CHAPTER TWELVE
Burdened with multiple plastic bags full of food and accessories he, Mikey, and his cousins needed to make it through the night, Hassan kicked twice on the steel door with his Prada loafers. Looking over his shoulder at Alexis’s car, he knew she was going to be mad that he hadn’t been here to greet her. He knew that she, Mikey, and Pops hadn’t always been on the best of terms, but Alexis had never let that stop her from making herself perfectly at home whenever she was up at the store. For Alexis and Hassan, color and religion had never been a major issue between them. Even though they knew any relationship they had would be challenged by both families, they felt their love could be and was “bigger than the game.”
“Hey, what took y’all so long to open the door?” Hassan barked when the door was finally opened.
“Slow the fuck down. We ain’t hear you, guy. We was at the front of the store, telling some more of them stupid motherfuckers we closed!” one of the twins answered as Mikey, his conscience guilt ridden, stood idly by and mute.
Hassan put the bags on the counter and glanced around the dark store, searching for Alexis. Not seeing her, he immediately turned to his brother and asked him if she was in the bathroom. Receiving no answer, he asked once more. “Yo, Mikey, I said, where ole girl at? I see her car parked out there, so where she at?” Hassan finally powered his cell back on and was blasted with the notifications of several new voice mails.
Mikey, no matter how much he disapproved of his brother and Alexis’s relationship, had no desire to be involved in the rape case his lunatic family members would be sure to catch when Alexis woke up from the traumatic beating and sexual assault she had sadly endured. After his trouble-minded cousins reassured him the girl would gladly take a small sum of money and would “get over it,” like the many “black whores” they’d done the same sort of thing to in the past, Mikey had prayed that would be the outcome, but he knew deep down in his heart that, tragically, it wouldn’t. Family loyalty was above everything else where they came from, and no matter what the circumstances, one member was not to cross another. It was tradition and common law, well, at least in their region of the world. But this was altogether different, and keeping his mouth shut would only slow the inevitable that was going to happen. Lowering his face in shame, Mikey knew he had to confess what had taken place. Even though he hadn’t actually touched Alexis himself, he was just as guilty as his crazed cousins, probably even more in his brother’s eyes.
“Hassan, look, she came knocking at the door and—”
Seeing that his cousin was the weak link and was not sticking to the game plan, the shorter twin cut Mikey off before he snitched them out. “And I told her we wasn’t opening the door for anybody. I told her she wasn’t special! I told her to kick rocks.”
“What the fuck, dude?” Hassan replied, shocked, as he unpacked the several bags containing the food. “Why you do that dumb shit? She ain’t just anybody, fool. That’s my girl!”
“Your girl.” The twin laughed.
“Yeah, my girl. And if she ain’t here, why her car still parked out there?”
Thinking quickly, one twin lied and said he thought that she was with another female and that they must’ve left in the other girl’s car.
Hassan stopped what he was doing to dial Alexis’s number, which rang a few times, then went to voice mail. “Well, she ain’t answering, but maybe this her that left me a message.”
Before Alexis’s man could check his voice mail or question them any further, the twins started a false fight with one another as a diversionary tactic. When Hassan and a confused Mikey grabbed the two and separated them, the most boisterous of the pair whispered in Mikey’s ear that if they went down, they would drag him down with them. “We already done jailed it, but you haven’t!”
Caught up in the commotion, Hassan did just as the twins had hoped: he temporarily forgot about Alexis and her whereabouts. When he finished distributing the food, he told them what crazy and over-the-top type of things was going on all throughout Detroit. He informed them that the National Guard had finally been called out to patrol the perimeter of the entire city to ensure none of the criminal rampage taking place would spill into good, law-abiding communities. They weren’t the least bit stunned by this news, even agreeing with the governor’s bold last-minute decision. Hassan also told them it was rumored that residents of those other counties and jurisdictions had been strongly encouraged to carry their licensed pistols in full sight, so any wannabe thugs spilling over from Detroit would know not to corrupt the safety of their homes and businesses.
“It’s mad crazy out there. It’s like some sort of movie or some shit like that,” Hassan explained as they ate. “I mean, people in long lines at the gas stations who dumb enough to still be serving out the front door, abandoned cars that have run out of gas being set on fire in the middle of Woodward and on Six Mile and down across John R . . . I mean, damn.” He took a huge gulp of cold pop that one of the twins had grabbed from the cooler while double-checking on the sly that Alexis was still passed out. “I ain’t never seen so many . . .”
“What? Wild niggas?” One twin remarked judgmentally, his words echoing off the walls of the store.
“I wasn’t gonna say that.” Hassan frowned.
The other twin anxiously jumped in with his two cents’ worth of commentary. “Fuck that, Hassan. Let’s keep it real. You know, like I know, them monkey-minded abeeds can’t act right on no regular day, so you know damn well they gonna be tripping now!”
“Why y’all always gotta talk shit about African Americans like that?” Hassan calmly questioned as his older brother Mikey remained peculiarly silent. “Everybody ain’t like that. It’s like saying all of us are terrorists because we Muslims or from the Middle Eastern part of the world.”
“Naw. Fuck all that politically correct talk. The way these black people disrespect they damn self is on them. Now, come on, Hassan. You know, like we all do, niggas gonna be niggas to the day they die . . . fried chicken and watermelon eating, pants sagging, forty-ounce drinking . . . hoes not knowing who they baby daddy is,” replied the twin who had last spoken.
“Yeah, bro, and don’t forget stealing everything that ain’t bolted down as they smoking a blunt but can’t pay their bills!” the other twin added.
Normally, Hassan was against racism in any shape or form, but as they said, “At one point or another everything in the dark has a way of finding itself to the light.” Although he had strong feelings and a deep-rooted love for Alexis, after a few more minutes of coaxing and peer pressure, he joined his two loudmouthed cousins in some of their ridiculing of Blacks, Hispanics, Chinese, and—not to be left out—the infamous White man. Before he knew it, Hassan was discussing with them the difference between getting some bomb-ass head from a black chick, namely, Alexis, and the Muslim Middle Eastern girl from the mosque his parents wanted him so badly to marry. Being young and stupid, he then started bragging about how good Alexis’s pussy was and how she low key worshipped him. At one point, caught up in showing out with the fellas, Hassan confessed that even if it was proven that her baby was his, he couldn’t legally claim it if he hoped to get his financial share of his Pops’s business holdings whenever he died.
“That’s my girl. I ain’t gonna lie,” he asserted, getting cocky with his comments. “And me and her gonna always hang out. But you know I can’t ever, ever take her home! That can never happen. It would kill my mother.”
Mikey was full of guilt, not knowing what to say or do next. He still hadn’t touched a bite of his food as he focused on the door of the walk-in cooler, where Alexis had been left, knocked out cold. His father would be mortified about the despicable act he’d allowed his cousins to perpetrate as he dumbly stood by. Pops would be disgraced, not only in the family, but in the community as well. Mikey wanted to get Alexis help, but even if he were to stand up to his cousins and call the police, there weren’t any cops to call. After all, Detroit was temporarily lawless.