Nick, can you run me over to Hope’s spot—she needs me,” I asked while separating some cash into three even stacks of a thousand each.
“You fuckin’ her raggedly ass? Let’s get waffles first. I’m fuckin’ barkin’!”
“Naw, she cool, and we’ll eat later.” I rubber-banded the cash and we hopped in Nick’s Camry.
A few weeks had gone by since I cracked the safe and I didn’t try to sell a single vial. I spent the time planning, scouting locations, and building a crew—stuff that corporations do. I also hired Hurk a lawyer. He did some research and recommended that Hurk turn himself in. The lawyer said the state’s case was as soft as baby shit because the informant was sketchy and not coming to court. He had guaranteed probation as a worst-case scenario, especially because there was no weapon. Nick and I showed up to every court date and Hurk’s lawyer was right. The state couldn’t pay that snitch or any witness to testify. Hurk was set to be processed and released any day.
“Yo Dee, you sure you wanna build a spot by Hope way?” asked Nick as we sat at a red light on Orleans Street.
“Doesn’t matter where we hustle. No beef and no killing is all I really care about. We can sell drugs until our arms fall off and cops don’t care but when the murders come…”
A blue pickup slammed into the back of our car, making Nick’s head slap the steering wheel like a crash dummy. His neck made a popping sound. I unbuckled my safety belt and reached over.
“Yo, what the fuck, you good, are you dead?”
His nod answered my question. I hopped out to see what the fuck was wrong with the dudes in the pickup. Two pint-sized Mexicans hopped out and charged toward me as if it was our fault. They could hardly speak English and probably didn’t really want any trouble, so I flashed the pistol strapped to my belt. They took off running in opposite directions, leaving their truck.
Nick didn’t have insurance and our windows had limo tint. We also had pistols on us and the car was a bong on wheels, so I dragged Nick out.
“Yo, forget this car. We leavin’ this crap, I’ma buy you a new one.” I said as my buck-sixty frame tried to support Nick’s 220 pounds of jewelry, acne, baby fat, and empty chicken boxes.
Three hours later, Nick lay across the couch still, his pudgy hands covering his face. I tried to pull one off but wasn’t strong enough. Tears trickled under his palms as he said, “Dee, go see Discoooo. Get me something, my back. Yo please, God, ehhhh.”
Disco Joe was a recovering addict who now worked as a nurse’s assistant or aide or something. Her place was over on the other end of Castle Street, right off of Jefferson. Disco offered “ghetto healthcare” to street dudes like us. You could get bullet or stab wounds stitched, random shots, and STD cures.
Nick was right, Disco Joe would have some pain pills or something for his back so I rolled him a blunt and went to her place. When I arrived, she was sprawled across her stoop, Newport balanced on her bottom lip, with cloudy diamond and gold rings on all ten of her fingers that looked like brass knuckles.
“Disco, wuz up, baby, I need some pain pills for Nick. We just crushed his whip.”
“I got Tylox, Oxys, or Perks, baby,” replied Disco with that half-lit cigarette that just wouldn’t fall. She resembled an anorexic Mary J. Blige with a hustle that never stopped moving. Disco made money hand over fist and her shop rocked 24/7.
“What you think I should buy him?”
“Two hundred fifty Perks for fifteen hundred dollars for you, bae, and tell ya sexy-ass uncle I wanna dig all in his ass,” replied Disco as she licked the crust off of the edge of her bottom lip, cigarette still holding on for dear life.
I ignored the invite and cashed her out. She brought the pills out in three long tangerine colored, white-capped cylinders, “I tossed a bundle of Tylox in there too, on me,” she said as I examined the bag and jumped off her top step.
“Why you givin’ me free stuff?”
“Cuz I love you, bae, and Bip was my bae too, you know that!” I said thanks, blew her a kiss, and headed straight home.
My Nextel hadn’t gone off in a while, which was weird because it’s normally a hotline, so I checked it and saw that it was on silent. Two missed calls from Nick and twenty from Uncle Gee. Twenty calls—I can’t take another death, I thought as I hit the callback key.
“Nephew! What the fuck iz up?” said Gee on the other end.
Gee used to be the man in east Baltimore but now he’s hit or miss. He flashes money when he’s clean and robs everybody in sight as soon as that monkey climbs back on him.
“I’m chillin’, man, what’s good?”
“I’ma come see you later, man, I need you, for real.”
I told him to come through around midnight. Nick should be good by then. I knew Gee wanted something. I could always see right through that “I need you, I love you” bullshit.
Gee coming by could be a good thing. I thought I could wholesale him some of that heroin and use the cash to buy Nick a nice car. He wanted a black Lexus GS 300 and I could get that for him and something for me without touching my cash or the coke.
On the walk home, I pondered on the fact that there was no perfect drug strip or situation for us to enter this game. The key is to buy low and sell high any and everywhere you can. I was over thinking this kingpin shit. Those drugs should’ve been gone. I didn’t have a real drug connect or a reason to babysit all of that product, plus Nick and I could’ve died today—fuck that. It was time to move all of it.
Back home, I used all of my power to sit Nick up.
“Nick, listen to me, bro. Chew three of these joints and you will be good. I’ma chew some too,” I said while putting the pills in his hand. He ate all three of them and eased back in the chair.
“Yo, dey taste like shit and baby powder mixed!” said Nick with a twisted face.
“How you know what baby powder and shit taste like?” I replied as I swallowed mine and washed it back with a swig of Belvedere. “Drink some of this too.”
I know alcohol makes Percocets work better—they go together like apples and cinnamon—shit, I don’t even know anyone who would take Perks without yak. I once heard that Percocets worked faster when chewed. I’m not sure about that, but moments later, Nick crawled over to the corner of the living room and balled up like an angry fist. There he farted, yawned, and slipped into euphoria with his eyes open, a little drool wetting his chin.
I called Hope and told her that I’d be visiting her tomorrow with a special surprise. Then I had to pull the dope out of the safe before Gee got there. He didn’t need to know about everything. Tomorrow was going to be a great day, I thought as I closed and locked the red door. I’m giving Hope three thousand dollars, getting Nick a car, Hurk could be a free man, I’m putting my uncle back in the game, and I’ll be teeing out my own crack in a few different blocks over east.
The pill in me was growing and then glowing. Bright lights and soft memories fogged my thoughts. Everything became easy in an instant. Those little pills were instant—instant gratification.
“Dee, get the fuck up! Boy, you lifted,” said Nick, standing over top of me with perfect posture. I never saw a person with a straighter back.
“Yo, how you feel, Nick,” I said while wiping drool off of my own chin.
“Amazing,” said Nick repeatedly as he threw jabs at the air in Ali motions. He shadowboxed for like ten minutes and then finally told me Gee called and would be here in five minutes. I looked at my watch and couldn’t believe that I had just slept for seven hours. What a pill—I think I like them.
I washed the high off of my face and wrapped Gee’s half brick up in a pillowcase. I then told Nick to go out and get some baking soda, a bag of ice, and some bottles of aspirin because I’d be cooking later.
As Nick was going out, Gee came walking in. They dapped each other up as Nick said, “I’ll see y’all lata.”
“Dee, what’s up, how you feel?” said Gee as he walked in and surveyed the place. His eyes looked like clots. He smelled like a gallon of Hennessy and Popeye’s beans and rice.
“I’m holdin’ on, missin’ Bip, but hey,” I replied, trying not to break eye contact.
Gee then went into a story about how special Bip was and that I’m lucky to have spent those last days with him. He called us the best things that ever happened to him. I wasn’t sure if it was love or our ability to support him financially that got him talking that way—either way, it felt good to talk to a relative.
“Gee, Bip left me a half brick of dope. It looks really good and I’ll give it to you for twenty racks even though it’s worth a lot more.”
“I ain’t got shit, man, and I owe some people,” he replied, without blinking. His desperation stunk.
“Well, what do you have? I know you don’t think I’m frontin’ you a whole joint. I ain’t Scarface.”
“Yeah, boy but you ain’t no drug dealer neither. Fuck you gonna do with that?”
Gee didn’t know. Shit, I didn’t know, but realistically I’m probably not going back to college. I’m in the game now.
“Oh, Gee, I definitely hustle now. I just don’t wanna fuck with dope, it’s too complicated. Crack man, I’m a crack man.”
I had Nick as my general, and we bump Jay Z all day so “Rockafella” would be my stamp. After tomorrow I’d have a rack of clients and maintaining that, or at least building that, would mean no freebies, even to family.
Gee walked over to our couch and sunk into the center. His 250-pound frame made the cushions fold up like a V. I leaned my back against the wall and slid down to the floor. Gee had a look on his face. The kind of look people get right before they ask a really stupid question.
“Gee, what you want from me, man? Like for real.”
“I’m tryin’ to get that whole thing from you, boy, I can move all of it. I’m good for it, boy I’m ya—”
I cut in and told him that I wasn’t even listening to that “I’m your family” shit, “you my nephew” shit. As far as he knew that’s all I had, and I wasn’t going to give him a chance to fuck that up.
“Why you hit me for help anyway? How you know I could look out? I don’t have a job.”
Gee said he wasn’t thinking drugs, he was thinking cash. He knew Bip had a bunch of it, probably left it to me, and he just thought he could borrow some buy-money and get us all right.
The whole story made sense except for the fact that he owed Bip cash from back in 1996 when he was supposed to be in rehab but checked out early, relapsed and begged for money every day. Bip would mock him like, “I need helpppppp, y’all livinnnnnn, this shit is fuckin me upppp!” He lent Gee 10K when he came out of rehab and would always crack jokes on how Gee would probably never pay him back.
“I’ll give you ten stacks and the rest when I get back in town. You a tough muh-fucker man. Got damn!”
I said no and told him to give me fifteen now and nine when he got back since he didn’t have all of the money up front—that was my final offer. I knew that he could easily make a ton after paying his workers and me so I had to add that extra tax. If he wasn’t family, I wouldn’t have fronted him shit. We shook on it and I told him that he could pick it up tomorrow or whenever he had that fifteen on him.
Nick came back about hour after Gee left. He stopped and got some chicken cheesesteaks but I didn’t eat. I was too excited and ready to work. Beating that extra money out of Gee ignited something inside of me, something I had never felt before. I grabbed the bag of supplies that I asked Nick to get and laid them across our countertop.
My Pyrex was big enough to cook a whole bird so making an eighth would be really easy. I wiped down the counter with a warm cloth. Everything was clean and clear. In front of me was a Pyrex of boiling water, a cloud of mist, a few ice cubes, a box of Arm & Hammer, a sack of cocaine, a pitcher of Kool-Aid, a cup of vodka, and bunch of opportunity. I never really cooked before but I saw it done at least a million times, so I knew I could do it. I was hard-wired for this.
I dumped the coke on top of the boiling water—and watched the oil set up. I looked to left, to right. Nick forgot the aspirin—fuck!
“Nick, you forgot the FUCKIN’ aspirin,” I yelled, busting a lung.
Giving out high quality testers is the most important part of being a great dealer. You have to build that hype like in any other industry. It introduces your product to the world. As I explained to Nick plenty of times: you don’t need aspirin to cook crack but adding it makes the rocks burn slower, giving fiends the illusion that their high is lasting longer than the standard eleven minutes.
I had to think quickly or risk fucking the batch up, so I blasted up to the medicine cabinet… nothing but toothpaste and Proactiv gel for Nick’s acne. The Tylox!
“I’m running to get aspirin now, Yo, my bad!” shouted Nick as he fell out the front door. I ground up the small pills and sprinkled the powder into the pot. Baking soda came next; I whipped it hard with my right hand and quickly tossed the ice chips in with my left. The end result was golden—similar to the color of Kellogg’s Corn Pops.
It was a little darker than what I was used to, but almost half more than I started with, and the fumes smelled right, a little funky, but right. Cutting it with Tylox could be genius or a fuck-up—I guessed I’d see tomorrow.
Nick came back in with a bag full of Motrin. I told him that he was too late and the batch was done—oh, and I asked what was up with the Motrin? Together Nick and I capped up a nation of crack samples. Two bitty shaved rocks in bottle after bottle. Our tops were black and we were ready. We were bringing a whole new element to the street and the pressure was off because I didn’t pay for the product. I could afford to fuck up a batch or two.
I fixed us some cups of vodka and continued capping. Our little black-topped bottles covered the table. Vials are deceiving, just like the crack inside. Crack is this over-hyped drug that fucks up lives and makes people crazy in exchange for an eleven-minute high. Vials are magnifying glasses that make it seem like you are getting more drugs. You aren’t. They both promise more while giving less.
“Ah, Dee, one day we’ll have naked bitches baggin’ up for us like Nino Brown at the Carter and shit,” said Nick.
“Man, you watch too much TV.” I told Nick that I knew there were three target areas where we could sample this stuff other than Hope’s block, including Highlandtown, Latrobe, and 21st. He had a few spots as well and we had more than enough product. We capped up about a ounce of testers, as we call them, and almost a quarter brick of nicks and dimes.
“After we tee to other niggas, I’m a find us a block too. We gonna get our own spot, man,” said Nick, making his way over to the couch.
Nick popped two Perks and fell asleep. I ate one and walked around the neighborhood. I stopped at Bocek Park and thought back to the days when my dirt bike ripped through the grass there and my only concern was being the best rider. I sat there in my state of Percocet-driven nostalgia and faded into the shadows. I loved the park at night. It’s consistent—pitch black and empty and remains that way until dawn, every day.