I can go from the studio to the trap with no problem, and right now that was exactly what I was doing. The sun was barely up yet and here I was pulling into my other workspace, but to everybody else it looked like a vacant building.
Plywood covered the doors and windows making it appear as if no living person was inside, yet walking up to the door it only took a few knocks and a jiggle of a door knob to get me inside.
Adjusting my eyes to the dim darkness of the room, it was like walking through a desert to an oasis of hood luxury. Big TV screens covered the walls, each of them from a different camera covering all angles from the house and parts of the street. This was my boy Uzi’s shit and he wasn’t leaving one stone unturned.
“Hurry up and close the door.” Uzi yelled and I did just what he said. Walking into Uzi’s trap was like walking into an armory. Guns lined his kitchen table, it was all the usual players. My nigga Julio was in the corner cutting up some dope and my boy Uzi was sucking on a cup of lean as usual. Crunching on ice made it sound like glaciers were crashing together in the room. He had his white Styrofoam cup with him, doubled up as usual, taking it to the head like it was the last drink of his life.
“Bruh...you spilling shit man.” I hadn’t been here five minutes and I could already tell that Uzi was sauced. He was slurping down the purple drink but he was falling asleep at the same time. Chunks of ice falling out of the cup onto the floor. I pointed out the cubes of ice on the floor that conveniently landed in some piles of money but he didn’t move to pick them up. The nigga was sloppy but he was also super paid.
“It ain’t shit. The money will soak it up.” Lying next to him was his name sake, a full load sitting on the edge of the table like a decoration.
“It’s all cool fam. He good…” In the corner where no one could see was Uzi’s right hand Keeno. He had a strap longer than his leg right at his side. He stood in the corner like a damn guard. He didn’t move and I hardly heard Keeno talk. What he was paid for was to watch Uzi’s back. They were usually always together, whether you saw the nigga or not.
I needed a Keeno and I needed to be on Uzi’s level. He was the lean man in Houston, I worked for months to get close to this nigga and now here I was walking into his crib like I was family.
“Wassup my dude.” I gave him a five. He moved a little slow at first, but that was only the lean. Seconds later he was standing up dusting his clothes off like nothing happened.
“Wassup man.”
“Shit dude. I’m just here to pick up another order.” I dropped the bag down on the table, opening it up so he could see it all.
“That’s wassup ya bitch. Get this bitch his shit.” My jaws clenched as he said the words.
“Damn man you gotta say bitch so much?” I asked him as Keeno came out of the shadows. He was a little nigga, five foot seven maybe, but he wore a dead straight look on his face like he could shoot you and not blink.
Dark with hair like the predator and teeth brighter than the sun, that was a New Orleans nigga for you. Since Katrina they have been in Houston like roaches, running shit and taking no prisoners.
“I’m from the motherfucking ninth ward, ya heard me...that’s what the fuck we say.” Uzi said. He talked fast, almost like a gun spitting bullets.
“That’s how we talk nigga, wit ya stupid ass...what the fuck nigga.” Keeno was talking now. Grabbing up the money and snapping. “On my maw nigga...we say what we want. Y’all niggas fucks me up bruh.”
“Cook it K. Ain’t no snap bitch. It’s cool. They think we got a...what they call that bitch…” Uzi said rubbing his head. “A accent nigga.”
“We ain’t the ones wit that accent nigga...we talk regular, it’s these bitches that got the accent.” Keeno was mad, his face all scrunched up and his dreads flew about his head as he talked.
“Son...go by the refrigerator and get me a cold drank. Fuck all the dumb shit.” Keeno had his eyes on me, for a full second I thought I was gonna have to square up with this nigga all over a question.
“My bad nigga, I didn’t mean shit by it. But here when a nigga say bitch it mean something else. We take that shit as disrespect.”
I held out my hand to dap Keeno up but he looked down at it like I had shit in my fingernails.
“Lil Keeno...go get me a cold drank man...chill out cuz…” but I saw it in his eyes, the white had turned red.
“Fuck that.” He moved so quick, going up under his shirt, and before I could blink he had pulled out a gun and lifted it to my face. He pressed the bitch into my neck as he cocked the motherfucker. The gun probably weighed more than him but Keeno handled that bitch like it weighed two pounds.
“So wassup now BITCH!” He screamed. “You don’t like the word bitch huh...Ya heard me…How you like this ya Bitch ya?” I’d rather die on my feet and I was ready to go at any second about this shit. Like a real gangster I stood my ground.
“If you gon’ shoot me, go ahead and do it. Like I said, you in H-Town nigga.” Lifting my head I gave him a clear shot to my throat. “Do what you gotta do.” In my mind I was saying goodbye to all my friends. I was sending them all a message through my brain, but seconds later the room filled with laughter.
“You see how stuck that bitch was K.” Uzi said mocking me. “Do what you gotta do…ya heard me?” They burst out into laughter but I was damn near about to shit myself. That’s how crazy this street shit is. You can kill or be killed or a nigga would test you like these New Orleans niggas were doing.
“Naw it's all good folk.” Keeno cracked a smile for the first time ever in my presence. Dapping me up he disappeared, taking his human sized AK with him.
“It’s all good bruh we just had to test ya out, ya heard me?” I would have went through hell and high water to get with they ass. I made forty thousand in three days fucking with these nigga, if this was how they wanted to play then so be it.
“Shit I wasn’t scared. Y’all niggas is funny though.” I laughed, sitting down on a chair like everything was cool. On the inside I wanted to panic and run out the door. I came here solo, with a gun on my side and a hundred racks in a Louis backpack.
“Aight here ya go nigga” coming back in the room the nigga Keeno was carrying two duffle bags now.
“Everything ya want ya heard me.” He gave me a handshake, his palm hard with thick ass callouses, but I shook his shit right back. “We good bruh, ain’t shit.” I told him and he said the same. But the look in his eye, the fire was still there. That couldn’t be faked. He let my hand go and retreated back to his corner but I felt something. That nigga Keeno couldn’t be trusted.
“Aight while you looking it over bruh I got a question for ya. I’m looking for a woman like yours bruh. Shit I saw her ass in the club last night…” I could only laugh at that. “I can’t believe you let yo chick dance for niggas bruh.” It was the same question everybody had. How could my gal be a stripper? But only if they knew what kind of bread we were getting and the main thing they didn’t know was Lark wasn’t my girl, she was my employee with benefits.
“Shit man she tight but you should see her sister.”
“Word, she got a sister?”
“Yep, younger, ass fatter, titties plumper and all that shit.” I hadn’t seen Fendi in person but from the pictures and videos I felt like I picked the wrong bitch.
“Word...where she at? Send her by here, real talk bruh. These bitches I’m finding are dirt.”
“She on her way, moving here straight from Atlanta.”
“Aww she a ATL freak. You know all them bitches down there gay as fuck. Say the chicks be fiending for dick and…” suddenly Uzi stopped talking. I looked up to see if this was another test and the nigga Uzi was snoring like a baby. In mid-sentence the lean had the nigga falling asleep and drooling. I checked the Actavis bottles I just purchased while he nodded off going back and forth between mumbling and being sleep as Keeno watched me like a hawk
“It’s all there bitch...you ain’t figured that out yet.” I didn't say shit to him. I kept doing my thing but out the corner of my eye I saw him fidgeting with the gun. Like he couldn’t wait to aim it at my head again, but this time he would pull the trigger.
“Yeah I got everything.”
“Good...now get ya bitch ass out here ya heard...you don’t like that word bitch huh...maybe I make that your new name...huh ya bitch.” I wanted to kill the nigga more than anybody I had ever come across in my life. My hand was shaking, begging me to grab my glock and let it spray through this bitch. But I was outnumbered, he had the gun in his hand and I had my product with my gun on my hip.
By the time I put this shit down and try to shoot him I would have been dead.
“Yo you good fam?” Uzi woke up, now standing up slow, and finally making a bit of sense. He did this out of nowhere like he wasn’t just snoring in a miniature coma.
“Yeah I’m good cuz. Get some rest.”
“Yo Bruh. Let me know when you get that bitch in here. I wanna fuck with her. She look like yo girl then I’m on it.” That was the only thing that brought a smile to my face.
“No doubt bruh. I got you.” I didn’t even glance Keeno’s way. To me he was a dead man, when a nigga pulls a strap out on me he might as well be ready for his Mama to be crying over his casket.
But I smiled, acting like shit was cool as I left.
“Aight fam. I’ll holla.” Back outside it was like the devil was already out. The H-Town humidity was thick as them nigga’s accents. Or maybe it was me, because I am the devil of H-Town, and like the devil I like lettin niggas fall into their habits until the shit turns into the problem they can’t escape.
In the car, I drove off putting everything together.
“Yeah you call me a bitch now nigga...wait till I put my bitch on you and trick you out, everything you got.” Now it was my turn to laugh. My plan would be airtight, now all I needed was the bait, and that bitch Fendi was it.