Brooklyn dudes, that’s a fact.
So I fight back. I punch one guy dead in the mouth and another guy in the eye. But that’s it. There’s too many of them. So I try and get away, but they pulling me, trying to get me in the alley with them, but I ain’t going there.
I’m, like, a foot away from the alley when it happen. One of the guys, the one that look the oldest, grab me by the head and press a nine millimeter to the side of my face. “The money,” he say real slow.
One of the guys try again to get my backpack, but I ain’t ’bout to give up all my shit just to try and hold on to Andre money. I don’t even know what I’m fighting for. Fuck Andre. I take the backpack off my shoulder, reach into the pocket, and take out the bag. Then I throw it into the alley and take off running down the street. My heart is beating fast and hard and I’m feeling like a chump. I just ain’t trying to get shot.
I get to the corner and turn back to see if they following me, but they ain’t. So I start walking, trying to cool myself down. It ain’t easy. I had a gun to my fucking head. I could be dead right now. And for what? For some drug money? For Andre?
I walk for a while, thinking and thinking. By the time I find another train station, I know what happened. And I shoulda knew what was up from jump. Andre set my ass up. I shoulda knew something was gonna go down from how he started whispering when he told me where he wanted me to go and how he threw the five hundred in my face.
Andre ain’t sent me here to Brooklyn for nothing. He trying to get back at me for something. Trying to get me scared.
Them guys wasn’t trying to kill me. They was sending me a message. That Andre could do whatever he want to me. That he got guys all over the place. Even Jimmy was trying to tell me ’bout Andre.
But I don’t care. Yeah, Andre could hire some dudes to attack me, but I know he ain’t no big-time gangsta. That shit is in his mind. He just don’t want nobody telling Cal he don’t hafta listen to him and do everything he say. He don’t want Cal to be his own man. He like my pops that way.
Back at the apartment, Cal in his room. It’s late, and I don’t know if he ’sleep or not. Music is coming from the radio in there, but it’s low. He could definitely sleep through it. Probably took some of them Vicodins and passed out again, knowing him. Shit. I could use a couple of them to stop the headache I got from getting hit in the head.
I sit in the living room for long time, having a beer and going over everything. The apartment is real quiet. I don’t know where the fuck Greg at. I send Andre a text: got robbed.
I wait for him to text me back or call me, but he don’t. I ain’t telling him nothing he ain’t already know.
I hold the phone thinking ’bout who I could call, but it’s late. All this shit that happened tonight and I don’t got nobody to talk to. I don’t even got a girl.
I think ’bout calling Jasmine, but she probably ’sleep already. Besides, I don’t want her knowing ’bout none of this. Girl would go crazy if she knew I was working for Andre. And if I tell her what happened tonight, she only gonna start worrying ’bout me too. That’s the last thing she need.
It take two
beers before I start to calm down. My head is still hurting, but weird thing is, what I’m really feeling is the pressure on the side of my face from the gun. Right there, at that spot, it’s still cold.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 15
TWENTY-FIVE
Going to Jersey City was a waste of time, straight up. We started off at the last apartment where Reyna was s’posed to be living at, and course she wasn’t there no more. But some woman that lived on the first floor told us that Reyna was working at some club, and I don’t know why we listened to a woman that was drunk at, like, eleven in the morning, but we did.
Turned out, yeah, Reyna worked there, but she quit, like, four months ago to work at some strip club. Course the strip club was all the way in Newark and they was just opening up ’cause I guess dudes like to go to strip clubs for lunch or something, but they wasn’t letting two kids in. Some guy that work there told us Reyna don’t work for them no more but he see her in the neighborhood, so Jasmine left a message with him to give to Reyna, telling her ’bout her party and where it’s at. Doubt he gonna give Reyna the message though. Anyway, why he hafta? Reyna know when Jasmine birthday is. Why she need some strip club dude to tell her to come to her own sister party?
Meanwhile, Jasmine been crying off and on all day, every time we left another place where Reyna wasn’t at. And no matter how many times I tried to tell her that Reyna probably okay wherever she at, Jasmine wasn’t trying to hear me. Finally, we ain’t had no other choice ’cept to come back to the Bronx.
“I don’t wanna go home,” Jasmine tell me on the train. “I wanna go to your place just until I can stop myself from crying.”
“A’ight. I want you to hear some of the music Patrick got, stuff that wasn’t even on your list.”
By the time we get back to Bronxwood, it’s after three. I’m trying to be cool, but inside I’m shitting bricks ’cause I need to start setting up for her party in exactly twenty-seven hours, and I don’t know how I’ma make that happen. Only good thing is Jasmine ain’t crying no more, but I can tell she still upset and still worried. And I get that. Reyna ain’t no kid, but she still Jasmine sister.
