by Noire
I stood there waiting, and for the first time in a long time, I wasn’t scared at all. I was ready for G and ready to die. The lights were on me so bright I could barely see G, but I knew he was twirling that ring with a killer look on his face.
“So you do like sucking dick, huh Juicy?”
I glanced over at Pluto. He was holding his shit through his pants.
“I guess.”
“Naw, bitch. Don’t look like you was guessing just now to me. Say that shit out loud. Don’t be shy. Say you like sucking dick, cause that’s exactly what you was doing.”
I went ahead and said it. What did it matter? “Yes, G. I like sucking dick.”
“Good,” he said. “Cause you gonna suck some dick tonight. Pluto, wake that niggah up.”
Pluto came up on stage and snatched the hoody off the brother in the chair. He turned a whole bottle of vodka over and poured it dead in the guy’s face. Ace and G started laughing as the guy sputtered and coughed while coming awake, and as I strained to see around Pluto’s big wide ass I almost passed out when I peeped who was struggling and choking in that chair.
It was Jimmy.
My brother looked more dead than alive. His face was all fucked up and blood was caked up everywhere. He had a dented gash deep in his forehead and his jaw swung back and forth like it was broken.
“Jimmy . . . ,” I moaned, dropping to my knees in front of him. He had come back for me. “Oh, God . . . Jimmy-Jo . . . what did they do to you?”
His eyes were so puffy he could hardly open them. He reached out to touch me and I saw that his fingers were swollen and broken and pointing every which way. “You . . . my heart . . . Juicy.”
I couldn’t stop crying. “And you my soul.”
I turned to G. “What’d you do to him, G?” I screamed. “I thought you loved him like your own! How could you do him this way?”
“Bitch, you thought I loved Gino, too, but that didn’t stop you from sucking his dick!”
“Get a doctor for him, G. Please. Do what you wanna do to me, but Jimmy is hurt for real. At least get him a doctor.”
“Everything Jimmy’s gonna get is right here.”
I put my head down on my brother’s lap and cried some more. His insides were so busted up that he was bleeding from the mouth and blood sprayed out his nose every time he exhaled.
G said, “You in just the right spot, Juicy. Now, since you like sucking dick so much, pull out that niggah’s shit and get to sucking!”
I looked up. “W-w-what?”
G’s voice was cold as ice. “You heard me. Suck . . . his . . . MOTHERFUCKIN DICK!” And then he added softly, “Or watch the motherfucker die.”
A chill ran through my body and I fumbled for Jimmy’s belt. I’d suck his dick. I’d lick his ass, I’d swallow his balls, just as long as G let him live.
Jimmy fought me as I tried to get to him, cursing and protesting. “Juicy . . . no . . . stop, Juicy. No . . .”
Ace and his niggahs was laughing like crazy as I slapped at Jimmy’s hands, crying louder as he winced in pain from my blows. I didn’t give a fuck. I was gonna suck his dick until the skin fell off. I’d do anything to please G and to keep my brother alive.
I managed to undo the top button on Jimmy’s pants and he finally quit fighting me and let me get his zipper down, but as soon as I reached down into his underwear he brought his knee up and caught me in the chest, and if I hadn’t grabbed hold of the chair I would have fallen over backward.
Jimmy looked down at me with love and tears in his eyes and I knew the only reason my brother was here was because of me. We stared at each other for a split second and I tried to make him see without words why we had to work together, why we had to do whatever it took to keep him alive. But he shook his head no.
“I love you, Juicy-Mo,” my baby brother whispered with blood on his lips, and as I opened my mouth to tell him the same thing, he stood up and reached into his pants and then I saw a quick flash of silver and heard two thunderous booms.
The first shot got G right where he stood, and the second shot, the one that Jimmy turned on himself, sent blood and brains and shattered pieces of bone raining down all over my head as my soul broke free of his body and floated up to heaven.
Chapter Twenty-Six
As soon as the shooting stopped Moonie grabbed me and led me back down to the Dungeon. I’d screamed until my throat was raw, hysterical at the sight of my brother’s faceless body and his brain matter clinging to my skin. Jimmy’s body had landed on top of me, slamming me down to the ground and protecting me from the rounds that sank into his dead flesh as Pluto opened fire. It was a miracle, but I didn’t have a hole in me, except for the one bleeding from my heart.
Pluto had actually screamed when G went down, and if it wasn’t for Moonie he would have shot me on the spot. Click! Click ! Click! Pluto kept on pulling his trigger even after all the bullets were gone, and if he’da had any rounds left my ass would be dead. Moonie and Cooter rolled Jimmy off of me, and I caught a quick glimpse of G laying against a table with half of his chest blown away.
“This is some fucked-up shit, Juicy.” Moonie took me in the tiny bathroom and tried to use his shirt to wipe the blood out my eyes. “Shit’s about to get hot cause too many niggas got emotional and fucked up!”
Moonie pulled my bloody T-shirt over my head and helped me take off my filthy panties. My period had come down earlier that morning, and I’d made a pad out of the last of the toilet tissue I’d found in the nasty little bathroom.
There wasn’t even a rag to wash up with, so Moonie turned on the rusted tap and wet my bloody T-shirt down, then used it to wash my face and chest, and get what gore he could out of my hair. I stood there naked and crying in grief, that last look in Jimmy’s eyes haunting me down to my bones.
I didn’t even know Pluto and Ace had come downstairs until they were standing in front of me. Pluto was still crying, and the way Ace was looking at me made me glad that Moonie was standing between us.
“You gonna do her, Moonie?” Pluto asked, slinging snot. “Or you want me to? Either way, this ho gotta go.”
Moonie looked at him and shrugged. “Don’t matter who do her. But Pacho is still in Brooklyn and we ain’t getting three bodies in the trunk of no Benz.” He grabbed my arm and dragged me over to the mattress on the floor, and flung me down on that nasty, cum-stained sheet. I was shaking as Moonie slipped the chain around my wrist and then looped it around the pole again and locked it. “We’ll come back for her ass later. This time we’ll make sure the bitch treats you right. And then we’ll do her.”
I tried to turn over in my sleep, but I was still chained to the pipe on the filthy mattress. I didn’t know how long much time had passed, but ants had been chowing down on me, and I’d scratched my leg down to the white meat while I was asleep. I’d been dreaming about Grandmother, and grief was all over me. I’d seen her as clear as day, wearing the same dress we’d buried her in, her smiling face still caked up with mortician makeup. “Look out for yourself, Juicy,” she had whispered to me. “Jimmy-Jo is right here with me and Cara, and that hardheaded boy is doing just fine.”
The realization that they were all gone hit me hard. I was left in this world all by myself, alone without nobody to love me or look out for me. I willed myself not to cry again, and instead I started praying, wishing Moonie hadn’t stepped in front of Pluto when he pulled out that gun and hoping that the next time Pluto pointed it at me he’d have enough heart to take me out fast.
At the top of the stairs, the door opened again, but I didn’t even bother to open my eyes. Why should I? I’d lost my soul in the G-Spot, and there was nothing left to live for anymore. I heard Pluto coming down, this time real slow, like he thought I was scared and he wanted to punk me some more. I could feel him standing there looking down at me, but if he thought I was gonna open my eyes and beg to suck his dick in exchange for my life, his ass was dead wrong. I wasn’t Cara. I didn’t even want to live.
“Juicy, we fin’ta find somewhere to stash them bodies, so I’ma give you the chance that somebody shoulda gave my little sister.”
My eyes flew open and I found Cooter looking down at me.
“What?” I said softly, confused as hell.
“Dig this,” Cooter said, and he sure as fuck wasn’t stuttering. “You lucky, Juicy, cause ain’t no such thing as an ex-bitch with G. You don’t just walk away after fuckin with a niggah like him. You end up in a graveyard. G fucked my whole family up when he killed Charlene. Broke my mama’s heart and she ain’t been right since. So I’ma do for you what I wish somebody woulda been man enough to do for Charlene. I’ma accidentally forget to lock that door when we leave up outta here, but if you still around when me and the crew get back . . . I sure hate it for ya.”
“W-w-where’s Moonie?”
“Moonie? He’s outtie. My man kept his family in a one-bedroom on Tiebout while G tricked his money away over on Central Park West. Don’t worry about Moonie. He done stashed away enough yardage to live larger than ten Gs, and ain’t a dime of it traceable back to this Spot.” Cooter tossed me a fat envelope. “He left this for you, though. It should help you start over again.”
I bit down on my lip as Cooter turned a key in the chain’s lock, and the next thing I knew my arm was free and I was staring at his back as he walked up the stairs.
It coulda been a trap, but I trusted Moonie and somehow I believed Cooter, and two seconds after that door slammed I was on my feet. Weak and sore, I searched around trying to find something to put on, but the only thing in the room besides my bloody shirt and drawers was the sheet on the bed and one dirty tube sock.
I wrapped that sheet around me the best I could, then grabbed the envelope and crept up the stairs and listened at the door. Even the air at the top of the stairs was foul, and I forced myself to chill and wait, instead of busting through the door and running.
I figured if I counted to one thousand real slow, chances were they’d be long gone. When I got up to 999 I turned the knob on the Dungeon’s door and crouched down low. Moving through the doorway and into the darkness, I hugged the wall and led myself through the warehouse by touch. Moments later I pushed out the front door of the G-Spot, wrapped in a dirty white sheet and squeezing a sock between my legs. Running barefoot through the ice and snow, I staggered to the curb, flagged down a bootleg taxi, and collapsed inside.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I fell into Rita’s arms as soon as she opened the door. I was numb and could barely answer her as she yelled in Spanish and her sisters ran and got me a blanket and a housecoat.
“Oh my God, Juicy,” Rita switched to English as she pulled me into the bathroom. Even though I’d made it out of the Spot alive, most of me was already dead. I was like a baby as Rita put me in the shower and washed the blood off of me with soap and warm water. All I could think about was Grandmother and Jimmy. Gino and Dicey. I cried my heart out and Rita just let me. She didn’t even ask me what had happened. She just did her best to help me the only way she knew how. She had to climb in the shower with me in order to shampoo my hair, and for the life of me I couldn’t lift a finger to help her. I was just that through.
“Jimmy’s dead,” I told her after she had dried me off and given me a tampon, a housecoat, and some warm socks to put on. “G and Gino, too.”
Rita cried along with me then. She’d gotten soaked trying to get me cleaned up, and now she sat next to me wearing a green duster and holding me in her arms as I told her how G had set us all up, how Jimmy found out G was gonna kill me and had come back to help me. I cried as I told Rita how guilty I felt because me and my bullshit had cost my baby brother his life.
“Jimmy came back because he loved you, Juicy. Don’t let that grimy motherfuckin G steal what you and your brother had. G is the one who was guilty. Jimmy was straight-up loyal to him, but G still set him up too, right? Just like you wouldn’t have left Jimmy out there hanging, your brother couldn’t leave you out there like that neither. Come on,” she said, pulling me to my feet, “you need to lay down, Juicy. Get some rest, chica. Later, we’ll figure out what to do.”
I followed Rita into her bedroom dragging my feet.
“I got that package for you,” she said, and reached into a closet and handed me my dance bag and the MGM bag that contained half of the money that had been in G’s safe.
I dropped the bags on the dresser next to the envelope I’d gotten from Cooter and just stood there.
Rita had just pulled down her blankets and was ordering me to get in the bed when I eyed the telephone on her nightstand. I knew it was crazy, but my emotions were wrecked and I needed to hear his voice one more time, even if it was only on his voice mail. “Okay, Rita,” I told her. “I’ll lay down for a while. But first let me make a call.”
I dialed his cell phone digits and screamed out loud when the phone was answered on the second ring.
“Speak.”
“Gino!” I started babbling and crying all over again. I couldn’t believe it. Gino was alive. I was expecting his machine to pick up, but my man was alive and somehow I wasn’t by myself anymore.
“Juicy, Juicy, Juicy, Juicy . . .”
All he could do was say my name. Over and over again.
I heard all kinds of noise in the background and it sounded like somebody was making an announcement over a loudspeaker.
“Baby, you okay?” he shouted. “Juicy, where are you? I’ve been calling the Spot. Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” I sniffled. “I’m . . . okay. They said you were dead. I’m at Rita’s house. In Harlem. Where are you?”
“At the airport, baby. I just landed at JFK. I caught a flight back as soon as I could. Hold tight, baby. I’m coming to get you.”
I reminded him of Rita’s address but I was scared to hang up. Scared the whole thing would have been a dream if I disconnected the call.
“I’m on my way, baby. Just let me rent me a ride, and I’ll be there in a minute.”
I forced myself to hang up the phone. Rita was squeezing my hand and we both started crying again. “He’s alive, Rita,” I said, still trying to convince myself. “He’s really okay.”
“Yes,” she nodded, and wiped her nose. “It’s all right now, Juice. Everything’s all right now.”
I waited like a crazy person. Pacing back and forth around Rita’s living room table. Wearing a path in the floor between the twelve steps from her kitchen to her bedroom, and then the four from her bedroom to her bathroom. I darted to the window every time a car went by, although common sense told me it was gonna take a minute before Gino could rent a car and get here through traffic.
I was doing my best to hold on until my man arrived, knowing how bad grief was gonna come down on both of us when he heard about G and Jimmy. I didn’t have it in me to tell him about them over the phone. That was something I thought he should experience with me right by his side.
What seemed like ten hours was actually closer to two. Gino pulled up in a rented Sean Jean edition Explorer and I forgot about how cold it was outside. I was busting out the front door, duster and all, before he could step on the sidewalk good.
Gino almost broke down when he saw me. “Juicy.” his whole body shook and he cupped my face in his hands, careful not to touch my thousands of bruises. “Damn, baby. Oh, Juicy.”
Gino had a black eye and a long slash down the side of his face that had about thirty stitches holding it together. His left arm was in a sling and a cut had scabbed over on his top lip.
In the privacy of Rita’s bedroom, me and my man cried together as I told him about Jimmy and G. Gino cried even h
arder when he heard how Jimmy had sacrificed himself for me, and he said he was sorry he wasn’t there to protect both of us.
My man was a rock for me as he held me in his arms and we drew strength from each other. I saw the deep pain in his eyes as he traced the bruises all over my body. I knew I looked bad, and it hurt him to see how G and his friends had beaten and abused me.
Even though I knew Gino loved me, I didn’t want to tell him how I had worked the rooms at the Spot. I couldn’t tell him how his father had pissed all over me and brought in mad niggahs to use my body like a piece of meat.
I was hurting so badly for my brother that I didn’t want to relive all of that pain and humiliation and Gino was cool with that. He said he’d never press me to tell him anything and that I didn’t have to talk about it ever again in life if I didn’t want to.
We fell asleep in Rita’s bed holding on to each other as tightly as we could. I kept waking up during the night, startled and crying, and checking to make sure Gino was still there.
“I’m right here, Juicy,” he whispered in my ear. “I’m right here and I ain’t going nowhere.”
We hid out at Rita’s for two days until it was safe to slide downtown. Shit was hot on the streets of Harlem with G gone. The police, his connects, everybody was out of control. Rita told us G’s whole crew was being shook down and locked up left and right. She said Flex was in the hospital on critical after getting popped by some kid trying to take over the projects, and Moonie’s apartment had got raided but the cops were too late. The house was empty and nobody had seen Moonie in days.
Gino had mad family in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn. A bunch of loud-ass close-knit Puerto Ricans who loved their Gino to death. They took us in and treated us right and gave us time and space to get our heads together and heal, which was exactly what we needed.
Three weeks had passed since I’d run naked out of the G-Spot, and the backlash from G’s murder was still vibrating through New York City. With all the arrests and street hits we were reading about in the Post and the Daily News, Gino and I both agreed that it was time to put this crazy city behind us. We had kept the Explorer even though renting it for so long had gotten expensive. I wanted to pay for it out of the twenty-five hundred I’d stolen from G’s safe, but Gino said he had some decent change and that I should hold on to what I was carrying. We were planning to turn it in at the airport later on today, right before we hopped on a flight out west.
