The Reluctant King: Book 1: The Book of Shadow

by K'wan

  “Boy, please. I haven’t had my hair done in weeks, and a pedicure longer still. Mama is about to get her life. Thanks, son.” She winked as the door slammed shut.

  “What did Mommy wanna talk to you about?” Crissy asked as she and Fresh walked up the avenue toward the bus stop.

  “Ma’s just being Ma. Nothing for you to worry about,” Fresh said. “You got money on you?”

  “I have like four bucks left from my chore money.”

  Fresh reached into his pocket and peeled off a twenty from his wad of cash. “Take that.”

  “Thanks,” Crissy said, stuffing the bill in her pocket. “You know, you don’t always have to give me money. I know you ain’t got it like that.”

  “Let your mother tell it, I’m a kingpin,” Fresh joked.

  “You can’t blame her for being a little worried, especially after what happened to Kevin.”

  “I’m not out here heavy like Kevin was. I’m just hustling here and there, nothing too crazy.” Fresh sold drugs from time to time, but he wasn’t on the block every day with it like some of the other guys, including his friend Pain. Fresh was a man of multiple hustles, with drug dealing being his least favorite. It was too time-consuming; Fresh preferred instant gratification.

  “That makes it even worse,” Chrissy said.

  “How do you mean?”

  “When I decided that I wanted to play basketball and didn’t make the team the first time, you told me that it was because my heart wasn’t in it. You said that anything I wanted to be great at, I should be all in with it. Same rules apply to you out here hustling. If you’re not all in, then what’s the point?”

  A smile touched Fresh’s lips. “You know, sometimes you’re too smart for your own good.”

  To get from their building to the bus stop, they had to walk north on Nostrand Avenue. Nostrand was a notorious strip always jumping with illicit activity. Normally, Fresh spent his time there with the rest of his knucklehead friends, but he hadn’t been up that way in a few days. A kid had gotten shot a few nights before so the strip was hot. But because it was early in the morning, most of the people out and about were headed to school or work. On the corner, though, Fresh ran into some boys posted up. He gave daps to a couple of the dudes he knew.

  “Let me get a bone, Fresh,” said one of the boys.

  Fresh fished around in his pocket and pulled out an empty pack. It was then he remembered that he had smoked his last cigarette when he came in the night before. Since the store was right there he decided to run in and get a fresh pack. “You want anything from out of here?” he asked Crissy.

  “Just some chips or something. And please don’t take too long. I don’t want to miss the bus.”

  Fresh grabbed a bottle of water from the bodega’s cooler, then snatched two bags of sour cream and onion chips for Crissy. He was at the counter getting his cigarettes and paying for his purchase when something drew his attention to the store’s window. A shiny black BMW idled along the curb and all the corner boys immediately clustered around it. Fresh didn’t recognize the car. He probably wouldn’t have paid it any mind if he hadn’t noticed Crissy leaning into the window talking to the driver. He tossed twenty dollars on the counter and didn’t bother waiting for his change before making hurried steps back outside. When he saw who was driving the vehicle, anger rose to his chest.

  Malice was just as his name suggested—someone with the intent or desire to do evil. Originally from the Fort Greene projects, he had migrated to Fresh’s neighborhood a few years back. He was the right-hand man of a dude named Vick who used to run the neighborhood. When Vick got locked up, Malice slid into his position and had held it ever since. Most of the dudes in Fresh’s area either hustled for Malice or bought their drugs from him. He was the man in their hood, but Fresh couldn’t stand him. It wasn’t that Malice had ever done anything to him directly, but his energy rubbed Fresh the wrong way. Now, here was this slimy muthafucka whispering to his baby sister like a snake charmer.

  “Crissy!” Fresh barked her name so sharply that the girl jumped. “Let’s go!”

  “A’ight, gosh. Why you gotta be yelling all crazy?” Crissy said, trying to hide her embarrassment. When she reached her brother, he gave her a little shove for good measure.

  “Don’t be out here hanging into no damn car window like a hood rat,” Fresh said through gritted teeth.

  “Yo, why don’t you ease up, shorty. It wasn’t even like that,” Malice said from the car window. Fresh ignored him, but then he heard the door open and a boot hit the curb. Fresh turned to see Malice emerging from his whip. An average-sized dude with a growing beer gut he hid beneath baggy shirts, Malice wore a thick gold chain around his neck, the weight of it swinging like a pendulum as he moved toward the siblings. “We was just talking.”

  “She’s thirteen and don’t need to be out here in no grownass men’s faces,” Fresh told him, trying to keep his voice even. He knew it wouldn’t take too much to get Malice started, which is what he was hoping to avoid.

  Malice gave Crissy a lecherous once-over. “Shit, I thought she was pushing at least seventeen. You better keep your good eye on this one, Fresh.”

  “I’ll take your advice, thanks,” Fresh said sarcastically before walking off.

  “Have a good day at school, lil’ mama,” Malice called after them. When Fresh looked back he saw Malice adjusting his crotch and looking at his sister like she was a piece of meat.

  “Don’t let me catch you all up in that nigga’s face again,” Fresh said when they were down the block.

  “I wasn’t all up in anybody’s face. I told him that I liked his car, so he was showing me the inside.” To Crissy, the whole thing was innocent.

  “I’ll bet that wasn’t all he was trying to show you. Dudes like Malice ain’t no good. All they want is one thing.”

  “The same thing you get from the three or four girls per week you sneak in and out of your room?”

  “The difference is that I’m grown and you’re thirteen! Crissy, I know you think I’m just trying to boss you around on some big-brother shit, but I’m only trying to protect you. I’m not stupid enough to think you haven’t discovered the opposite sex yet, and that’s cool, but you gotta be smart about the kind of guys you allow into your space. You’re young, pretty, and smart, so you’re gonna be a magnet for wolves. I’m trying to make sure you’re wise enough to know a predator when you see one, because my baby sister ain’t gonna end up anybody’s prey. You feel me?”

  “I guess,” Crissy muttered. She understood what her brother was saying, but his delivery was too harsh.

  Five minutes later, the bus showed up and it was time for them to part ways. Crissy fell in step with two of her friends who had just arrived at the bus stop.

  “Crissy,” Fresh called after her. When she turned he told her, “I love you.”

  She smiled at her older brother and got on the bus with her friends. Crissy was a pain in the ass, but Fresh loved her with everything he had. She was the one person, besides his mom, who he would do anything for … anything at all.

  When Fresh came back down the avenue, everyone was still pretty much where he’d left them, including Malice, who was sitting on the hood of his car, rolling a blunt. Fresh was tempted to run down on him and knock the shit out of him, but that would likely create a problem he didn’t need. He decided to let Malice’s little stunt earlier slide and continue about his day. As he got closer, though, Malice noticed him. He tapped one of his henchmen on the shoulder and nodded at Fresh, then whispered something that caused the henchman to chuckle. Fresh wasn’t dumb. He knew that Malice was trying to bait him but he had no intention of feeding into the bullshit. Until the gangster opened his mouth.

  “What up, Fresh? You still in your feelings?”

  “Nah, we good, fam,” Fresh replied.

  “Oh, a’ight,” said Malice, “I should hope so, because you’re one of the few lil’ niggas from over this side that I actually fuck with. You st
ick to your own and don’t get involved in other people’s bullshit. I respect that.”

  “Thanks.”

  “So, I’m saying, when you gonna come fuck with me and get this money?”

  “Thanks, but I’m cool. Me and my people kinda got our own thing going.”

  “What? Them little g-packs and ready rock you be hustling by the projects?” Malice said. “That’s sneaker money, man. I’m talking about the kind of cake that’ll keep you off the bus and riding in style like me.” He ran his hand over the hood of the BMW.

  “I see you out here shining and I respect your hustle, but I’m cool with grinding for mine,” Fresh said.

  “Shorty, that ain’t no grind, that’s a rub!” Malice laughed. “Look, I ain’t gonna twist your arm to make no paper. I was just trying to offer you an opportunity to fill some of those holes in your pocket. You can buy something nice for that pretty little sister of yours.”

  “On some real shit, you need to keep my sister out your mouth.”

  The boys on the corner must’ve sensed Fresh’s anger, because those loyal to Malice began closing ranks around him.

  “Nah, you ain’t gotta worry about your sister in my mouth. In a year or two? Maybe, but not right now.”

  “You need to watch your fucking mouth,” Fresh said evenly, taking a step toward him. He stopped when Malice lifted his shirt and showed him the butt of a gun jammed down the front of his pants.

  “Or what?” Malice challenged. Fresh was silent. “Just like I thought. You be walking around out here with your nose in the air because your brother’s name used to ring, but yours don’t. Kevin was about that life, but you ain’t no gangster.”

  “He might not be a gangster, but he rolls with a few,” chimed Pain, who had just appeared at the curb. He was wearing a tattered fatigue jacket, black Timbs, and baggy blue jeans. His short Afro hadn’t been combed in a day or two, still sporting traces of lint from wherever he had slept the night before. His dark eyes were fixed on Malice. “What’s good?” he said.

  “What’s good is that I offered your man my hand in friendship and he spat in it,” Malice answered.

  “So, this is what friendship looks like where you’re from?” Pain glanced over the boys who had now surrounded Fresh. Something in his gaze made a few of them take a cautious step back. “I’d say it looks like you’re planning on an ass-whipping.”

  “What if I am?” Malice said.

  Pain shrugged. “I ain’t got no issue with that, if you’re looking to have a fair one with Fresh. Now, if y’all were thinking about jumping one of my closest friends, then it might become something else.” He flicked his tongue ever so slightly so that Malice could see the razor resting on it. It was a trick Pain had mastered during the few months he had spent on Rikers Island.

  “You ain’t never heard the expression about bringing a knife to a gunfight?” Malice adjusted his gun.

  Pain let his eyes roam from the gun back to Malice’s face. His expression remained cool. “Indeed I have, which is why I’m hoping we can end this without me or my boy going to the morgue and you or one of yours ending up in the ER trying to get your face stapled back on.” Pain waved his hands in front of his face like a magician. Two razors appeared in his hands, small but sharp. “We might be few, but we’re crazy. You trying to put that to the test?”

  Malice appeared to be weighing his options. He was a shooter, but he knew that the young man standing between him and Fresh was a gladiator. Pain was one of the younger dudes in the neighborhood who the older guys respected—he had the heart of a lion. He wasn’t the type to back down from a fight under any circumstances, even the threat of being shot. If you did happen to get the best of Pain, then you had better grow eyes in the back of your head because he was going to keep coming back until you were dead.

  Malice knew he needed to bow out of the situation gracefully, so he was pleased when a silver Mercedes pulled up to the curb.

  “We’ll dance another time,” Pain told Malice before heading over to the Benz.

  Fresh followed Pain and then gave him a dap.

  “Thanks, man,” he said.

  “You know how we do, kid,” Pain chanted, returning his blades to their hiding spots. “What did you do to piss Malice off so early in the morning?”

  “It’s a long story. But yo, who’s in the Benz?” Fresh asked. Everyone on the block seemed to be flocking around it.

  Pain cracked a half smile. “If you’d checked the text message I sent you this morning, you would know.”

  CHAPTER 9

  By the time Shadow pushed his mother’s car into Brooklyn, rush hour had started to thicken. Normally, when he came into the city, he used public transportation or spent a grip on Ubers. But on those rare occasions when he was allowed to drive, he was thrown the keys to one of his family’s low-end hoopties. Driving the luxury Mercedes was a whole different experience. It was empowering.

  He had some time to kill, so he took the long way to the hood and detoured through downtown. He rode slowly up Fulton, absorbing the sights and sounds. Stores were just rolling up their gates to open for the day’s business. To his left loomed the Albee Square Mall, a Brooklyn landmark that brought back a storm of memories. As a kid his father would bring him here to shop, regaling him with stories of the brazen capers he and his friends pulled in the area before he had gotten his act together.

  Though the power base of the King family was Five Points, it was Brooklyn where Chance King had put down his family’s roots. Shadow was young when they left Brooklyn but old enough to remember the leaner times they’d spent as residents of Kings County. Back then, his dad still had one leg knee-deep in the game. Sure, he did the real estate thing, but he hadn’t really started making life-changing money from it. The family had occupied the top floor of a walk-up apartment building in Bedford-Stuyvesant, on a not-so-nice block. There were some tough cats in his old neighborhood, but they all respected Chance King. When the family finally got their weight up and moved out of the neighborhood, Chance purchased the building they once lived in. He rented out the other units, but kept the top-floor apartment. His dad always said that it would serve as a reminder of his humble beginnings.

  For Shadow, it was a crash pad. Unbeknownst to his dad, he’d had a set of keys made to the place. Sometimes when he was in the hood, he would slide through the old apartment, especially on days when it was too cold for him and his friends to smoke weed outside or if he was trying to bang a girl. Sometimes he would sit in the window of that apartment and stare out at the neighborhood, imagining what it was like to see it through his father’s eyes.

  The deeper he ventured into Brooklyn, the more the scenery changed. The fancy shops and open-air eateries dissipated, and soon the streets were lined with bodegas, liquor stores, and Chinese restaurants. This is when Shadow slipped into character: the driver’s seat went back a little farther, the music went up a little louder, and he configured his face to look a little harder. He was in the jungle now. If you appeared weak, you were fair game.

  He spotted a familiar face at a bus stop on Nostrand Avenue, locked in a heated discussion with a young girl. Shadow hit the horn, but his friend was so preoccupied that he didn’t turn around. He wanted to pull over, but there was too much traffic. Circling the block was too much of a pain; he didn’t want to drive a few extra blocks just to make the turn that would allow him to come back around on that side of the street.

  “Fuck it,” Shadow said, and kept moving. When he stopped at the next red light, he noticed a person with a familiar walk coming up the block, headed for the train station. She was wearing a long black wig, overcoat, and dark glasses, but Shadow didn’t have to see her face to know who it was. He’d recognize that gait anywhere. It was the stride of a panther looking for a kill. The light had barely turned green before Shadow sped through it and bent around the corner. He pulled up next to a fire hydrant and threw on the hazards before hoping out. He was leery of leaving the car there for too long be
cause the thirsty-ass meter maids were always lurking, so he had to make this quick. If he didn’t catch her before she went down into the station, there was no telling when he’d bump into her again. With this in mind, he broke into a jog. She was just about to descend the train station steps and out of sight when she heard him.

  “Hey, pretty girl!” Shadow called out, with his hands cupped around his mouth like a bullhorn. She never broke her stride. Dudes probably shouted corny lines at her all day to get her attention. Shadow had to get creative or risk losing her again. “Your mama still make the best griot in the hood?” At the mention of one of her mother’s specialty dishes, she stopped in her tracks.

  The woman turned, looking over the rim of her sunglasses. There was only one person she knew who loved her mother’s griot enough to be in the streets shouting about it. A scowl touched her lips. “It must be snowing in hell if the crown prince of the King monarchy is out here crawling through the slums,” she scoffed, folding her arms over her breasts.

  Her reception was colder than he’d expected, but not as cold as it could’ve been. They had history, not all of it good. “Voodoo, how can you wound me by saying such a thing?” he said, placing his hand dramatically over his heart.

  “Wound you? Shadow, you’re lucky I didn’t pop you.” She jiggled her bag to suggest that she was carrying. He expected nothing less from her. “What are you doing out here this morning? Trolling for schoolgirls?”

  “See, now you’re just out of pocket with the insults. I know we haven’t seen each other in a minute, but—”

  “Is it that simple to you?” Voodoo cut him off. “We haven’t seen each other in a minute? And why is that, Shadow? Or is that selective memory of yours kicking in and you only remember stations that paint you as an angel instead of the devil I know you to be?”

  Shadow couldn’t blame Voodoo for going in on him. Their relationship used to be rock-solid, at least until Shadow cracked the foundation. As little kids, they grew up on the same block and Shadow was smitten with Voodoo from the first time he saw her sitting on the stoop with Lolli, sharing a pack of chocolate chip cookies. Whenever she played with his sister, Shadow made sure he was around. And the days that she didn’t come over, he would sit on the stoop all day hoping to catch a glimpse of her.