“Who’s in the car with you?” Marcus asked. He walked to the car and peered inside.
A smiling dirty white woman waved at him. She, too, was missing several teeth.
“It’s my wife,” the man told them. He smiled nervously at the woman.
Marcus turned toward Travon and nodded. “It’s cool.”
Travon pulled a small white piece of cocaine base from his tiny plastic sack and handed it to the man.
The man examined the small piece of crack, and nervously rolled it around in the palm of his hand. “It’s too small; can you add another piece?”
“Hell no!” Travon shouted. “Now where’s my fuckin’ money?”
The man nodded toward the car. “My wife’s got it. Hold on.”
The man walked to the car, with Travon following closely behind. Once the man was close enough to his vehicle, he leapt through the passenger side window.
“Go! Go! Go!” he shouted to the woman.
Travon and Marcus grabbed the man’s legs and began to pull. The woman drove off just as Darius reached inside of the car and opened the passenger side door. The man was pulled away from the moving vehicle, and hit the ground hard. Like a pack of wolves, Darius, Travon, and Marcus surrounded the man and began to kick him brutally.
“Muthafuckin’ geeker!” Travon shouted.
“Yeah!” Darius added while delivering a blow. “I bet you won’t try to beat no one else!”
“Yeah, fuckin’g stupid-ass geeker!” Marcus yelled.
The man’s wife stopped the car down the street and began honking the horn. Travon, Marcus, and Darius continued to kick brutally, until too many lights from the surrounding houses began to come on. Doors began to open, blinds began to crack, and the once dark and peaceful street began to come alive.
“Let’s go!” Darius shouted. “Fuck this trick!”
The boys took off running into the backyard of the crackhouse and hopped the fence into an adjacent alley. They continued to scale fences and cut through trails, until they reached the main hangout spot. Out of breath, they emerged from the shadows between two houses.
“Man, y’all better cut that shit out!” Lil Fade shouted. “Y’all asses almost got mowed down by this muthafuckin’ chopper!” He showed them the AK-47 assault rifle cradled in his arms.
“All of that running out from in between the houses almost got y’all killed, Blood!” Lil Bling shouted.
Travon, Marcus, and Darius slowly walked to where the rest of the boys were standing around and hanging out.
“What’s poppin’?” Darius asked.
Lil Fade shook his head. “Shit, nothing. Everybody done boned the fuck out, that’s what’s happening.”
“Where y’all coming from?” Capone asked.
“Shit, we was on our way here, and we had to stop and whip this geeker,” Darius lied. He wanted to keep his other drug spot a secret.
“Oh, yeah?” Lil Fade asked. “Damn, I missed all the fun.”
A car pulled up in front of them and the passenger flashed a cigarette lighter twice.
“Shit, I’m out,” Capone announced, extending his arms out to his sides.
Lil Fade shook his head. “I ain’t got nothing.”
Marcus turned to Travon. “Go on and get it.”
Travon strolled up to the driver’s side and examined its occupants. There were two young, attractive women inside. They both smiled at Travon.
“Hey, baby, what’s up?” the driver asked, fondling Travon’s zipper.
“You wanna do something?” the passenger asked.
“Fuck!” Travon smacked his lips, and walked back into the yard where the others were standing.
“What’s up?” Capone asked.
Travon smacked his lips once again. “They ain’t got no money; they wanna get busy and shit.”
Capone peered over Travon’s shoulder, examining the occupants of the vehicle. He liked what he saw and turned back toward Travon. “Say, lil kinfolk, let me get a piece from you and I’ll pay you back tomorrow.”
Travon shook his head and pulled out his small plastic sack, which was filled with pieces of crack cocaine. He unwrapped the sack, and handed Capone a twenty-dollar piece. Lil Fade hurried over.
“Break it in half and give me a piece,” Lil Fade told Capone.
Using his fingernail, Capone snapped the twenty-dollar piece of crack cocaine in two, and handed Lil Fade one of the pieces. Together, they approached the car.
“Yeah, boy!” Lil Fade said excitedly. “I’ma get my duck sick tonight!”
“So, what y’all wanna do?” one of the ladies asked.
Lil Fade held up his palm. “Hold on, bitch!”
Capone, who had walked to the passenger side window, quickly examined the ladies, and then headed over to the driver’s side. “I wanna get my jimmy waxed.”
“Me too,” Lil Fade told the passenger.
“You got a dime?” the passenger asked.
“Yeah, just come on!” Lil Fade told her.
“Hold on!” she begged. “Let me hit it first.”
Lil Fade shook his head. “Nope, first I handle my business, then you can handle yours.” Lil Fade grabbed her arm, pulled her out of the car, and then led her around to the side of the house.
“Get in the backseat, and take your mutherfuckin’ pants off,” Capone told the driver.
“You got a twenty?” she asked.
“Bitch, please!” Capone told her. “You better be happy with this dime I’m a give you.”
The driver climbed into the backseat, and removed her blue jeans.
“Ho, open your muthafuckin’ legs!” Capone told her, as he climbed on top of her.
A second car pulled up, and the man inside held up two fingers, then cupped his hands into a circle. He mouthed the words two and zero.
Travon nodded and pulled out a twenty-dollar piece of crack from his little plastic sack, and then handed it to the driver. The driver handed Travon a twenty and then pulled away.
“Let’s go to the weed house, and the bootleg,” Lil Bling suggested.
Marcus, Darius, and Lil Bling rose, walked to the Chevrolet Impala, and climbed inside. Marcus turned back toward Travon, who was standing in the yard.
“You coming?” he asked.
Travon shook his head. “Naw, y’all go ahead, I’m a stay down.”
“All right, BSV out then, Blood!” Marcus told him with a smile.
Lil Bling flipped a toggle switch on his dashboard, activating the hydraulic suspension system on his car. The car bounced up, lifting itself off the ground. After a few seconds, the booming stereo system came alive, and Lil Bling pulled away.
Another car pulled up to the house where Travon was standing. This one was a late-model Nissan Maxima with chrome rims, tinted windows, and a ground effects kit. It looked more like a dealer’s car than a drug. The window slid down.
“You got a two-oh,” the passenger asked.
Travon removed a twenty-dollar piece of rock cocaine from his small plastic sack and walked to the passenger’s side. Both driver and passenger were wearing military uniforms. Remembering what Darius had told him about military customers, Travon added a few pieces of loose chips from the bottom of his sack, to make it appear as though they were getting a lot more. He handed the merchandise over to the passenger.
“Look at this!” the passenger said excitedly. He held out his hand so that the driver could see the amount that he had been given. “I told you that this was the spot!”
The driver looked up at Travon. “What will you do for a C-note?”
Travon pulled out six pieces of rock cocaine and added several loose pieces from the bottom of his sack.
“Bet!” the driver said happily. He handed Travon a one-hundred-dollar bill and Travon handed over the crack. “What’s your name?”
“Rico,” Travon told them.
“All right, homeboy, the next time we come through, we are gonna ask for you,” the driver told him.
Travon nodded and returned to the empty porch. Soon, the car pulled away, leaving him alone with his thoughts.
Travon sat quietly, thinking about his life, and the direction it had taken. Too-Low had been dead for less than a year, and in that short period of time, he had gone from being one of the favorites in the Courts to being its sworn enemy. In that short time period, he had gone from not knowing anything about drugs to sitting on a porch in one of the city’s hottest dope spots. In that short amount of time, he had gone from being an unaffiliated innocent to being a member of one of the state’s most notorious and violent gangs.
This time last year, he would have been sneaking out of the house to meet Frog, Justin, and Re-Re in the park. Now, with the exception of Frog, the others wanted him dead. He never saw it coming, and he didn’t really understand how it happened. Everything was moving at warp speed, and it was so hard to get a grip on things, to gain his bearings. He felt like a bullet. Traveling fast, not knowing where he was going, when he was going to stop, how he was going to stop, and worst of all, not being in control of his own fate. His life was spiraling out of control, faster and faster with each revolution. He would be dead within a year, he told himself. Dead within a year.
“Why you do it in my mouth?” the young lady from the passenger seat asked.
“Shut up, trick!” Lil Fade told her, as they emerged from the shadows. “Just swallow and be happy.”
Travon peered in the direction from which they came. Lil Fade was zip-ping his pants; the girl was spitting. She huffed, and stormed back to the car, where Capone was climbing out and pulling up his pants. Capone tossed the young lady in the backseat her payment, and then returned to the porch where Travon and Lil Fade were now sitting.
“Y’all tricks hurry up and get the fuck outta here!” Lil Fade shouted.
The young lady in the backseat emerged from the vehicle, and put her pants back on in the middle of the street. Then she climbed in the driver’s seat, and turned to the passenger, who was already inside.
“Bitch!” the driver shouted. “I knew you would start smoking without me, give me some of that!”
They sat for a few moments and quickly ingested some of the payment for their services, before finally driving away.
Lil Fade opened the front door, grabbed a radio, along with his AK-47 and an extra thirty-round magazine. He turned on the radio, rose, and then walked to some nearby bushes and stashed the AK-47. When finished, he returned to the porch, where they all sat quietly listening to the radio and bobbing their heads. Soon, they heard the distant rumbling of some deep bass notes.
Lil Fade rose, walked over to where the AK-47 was hidden, and waited patiently as the bass notes grew louder. Soon, Lil Bling’s car turned the corner, and Lil Fade rejoined Capone and Travon on the porch.
Lil Bling’s car pulled up in front of the house and slowly lowered itself to the ground when he hit the switch for it to pancake. Laughing loudly, the boys climbed out of the burgundy lowrider, and strolled up to the porch carrying bags of beer, liquor, and marijuana.
“What the fuck took y’all so long?” Travon asked.
“We ran into some hoochies at the store,” Marcus told them. “Plus, Lil Bling had to call his baby’s momma back at the pay phone. She kept blowing his shit up.”
Lil Bling set a bag of beer, chips, and other items down on the porch, and then headed back toward his car. “I’ll holler at y’all later.”
“Where the fuck is he going?” Travon asked.
“Shit, he’s probably going to go and whip that tripping bitch of his,” Lil Fade answered.
Capone peered up from the bag in which he was rummaging. “Say, fool! Don’t go and catch no ho-bashing case!”
Darius shook his head. “Man, I couldn’t have no broad like that!”
Marcus reached into his pocket and pulled out a large plastic bag filled with marijuana. Some of it had already been rolled into joints. “I rolled some up already, but I ain’t about to roll no more,” he told them, holding the bag in the air. “That shit got my fingers cramping.”
Lil Fade snatched the bag away from Marcus. “Shit, nigga, give it here. You ain’t said nothing, I’ll roll the rest.” He turned to Capone. “Puffing is an art form. You have to be able to roll the shit just right, plus you have to be able to puff all night.”
The boys laughed at Lil Fade’s rhyme.
Capone turned to Marcus. “You can’t roll no weed anyway, youngster. You be rolling baby joints. Yo shit so tight, a nigga can’t even get a decent pull off a one.”
Marcus pulled out a Swisher Sweet cigar that had been emptied and stuffed with marijuana. “That’s cool, y’all keep on cutting, while I sit here puffin’. And since y’all wanna talk about the way I roll, y’all gets none of this here.”
“Naw, dog, you know I’m just fuckin’g with you,” Capone told him.
Marcus pulled out five more Swisher Sweet cigars, and tossed them to Lil Fade, who immediately began removing the tobacco from them.
“I got more ’gars if you need ’em,” Darius told him.
Lil Fade nodded. “Bet.”
Capone popped the top on a bottle of gin, took a drink, and then passed it around. Darius turned up the volume on the radio, and the boys commenced to getting drunk and high.
Later that night, Travon was helped inside the house, where he was laid on a couch. He quickly fell asleep again. This time, he dreamt of his brother.
“Don’t ever join a gang, Tre.”
“I do this shit, so you don’t have to!”
“I better not ever hear about you joining a gang, or selling any kind a dope, do you hear me?”
“Tre Tre Tre”
Travon tossed and turned in his sleep. He dreamt of the gunshots that he’d heard the night of his brother’s murder. He dreamt of the shootout in the Courts between himself and the others. He dreamt of the shootout in the park. He dreamt of the shootout on the highway and of the words that his aunt spoke to him afterward. His dreams, and his sleep, came to an abrupt end when a thunderous roar ripped through the house, as the front door was busted open.
“Everybody get down on the floor now!” Now! Now! Now!” the first officer through the door shouted. “This is a search warrant! Search warrant! Police Department! Everybody on the floor now!”
Travon’s heart began to beat a million miles per hour. His first thought was that it was actually a jack move by some rival gang. Those thoughts were quickly erased when he spied two officers wearing black jumpsuits, ski masks, gloves, boots, helmets, and utility vests entering into the room. They were also wearing bright yellow jackets with “police” printed across the front of them, and they carried large black bulletproof shields in their left arms. One of the officers was pointing a Glock semiautomatic pistol at him, from behind his shield.
“Get down on the ground now!” the officer shouted through his black ski mask. “This is a narcotics search warrant! Keep your hands where I can see them!”
Travon quickly felt himself being searched; his arms were pulled back and his wrists were cuffed.
“Get up!” one of the masked officers told him.
Another clasped Travon by his forearm, and pulled him up from off the floor.
“Yeah, we got you muthafuckers now!” shouted the officer who was holding Travon’s arm.
Travon was led into the kitchen; Marcus, Darius, Capone, and Lil Fade were already seated around the breakfast table with their hands cuffed behind their backs. He stared at Darius, who smiled at him. Travon shook his head in disbelief, and then peered down at the floor.
“Sit down over here,” one of the masked officers told Travon, pointing toward an empty chair.
As Travon was seated, the old man to whom the house belonged was led in. All of the chairs around the small breakfast table were occupied, so a chair was brought from the living room for the old man to sit in.
“We’re clear,” one of the officers announced. “This is everybody.”
&nb
sp; One of the masked officers walked to the front door, and waved his hand signaling that everything was clear. All of the officers with the exception of two holstered their weapons. The officers leaned their massive ballistic shields against the dirty off-white refrigerator, just as an old fat white man in a beige Guayabera shirt hobbled into the kitchen. The old man held a long, official-looking piece of paper.
“Canine unit is five minutes out, sir,” one of the officers reported.
The old man nodded, and the officer turned sharply on his heels and departed. The old man shifted his gaze toward the boys.
“Listen up!” he barked. “I’m Sumner Bowlman, and this here’s a narcotics search warrant. It was signed last night by municipal court Judge Homer Falls. You can make it easy on us and tell us where the dope is, or we can tear the place apart. But before you say anything, I’m a gonna read you your rights. You got the right to remain silent, because anything you say can and will be used against ya in a court a law. You all have the right to an attorney, an’ if’n you can’t afford an attorney, they have to give you one. Do you fellers understand these here rights as I have read them to ya?”
The boys stared at one another; all remained silent.
“Good,” Bowlman said. “Now down to business. Where’s the fuckin’ dope at?”
The boys remained silent. Bowlman turned to the owner of the house.
“Waters, do you know where these boys keep their dope at?” Bowlman asked, in his heavy, good-old-boy accent.
Waters shook his head.
Bowlman squinted and shrugged. “Okay, if that’s the way you want it. I guess we’ll be here all day then.” Bowlman turned to the unit of masked officers. “Okay, boys, tear the place up.”
“All right!” one of the officers exclaimed.
Another officer brought a chair from the living room, and sat it down just behind Bowlman. The commander seated himself in it, and began to rock back and forth and stare at the boys.
The noise from the officers’ overly enthusiastic search soon became deafening. They broke, smashed, tore, ripped, slashed, cut, and destroyed everything in sight. It was what the Waffen SS once termed “Youthful Exuberance.” They merrily destroyed the entire house.
Eastside Page 13
