by Teri Woods
“Don’t,” he whimpered, attempting no resistance as she placed his hands on her breasts. It was the closest Qwan had ever been to heaven. Dreams of Angel had defined his young adulthood. His every boyhood fantasy was made of what his nerve endings were feeling now.
“Please…”
“Exactly. Let me please you.”
Qwan pulled his hand away. “No, I can’t do this.”
“No? Well can you do this?” Angel folded her body into his and kissed him, sucking in his breath and giving him her succulent tongue to taste. To him, it was like strawberry cream, and he sucked her tongue like a lollipop. Angel led him over to the couch and laid him down. She positioned herself on top of him, gyrating her hips, bringing him to the verge of wettin’ all over himself.
“What do you want, Qwan?” Angel whispered in his ear.
“I… I want…” Qwan lay with his eyes closed, torn between spirit and flesh, unable to answer.
“Tell me, baby. Tell me how much you want me, how much you’ve always wanted me,” she urged, darting her tongue in and out his ear, all the while squeezing his manhood through his trousers. Qwan groaned with desire.
“Tell me,” she demanded through clenched teeth.
The dam of his righteous resistance broke and flooded him with desire.
“Yes,” he admitted, looking her in the face, eyes full of lust, “I’ve always wanted you, Angel. Stay with me. I’ll make you godly if you make me whole.”
Qwan knew this was a test of faith, and he knew he had failed. He just didn’t know that his failure would cost him his life. He was too far gone to see the ice form in Angel’s eyes, frozen rigid marbles that tensed her body.
“Are you ready to give yourself to me?” he asked lustfully, taking her breast in his mouth.
She watched him sucking on her breast for a moment, totally detached, numb to any thought except murder. She lifted his head with her hand and bent to lick him from his ear to his neck and around to the other side. He never saw the thin steel razor she flipped from her tongue and into her clenched teeth. He was too busy trying to palm her ass.
The razor slit his throat from ear to ear. He felt no pain but heard the gurgling sound of his blood spewing from his body.
He grabbed for his throat, eyes wide with frantic fear and amazement. He had cum in his pants the very instant his life began to leak all over the burgundy carpet. Angel slowly rose and watched him suffer.
“Punta!” she hissed. “You hid behind God because you were afraid to be the devil,” she accused and spat on his convulsing body. “Your repentance ain’t accepted, Reverend. Forgiveness denied.”
He tried to get up but was too weak. All he could do was fall facedown in a pool of his own blood at Angel’s red stiletto heels.
“Judas,” was her single-word eulogy.
Angel slid her dress back on, not stopping to wipe the splattered blood from her body. She wore it like a badge of honor.
She walked out of the office and down the stairs, using the ends of her dress to open and close the door. She crossed the parking lot to Goldilocks, who was waiting patiently in a Jag.
As she got in the driver’s side, she removed the blonde wig, unpinned her hair, and shook it out to its full length. Goldilocks studied her. She had never seen this side of Angel before. Goldilocks wiped the small spots of blood from her lover’s face with a napkin.
“Death before dishonor?” Goldilocks inquired directly.
“Amen,” replied Angel.
They pulled off, girlish giggles floating in the air in their wake.
“We fucked up, yo. He got away.”
Duke couldn’t believe the words he was hearing on the other end of the phone.
“Fuck you mean ‘got away’?” he barked back.
Ty was on the other end, too shaken to speak. He looked in the rearview mirror as he hit the turnpike, heading south.
“Roll, yo, he…”
Duke jumped up from his couch and shouted into the phone. “I know who, muthafucka! Tell me how!”
The word “how” scrambled his brain like a bad hit of EX. He had formulated the perfect plan. He had organized it meticulously, down to the last detail. It was simple, a piece of cake, but somehow, it had blown up in his face.
The plan was to use Ty and three others. They were supposed to meet Roll’s people, which they did, in Branch Brook Park. Roll had three cats with him. Duke knew that they’d be frisked, so the plan was to make the deal, then have two shooters in a stolen car positioned outside the park tail Roll, nod him at a stop light, then take back the money and merchandise.
The deal went down as planned. Roll took the duffel-bagged million, and Ty took the weight. Then Ty made the call to the shooters.
“He out.”
The shooters readied themselves. When they spotted Roll’s BMW, they followed him, swerved up beside him at the red light, and opened fire.
They didn’t count on the BMW being bulletproof, but it was. They could’ve been tossing grenades at the car and still not cracked the windshield. The talons bounced off the car like it was Superman’s chest.
Roll ducked out of pure instinct but came up laughing at the feeble assassination attempt. The shooters did manage to damage the tires, but even they were designed to roll in the event of a blowout. The shooters attempted to give chase, but the blare of approaching sirens made them quickly detour.
When Ty got the word, he jumped dead in his rental and aimed it for the turnpike. He knew he had fucked up. He knew there would be retaliation. He now had two of New Jersey’s biggest drug lords on his ass, and he wasn’t about to stick around for the fireworks.
“Where you at?” Duke asked, head spinning.
“On my way out to your spot,” Ty lied, already heading in the opposite direction.
“Naw, naw. Meet me in Elizabeth. You know the spot,” Duke ordered, already trying to figure out where he was gonna dump Ty’s body.
“No doubt. One.”
Ty hung up and tossed the cell onto the empty passenger seat. Wasn’t no way he was gonna meet Duke anywhere, especially since Duke had found out that Roll got away with his paper. It was a total failure, but for Duke it loomed even larger.
Once Roll found out who was behind the assassination attempt, war was inevitable. Young World had warned Duke from sparking, and Duke had violated. He knew World wouldn’t like it and knew he had to prepare for two wars. One with Roll and the other with Young World. Either way, it was on, and Duke couldn’t turn back the clock.
Roll was a big, fat, black, Biggie Smalls–type nigga, whose belly shook when he laughed. As he and his main man, Nitti, walked into his wife’s hair salon, his belly bounced with hilarious cackles.
“What’s so funny, Roland?” his wife, Renée, asked as she prepared to open the shop.
Roll took the duffel bag from Nitti and kissed Renée on the cheek.
“Somebody tried to kill me.” He laughed.
“And that’s funny?” she asked in a panic. She knew her man was crazy, but she thought he had finally lost it.
Roll relaxed in one of the salon chairs.
“It is when you send stupid muthafuckas to murk a nigga like Big Roll,” he boasted.
Roll explained the scenario, and Renée sucked her teeth.
“It’s not funny, Roland. I swear I wish you’d leave this shit alone because everybody won’t always be stupid muthafuckas,” she told him, then walked away mad that he took the attempt on his life so nonchalantly.
Nitti, Roll’s sleepy-eyed silent killer, wasn’t laughing either. “I guess I ain’t gotta tell you who it was, do I?” Nitti asked.
Roll lit a Cuban cigar.
“Hell no! Who else could afford to just give away a million dollars, except me, and I damn sure ain’t try and kill myself.” Roll chuckled, but his insides were beginning to boil over. “I’ll tell you this though,” he said between puffs, “I was startin’ to think World’s bitch ass was goin’ soft, yo. He was makin’ it too
easy to play him out of pocket.”
Roll blew out a puff of smoke. The more he thought about it, the more his nervousness subsided and his anger grew.
“Send toy soldiers at a real nigga like Roll? I’ma bury that nigga! Him, that bitch-ass Duke, his dick-suckin’ mother, and whoever else get in my way! I’ma take what shoulda been mine from the jump!” Roll huffed. “And my next Bentley on World!” Roll exclaimed and held up the million-dollar duffel bag.
“You got exactly one hour, Muhammad,” the blond CO told Rahman as he took off the cuffs at the door of the booth.
Rahman didn’t respond. Instead he looked over his shoulder at Young World on the other side of the Plexiglas.
Rahman gave him a wink, but he could tell Young World didn’t like seeing him in a cage chained like an animal. When the officer left, he firmly locked the door with a thud. Rahman turned to the phone and picked it up with a smile.
“As-Salaamu Alaikum, Shahid,” Rahman said, calling World by his born name.
“Alaikum As-Salaamu, my brother,” World replied. “What up wit’ this thick-ass Plexi and crazy heavy phones? You been wildin’ on them niggas in there or what?”
“Naw. You know how these crackers play with a nigga’s life. A nigga ain’t suppose to speak. And if you outspoken, then you losin’ some type of privilege. It ain’t nothin’ though.”
Young World nodded.
“What was you protestin’ for, more food?” World joked. “I saw that gut, Ock!”
Rahman threw his head back and laughed. “Yeah, I know. I ain’t been workin’ out like I should,” he confessed, noticing the dragon chain World was wearing. Rahman could clearly see the world he had introduced his young protégé to, a world based on slavery. Enslavement of self, morally, and principally, enslavement to materialism, totally. It was the prison of the game many entered but few ever escaped. Rahman turned his head away.
Young World sensed his annoyance but mistook it for a different kind of disappointment. World thought Roc was upset with the way he had been handling the family affairs, so he sought to explain himself.
“I’m sayin’ yo, I know I ain’t holdin’ it down like you and Dutch, but shit is crazy for a nigga right now. I know you heard about it.”
“First of all, this is a federal penitentiary, Sha. I’m in here on drug and racketeering charges. My mail, my phone calls, my visits are all monitored and documented. You see that?” Rahman asked, pointing to the cameras in the corners of the room. “My whole life is an open book, and you come up in here with a murdered man’s chain around your neck, an armful of bling, sayin’ names like Dutch and y’all? You must wanna go to prison.”
“Naw, naw, my bad. I wasn’t—”
“Thinking?” Rahman finished the statement, then sighed. “If you gonna live that life, you always gotta think before you act.”
Young World was back on familiar ground now that his mentor was keeping him sharp, which was exactly what he had come for.
“I got you, my bad.”
“So what was it I’m ’posed to be hearin’?” Rahman asked, changing the subject.
Young World glanced at the camera before beginning. “Just things. I know dudes in here comin’ at you saying I ain’t cut for this shit or whatever.”
“It’s a lot of talk that I don’t listen to these days,” Rahman replied.
“Everybody wants to be gorillas and killas like they’d rather see blood than money. You know me, Roc, and you know how you raised me. Ice cold, and I done dealt with shit on those terms, but it ain’t enough, yo. It’s like, I’m missing somethin’. I’m missin’ a lot. That’s why I’m here.”
Rahman had lost his focus on Young World’s words after World said “how you raised me.” It echoed in his mind several times before settling in his stomach like a ball of hot lead. He grimaced over the lessons he had instilled in Young World.
Fuck the forty-eight laws of power, Rahman remembered saying once, referring to the true hustler’s handbook. The forty-ninth law is break every law except your own.
They were lessons that all ran counter to the Islamic faith, which he now held so dear. Rahman rubbed his head.
“So what you sayin’, Sha?”
“How he do it?”
“He who?” Rahman replied, feigning ignorance.
Young World just looked at him as if to say, who else?
“The only man that knew that answer is dead,” Rahman replied dryly.
“But, Ock, you know son like that. Y’all came up from the dirt together. You know the moves he made and why. I know you wasn’t in his head, but you was there from the jump.”
Rahman could tell Young World was desperately seeking the secrets of Dutch’s success, secrets only he could provide, ones he’d never reveal, not because of the code of the streets but because of the code of Islam. He knew he had created a monster in Young World, one that would eventually destroy itself.
“Let me ask you something, Sha. What does your name mean?”
Young World was puzzled.
“What? Young World? You gave me that name, remember? You said I was the next generation, the Young World.”
I know this nigga ain’t forget, Young World wondered to himself.
“But the next generation of what?” Rahman asked. “How’s your Abu? He still go to the masjid on Branford?” asked Rahman, changing the subject once again.
“Yeah, I guess,” World replied, not really feeling the small talk when there was more important business to discuss in the hour they had.
“How about you? You go?”
“Sometimes,” World lied.
“When’s the last time you been?” Rahman pressed.
Young World realized where the conversation was going so he sarcastically retorted, “I don’t know, yo. Whenever. I ain’t bodyin’ a nigga or a nigga tryin’ to body me. I drop by.”
Rahman sighed when he saw the steel in Young World’s eyes. The door to his soul was locked shut.
“If I could tell you, I would tell you, but then what? Huh? What you gonna do then? Go out and try and be like him? Be like me? Which one you want, death or jail? Because that’s where it ends. Don’t look at what we did to get it. Look at the inevitability of how we lost it!”
Rahman was adamant in his tone, but Young World was just as adamant in his resolve.
“Naw, Ock, I ain’t tryin’ to be nobody. I am somebody! I’m muthafuckin’ Young World! Let me worry about tomorrow. I’m askin’ you about today!” World exclaimed.
“Sound like you want me to hold your fuckin’ hand,” Rahman cursed, which was something he no longer did. He was angrier with himself than with Young World.
“Yo, Roc, what’s up with you? I fly all the way down here to holla at you and you on some bullshit!” Young World barked.
“Naw, nigga. You on some bullshit. The life you livin’ is bullshit, and you flew down here on some bullshit, that’s bullshit, nigga!”
Young World cracked a smile of understanding. “Ohh, I see now. I see what this is all about. They got you up in these muthafuckin’ mountains and now you on some peace shit. Some Malcolm X–type shit, and you thought you could get me to turn the other cheek with you,” World snidely surmised.
Rahman met his gaze. “Look, I’ll probably be home sooner than you think, Insha Allah. And we got big plans, believe me. It’s official. I want you to roll with me on this, but you gotta leave the game behind. You do that and I’ll tell you what you need to know,” Rahman explained, trying one last time to bring World over to his side.
World laughed in his face.
“While you safe in a cage, and I’m out fightin’ wolves, you talkin’ about some plan? Some prison dream?”
Rahman dropped his head. He understood Young World’s dilemma. He was in too deep to just get out, his foolish manhood telling him to get out now would be to run like a coward. He wouldn’t just walk away from the level he had obtained.
But Rahman had his own dilemma. To tutor Young World
would be to assist him in his dealings. In Islam, whoever takes part in devilishness is a devil himself. Yet, to turn him away would be to basically cosign Young World’s death warrant. Rahman was well aware of the latest developments in the streets. The Plexiglas was much more than just a security partition. It was a gaping void between the worlds of two opposing principles.
“Ain’t nothin’ I can do for you.”
His simple answer was full of complex meanings, but to World, it was just that, a simple answer, an answer that meant Roc had simply turned his back and thrown him to the wolves. Young World shot to his feet, exploding with rage.
“Nigga, you’sa bitch! A muthafuckin’ coward hidin’ behind a kufi! You ain’t no Muslim! You just a scared-ass nigga!”
Rahman silently seethed. He was a changed man, but a man nonetheless. He still possessed a killer’s instinct, and had the Plexiglas not been between them, he probably would’ve flipped on World, violently. Not for the insults he was spewing, but to rid himself of the guilt for what he had created. He knew that once he returned home, Young World would become an issue that would have to be dealt with one way or another.
He stood up.
“The visit’s over,” Rahman announced, then hung up the phone. He turned to the door and knocked twice to signal the CO.
“Fuck you, nigga! Fuck you! If you do come home, bitch, I’ll kill you myself! You hear me? Myself!”
Rahman felt each expletive hit his back like a slug as the CO opened the door and cuffed him.
“Did you have a nice visit?” the redneck asked slyly, but Rahman’s eyes checked him so coldly that the officer dropped his head, red-faced.
Young World watched the door close, then turned and walked out.
Once he was back in Jersey, Young World prepared his mind to go all out. His anger still had the best of him and his emotions were controlling his intellect, but Roc had left him no other choice.
What I got to lose? his mind asked as he heard Dutch’s advice.
A better opportunity.
He remembered Dutch saying that to him, dropping a jewel about desperation on his young mind.
Never think you have nothing to lose. Because then you move out of desperation. And desperation is the worst motivation for action.
