Against the Grain

by Freeze

  Kay didn’t respond because he knew Mike was right. “Lemme see your gun, Duke,” Kay said.

  “Yo, I never understood why you don’t carry a gun. Duke ain’t always wit you. One of these young boys might kidnap yo ass one of these days,” Mike said.

  “ ’Cause I know the law. I’ma convicted felon and if I get caught with a gun, that’s fifteen to twenty for me. Plus, if a nigga fucks with me, he’s going to get repercussions from ya’ll niggaz. Who wants that?” Kay said, knowing that he’d just stroked Mike’s ego.

  Big Duke handed Kay his gun. “Be careful with this big dog, that ain’t no twenty-two, that’s a fo-fifth, you could blow your own foot off with that,” Big Duke said to Kay. They all laughed. Kay got out the car.

  “What’s up, nigga?” Tank said to Kay. Tank nodded to Gee who threw a bucket of cold water on Magic.

  “Wake yo ass up, so you can see yourself die,” Tank said.

  Everyone laughed but Kay and Magic. Magic looked Kay in the eye and looked like he wanted to beg for his life but his pride wouldn’t allow it. Instead, he took a deep breath and shut his eyes as Kay walked over and dumped five in his head and face.

  Mike had taken out his gun to kill Big Duke for pulling his gun that day. He was the one that brought Big Duke in anyway. Fuck it. Kay would just have to get another bodyguard. Besides, Big Duke was feeling himself since Kay promoted his ass. After watching Kay kill Magic, Mike decided he would catch Duke by himself. He jumped out of the car, “Yeah, Yeah, Yeah! That’s what I’m talking about! That’s the Kay I remember!” He grabbed Kay and swung him around. “You had all of us scared for a minute, nigga. I thought you had got soft on us or something.”

  “Get the fuck outta here. Never that,” Kay said.

  “Aiight, let’s go celebrate, my treat,” Tank said.

  As they got in their cars to leave, Kay thought to himself. . . . There’s no turning back now. He’d committed murder in the first degree. They left a few niggaz behind to dispose of the body so that it would never be found.

  21

  Gee was around the way standing on the block with the fellaz. It was a nice day. The sun beamed down as the neighborhood kids ran up and down the street, and as the fiends schemed to get their drugs of choice. He walked out of the 77 carry-out with a box of chicken wings and fries and a large half & half (half lemonade, half ice tea). Mike and Kay each took a chicken wing from him. He offered Tank one, but he waved Gee off because he was on the phone. Gee looked up just in time to see wifey bend the corner and stop in front of him. The window on the passenger side went down.

  “Gee, come here for a minute,” she said. Gee looked back at his crew for a second. They were all smiling because they knew it was getting ready to be some drama. Sandra was the drama queen. She didn’t mind busting this nigga in the head or cutting him when they got in an argument. She’d put Gee out a week ago after a big fight and she hadn’t seen him since. Gee dropped his piece of chicken back in the box and licked his fingers. He walked over to the car and got in. She drove up the block a few yards and parked.

  “Nigga, why you ain’t been home?”

  “Shit! You told me to get out.”

  “So what, motherfucker, you ain’t never been gone this long before. You be right back the next day apologizing and sniffin’ my ass.” Gee didn’t say anything, he just kept eating his chicken and fries.

  “I know what it is. You ain’t slick, motherfucker. Somebody told me they seen you coming out some bitch named Tracy’s house down in the projects. If you fucking her, I’m going to fuck you up.”

  “Nah, it ain’t like that. I use shorty’s crib to bag shit up. I just stayed over there a few nights but I slept on the couch. That bitch is ugly as shit. She ain’t my type.”

  “You got clothes over there?”

  “Just a couple pairs of shoes and shit.”

  Sandra put the car in gear and made a U-turn.

  “Where you going?” he asked.

  “We going to get your shit and I don’t want you to say nothing else to her.” Gee just kept eating, thinking how he was going to get out of this one. When Sandra stopped in front of the correct building Gee wondered how she knew where to go. He was going to ask her but dismissed the thought quickly. That wasn’t important right now. Gee opened the door and looked at Sandra.

  “Stay here, I’ll be right back,” he said.

  “Get the fuck outta here, I’m going with you, nigga,” she told him as she got out, too. When they got to Tracy’s apartment on the seventh floor, Gee knocked on the door and within a few seconds Tracy opened the door. She had a look of confusion on her face as she looked back and forth from Gee to Sandra. She knew who Sandra was, everyone did, but that didn’t stop her from fucking with Gee. They had been dealing with each other for two years and she’d never seen the look on Gee’s face that she saw that moment. Sandra couldn’t take her eyes off her. She was beautiful. Tracy couldn’t have been any older than twenty-one or twenty-two years old. She was tall and had the body of a model. Her skin was pretty. She had a milk-chocolate complexion and could have been Tyra Banks’s little sister. This nigga lied to me, she thought to herself.

  “Wait right here,” Gee said.

  “Nah, motherfucker, I’m coming with you. Excuse me, miss, can I come in while he gets his shit?” Sandra asked Tracy.

  “Yeah, c’mon in. What’s going on?” Tracy asked.

  “This is my man and he told me that you were ugly and that he just uses your house to bag up drugs.”

  Tracy shot Gee an evil look.

  “I know he ain’t shit and he’s a lying black-ass motherfucker and I just came over here with him to get his shoes and shit, so he won’t have no reason for coming over here,” Sandra said. Tracy looked at the playpen that was in the living room. Sandra looked, too, and saw a newborn baby. She walked over to the playpen and looked into the little boy’s eyes and knew it was Gee’s baby. No one said a word. She picked the baby up and said, “Hey, precious.”

  The baby smiled and reached for Sandra’s gold chain.

  “There go your sorry-ass daddy.” The baby smiled again. Sandra turned to face Gee and Tracy.

  “What’s his name and how old is he?” she asked.

  Tracy started to answer and Sandra held up her hand to cut her off. Then she looked at Gee.

  “Rayshon and he’s fourteen months,” he said.

  “When were you going to tell me about this, Gee?”

  “I didn’t know how,” he told her with a stupid-ass look on his face.

  “Just go get your shit. We’ll deal with this when we get home.”

  Gee disappeared into the bedroom. While he packed his stuff, Sandra and Tracy talked. Sandra made it clear that Gee was her man and that she’d invested too much time in him to let her come in and tear her family apart. She also let her know that the next time she wouldn’t be so nice. Sandra wanted to be a woman about the whole situation. It wasn’t their fault that they were both in love with the same sorry-ass nigga. Sandra wanted her kids to know they had a new baby brother. She promised Tracy that the baby would be well taken care of and that she would help her get an apartment in a better neighborhood. The projects was no place to raise a child. They exchanged numbers as Sandra continued to play with the baby. Gee finally came out the room with four big-ass garbage bags full of shit.

  “I thought you said that you only had a few things over here. You’s a lying black-ass nigga,” Sandra said as she handed Tracy the baby. Gee couldn’t say shit. He was busted. Sandra took one of the bags from him and they headed out the door.

  “Gee, I need my house key back,” Tracy said to him. He looked at Sandra first, then at Tracy and said, “I told you I lost your key,” putting extra emphasis on the word “your,” like the key was never his.

  “So how did you lock the door when you left this morning?” Tracy asked, switching the baby to her other hip. Sandra didn’t say a word. She walked over to Gee and reached in his right front pocket. Sh
e pulled out his key ring and handed it to Tracy. Tracy went through each key until she found hers. She took it off the ring and handed it back to Sandra.

  “I’ll call you later, Sandra,” she said, and almost slammed the door on Gee’s leg.

  22

  A few weeks later Kay was awakened by the same nightmare that had been haunting him for years. It had been awhile since he had it. He sat straight up in bed and put his face in his hands. Then he looked at his watch. It was 12:34 p.m. He looked at his pager, then turned his cell phone on. He was still naked, so he took off his ring and watch and took a hot shower. When he got out of the shower he needed something cold to drink so he headed for the kitchen. On his way there he could hear someone playing classical music on the piano. The first thing he thought was that it was one of the staff, but they knew better. Shu-Shu didn’t allow anyone in her living room. When he got there he found Dre sitting at the piano with his shoes off playing Beethoven. Dre must have felt someone behind him, because he stopped. He turned to face Kay.

  “I didn’t know you could play the piano,” Kay said.

  “There’s a lot of things you don’t know about me. Like I’ve got a degree in psychology. Mina and I are married, too. She’s a pediatrician now.” He paused to give Kay a moment to digest what he had heard. “She wants me to get out the game, Kay. And I’m tired. The game ain’t fun no more. Everybody has dough now. Money’s really not a big issue. Now the big issue is how to take advantage of people. How do we go to bed with this girl and that girl? How do we floss? How do we let people see our houses, our cars, and how fly we are? It’s all about what we do with our money now. So after the New Year, I’m through. My wife and I are leaving Maryland. She wants to see the world.” Dre smiled, “Oh yeah, and I speak seven different languages fluently.”

  “C’mon, man, seven different languages? Shit, you barely speak English around anybody,” Kay told him.

  “You’d be surprised at the things you’ll learn if you just listen,” Dre said.

  “How long you been here?”

  “I pulled up about an hour ago.” Then he changed the subject. “I volunteered at the old folks home this morning. You should always treat old folks nice because they feel people don’t care about them no more, and if you’re lucky they’ll teach you something that money can’t buy.”

  “I wish you would have woke me up. I keep having the same bad dream since Apache died.”

  “Tell me about it. Maybe I can help you.”

  “Go ’head with that bullshit, nigga. Don’t try that psychology shit on me. Ain’t nothing wrong with me,” Kay said, smiling.

  “Nah, I’m serious, Kay. I might be able to help you.”

  “Well, the dream always starts the same way every time. I see Apache get killed by the police and it gets pitch black, I can’t see anything. Then out of the darkness, Apache is walking toward me with his right arm and index finger extended out at me. He’s shaking his head no and waving his finger back and forth as if he’s telling me something. Then he reaches out to touch me and I get so scared that I wake up covered in a cold sweat.”

  Dre thought to himself for a moment before he asked, “How do you feel about Apache’s death?”

  “What kind of question is that?” Dre just looked at him and Kay continued, “I’m fucked up about it. If I hadn’t panicked that day and crashed the car, Apache would still be here.”

  Dre thought for another moment with his head down. Then he looked up at Kay and asked, “Is that what you’ve been thinking all these years? That you’re the reason that Apache is dead?”

  Kay looked puzzled. “Do you know something that I don’t?”

  “When we went in that bank and you stayed in the car that greedy motherfuckin’ Mike didn’t stick to the script; he decided that he wanted to hit the vault. That’s why we were in there longer than usual. You didn’t notice how stuffed the bags were when we came out? Everything was timed perfect. If we had come out the bank on time, we would have caught all the traffic lights on green. That’s the way we had done it all the other times. That light turned red on us because Mike put us behind schedule. No one could have planned for the cop being there. So if you want to blame somebody, blame Mike. The rest of us know it was Mike’s fault.”

  Kay didn’t say anything.

  “I think Apache is trying to tell you that it’s not your fault. That’s why he’s shaking his head no. He wants you to stop blaming yourself,” Dre said. They were both quiet for a moment.

  Then Kay said, “Yo, you better get out Shu-Shu’s living room before she comes in. I’m going upstairs to get dressed. I’ll be ready in about twenty minutes.” He turned and walked upstairs.

  Thirty minutes later Kay was dressed. They got in his canary-yellow F360 Modena and headed to Mike’s house. When they got there, they noticed a few guys standing around smoking weed. Some were shooting ball. Tank was wiping down his brand-new gold convertible Aston Martin. Tank walked over and greeted them with a hug.

  “Where Mike?” Kay asked.

  “He’s inside on the phone,” Tank answered.

  “Damn, nigga, I see you got the fly shit. You gonna be bangin’ ’em in the head with this one,” Kay said, referring to the Aston Martin.

  “See, I knew you would like it ’cause you got class. I ain’t one of them niggaz around the way that buys things they don’t need, with money they don’t have, to impress niggaz they don’t like. I’ma rich nigga and I can afford to shit on the fag-ass niggaz.” Tank slapped Kay five as if to say, “You feel me?”

  Kay went in the house. Mike was on his cell phone and making a sandwich in the kitchen. When he saw Kay, he smiled and motioned with his right index finger for him to hold on. After a few minutes, Mike snapped his fingers to get his attention. When Kay looked, Mike pointed to the other half of the sandwich, asking Kay if he wanted it. Kay shook his head no and Mike walked into another room to finish his phone call. When he was done he came back into the kitchen.

  “What up, nigga?” Kay said as they gave each other a pound.

  “That was my connect. I’m getting ready to start buying two hundred of them thangs and he’s going to front me two hundred. I told you that I wanted to start bouncing around with you to other states,” Mike said with a smile.

  “Yo, what happened that day in the bank?” Kay asked, taking the smile off Mike’s face. Kay knew that he’d caught him off guard. Mike walked over to the kitchen window and looked out.

  “I see that bitch-ass nigga Dre finally told you, huh? Fuck it. I was tired of putting my life on the line for that little bit of dough, so I hit the vault. I didn’t mean for shit to happen the way it did. Apache is the stupid motherfucka for pulling his gun on the police. He would still be here with us if he hadn’t done that dumb shit. We can’t bring him back, so what the fuck.”

  Kay was furious. He could have killed Mike but instead he smacked Mike’s glass of juice off the counter. It made a loud crash when it hit the wall. Everyone outside heard it and stopped what they were doing.

  “You always have to be the greedy one, Mike. I told you when we were younger, all money ain’t good money and this is a perfect example. My friend is dead because you wanted more money. What about the rest of us?” Kay yelled.

  “Look around, nigga, wouldn’t none of us have shit if it wasn’t for me!” Mike shouted back.

  “Just stay the fuck away from me!” Kay said as he turned and walked out the house. Everyone stood there in shock.

  As Kay and Dre were getting in the car, Mike came to the door and shouted out, “Fuck you. Fuck Dre. And fuck that nigga Apache.” Then he laughed. Dre stared at Mike as the car backed down the driveway. Tank and Gee rushed inside the house and shut the door.

  “Yo, I’m glad them niggaz is gone. Kay think he better than us anyway. That’s why he’s always trying to outdo us. I even heard that he’s thinking about getting into the coke business,” Tank told Mike, knowing damn well that was a lie.

  • • •


  Kay went to meet with Scatter and Big Duke to let them know what was going on. Scatter convinced them that they couldn’t make money and beef at the same time so Kay gave Scatter his word that he would let it go. Then he left to pick up his son. Big Duke didn’t trust Mike, so he got on the phone and called three of his cousins from North Carolina that were ’bout it, ’bout it. Bill, Frankie, and Chris wanted to be down with their cousin Duke so bad, they would do anything . And that included touching Mike.

  • • •

  The next day, Scatter dropped Kay and Dre off at the airport. They were on their way to Detroit to hang out with one of Kay’s people from prison, Mingo. Kay’s friend had tickets for ringside seats at the Tyson-Golota fight that same night.

  • • •

  It was the middle of November. A month had gone by. Kay and Mike still hadn’t talked to each other. Kay, Lil ‘C’, Dre, P-Nut, Big Duke, and his three cousins were all in Kay’s home movie theater watching that Chinese hit man shit, The Killer. It seemed like they watched it once a week. They swore it got better and better every time they saw it. Kay had postponed his out-of-town trips because Shu-Shu had begun to act strange lately. He still sent some of his lieutenants out of town to meet them niggaz that he was locked up with who came to his party. He sent ten kilos of heroin to ten different cities.

  When Kay had left Shu-Shu upstairs a half hour ago, she was getting dressed. She said she was going to hang out with some friends in D.C. When she finally came downstairs to tell Kay she was leaving, she had on a yellow cashmere sweater, a green ostrich leather skirt with matching Christian Dior green leopard-print ostrich boots. Everyone smelled her as soon as she walked in because she wore another one of Kay’s favorite perfumes, Trésor.

  “Hey, baby, I’m getting ready to leave. Don’t wait up for me,” she said with a smile as she bent down and kissed Kay. And just like that, she was gone. She jumped in her new 2001 Qvale Mangusta and disappeared into the night.