Madeira Street was a ghost town. My shop was closed; Nick sat on Angie’s steps in all black. His hood eclipsed his eyes, his back lined up with the wall; his head was like a swivel rotating in every direction—he was on point. I parked and joined him.
“Yo, wassup?” I asked.
“You gotta gun on you?” said Nick, still looking over my shoulder and surveying the block.
“Naw,” I replied, trying to follow his eyes and see what he was looking for.
“Yo, you talk to Hurk? Sit by me and hold this,” he said, passing me a Glock.
“Naw, I ain’t rap to Hurk,” I replied. Nick told me that someone shot Rex up and Hurk has been coming through every hour on the hour looking for me.
“Damn, is he dead?”
“I don’t even know, man, but he buggin’ out and that’s not even the worse part. Dis day fucked!” he said.
“It gets worse?” I asked.
Nick nodded and said that Gee hooked up with Long Tooth and picked up Dog Boy. The trio popped handfuls of ecstasy and had been riding around the city all day shooting at any and everyone they thought had something to do with our incident. No one had asked me or gave a fuck what I thought. They waged a war off of blindness—with Gee, who has never made a rational decision in his life. I’m not even sure who told him about the shooting, but the idea of me being attacked probably sent him crazy. Especially since I put him back on his feet. I love him but he is the definition of what no one should ever aim to be like. Gee also had a million petty charges, ranging from domestics to assault.
Gee once climbed into the booth and knocked out the DJ at Strawberries for not playing DMX. Afterward he threw the guy into the crowd and took over the show. When I was a kid he rode a dirt bike wearing nothing but a blue mink and some blue gators all through his project lobby—old women turned away and covered their kids’ eyes. The housing cops managed to tackle him off of the bike but he knocked out a few before they subdued him, and he did the shit again as soon as he got a bail. Gee’s never been sober, and his gun stays warm; he doesn’t fuck with vegetables—he doesn’t really fuck with anything. Forever he’ll be a wildcard with no filter; he’ll always drink life and smoke whatever you pass to him. He always made every situation worse.
“Yo, you got extra bullets?” I asked. Nick was right, I needed a gun; I’m not getting killed because of their bullshit. Nick said he had a case at the crib. I texted Soni, I love you just because. Hurk had pulled up in a new CL500 with his passenger window down.
“Dee, ya phone broke, nigga? Get in the car, man.”
Soni texted I love you back. I dapped Nick and hopped in Hurk’s ride. The interior was a rich peanut butter color and smelled like new leather dipped in weed smoke and a vanilla tree. Hennessy leaped out of his pores. We cut through Bradford and rode up Monument Street. Nick wasn’t lying, nobody was out. This Gee shit was all my fault. I should’ve handled this situation before LT came out. We could’ve spent a month in the islands. By the time we would’ve returned, they wouldn’t care about this petty beef shit. Hurk had a Mac 11 in his lap with an extended clip poking out. There was a sawed-off shotgun with peeling grip tape on the handle resting in the backseat. I saw the bulletproof vest print all in his t-shirt.
“Where we going at?” I asked.
“Nowhere for real, just wanna put you down with Rex. Niggas tryin’ to say we killed him, that’s crazy shit, right?”
“We! Fuck you mean ‘we’?”
He said he was as surprised as me and that I needed to lay low for a while. He needed some time to figure everything out because it was a strong possibility that some people would be coming for us. This is the ugly part of the game that recruiters forget to mention—home invasions, sleepless nights, gun battles, and wondering if you’ll be the next person with a hole in your head or in a wheelchair or dead. We pulled up at a 7-Eleven. Some people admired the car.
“What you want, Yo?” asked Hurk.
“Grab me an extra large red Slurpee and some seeds!” I yelled out the window. A frail shell of a woman approached the car.
“Can I have some change please?”
I glanced at her round face and patted my pockets. The only thing worse than her skin and breath were her teeth—they were jagged and spotted like dice. A cloud of crack funk followed her. I glanced again. It was Hope. Hope was a junkie now. I pulled some crumbled ones from a roll of money I had tucked in my sock. She didn’t acknowledge me and I didn’t acknowledge her.
“Aye, get the fuck away from my car, you stinky bitch!” yelled Hurk, coming out of the store.
“It’s cool!” I said. “It’s cool”
She tucked her head down and walked away. Hurk threw his fountain soda in her direction, cranked his Project Pat album, and skidded off.
I looked at myself in the side-view mirror. The reflection had red eyes like hers, rough skin like hers—my tone was off, I looked numb. I didn’t look as good as I thought I did. I could be Hope sometime soon.
Fuck that!
I can’t even front, we had some amazing times together. Met you at eighteen and now I’m twenty! Who thought I’d see twenty! You’ve been there when I couldn’t even buy a friend, helping me get over death after death after death, and letdown after letdown after letdown—numbing me to the pain of life. You made everything better, which makes this painful, but I gotta let you go. I’ll always love you, but you gotta go.
You fucking my hood up, my friends up, and fucking me up too. We all look ugly and ten years older because of you. I keep shitting blood and I know it’s because of you; I act like it’s not but I know it’s you. You are on my mind all the time and it’s messed up how all of the bad things always have to be so damn good. You, raw pussy, and chocolate chip cookies are all bad but you all feel so good.
I was riding through my block the other day and you were out. I knew you were out because you all over east Baltimore now, on every stoop, project lobby, and corner. Dudes who used to be the cleanest are walking around with holey Nikes, mini linty ’fros, and shredded-worn Seven jeans. They keep scratching like they are covered in ants and so do I. They are the new junkies and I’m one of them.
I saw a respected hustler get bitched by a heroin addict over you the other day. It felt like I was in the Twilight Zone. I couldn’t tell who the junkie was because the hustler needed you as much as the heroin addict needed his heroin. They were both sick. I’m sick and I don’t want to be anymore, so you gotta go.
I don’t want to sell drugs forever so it’s definitely time to stop using them. Thank you for everything. I’ll always remember you. Bulletproof love.
Your homie,
Dee