Carl Weber Presents Ride or Die Chick 1: The Story of Treacherous and Teflon

by J. M. Benjamin

  “Boy, you ain’t got no friends.” O.G. laughed. “Your old man ain’t let you have none, and in case you wonderin’ how I know that, it’s because I’m the one that told him not to let you have none, ’cause you never know when you might have to do something to one of these lame-ass turkeys out here. That way you won’t have no regrets or remorse when you do.” Treacherous became wide eyed.

  Here was this old man who sat in front of him quoting the same words used by his father. There was no way this man could have known that unless he was close to his father, Treacherous concluded, so he was eager to hear more from the old-timer.

  “Why’d my dad trust you, he didn’t trust no one?” he asked

  O.G. snickered at the question. “Listen, Treach, we ain’t got time for no twenty questions or no history class, ’cause it’s hot out here right now. One thing you need to know, though, is that I raised your dad in the game. He used to run for me and do other little odd jobs, you dig? Then when your momma died I helped Rich raise you, but I played the backfield ’cause you was his kid to raise and I didn’t want to come between that. He came to me for advice and I gave it, that simple. He made me your godfather and that’s why I’m pullin’ you up right now.”

  Treacherous listened as O.G. talked taking it all in.

  “Right now those people are looking for you. One of the local snitches said you ran away from social services,” O.G. said as he laughed. “I don’t blame you, but it’s just a matter of time ’fore one of these jealous-ass niggas drop a dime and let them know you around here, so you can’t stay too long.”

  Treacherous reflected and it all made sense why he had received all the stares. Although he knew his father’s charges, he was still in the dark about what really happened and he knew O.G. could shed some light on the situation.

  “Why the feds got my pops?”

  O.G. looked at him, puzzled, but then understood why Rich had kept this from him, but it was time for him to know.

  “Your old man robbed a bank,” O.G. started. “Matter of fact, he robbed a couple of banks,” O.G. continued as a smirk came across his face the way a proud father smiles when hearing of his son’s accomplishments.

  “But this last bank he hit he shot a couple of people and took a lot of money from them people. When he moved y’all up out of the projects and into that house the streets started talkin, ’cause the streets is always watching. I don’t know who or how they got onto your old man, but my guess is once they got the word they put a tail on him. A lot of them muthafuckas up in here didn’t like your daddy, but they was scared to death of him, so to see him off the streets is a blessing to them. Now they can sleep better at night and eat more because your pops was shakin’ them little punks down left and right, even after he robbed that bank. I told him he didn’t have to keep robbing, but that’s what he liked to do, that was his first love, so I couldn’t get him to stop that easy. He had given me two hundred and fifty Gs from his take and told me he had made out with a million-two. If I hadn’t read it in the papers saying they confiscated over nine hundred grand from out of his house to this day I wouldn’t have believed it. I don’t know how he pulled it off ’cause he never told me, but he did it.”

  As O.G. spoke, Treacherous realized for the first time in his life that his father was not just some small-time gangsta, he was as big as some of the all-time greats like Jesse James, Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson, Pretty Boy Floyd, and even Clyde. He wondered if his moms had been Bonnie. Treacherous had never been more proud than he was right then of his father, the man he would one day become.

  “How your pockets lookin’? You good on bread?” O.G. asked.

  “Yeah, I’m straight,” answered Treacherous, thinking about the 800 dollars and some change he had on him.

  “A’ight, well, if you ever need anything don’t hesitate to ask. Don’t be proud. I know your old man taught you a closed mouth don’t get fed, but if you can’t make it here that ain’t no need for you to starve, if you ain’t got it and you need it then you gots to take it from somebody who has it. I’m giving it to you like I gave it to your old man when he was your age. You got a piece on you?” asked O.G.

  “Yeah, I got three. The one my pops brought me and the two he carried,” Treacherous stated boldly.

  “Good, that’s good, then you set. Where you stayin’?”

  “Wherever I lay my head,” Treacherous responded.

  O.G. wished that he had sons like Treacherous and Rich, who he felt were built for the mean streets. He viewed his own two sons as cowards, both who he had lost to the streets. In spite of the big age difference he and O.G. felt just as his dad, Treacherous was cut from the same cloth as himself, which was that of a gangster.

  “Look here, take this key, I gotta a little stash crib that I keep in case of emergencies around the corner. You can stay there until you get situated.”

  Treacherous took the key.

  “Thanks O.G.,” he said.

  “Call me G.F. O.G. is for these cats in the streets. I’m your godfather.”

  “A’ight G.F.,” Treacherous corrected.

  “Go ahead and get up outta here and be safe,” he said, giving Treacherous dap with a closed fist. He was a man who showed little emotions, which was why he never hugged or shook hands. He was truly an old-school gangsta.

  Treacherous left the projects, caught up in his own thoughts, paying no mind to the dudes he had been playing the staring game with when he first arrived at his old neighborhood. Just as Treacherous reached the end of the projects, his thoughts were interrupted.

  “Treacherous Freeman,” someone blared out. Before Treacherous had time to focus on the unfamiliar voice, he was swarmed by two unmarked police cars. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what had happened. Someone had dropped a dime on him and informed the cops of his whereabouts. Treacherous was now boxed in. He had little room to think or react. He contemplated making a run for it but quickly x-ed that option out.

  “Just stay right there, son,” one of the officers ordered, cautiously making his way over toward Treacherous, whose heart rate increased. He knew in a situation such as the one he was in he was doomed. Treacherous stood there with hands in his pockets, watching the officer closely as two more exited the other police car.

  “Son, let me see your hands,” the officer calmly stated. “Slowly take them out one at a time, for your safety and mine, all right, buddy?”

  Treacherous could already see the outcome of his predicament. He knew he had been caught in the wrong place at the wrong time and there was nothing he could do about it. One by one Treacherous slowly slid his hands out of his jacket pockets. Relieved, but still cautious, the officer continued to approach Treacherous while his partners did the same from opposite sides. Everyone in the projects watched from a distance as the police drew in.

  “Son, you do know why we’re here, right?” the officer questioned, receiving no reply. “There are some people who are concerned about your well-being. They gave us a call and said you ran away from the children’s home. We’re just here to escort you back, that’s all, son,” the officer continued in a subtle tone. He had been a police officer for ten years. Something about Treacherous’s demeanor made him uneasy.

  “Now, all of this can be over in just a few minutes, but I’m gonna need you to help me out here.” Treacherous continued to stand there in silence, listening to the officer attempting to con him. He already knew his fate.

  “I’m going to need you to step over to the car. Let me pat you down, then my friends and I will escort you back to the house.” By then, the other two officers were positioned behind Treacherous, prepared for the worse. They were immune to bad-reputation housing projects from responding to incidents at some point in their career. On many occasions calls resulted in them having to use physical force or draw their weapons, so they didn’t treat the situation any different. Treacherous walked over to the nearest police car.

  “Thanks, son. I appreciate your cooperation,” t
he officer stated genuinely.

  “Stop calling me son. You’re not my father,” Treacherous spit. It was the first words he had said since the police had closed him in. The officer was taken aback by Treacherous’s words. For a split second, he had the urge to pull his gun, but when he saw Treacherous place his hands on the hood of the car, he disregarded the urge.

  “No problem, young fella,” the officer corrected. Instantly he began patting down Treacherous. “Don’t move,” he yelled, quickly drawing his weapon. His tone triggered his colleagues and they too now drew their weapons. The onlookers in the neighborhood began to draw in closer to see what was happening.

  “Everybody back up,” one of the other officers yelled to the crowd that was now forming.

  “Son, get on the ground. Now!” the officer ordered him.

  Calmly, Treacherous complied. He could hear sirens in the distance. He counted three pair of feet as he lay on the pavement. The officers now had him secured. The officer who ordered Treacherous on the ground discovered he had more on his person then he would have ever imagined. Initially Treacherous knew he would have been taken back to the group home, but with the three guns, along with the money and stolen jewelry, he knew he would be paying a visit to the youth house. Just as he figured, they found his weapons along with the rest of the contents in his pockets and began handcuffing him.

  Treacherous knew if his father could see him he would be disappointed. He made a mental promise to himself that as long as he lived the police would never catch him ever again like this.

  Chapter Nine

  Norfolk Detention Center was jammed with young adolescents and juvenile delinquents. It took no time for Treacherous to find position and gain status up in the juvenile jail for young boys and girls. He had been charged with illegal possession of firearms and receiving stolen property. When he went to court after three days the caseworker he remembered questioning him was there. After she spoke the judge called Treach a menace to society and a threat to the community and remanded him in detention until he reached the age of eighteen. To all the other kids who only had to serve a couple weeks, months, or a year or two, what Treacherous had was a juvenile life sentence, so they all respected him for his time. In addition to that, they had discovered that the man they had read about in the newspapers and some knew of and respected, was Treacherous’s father. What they thought about Treacherous made him no difference. His only concern was serving the five and a half years in confinement, and how he would pay society back for stripping him of his father as well as his freedom. Some kids learned their lessons and went home better than they came in. Treach had never committed a crime in his life, but was being condemned and punished for what his father had done, and he was angry at the judicial system, so instead of learning any lessons and going home and becoming a productive part of society, he vowed he would leave up out of there worse than when he entered.

  Four years went by and Treacherous grew both physically and mentally. If he wasn’t doing push-ups or dips he was reading a book. He had gotten his GED two years prior and began to teach himself by acquiring more knowledge through the books that were available to him, which were mostly white historical books. Treacherous wasn’t fortunate to have someone on the outside to send him any good books, but there was one kid who had gotten in a bunch of books by some black authors and he offered Treacherous the opportunity to read them. Treacherous enjoyed reading, especially while he was on room-lockdown from fighting. Treacherous had a total of twenty-nine fights in the four-year span he had been in the detention center, and won every last one of them. Whenever Treacherous would get locked down, the kid would slide a book under the door for him. Treacherous had read all of the books by Donald Goines and Iceberg Slim over and over until he practically knew them by heart. He had his Goines favorites like the Kenyatta sequels and Black Girl Lost, but his all- time favorite was Black Gangster. Pimp was his favorite of Iceberg Slim, along with Long White Con. It was through these books he had become more educated with the many aspects of the game. He realized, through the books he read, whether you were a pimp, player, con, drug dealer, or a gangsta, you were still a hustler and you only had two choices: Either you go out there and go hard by making it, or you go hard by taking it. From that day forward Treacherous knew what he was going to do upon his release. It was in his blood, he rationalized.

  “What’s up, Treach?” was all he heard as he made his way to the breakfast line. Treacherous had grown accustomed to the type of attention he received. The detention center had been his home for the past few years and he practically ran it. He knew some spoke out of respect while others out of fear. But either way, Treacherous gave none of them the time of day. He was a loner by nature, and that’s the way he liked it. Treacherous had just gotten off room restrictions after being locked down for twenty-one days when he entered the dayroom. He was eighteen months short of getting his release and decided that he would chill this time, since his time was quickly coming to an end. As he got his breakfast and sat down he noticed the young females who had been released from the girls’ side to eat. Over the years young girls had come and gone, none really catching Treacherous, who compared all females to his mother, but as he zeroed in on the five girls, two black, one white, and one Hispanic-looking one of the black girls, stood out from the rest. She looked out of place, but if he looked hard enough you could see the toughness in her eyes. Treacherous thought she favored his mother slightly. This was the first time he had ever thought someone was worthy of even being compared.

  The medium-height, light-brown–skinned girl noticed Treacherous staring at her as their eyes met. She had only been in the detention center for ten days but throughout that short period of time she had practically seen all the guys that had been in there, most of them trying to talk to her, but after the first few days of being unsuccessful they began to view her as stuck-up. She had heard stories about a kid named Treacherous who had been in detention for four years and stayed on lockdown for fighting. She was told that he ran Tidewater Detention House. Now, laying eyes on Treacherous had her confident he was the one who the girls spoke about, even before the other girls who knew of him had confirmed it.

  While everyone else sat at the tables grouped up, Treacherous sat alone. It had been that way for years now. Apparently, no one told the new girl that. She headed toward the table where he was sitting. Treacherous saw the girl heading his way and stopped eating his cereal. When she reached his table he looked up at her. Closer up, she favored his mother’s picture a little more, he thought.

  “Is this seat taken?” she asked with the deepest but softest voice he had ever heard from a female.

  Instead of answering, Treacherous shook his head. The girl sat down. Everyone looked as the new girl sat with him. All the boys in the detention center were jealous while the girls were envious. Even the staff was in disbelief. No one had bothered to inform the new girl that Treacherous liked to eat alone and expected him to blow up on her, but to their surprise he didn’t.

  Treacherous continued eating his cereal as the girl fumbled, trying to open her milk. She hoped that her nervousness in Treacherous’s presence didn’t show on the outside because on the inside she was a nervous wreck. She had never met a guy who reeked of strength and commanded respect. She saw how he had the entire facility walking on eggshells. Her now ex-boyfriend, who was the reason why she was in the detention center in the first place, had been the leader of his block but he was not respected or feared the way she felt he should have been. She was only fifteen but her ex was nineteen. As sharp as she thought she was, she couldn’t believe how naive she had been when it came to him, and now she was sitting up in jail for him.

  The new girl continued to fight with the milk carton as Treacherous watched her out of the corner of his eye as he ate. He was tempted to help her but he just couldn’t bring himself to. That was not his style. He was a gangsta, and gangstas kept it gangsta at all times. The new girl thought she had the difficult milk cart
on licked, but as she peeled the flaps open, the milk slipped out of her hands. “Oh shit, my bad,” she chimed, seeing the milk had spilled over the table toward Treacherous. He jumped up just as the milk began pouring in his lap. Everyone saw the commotion and turned their attention toward Treacherous and the new girl.

  “Clumsy-ass chick,” Treacherous shouted as he brushed the milk off the front of his jumper.

  The girl was about to apologize for her mistake until she was interrupted by the words that came out of Treacherous’s mouth.

  “What? Fuck you,” she retorted. “It was a mistake. Who the fuck you calling clumsy?”

  All the other girls and guys looked at the new girl as if she had lost her mind. The other kids were sure now Treacherous was going to knock the new girl’s teeth down her throat for the blatant disrespect. They had never heard anyone take the tone with Treacherous the way the new girl had done.

  Treacherous looked at the girl as if her words lashed at him. Before he could even do or say anything, staff ran and jumped between the two of them.

  “Mr. Freeman, please go over there,” one of the staff members requested, pleading with him while the other staff tried to escort the new girl out of the dining area.

  Treacherous knew why they were handling him in such a manner. On several occasions throughout his stay at the detention center, Treacherous had become untamable whenever altercations arose with him and another resident. This was Treacherous’s first time ever getting into a situation with a female. What the staff could not have known was no matter what the girl had said to him, Treacherous would never put his hands on her. He did as he was told and backed up as he watched the new girl carry on.