The System Has Failed

by Ms. Michel Moore

  Simone was chilling at home, at this point feeling the complete opposite. She’d embraced that her son wanted to live the thug life, and she proudly encouraged it. It was all she herself had known for the past two decades, and to her way of thinking anything that got her son farther away from Prayer, even if it was a jail cell, she was fine with.

  After divulging the information she’d found out about Monique’s kids, Big Ace, whom Simone was loyal to, advised her to stick near the crib and try to monitor Joi’s moves and thoughts to see if she or her sister had any memory of the day he’d murdered her mother. With Big Ace’s assurance that if one of them did say anything, he’d quickly handle it, Simone watched her only child shower the young girl with gifts the same way Kamal and Joey used to do to her back in her prime. She pondered making the call, lying, just because she was jealous.

  Simone was so caught up in Joi getting the fast street money that Terrell could’ve spent on her, she had no worldly idea that all three of them had been watched and followed from afar for several days by Mitts and LoLo.

  On the other side of the Gates, while Joi, whose diary her sister violated nightly giving updated information to Elon, was picking out the perfect outfit to wear to meet Terrell’s step-mother Prayer, Shauntae was feeling guilty as she rearranged the new dozen roses that Stuff had sent her for the fourth time this week. With the swelling almost completely down, she could see just how beautiful the diamond tennis bracelet, also courtesy of Stuff, looked on her wrist. Even though she had yet to give up the pussy, he was serving her like a true queen, which no Negro in the hood ever had. He was too good to be true.

  With the clock ticking, Shauntae felt remorse because she knew that at any given moment Elon and his crew might strike, bringing harm to Stuff, which meant an end to his kindness and possibly his life. Fuck Terrell’s and Yankee’s trifling asses, was all she could think, but Stuff in her eyes had made amends. Wanting nothing more than to call Elon and recant the information about Stuff and his involvement in the bullshit, she just couldn’t bring herself to do it. Besides, Elon was a lunatic and might bug out and kick her ass behind the bullshit, and bottom line, she’d suffered enough ass kickings to last a hundred damn lifetimes.

  Even though Stuff hadn’t mentioned the Barristers’ Ball in days, secretly hoping Shauntae’s face would still be too bruised to go out in public since he’d promised Marie Averez he’d take her instead, the underprivileged female had marked the calendar weeks ago and since it was on her birthday she was definitely counting on going. For Shauntae it was a one-in-a-million chance to actually go somewhere where people who she always admired and wanted to be like were hobnobbing in the same place.

  Donte and Elon were content knowing that soon their problems would be completely over. Starting today, their plan of taking care of the competition would be placed in full swing, and their lives would go back to normal. Elon had several of their tight-knit crew set to split the wigs of all the little niggas Yankee and Terrell had on the corners, gas stations, and city parks. This Saturday night in the city would be like no other.

  Terrell had just dropped off the last pound of weed that Juan had blessed them with to Yankee, who was posted up at the greasy Chicken Shack on the corner of his block. Spending time with Prayer and his girl was at the top of his list, and he wasn’t gonna let anyone or anything, including grief from Simone, stand in his way. The young, wheelchair-bound man didn’t care what his mother or Drake claimed to have seen happen between Joi and some dude. He trusted her.

  He, Drake, and Prayer all had tickets to attend the local Barristers’ Ball to see Stuff’s dad get an award, but Drake was called away on business, leaving Prayer on her own. This was a perfect time to have Joi meet Prayer.

  When Yankee got the package from Li’l T, he was more than heated at the stipulations Terrell had the nerve to put on how he was to pay it back. Not giving five hot-fire shits that they had to pay Juan a ticket, Yankee wanted to do what he’d been doing for weeks, which was jacking off money at Northland Mall, eating like a fucking kingpin, and tricking with different bad-ass bitches who would’ve never given him the time of day if he hadn’t been paying them. In his paranoid mind and twisted way of thinking, he felt like not only were Terrell and Stuff already blessed with money, but they also were getting one over on him, shortchanging his share of the revenue on the weed sales.

  With the scorching hot day dragging by, Yankee, who wore a baseball cap backward, and Wahoo, still deep in mourning, sat on the front stoop of Yankee’s house, going over the loosely concocted robbery game plan that was only hours from going down. Bragging to every crackhead, whore, and drunk in the alley, bragging to the mailman and even to the Arab at the party store, Shauntae, cocky and proud, had let it be known all across one side of the ghetto hood to the next that she was gonna go to the highly publicized, uppity-ass lawyers’ bullshit party with Stuff. Knowing that information, when Stuff and Shauntae left the event, Wahoo and Yankee would make their move and follow him back to his house.

  Sitting on the edge of his bed, Stuff carefully looked over the bills he’d accumulated over the past week, trying to show Shauntae he was sorry for allowing things to get so out of hand between her and Terrell. Sure, he thought she was rough around the edges, but she was different from any other female he’d ever encountered, and that intrigued him beyond belief. Everyone always said good girls loved bad boys. Well, in this case, it was the complete opposite.

  After he and Marie Averez returned from their date at the ball, Stuff was gonna make sure to spend all his available time the rest of summer before he went off to college with Shauntae and only Shauntae, even if it did make Juan cut off them and their supply of weed. After all, this was nothing more than a temporary thing to do to make some extra bread before he received his trust fund, not an occupation.

  Chapter Five

  It was Saturday morning, and the sun was shining bright. Shauntae had spoken to Stuff several times during the week, thanking him for all the flowers and especially her birthday gift bracelet. Never once confirming that she was still going with him to the ball, Shauntae took it for a given. After tricking with an old white man to get some extra loot, she used the money to buy a brand-new expensive dress, shoes, and of course to top it off, some cheap-ass accessories.

  “I’m about to be out.” Shauntae snatched her cell phone off the charger and headed toward the door. “I got an eleven o’clock appointment at the salon and a bitch don’t wanna be late.”

  “Okay,” Joi yelled out the kitchen doorway. “I’ll still be here when you get back. Terrell isn’t picking me up until four or five.”

  “Fuck that nigga Terrell and his crippled ass that can’t walk and probably can’t fuck! I told you to stop saying that fag’s name to me!” she screamed, looking at the mirror near the door and making sure all the swelling was gone, which it was. The dark bruise marks were still visible, but she’d already planned on putting extra makeup on those spots. When Stuff, the same dude she’d set up to get fucked up, picked her up for her fairy-tale evening, she’d be perfect. “Now I’m out!”

  “I heard you the first time! So just go!” Joi understood her sister still being angry, and she felt she had every right to be, but that still didn’t stop her from not wanting to hear that dumb shit about her boyfriend Terrell.

  * * *

  Despite having an appointment, Shauntae waited her turn to even get shampooed. Now she was almost finished getting the last track sewn in and ironed, and it was not soon enough for the other tired customers and stylists who had to hear her brag about her plans of being the baddest bitch at a ball most of them had never heard of, let alone been invited to.

  After flagging down a cab, Shauntae settled in the rear seat for the four-mile trip back to her house. As the car hit every unavoidable pothole, the overjoyed female felt her cell phone vibrating in her bootleg Coach purse. She hoped it wasn’t Elon again for the fifteenth time. After blowing up Stuff’s phone three times earlier in th
e morning herself and getting his voicemail, she was glad it was him finally returning her call.

  “Hello.”

  “Hey, happy birthday. It’s me, Stuff.”

  “I know your voice by now.” A smile graced her face.

  “Oh.” Stuff felt he was making some headway in cracking through Shauntae’s concrete exterior. “What you doing?”

  “I just got my hair done!” she excitedly yelled as the cab driver glanced back to see why she was so loud. “I paid damn near a hundred and fifty for this sew in!”

  “Oh, yeah? What you got up?”

  “Don’t act silly, nigga,” Shauntae laughed. “What time you picking me up? Or are we going in a limo?”

  “Limo?” Stuff questioned. “What you talking about a limo for? I don’t get it.”

  “Dang, boy, I was just asking. You know I ain’t never been to a party like the one tonight, so I don’t be knowing how y’all be flossing on the other side of the law.”

  It was then and only then that Stuff realized she was talking about the Barristers’ Ball he was attending later on. He had mentioned it to her weeks ago in passing, but he assumed she’d forgotten all about it since neither he nor she had brought the subject back up. Even if he hadn’t confirmed he was taking a refined and equally educated Marie, considering all the disrespectful, crude, and obnoxious behavior Shauntae displayed at Simone’s, there was no way in sweet hell he’d take her around his father and his father’s peers. The young man who lived by the book had to come up with something to fix this situation without hurting her feelings, but there was only one way he could see to do it: lie.

  “Well,” he stammered, “that’s what I was calling to tell you. My mom is pulling one of her major headache, ‘I’m about to have a heart attack’ routines and wants me to stay home with her.”

  “What?” Shauntae screamed out, causing the cab driver to swerve.

  “Yeah. Since my parents divorced, she does it all the time when I’m going to spend some time with my dad.”

  “So fucking what? Can’t one of your sisters stay with her good faking ass? That some straight-up bullshit she pulling!”

  “Naw.” Stuff continued to let the lie grow bigger, knowing he couldn’t take her out in public. “Their husbands are all lawyers like my pops, so they have to be there too. I’m the only one.”

  Feeling like a child who’d lost her dog, Shauntae hung up the phone after Stuff promised to call her if he could find someone else to chill with his mother.

  * * *

  Joi was a nervous wreck as she and Terrell made their way up the long driveway of the house that he grew up in and called home. After reassuring her that Prayer was easygoing and laid-back, nothing at all like what she witnessed firsthand when she met Simone, Li’l T turned the van’s engine off and got out, and then sat in his wheelchair, which Joi had quickly brought around to the side. Before they could reach the ramp located on the left side of the front porch, they were met on the stairs by a jubilant Prayer.

  “Hey, baby.” She tightly hugged him, not wanting to let go. “I missed you so much!”

  “I missed you too.”

  “Hello, sweetie. You must be Joi.”

  “Hello, Mrs. Martin.” Joi smiled, feeling welcomed. “It’s so nice to finally meet you.”

  “You also. Y’all two come on in.”

  Prayer was the perfect hostess to her surrogate son’s girlfriend the rest of the evening until they got ready to leave. Even when she found out that coincidentally she was the youngest daughter of Monique Richard, who she, Chari, and especially Simone despised and beefed out with every time they came into contact, she still was hospitable, knowing that you can’t choose whom you’re related to.

  As the happy couple was making their way back to the van, Prayer’s cordless phone rang, causing her to get angry. “This ain’t nobody but Stuff’s mother again acting a straight-up fool. She’s been clowning all day.”

  “Dang, why now?” Terrell asked as Joi’s ears perked up at the mention of her sister’s newfound love interest.

  “You know that Barristers’ Ball is going on and that boy is with his daddy. And you know how she gets when he ain’t all up under her.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Li’l T knew low-key that Prayer was just like Stuff’s mother: over-possessive.

  “Yeah. He took Marie Averez.” Prayer nonchalantly dropped the bomb not knowing Joi’s sister thought she was the one supposed to be on his arm tonight. “You know that girl always had a crush on him since y’all was kids.”

  * * *

  The ride home was a solemn one as Joi tried to figure out the best way possible to break the news to her big sister that Stuff wasn’t about shit and was playing her.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Terrell asked as he rubbed her on the leg. “Auntie Prayer loved you.”

  “I love her too.” Joi smiled as she leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “I just got something on my mind, that’s all.”

  Before he could say another word, his cell phone starting ringing. “Yeah, what up doe?”

  “Dawg, ya ain’t gonna believe this dumb shit!”

  “What is it, Yankee? What the hell is wrong?”

  “Mannnn, some of the young cats from around da way just called me saying some crazy guys with bats jumped out on them swinging and shit.” Yankee had panic in his voice mixed with rage. “They said two of our runners’ shit is split wide the fuck open and they on their way to the goddamn hospital bleeding like a son of a bitch!”

  “You bullshitting.” Li’l T felt his heart start to race and his adrenalin rise as he drove faster toward Joi’s house. “What the fuck!”

  “Naw, nigga, but . . .” Yankee saw his other line was ringing, and it was Wahoo. “Hold on, T, this Wahoo.”

  While Terrell was on hold, his anger increased, scaring Joi once again as she saw the same bizarre expression he had on his face when he bugged out on Shauntae. She hesitated to ask what was wrong, but since he was driving fanatically, she felt the need to at least try to calm him down before he got into an accident and got them both killed.

  “Baby, what’s happening?” She massaged his shoulder as he drove twenty or thirty miles per hour over the speed limit.

  “Nothing,” he exhaled before Yankee got back on the line. “Hello!”

  “Yeah, dude, I’m back!” Yankee, who was secretly scheming on Terrell himself, was talking loudly enough now for Joi to hear him. “My cousin just told me them other workers we got posted down the street from him just ran up on his front porch after being chased off Jefferson. And dig this here, them fools had bats too!”

  “Where you at? ’Cause I’m on my way as soon as I drop Joi off at the crib. Then somebody gonna pay for trying to mess up our fucking hustle!” Terrell bent the corner of his girl’s street. After they decided to meet up at Wendy’s across from the old, abandoned KFC, he hung up and brought his van to a quick halt at Joi’s front door. “All right, baby, I gotta dip.”

  “Are you gonna be okay?” she asked, worried.

  “Babe, I got this. Now I gotta be out. Something ain’t right!”

  As Terrell skidded off, Joi entered her house to find Shauntae sitting on the couch with a blunt up to her lips and a bottle of Rémy Martin on the coffee table smack dab in front of her. The ten o’clock news was on the television, and the sound was loud enough for a deaf man to hear it.

  “Hey, Tay.” Joi could tell her sister was not in a good mood and still depressed since she had missed going to the Barristers’ Ball with Stuff. Joi hated to add fuel to the fire on her sister’s birthday, but she knew she had to deliver the devastating blow that Stuff had lied to her and really did go to the ball, and worse than that, with some other chick named Marie.

  “Oh, hey,” Shauntae grumbled, barely looking away from the screen. “Wanna see something I recorded off the news?”

  “Ummmm, I guess so.” Joi was glad to avoid telling her about Stuff when she saw the unthinkable. It was a report from downto
wn Detroit featuring a collection of Motown’s who’s who of local celebrities, honorees, and fashionable upper crust who were attending the Barristers’ Ball. Just when the report was over, Shauntae pointed the remote and pressed the hold button. Joi’s mouth dropped open in disbelief as she saw Stuff (Kenneth Ian Spencer III) and Marie Averez hand in hand, walking the red carpet. They posed for media pictures. Unbeknownst to them, the watchful, predatory eye of Wahoo was parked across the street, waiting for Stuff to leave.

  “Ain’t that a bitch.” Shauntae relit the blunt, gagging as she reached for the bottle that she was taking straight to the head like it wasn’t shit but water. “He played me for some Spanish broad! It’s all good, ’cause that nigga and ya boyfriend gonna all get theirs soon!”

  “What you talking about?” Joi quizzed her sister, who was drunk and high as a kite. “What does Terrell have to do with it? What did you do now, Shauntae? I hope that’s not why he was so mad! What did you do?”

  Slurring her words as she started to dance around the room with the new dress she’d brought up to her body, Shauntae laughed. “They think they’re better than us! Elon knows where both they bitch asses live at, and we about to see what’s really good when some mama’s boys try to go hard. Fuck ’em! Fuck ’em all!”

  Joi immediately wasted no time trying to get in touch with Terrell, but she had no luck, getting nothing but his voicemail. Damn, he’s not picking up.

  When Shauntae realized that her baby sister was trying to throw salt in her revenge game plan, she vindictively snatched Joi’s cell phone from her hand, causing the two of them to struggle. Having the strength of a bull and accustomed to taking ass kickings from different dudes on the regular, an intoxicated Shauntae easily won the battle, knocking Joi off-balance. Fuming with envy, Shauntae shoved her against the wall, knocking the wind out of Joi. With contempt and malice in her heart, Shauntae then took the sibling fight to an all-time low. When Joi tried to get back up on her feet, without a second thought the older of the two grabbed one of Joi’s many academic award plaques off the wall, striking her sister across the face and knocking her out cold.