My gaze locks onto a dusty brown Chevy Impala cruising down the crowded street. Behind the wheel, a short muthafucka with thick cornrows and cheap mirror sunglasses catches my attention and blows my high. Who’s that muthafucka? But my brain is working slower than usual.
“FORKS UP!” KyJuan yells, shoving a hand against my back, tripping me out of my pumps and sending me careening toward the sidewalk.
I scream just as my exposed skin hits concrete and I scrape a good foot along pebbles, broken glass, and God only knows what else.
POP! POP! POP! POP!
RA-DA-TAT-TAT-TAT!
Bullets fly everywhere.
Startled and hysterical screams fill my ears while I’m still a little dazed and confused. An army of Gangster Disciples pours out the houses on Shotgun Row, guns blazing. There’s a loud screech from the Impala’s tires, and the evening air is blanketed with the scent of burning rubber.
POP! POP! POP! POP!
RA-DA-TAT-TAT-TAT!
The Impala attempts to make a sharp turn off the street but instead crashes into a parked black Escalade. Disciples proceed to turn the Impala and the three niggas inside it into Swiss cheese. When I sit up, I watch as the dead bodies jump and wiggle around as a barrage of bullets hits them.
“YEAH! YEAH!” KyJuan starts jumping around, throwing his fist in the air. “FUCK THEM NIGGAS UP!” He runs over to the car just as most of 6 poppin’ crew are pulling the doors open and jerking bodies out. KyJuan is one of the first to start stomping the niggas into the ground.
I pull myself off the sidewalk and then inspect my legs and arms to see what the damage is. Relieved to find only a few cuts and bruises, I start laughing about the near-death experience.
WHOOSH!
I glance up to see the old Impala now ablaze. I can’t feel sorry for those niggas, even if I wanted to. What the hell were they thinking rolling through our hood and attempting to do a massive drive-by? Everybody in Memphis knows that Shotgun Row is the muthafuckin’ heart of the Gangster Disciples’ territory. Clearly these niggas were trying to impress somebody and got caught up.
KyJuan races back over to me, shooting his gun straight into the air. “YEAH! YEAH! You see that shit?” He stumbles. “Whoa.”
I smile. “For sure. You handled yours, Daddy.”
“Damn straight.” His greedy eyes roam my figure. “I done smoked me some la, capped me some Vice; all I need is some pussy to call it a day.”
I frown as my gaze falls to the blood soaking his T-shirt. “Did you get hit, Daddy?”
KyJuan follows my line of vision and then looks surprised. “Oh shit.” He lowers his gun and pulls up his T-Shirt.
All I can make out is blood and pulverized flesh before he slumps to his knees. “Those muthafuckas!” He swears under his breath, drops his gun, and then passes out.
I stare at my golden ticket to rising up in the Queen Gs and can’t believe my eyes. I walk over to him on bruised knees and check for a pulse. When I can’t find one, my tears swell. “Now what the fuck am I going to do?”
5
LeShelle
I’m high as hell, grinding my hips and clapping my ass in Python’s face when these pussy, punk muthafuckas start blasting down Shotgun Row. Next thing I know, my arm is on fire and Python is shoving me to the floor and reaching for his chrome. There isn’t even time for me to question what the fuck is happening before he charges the front door with the rest of the set.
But it’s hard to keep a good gangsta bitch down. I roll up off the floor and reached for the 9 mm I keep strapped to my right calf. Even Momma Peaches goes for her cast-iron umbrella stand and rises up with an HK SL8 assault weapon, ready to rock-a-bye any nigga who gets in her way.
In the short time it takes for me to hustle my way to the front yard, the brown Impala has crashed and niggas are pulling bodies out of the car and stomping their asses like cockroaches. I start to run over to add my high-heeled pumps into the mix when someone sets that shit on blaze. Niggas whoop and holler, acting like they just got their freedom papers.
“Is y’all sure that’s all of them?” Momma Peaches asks, clutching her weapon and peeking around the corner of the front door like some real commando.
I laugh. “Yeah, those trick ass—” From the corner of my eye, I see KyJuan drop like a stone.
“FUCK!” Rage twists Python’s face before he plows through a crowd of niggas and hoofs it up the cracked sidewalk.
I race after him. My heart pounds in the center of my throat. Everyone knows that Python and KyJuan have known each other since they were baby seeds. They grew up and blew up together. They were the kings of Shotgun Row, and the thought of some miscellaneous niggas rolling through our block and blasting one of them off their throne is just too much to wrap my brain around.
Python drops to his knees and snatches KyJuan away from the chicken head crouching over him, but it’s clear by the way KyJuan flops over and the amount of blood painting the concrete that the Grim Reaper has collected one king and is marching him toward heaven’s ghetto.
“Fuck these muthafuckas!” Python jumps up and throws punches in the air. “I want to know who the fuck sanctioned this shit, and then we ride the fuck out.”
“Vice, man,” a foot soldiers says. “I know I’ve seen that one dude dumping and running with those dirty niggas. You feel me?”
“McGriff,” Python hollers as he heads back toward the burning Impala. “Verify this shit. Are those niggas tagged?”
An army of Disciples launch an immediate search of the two dead bodies that had been pulled from the wreckage. There are no flags, and none of the tats identify a gang affiliation.
“These muthafuckas are clean.”
“What the fuck?” Python reaches their side and performs his own search. “You ain’t going to tell me that these niggas just decided to pop off down here by they damn selves.”
“Could’ve been just an initiation stunt,” McGriff offers, shaking his head, his hand still clutching his chrome.
Python lifts his foot back and delivers a hard, swift kick to one of the dead man’s head. It’s clear he’s hot. Heat rolls off of him in waves. “These muthafuckas had names. I want them, plus where they lived, who they people is—you feel me? And if we get any muthafuckin confirmation that Fat Ace’s ass had anything to with this shit here, we’re blazing this city up. Six poppin’ five droppin’ tonight, baby. You feel me?”
“I feel you, man.” The men fist pound.
With flames and black soot coiling up toward the darkening sky, Python turns his attention to the hundred deep surrounding him. His six-foot-five frame suddenly looks ten feet tall as he starts looking niggas one by one in the eye. “This shit here won’t stand. Niggas got us confused if they think they can roll down our shit, disrespecting Shotgun Row or any other block we got on lock.” His black eyes cast back up a ways, where his road dawg still lay in the street. “Somebody get something to cover my nigga up. Show some muthafuckin’ respect!”
A few Queen Gs scramble to carry out the order.
Python sniffs one time, but no tears drop from his eyes. “Niggas want to blast, we blast. We going to let the muthafuckas who are behind this shit know that they started a war! You feel me?”
“HELL YEAH!”
“We will not rest until we earth every one of those grimy muthafuckas!”
“HELL YEAH!”
The crowd of blue and black cheer their agreement, and some even shoot off a few bullets into the air.
I smile, loving how my man commanded everyone’s attention and respect. As I start to pump my fist into the air, that fiery pain surges back into my arm. How in the hell did I forget about that? I glance down and suck in a sharp breath as I notice my thin, bubble-gum-pink top darken with blood.
“Shit!” With my right hand still holding my nine, I use the tip of my pinky finger to pull up my short sleeve and reveal my gushing wound. “Shit! Shit! Shit!”
Despite the amped-up crowd, I catch Python’
s attention. In a flash, he’s standing next to me, examining the wound. After a sec, one corner of his thick lips quirks up. “I can take care of this for you, Ma.”
I try to smile back, but my arm feels like straight fire now, and as sure as my ass is black, I know every member of the Queen Gs is watching me, so the option of crying like a bitch is completely taken off the table. To clamp down on the pain, I grind my teeth together as Python leads me back through the crowd to Momma Peaches’s spot.
“Get the fuck out of the way!” Python shouts, storming through the front door.
Niggas part like his ass is Moses.
We make a beeline to the kitchen.
“Let me get my shit,” Momma Peaches says, returning my weapon back to its hiding spot before rushing for the first-aid kit.
“I need some ice,” Python says calmly.
Baby Thug, a short, thuggish shawty just barely kissing five feet with little mosquito bites for titties, quickly jerks open a couple of cabinets, grabs a large Glad bag, and then fills it with ice. Shortly after, the bag is pressed to my bullet wound.
I hiss but still manage to fight back tears.
Python’s chest swells with pride. “That’s right, Shelle. You can handle this shit.” He takes my gun from my clenched hand and sets it on the counter.
Momma Peaches whirls onto the scene like a hurricane. “How we doing in here?” She pops open the white box and starts pulling out bandages and medical tape.
“We’re numbing the shit up,” Python says, moving to the stove and turning on an eye.
“Good. Good.” She turns toward the crowd at the kitchen door. “One of you niggas get me some alcohol. Either Scotch or some whiskey.”
“Get me something for her to bite down on—a stick or something,” Python adds as he sets a large knife on the glowing stove eye.
Fear knots in my chest. My heart races. My head spins.
“Don’t worry, baby. I’m about to fix you on up.” He moves back to my side and removes the ice bag. “That’s long enough with that.” Python produces a second knife and runs it under some cold water from the sink. “Now this shit might hurt for a minute, but you man up, baby. A’ight?”
I nod.
“Here you go, man.” Lethal, another lieutenant, steps up with a nasty little stick. He doesn’t even bother to wipe off the dirt and bugs.
Momma Peaches notices my scrunched-up face and snatches the stick from Lethal’s hand and runs it under the sink. “Better?” she asks.
I nod, though all I want to do is scream for them to get the fuck away from me. The stick is shoved into my mouth with Momma Peaches’s simple instruction to “Bite down.”
Python smiles and wraps one of his large hands around my wounded arm and lifts it so that he can have a better look. Then I watch as the cold, wet knife descends to my arm like a hawk. In the next second, my entire world is nothing but pain as Python’s knife digs around in my arm.
I growl and hiss, and then my teeth clamp down so hard that the stick snaps in half—but not a muthafuckin’ tear drops.
“That’s right, Shelle. Hang in there. I almost got it.”
When the bullet eases out of my bloody arm, I expect some relief, but it doesn’t happen. Blood continues to gush and the pain is relentless.
“C’mon over here by the sink,” Python says.
Momma Peaches removes the knife from the stove’s eye.
I spit the sticks out of my mouth and try to walk on legs that feel like they are filled with Jell-O. By sheer will alone, I make it over to the sink with my audience doubling in size.
“Goddamn.” One bitch winces. “Shouldn’t we be getting her ass to a doctor or something?”
Python leans my arm over the sink and reaches for the bottle of Scotch. “Take a deep breath.”
Again, I follow orders, but damn near faint when the first drops of liquor splash against my arm. Suddenly Momma Peaches is right there to help hold me up. Still, I don’t scream or cry.
But the comments from the peanut gallery continue. “Aw, hell naw.”
“Sheeit!”
“Yeah, that’s my gangsta bitch right here. Niggas, y’all checking this shit out? Is my girl a solider or what?”
There’s a rumble of agreement and even a few cheers for me to hang in there.
“Some of y’all could learn a thing or two,” he boasts as he splashes Scotch all over my arm. “I ain’t going to call out no names, but I know a few of y’all would be hollering my damn ear off right about now.”
“Not me!”
“Nuh-uh!”
Python rolls his eyes and then sets the bottle aside.
My ego doesn’t even trip. It takes all I have just to hang on. You can do this. You can do this. I repeat the words until I start to believe it. But then Python reaches for the heated knife his aunt has taken off the stove. Tears finally rise up and sting my eyes, but I blink those muthafuckas back as I watch Python bring the knife closer.
He licks his lips with his snakelike tongue. Python loves inflicting pain. It doesn’t matter on whom. “Now I’m going to seal this shit up. A’ight?”
I draw in a sharp breath and summon courage from parts of my body that I didn’t know existed before I finally give Python the nod to go ahead. You can do this. You can do this. Yet, doubt starts creeping up my spine. You can do this. You can do this.
“Look at me, baby,” Python commands.
My jittering gaze makes its way up to my man’s black eyes, and a strange calm settles over me as I stare into his soulless depths.
“Ready?” he asks.
I swallow as sweat blankets my face. “Ready.”
Python presses the scorching knife against my skin.
My head explodes with pain while the sound of my skin sizzling fills my head. A scream rips from my throat before I have a chance to stop it. But it isn’t a bitch scream. It is more guttural and Herculean—like a nigga trying to bench-press twice his body weight.
More importantly, no tears fall.
Pride polishes Python’s black eyes as he finishes sealing my wound and then wrapping my arm up with a tight gauzy bandage. When it is all over, he stands and inspects his work as police sirens fill the air. “You’re a bad bitch, baby.” His face twists into a menacing smile as he tilts up my chin. “Don’t ever let anyone tell you different.” He leans down and slithers his forked tongue into my mouth for a kiss.
I smile against his thick lips. Damn straight, I am—and don’t you ever forget it.
6
Melanie
“We have a code purple reporting off Utah Avenue. Car thirty-four, are you still in the area?”
I groan and ground my teeth. Utah Avenue—better known as Shotgun Row. I’ve been on the force for four years, and I’m so sick of all the gang activity in this shitty-ass place I don’t know what to do. It’s dusk, there’s a blood-orange glow settling over the city I call Hell’s Paradise, and I’m more than ready to take my ass home, jump into a warm bath, and blaze up a fat blunt to relax my nerves.
“Car thirty-four, you roger?”
My partner and pain in my left ass cheek, Detective Keegan O’Malley, chuckles and reaches over for the hand radio. “Thirty-four, copy. We’re on our way.”
“Roger that, thirty-four. We have reports that there is eleven-forty-four on the scene. Car forty-three and fifty-four will assist.”
“Shit,” I spat. “We’re probably rolling up on a war.”
“If we’re lucky.”
I side eye O’Malley. No doubt my adrenaline-junkie partner is just looking for an excuse to shoot at niggas. The muthafucka is always acting like this gang shit is some kind of fucking video game and he’s the big exterminator who is going to rid Memphis of gangbangers. I suspect most of that blustering comes from all the steroids his ass be pumping. Oh, he would deny the shit, but I know nobody’s neck is supposed to be as thick as a tree trunk.
Sure, O’Malley works out all the time, but the shit still doesn’t seem natu
ral. When he isn’t in the gym, his ass is at a gun range. He’s a perpetual solider who’d traded in shooting at sand niggas for the real thing. In Memphis, the badge is a license to shoot first and ask questions later—and nobody dares challenge that shit. The city at large knows what kind of battle we’re in with these street gangs, and they don’t ask too many questions as long as it appears that we’re doing our jobs.
Appearances aren’t everything.
The truth is much more sinister.
O’Malley laughs, his bald head rocking back and forth. “Don’t look at me like that. The sooner we get over there, the sooner we get off the clock and you can go back home to play with your cat.”
“Don’t start that ignorant shit with me,” I hiss, pressing the accelerator down to the floorboard as I whip around cars, trucks, and a little old lady taking her sweet-ass time trying to cross the road.
“What?” He laughs, cracking himself up. “When was the last fuckin’ time you even went out on a date, Detective Johnson?”
“That ain’t none of your goddamn business, O’Malley.”
He tosses up his hands, still smirking. “Fine. But if you ever need someone to scratch that itch—”
“Don’t even fuckin’ finish that goddamn sentence.”
“—I’ll be willing to take one for the team.”
As O’Malley’s laughter explodes from his chest, I imagine ramming his Mr. Clean head into the dashboard until I bust his face wide open. I can’t stand his racist ass, and I find it exasperating that he thinks shit is cool between us.
Far from it.
In the meantime, I bide my time. I don’t want to complain to my lieutenant—mainly because he’ll take my complaint to the captain, who just happens to be my father. It isn’t easy being the police captain’s daughter. Everyone is always eyeballing me to make sure I’m not receiving any special treatment. What they find instead is that I have it harder than anyone else. From the police academy to now, Captain Melvin Johnson made sure my superiors pushed me harder than everyone else. He wants to break what he calls my iron will so that I’ll quit and take my ass to college and law school like he always wanted.
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