The Candy Shop

by Kiki Swinson

  “Faith Simmons. Why?” I replied, as I clutched my bag of food close to my chest.

  Falling to answer my question, he continued by saying, “Are you related to her in anyway?”

  “No. But, she’s my best friend. Why?”

  “Do you two reside together?”

  “Yes, we do. And why are you asking me all of these questions? Is there something wrong?” I asked him.

  “Calm down, Ms. Simmons,” the other officer said.

  “Well, I’m trying to be calm. But, it’s hard when someone is keeping you in the dark about something.”

  “I understand,” the same officer said, “But, is there somewhere else we can talk in private?”

  “Yes, we can go in the house.” I escorted them both into Teresa’s apartment. And as soon as we walked inside I reached for the light switch on the wall and flipped it upwards to turn it on, but the damn thing wouldn’t work. So, they stood at the front door while I tried the rest of the light switches. When I realized that they weren’t working either, something told me that the electricity was shut off.

  “I’m so sorry that we have to be in the dark. But, it seems as though the lights just got cut off while I was out,” I began to explain as I walked back to where they were both standing.

  “Oh, it’s perfectly all right. We have flashlights,” the first officer who approached me said. “Now, we came by here to tell a relative of Teresa’s that we found her dead in a back alley of a drug-infested area in Huntersville. And it appears that she died of an overdose of heroin.”

  “No, you must be mistaken,” I said, as I backed away from them .

  “No, I’m sorry. But, we’re not mistaken. She had her driver’s license on her when we found her body,” the same officer concluded.

  Even though I had already been through the hard part of seeing Teresa’s stiff body laid up in Walt’s house, having someone remind me that she was gone hit me harder this time around. I honestly bawled out of control and there was nothing these officers could do to calm me down.

  “Can I ask you something?” the first officer wanted to know.

  “Yeah, sure,” I said, still sobbing.

  “Does she have any relatives you can contact and let them know what we’ve just told you?”

  “Yes, she has a mother. But, she lives out of state.”

  “Will you be able to contact her?”

  “Yes, I will,” I told him.

  “Well, do that for us. And if her mother happens to have any questions, she can call either one of us,” he continued while the both of them handed me their cards.

  “Okay, I’ll let her know,” I told them and took both of their cards in hand.

  They said a few more words before they left, but it all sounded scrambled up to me. I guess it was because I’d heard all I needed to hear.

  Blinded

  It took me two days to finally get in contact with Teresa’s mother, and when I broke the news to her, I could feel her pain through her cry. She was really torn up when I told her where the police found Teresa’s body, and I couldn’t blame her. But, what I didn’t tell her was that I was in the vicinity and allowed one of Teresa’s male friends to throw her body out on the street after we found her dead. I couldn’t bear the thought of how she would take that information, much less how she would think of me, so I left it alone and prayed that Teresa would forgive me.

  Since her mother lived out of town, she planned to have Teresa’s body shipped back home with her and have her buried in a cemetery in her area. Of course I was opposed to that idea, but when Mrs. Daniels told me she would have a small memorial service done at a local funeral home, it made me feel really good that I would be able to say goodbye. And as far as the things in her apartment went, when Mrs. Daniels took a mini-tour of the place and realized that there was nothing of value in the entire residence, she told me to only pack up the pictures and that I could keep everything else, including the car. So, I was ecstatic about that.

  **********

  Only a few people attended Teresa’s memorial service. Mrs. Daniels had her looking so pretty in that casket and no one could even tell she was pregnant. After the service, I kissed Mrs. Daniels on the cheek and bid her farewell. She encouraged me to keep in touch with her, so I told her I would. But, deep down inside, I knew I wouldn’t.

  All the drama and stress I had caused me to run right back to that dope. And just think that I was doing really good before all that shit fell into my lap. But, what was really bad was that my dope habit had doubled from three pills a day to six. People told me that the meth pills were going to increase my appetite for more dope, and they did. I couldn’t stay out of Grandy Park for nothing in the world. I also had my share of running into Papoose on a daily basis and he made it his business to dog me every chance he got. I couldn’t get no play from that motherfucker to save my life. And not only that, when he found out happened to Teresa, he tried to rag me out, saying, “You feel lonely without your partner in crime, huh? Well, don’t be sad, ’cause if she would not have died from that O.D., then one of these niggas would’ve probably plugged her skull up with some lead, sooner or later.”

  Now hearing him say that really put a bad taste in my mouth, but I brushed it off because he was the most ignorant nigga I knew. And besides, he’d get his one of these days.

  Speaking of days, I’d been living by candlelight for six days and had a seventy-two hour eviction noticed posted on the front door for two days. I had approximately twenty-four hours to pack up my shit and head out of there before I was forced out by the local sheriff’s deputy. And I was not looking forward to that. So, had to come up with a plan real quick. Meanwhile, I jumped in the car and decided to head out to Grandy Park for a re-up of those spider bags that were floating around. Now out of that four hundred dollars I got from the pawn shop, I only had forty dollars left to my name. So, I was gonna get two bags and save the other twenty dollars for tomorrow. But, little did I know I was going to find a ghost town when I made my entrance.

  “Where the fuck is everybody at?” I asked this fiend, whom I’d seen roaming around every now and then.

  “Everybody done closed down shop ’cause the narcs just came through here and did a sweep,” he said.

  “How long ago was that?”

  “Probably about thirty minutes ago.”

  “So, there’s nobody out here holding?”

  “Nope. Your best bet is to go out Huntersville to the candy shop. That nigga Walt be having dem Huntersville boys up in there selling that good shit.”

  “You talking about Walt that wears the red baseball cap?”

  “Yeah, that’s him,” the fiend assured me.

  “Well, all right, thanks,” I told the guy and left.

  On my way to Walt’s place, which I had no idea that they called the candy shop, my mind started dredging up memories that surrounded Teresa’s death. So, I was somewhat hesitant to step back into that house.

  But, fear sure has its way of taking the backseat when copping drugs are involved. Because as soon as I was about to turn this car around and find somewhere else to buy me a couple of pills of dope, I thought about the huge chance that I could run into some garbage and I couldn’t afford to do that right now. So, I immediately convinced myself that I was going to be all right.

  When I pulled up, Walt was standing outside talking to this young boy, and from the looks of things, this young boy definitely looked like he was peddling something, so I hopped out of the car that instant.

  “What’s up, stranger?” I said with a cheesy smile.

  Walt smiled back and said, “Hey, baby girl. Couldn’t stay away for long, huh?”

  With no remote interest to answer his question, I responded by saying, “I’m just trying to cop some good dope.”

  “Oh, well, you came to the right place.”

  “What’s running around here?” I asked him as I got a little closer.

  “Well, I got some people in the house holding that
Helter Skelter. And this youngin’ right here got dem half of caps.”

  “Which one is better?”

  “My shit is better!” the young boy spoke up.

  “Is it for real?” I looked back at Walt for his approval.

  “Yeah, it’s real good. But, his joints go for fifteen dollars a pop.”

  “Oh nah, I ain’t trying to buy a half of cap of dope for fifteen dollars, when I can get two for twenty,” I told them both and started walking toward the house.

  “Listen, homegirl, my shit is a missile. Ask anybody ’round here,” the guy blurted out.

  “I’m quite sure it is, but I’ll take my chances with that Helter Skelter,” I continued and proceeded into the house.

  Walt walked behind me and pointed me in the direction of the house, where he let the other young boys set up shop. The house, of course, was still smelly, but I guessed you’d get used to the smell after you’d been in there for awhile. As we approached the side of the house where all the action was, I heard voices of men instructing others to form a line. So, I looked at Walt and said, “It sure is a lot of chaos going on around that corner.”

  He chuckled a bit and said, “It gets like this all the time.”

  “Is their dope really that good?” I asked him once again.

  “Oh yeah. I wouldn’t have dem in my spot if it wasn’t.”

  “Well be honest, which dope you think is better, the shit your peoples got or the half of caps?”

  “Personally, I would’ve coped one of dem half of caps because the shit is mixed up with that Q & B and horse tranquilizer.”

  Shocked by his response, I said, “Horse tranquilizer!”

  “Hell yeah, and that shit is on the money too!”

  “So, why ain’t he got a long line of niggas trying to cop his shit?”

  “He did a while ago. But, everybody ain’t got the money he’s asking for, so that’s why I got a crowd of muthafuckers in here,” he explained as we approached an old wooden door.

  And before Walt had a chance to grab a hold to the knob and turn it, the door opened and out came three dope fiends. One by one, they all came strolling out of the room with their faces lit up. You could tell that their only concern was to get high, because when they walked by us, they didn’t look our way. It was as if they were programmed or something, and believe it or not, good dope did that to you. So, I was truly looking forward to having that same expression on my face.

  We walked into the room and it was filled up with a few more junkies trying to make a purchase, which meant that I had to wait in line. But, Walt walked ahead of me and whispered something in this fine, dark-skinned guy’s ear. And when the guy looked into my direction, he waved me to come on over to where he was, so I did just that.

  “You trying to make a trade ?” he didn’t hesitate to ask me, revealing a whole mouthful of platinum and diamond teeth.

  I nodded my head.

  “Where your dough at?” he wanted to know.

  So, I handed him a folded twenty dollar bill and in exchange, he handed me the two caps of the lethal dope everybody called Helter Skelter.

  “You ready?” Walt asked me.

  “Yeah,” I said and turned around to leave.

  Back in the hallway, he asked me what I was about to do next. And that’s when I told him I was going to head back to the apartment Teresa had before she passed.

  “Ahhh man,” he began to say, “please forgive my manners. How was her funeral?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t know because her mother had her body flown back to her home state. But, she did arrange for her to have a memorial service at the funeral home on 35th Street in Park Place.”

  “How did she look?”

  “Oh my, God! Her mother had her looking good. And you couldn’t even tell she was pregnant.”

  “That’s good,” he replied as we walked toward the front door. “So, who’s at the house waiting on you?”

  “Nobody.”

  “So, why you trying to go back there and be all by yourself?”

  “I don’t mind being by myself,” I expressed to him.

  “I don’t either, but won’t cha stay here for a while and take a load off?”

  “Nah, I don’t know about that. These people you keep up in here scare me.”

  “I ain’t gon’ have you ’round dem,” he assured me. “I’ma put cha in my room and ain’t nobody gon’ bother you, either.”

  I was beginning to feel like he was backing me up in a corner with his offer, and so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to chill out there. And besides, if the dope was good like he said it was, then I wouldn’t have to get back in the car and drive all of this way to make another purchase; it was right there at my disposal. So, I followed him to his room and I had to admit that it didn’t look like the rest of the house. He actually had a bed, a nightstand with a lamp, and a dresser with a mirror on top. It wasn’t all that clean in there, but it beat hanging out in one of those other hollow rooms.

  “Make yourself comfortable,” he insisted.

  “All right.”

  “Now, if you need anything, I’ll be out in front of the house, making sure shit stays in order.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  “Lock the door after I leave too,” he instructed me. “I would hate for somebody to come in here and disturb you.”

  “Oh, I’m fine. But, let me ask you something.”

  “What’s up?”

  “Who was that guy—the dark-skinned guy with the platinum and diamond teeth in his mouth?”

  “Everybody calls him Black, why?”

  “Just curious.”

  “Well, I guess you’re entitled. But remember, if you need anything, just holler for me.”

  “I will,” I assured him, and then he left.

  The Ski Mask Way

  A whole lot of shit transpired since I stepped back into the Candy Shop. First off, Walt invited me to move in with him the very next morning after the Sheriff set all of me and Teresa’s things out on the street.

  We didn’t make it out there in time to get my things packed before they were actually set outside, but Walt and I were able to gather up all the things I needed. Speaking of which, we were together now. Yeah, I know that sounds strange and all, but he treated me with so much respect, it was unbelievable. And not only that, when I needed somewhere to lay my head, he came to my rescue. He even showed me how to master the dope game.

  People looked for advice from him all the time. And what I liked about him was that he kept it real. Now, he may have been a washed-up old man, but he was smart as shit and a lot of people trusted him. And that’s what I was most attracted to.

  Okay, now when he looked at me, he was always saying that he couldn’t believe that he had a woman like me. He was always trying to make sure I was all right and when we were in bed, he was always trying to go that extra mile. Now, his dick wasn’t all that big, but his tongue compensated for it all. Especially when he made me ride his face. Boy, that forty-seven year old man let me grind on his face like there was no tomorrow. And what really fucked me up was when he turned me over on my stomach and ate my pussy from the back. I guess seeing all this ass flapping in his face sent him off the deep end. So, if he liked it, I loved it.

  It’d been nine months that I’d been living there. And believe me when I tell you I’d seen everything from niggas getting their asses kicked behind dumb shit, to the police running up in there and making arrests, to the stick-up kids walking out with shit that didn’t belong to them. I even started shooting up dope, but the way that I spiked myself was safe. Walt schooled me on how to work the needle properly.

  And I have to admit that the shit really worked. But what I failed to mention was that two months earlier I loaned out Teresa’s car to a young boy and the bastard wrecked the fucking car. So now, I was out of a vehicle and back to doing it the old-fashioned way. Other than that, everything was everything except for the fact that I knew Walt was working for the police. I overheard
Walt making a deal with one of the narc officers in private about setting up other people, just to keep his place running. And when I heard it, I was shocked like a motherfucker. I mean, this was not the Walt I had grown to know. This guy I overheard was somebody else. But, who was I to judge? I mean, if that was the only way for him to keep his spot open, then I was gonna have to roll it with and keep my damn mouth shut. I figured he knew what he was doing, so I was gonna get out of the way and let him do it.

  Walt got the young boys who peddled that Helter Skelter dope to leave him a few of their caps, just in case some people came through looking for it. Now, it wasn’t unlikely for these guys to do this, because they’d done it before. And since Walt always had their money straight when they returned the following day, they handed him ten caps, closed down shop, and left.

  Once the coast was clear, he took his ass straight up to his room. Now, I knew immediately what that meant, so I followed right behind him. Shit, I wasn’t going to let him have all the fun by himself. I wanted to get high too. And that’s exactly what I did. But, before we were able to cook our shit up and suck it up into the syringe, he had to make sure he only beat small quantities from each head of the caps.

  If he took too much dope from each pill, then the fiends would notice it and they wouldn’t cop it. And not only that, them niggas who gave him those caps to hold were going to notice it too. So, if you tried to hand them their dope back and it had been tampered with, they’d kill you for playing with their emotions. That’s a no-no in this game.

  But, people like me and Walt will still tread that thin line. It was just in our nature. Now, I saw why Eugene and Teresa used to get their asses kicked all of the time. They were fighting that temptation demon. And that motherfucker was a hard one to battle.

  “Hold up, Walt. You took too much off that one,” I told him.

  “No, I didn’t,” he protested.

  “Yes, you did. Now, look at it,” I insisted as I picked the cap up in my hand and held it out for him to take a look at it.

  He took a closer look at it and said, “Yeah, you’re right. That mu’fucka looks skimpy as hell.”