Chapter 40

My heart was fucking pounding. Spin had called me for the seventh time requesting a meeting and each time the nigga was getting bolder and bolder.

I had to remember that his ass was the enemy, but it was getting harder and harder to look at him that way. He was actually funny and very charming.

“You ever been to the Cheese Cake Factory?” he asked me his last call.

“No!” I answered. I was trying to be a bitch with my short answers.

“Well how ‘bout we meet there and talk business?”

I couldn’t help, but smile as I laughed, “With yo’ boys close by?”

“They can share a booth with your boys,” he said.

I was silent. Yes a bitch was really considering it. I mean it was a way to get close to him, and that was my goal…right?

“Would this be business or pleasure?”

“A little bit of both.”

“Well Spin I’m sorry, I don’t mix business with pleasure, and no I am not available to meet tomorrow. How about you think of giving me more than a few hours’ notice,” I said.

I really didn’t have anything better to do. At first I was biding time until we made the money we needed back. Now I was just fucking with him. It’s strange because I always thought of him as the inhuman monster who murdered my family or my brother at the very least but when I got on the phone with him. It was different. All of that was forgotten.

“What if you undercover?” he asked.

I knew from King that, that was the reason for the short notice. He did not want to give us time to set up the meeting place.

“That’s the risk you’re gonna have to take,” I smiled. Yes, a bitch was blushing and feeling like a little school girl. “Well Spin I gotta go. Bye…oh and I’m not five oh.”

I hung up the phone before he could respond.

I’d found myself looking forward to his calls. He always called me at the same time; nine o’clock p.m. and we always stayed on the phone at least thirty minutes depending on how I was feeling and what I was doing. I was staying with Vicky at her new apartment and loving it. We were making up for the lost years watching chick flicks, doing facials, painting our nails and shopping. We were treating life like one big sleep over and having quality time. Girl’s night every night. Our diet consisted of ice cream, pizza and popcorn.

A bitch was starting to feel like she was getting fat, so we started going to the twenty four hour gym on the same floor as Vicky’s at the end of the hall.

But no matter what I made time for my little conversations with Spin.

The day I decided to meet Spin was not my idea. Vicky and I were making our rounds. I was going to Court Yard at Bay Road to collect my money from the girls. When I got there something did not feel right.

Diamond smiled, and I could see something there. She handed me over five racks, and I would have left, but something made me look around. I don’t know I could tell my girls were troubled. I sat on the sofa determined to find whatever it was out.

I decided I wanted a little info.

“So, how’s things?”

Diamond sat down and crossed her legs. “Good, Vahlery and Sasha moved out Tuesday, but they both dropped off a g’ each.”

I nodded and then asked, “How’s Hope?” I was ready to run down the list of all my girls.

“She’s cool, her and Faith do a lot of work together since they started the double dates.”

I nodded again. “Tam?”

Diamond shrugged, “Tammy is, Tammy.” Diamond tried to smile.

“Where is Tammy? I wanna see her; we ain’t had a talk in forever.”

And I saw it. The bitch looked nervous. Diamond was good, a stone cold liar and manipulator. But after being around the bitch fo’ so long I knew when she was lying and hiding shit. She was a quick thinker, but when she was caught off guard it showed.

“She’s on a date.”

I smiled at Diamond and then got up and started towards the back of the apartment. She said nothing, she only followed me. I mean what could she say? I opened the first door and saw Fantasy-a tranny-and Serenity-a regular girl-wildly sleeping in the same bed. Nothing unusual there.

I walked to my old room which was slowly being converted into everyone’s room. Dime was sitting on my bed looking pissed. She was a real girl or shall I say born a woman. When she saw me her eyes widened.

“What’s up Piece?” I smiled.

“Hey S Square,” she said slowly.

I smiled Shiesty Shi or Double S or S Square as Dime called me. I noticed her voice was shaky.

“What’s going on-” I stopped short and turned around.

Dime was looking at diamond, and I had a feeling Diamond was doing something behind my back.

What the fuck was going on.

I saw the light on in the bathroom. I walked passed Diamond and pushed the door open. I was confused at what I saw. Tammy was standing over the sink quickly applying makeup to Double D’s face. They both turned to look at me.

“What the fuck happened?” I asked looking at Double D’s caked on makeup and swollen eye. “Diamond!” I yelled, and she was behind me.

“It’s okay Shi, I fell.”

“On your eye?” I yelled at Double D. No one responded, and I lifted my eyebrow. “Tell me how the fuck you fall on yo’ eye bitch. What you hit it on the door knob?”

“Shi, it’s not that bad,” Tammy said.

“Not that bad?” I yelled. I was getting fucking pissed really quick, “The bitch can’t see.”

“Shi it’s not what it looks like. It was a misunderstanding.”

I turned to look at Diamond. “A misunderstanding? That don’t look like no misunderstanding,” I yelled pointing at Double D. “That look like she got her ass beat-”

“Shi!”

It was Vicky. She’d been waiting for me in the car.

“Back here,” I yelled and we silently waited for her. When Vicky made it to the bathroom I said, “Come here Vick. What does that look like?” I was pointing at Double D who would not look at me.

“It looks like someone beat her up.”

“What? That’s what I said, but they tell me it’s a misunderstanding, not an ass whooping.”

Diamond sighed loudly, “This is why we didn’t want to tell you.”

“Well you still ain’t told me so why don’t you start with who the fuck did that?”

No one spoke. So I sucked my teeth and stormed off towards the living room. I grabbed the note book we logged the dates in and began flipping through it. Everyone was behind me as I found Double D’s last date. Her last date was the night before with someone named SW with a five one oh area code. He had to be the one who did it. I was sure her ass didn’t go on no dates looking like that not even with makeup. The problem was I wanted them to tell me.

“Who was it?”

“He didn’t know she was a tranny Shi,” Tammy tried me.

“Bull motha fuckin’ shit bitch!” I said. I was fucking heated. “All y’all ads say what y’all is unless Diamond left that out.” Diamond mugged me when I said that. “I didn’t think so, and since it wasn’t our error I won’t even consider any other excuse. I don’t care if the nigga can’t read or only know text talk, his illiterate ass should have told you he was cool and let you on yo’ merry way. Now which one is he? SW?”

No one said anything. I tucked the notebook under my arm.

“Double D, I’m auditing you and I’m gonna call ‘eryone up in here starting with SW and fuck they ass up. Hell I’m bound to get the right nigga.”

Her one eye got big. Most of their customers were not only repeats but on the down low. Drama scared them, they didn’t want people knowing, and if I beat someone’s ass then Double D would lose clients.

“It’s him,” I heard Dime say. “His name is Sick Wid It; they met at room six-o-five at the Oakland Marriott by the airport.”

I nodded and dropped the notebook and made a beeline for the door.

“Shi don’t do nothing dumb, this nigga is like six foot three, three hun—”

I slammed the door behind me and went straight to my car. Vicky was behind me in seconds. I popped the trunk and lifted up the compartment for the spare tire praying that nigga was still at the room. I grabbed the balled up shirt closed the trunk and tossed Vicky the keys. “We’re going to the Marriott in Oakland by the airport, you drive.”

She got in started the car and drove. I waited ‘til we was on the Dumbarton Bridge before I opened the shirt. I took the nine-millimeter I got from King for the bank robberies out. I took out the clip which I filled after the robberies.

Vicky was staring at me and trying to watch the road at the same time. I took the clip out and emptied it into the shirt and then put the clip back in. There was one bullet still in the chamber. That was all I would need. I didn’t wanna get carried away.

“Shi? What are you gonna do?”

The truth was I had no idea what I was going to do. I’d never shot anyone before, but the adrenaline made me fearless and feel I was capable.

We got to Oakland at three and by three twenty I tapped on room six-o-five with my gun. I could see the peephole darken as someone looked out. I had no doubt that the nigga would open the door. I mean what could a five six one hundred and forty five pound bitch with long hair in a sundress with flip flops do?

The door opened a little, the chain lock was on.

“What?”

“I’m looking fo’ Sick Wid It,” I said in my best ignorant ghetto bitches voice.

“What?”

“You Sick Wid It?”

“Yeah, who you?”

I smiled and stepped back a little. I could see his big black ass nose through the crack in the door. Taking a deep breath I put all my strength in my foot and kicked the door. The lock broke, and the door hit him in the face.

“Fuck!” he yelled.

I walked in scared as hell and shut the door behind me. The room was dark, but I could see. I reached and turned on a light. I didn’t have time for my eyes to really adjust to the darkness.

The room was a mess. He had a gun, it fell when the door hit him. I hurriedly swooped it and pointed both of them at him. My foot was killing me, but the adrenaline kept me going.

“Crazy bitch,” he said looking up at me.

You have no idea, I thought.

The man was huge. “Sit yo’ big ass down. We need to talk.”

He sat down but I had a feeling he didn’t like being told what to do by a woman and a gun.

“Who the fuck are you?”

“Hi Sick Wid It, I’m Shi,” I smiled leaning against a wall.

“Shi?”

“Yes as in Shiesty Shi, Simply Shi, as in Shi Girls, you know one of the girls you hit?”

“That wasn’t no bitch.”

“She looks like one.”

“That’s a fuckin’ nigga.”

“And you knew that when you called and asked for her.”

He was shaking his head. “Homie said y’all had some pretty bitches-”

I sighed loudly. He looked at me with his yellow nasty ass looking eyes.

“Bitch is, so derogatory…it’s like really degrading to women, let’s call them beezies.”

I waved my hand indicating he could continue his story.

“I called for a bi— beezy and the bi—” he groaned loud clearly frustrated. A gun in yo’ face held by a crazy bitch-oh my bad beezy, a gun in your face held by a crazy beezy-is a good motivator.

“She told me about the other beezy, and I said I wanted her.”

“Are you telling me we failed to notify you that said beezy was packin’?” I thought that was a nice way to say a gender challenged individual. What about you?

He looked at me.

“Anywhere in the conversation or description did you hear the words T and S?”

He just stared at me.

“What does T.S. mean Mr. Wid It?”

He swallowed.

The nigga was fucking huge. His hand could cup my entire head, and I knew if he got the chance… yeah, I’d be gone. Hell he’d probably eat me after. However, at that moment he looked like a big baby.

“I take it you do know the lingo seeing as it ain’t no secret Simply Shi has transsexuals as well as real girls. And even if you did not know when you found out you should have simply kicked the bitch out, hell, don’t pay her.”

I took a step towards him and began to speak in a sympathetic tone.

“I just wanted to talk to you, I didn’t mean it to go down like this, but I hate it when people hit on smaller people.”

He nodded and said, “It was a misunderstanding, I’m sorry.”

I smiled and so did he. His yellow ass teeth were disgusting. The nigga was waiting to pounce, but I did before he could.

“Then I apologize to you for this misunderstanding,” I slapped the shit out of him with his own gun. He turned towards me, and I brought the butt of it into his eye. His fat ass screamed like a bitch grabbing his face.

Oh my fucking God.

The feeling I had, the violence almost made me nutt. I had to physically restrain myself.

“I hope you didn’t misunderstand that,” I yelled.

I turned to leave with both guns in my hands.

“The fuck you the pimp?” he screamed holding his eye with one hand.

I turned around and I don’t know. It was automatic. I’d been debating shooting the nigga. Just to see how it felt to shoot someone. When I saw his big ass hunched over looking up at me, I remember Double D and how she looked.

Keep yo’ hands to yo’self, I thought and shot the nigga right through the top of his left hand. He was screaming loudly. I headed to the door in a hurry but before I left I turned and said, “And Shiesty Shi ain’t no pimp… But, I’m something like one.” I slammed the door liking my little dramatic movie line.

When I left I almost fell, my legs were so unsteady. But the adrenaline had me on one. I hurried to the car. It was Oakland, I didn’t think no one called the cops but if they did hell Lord knows when they’d arrive. Damn, so why was I rushing?

Vicky was staring at me as I climbed into the car breathing heavily.

“Shi, that shit was scary. I thought you was hurt.”

“Let’s go,” I said as my phone rang.

It was King. “Shi what the hell’s going on? Vicky called me talking ‘bout you was gonna kill someone.”

I smiled and put my feet up on the dashboard. “Don’t worry its good. What’s up?”

“I was calling to see what’s going on with Spin.”

“Oh we’re still working out our meeting.”

“Shi, you been cupcakin’ with that nigga fo’ almost a month.” The tone of his voice told me he was jealous. I smiled, but it didn’t make me feel good.

“Okay, Okay when’s a good time for you?” I said sarcastically.

“Tell um we’ll meet him on Tuesday and Shi make sure it’s a crowded place just in case.”

“‘kay anything else?” I asked voice still dripping with sarcasm.

“Yeah, I think we need to do this on our turf.”

Where the hell was we gonna go in East Palo Alto? The library? McDonalds? Ikea?

“So, you wanna set it up at Three Brothers on University?”

He sighed, “Cute Shi. How about downtown?”

Downtown Palo Alto? I shrugged and said, “I’ll call you back in ten.”

I hung up and rolled my eyes.

“Home?” Vicky asked, and I nodded.

I found Spin’s cell number with ease since we talked like all the time.

“What’s good lil’ mah?”

I rolled my eyes and took a deep breath.

“I’m craving cheesecake.”

He laughed, “And so you call me?”

“You offered.”

“You don’t mix business with pleasure-”

“On an empty stomach,” I smiled as he laughed. “Besides it’s more business. So majority wins.” I knew I was flirting, and I guess King was right, I was cupcakin’.

“It’s yo’ world baby girl. When we gonna do this?”

“Tuesday. You free?”

“If not I will be.”

“Awe, fo’ me?”

He laughed, “You crazy Shi.” Damn, second time in the last hour, maybe I was a little off. What you think? “‘ight you got a time?”

“Eight? Nine?”

“Nine is cool; do you need me to come swoop you?”

I laughed, “Spin I’m buying weed from you, this ain’t no date. Besides I’m closer to the Cheesecake Factory.”

“Huh? Where… you already in the City? I—”

“No, there’s one in Downtown Palo Alto.” He was silent, and I knew all sorts of danger and warning signs were going off in his head, but before he could protest I said in a sing song voice, “See you Tuesday at nine,” and hung up.