CHAPTER THREE

 

 

 
Rellik stared into the mirror as he buttoned up his shirt, a simple white collared thing left from his last court appearance. Yet he dressed with the solemnity and attention of a man of occasion preparing for an evening out. Freckles collected in clusters on each cheek, offset by his light skin. Reddish-brown braids draped to his shoulders. Perpetual and bloodshot, his black eyes fixed straight ahead while the prison guard waited impatiently at his cell door. Though the day was slow in coming, it wasn't as if Rellik served the entire amount of time he could've. Should've. Guilty of many crimes he wasn't tried – much less been convicted – for, he followed the simple belief that confession wasn't as good for the soul as people would have him believe. He'd confessed only to as much as the state could prove, and even then, only to shave a few years off his bid. He strode toward the guard, who stepped back and allowed him to lead the way.

  Allisonville Correctional Facility, a Level Four prison. The A-V. The Ave. Prison. Projects. Projects. Prison. Either way, cram too many desperate motherfuckers into a place and things were bound to jump off. Rows of white metal bars formed a gauntlet, one he'd run every day for seven years. The voices of his fellow inmates fell silent as he walked by. Cunning, private, unhousebroken, he was just another animal in a cage and the only thing the cages were good for was to better train animals. Breed them for contempt. Of themselves. Of each other. Of authority. Of society. Then cut them loose with bus fare, severed freedoms, and dim hopes to make a real fresh start in life. Because no one forgot and no one lets you forget.

  "Gavain Orkney," the face behind the bulletproof glass said through a microphone.

  Rellik bristled. It had been more years than he could remember since anyone called him by his slave name. And not since elementary school since anyone emphasized the pronunciation of "vain" rather than correctly as "vin."

  "One toothpick, unopened. A set of cuff links. One Movado wristwatch. Three rings. And one cross necklace."

  After sliding on each item in a protracted manner designed to drag out his time there – his shiny Jesus piece the last for him to don – he opened the toothpick and slipped it into his mouth.

  "We ready?" the guard asked.

  "Let's do this."

  The metal gate at the end of his cell block clanged open, a metal mouth of two rows of teeth which snapped shut behind him. Three sets of such jaws stood between him and what passed for freedom. Surviving prison was all about clinging to some semblance of faith. He had to believe in something to make a real go of things. What and whoever it took to get a brother through. God. Allah. A girl. A guy. The myth people called love. Those things carried some people through, but not him. No, Rellik had faith in his crew. The game. It never let him down. Like anyone who had reached a dark night of the soul, those times of profound doubt and questioning when his faith was at its lowest ebb, he was forced to make mental gymnastics in order to keep hold of his faith. In his case, it wasn't his crew that let him down, who abandoned him, who remained silent when he needed them most. He had let them down with his weakness.

  Rows of lockers. Signs regarding contraband. Warnings about personal safety. The gray walls. The gray and white linoleum. Rellik would miss none of this place, though it was the world he knew best. Clouds, like torn fabric, churned with menace in the afternoon sky. Under the harsh glare of the sun, he dreamt of freedom. The sky stretched, an infinite canopy of possibilities. In it, he cold lose himself and fly. He could forget that he was surrounded by concrete and that his feet remained locked to his earthen path. He took in a deep breath.

  Rellik, a true OG, was coming home.

 

After a few hours on the bus, Rellik was ready to stretch his legs. It took a while to get his mind around the name The Phoenix Apartments. When he went inside, the projects were still called The Meadows. His mother moved him and his brother there to start over. As a kid, he ran the hallways, threw rocks at passing cars, rang doorbells and ran, and raced swings in the playground only to leap from them at the apogee to go sailing along the concrete slab. He played stinky finger with Gayle Harmon in an alcove. Lost his cherry in an Impala in the parking lot. Despite the name change and a fresh coat of paint, it was still the closest thing to home that he knew. Some things never changed and some people were fixtures.

  "Look at this motherfucker right here," said an old man with a head too small for his body, from beneath the hood of a car. Revealing a teak complexion, and gray goatee, when he fully stepped from behind the car, he fumbled inside his shirt pocket for a pair of thick, black-framed glasses as if double-checking a vision.

  Rellik returned a long, penetrating stare. "Geno."

  The old man screwed up his face in mock disgust then raised his hand to give him a pound. Geno was one of the neighborhood home repair and handymen, and was old when Rellik went in. An odd-jobber by trade and practice, he could fix refrigerators or televisions, bring in free electricity or gas, even install AC. The story of his life fell into two parts. In part one, during his real life, he held various blue-collar jobs. Then his story went the way of many stories and slipped into part two. He got laid off, lost the lease on his apartment, and became homeless. He squatted in any vacant apartment in the Meadows, now Phoenix, staying out of folks' way except to offer his services. Since he didn't "truck with no drugs" – and neither brought nor followed trouble – he was loved by the tenants.

  "What's going on?" Rellik scanned the deserted lot. Eyes peeped him from the playground's lone bench attended by three boys. One took off after locking eyes with Rellik. Restless and frowning, still learning to wear the mask of street toughness.

  "Same old, same old. You probably know the comings and goings round here better than most."

  "They up there?"

  "What's left of them." Geno wiped the oil dipstick with a rag then returned the rag to his back pocket.

  "Same spot?"

  "Yeah. Too lazy to change things up too much."

  Careless and undisciplined. Too confident in their setup despite so much evidence to the contrary of it being a good one. Despite Five-O all but setting up shop here, coming and going as they pleased as if they owned the place. His boy from way back, Night had held things down, but with him out of the picture, operations were slipping.

  It had been a while since he'd been to Night's "penthouse", two adjoining apartments on the sixth floor, the top floor of the tallest of the Meadows-nowPhoenix. The first laid out with a large screen plasma television. Four junior knuckleheads wrestled over the Wii controllers, shouting at each other, as they trashtalked their way through a game.

  "I hope I'm not interrupting?" Rellik asked.

  The crew froze in their spots, a garden of hoodlum statues along the couch and from the kitchen a steady beam of bewildered glares as they wondered how this fool got into their place without making a sound. The front door was reinforced, a bar locking it into place to slow down anyone using a ram to bust in. A man stood guard on it. And yet here this man stood, carefree and bold, unbothered by the host of men now drawing down on him. Rellik swished his toothpick from one side of his mouth to the other.

  "Nigga, what's up?" A small-statured boy rose up, flexing manhood, but the smell of his mother's milk was still fresh on his breath. Small twists crowned his head, the beginnings of a thick mop of braids. Eyes the color of cooked honey studied him with practiced hardness. Despite how short he was, he had a bit of a hard body, gym locker room edge, probably the only class he didn't cut. The skunky odor of fresh bud clung to his clothes; he had the look of a marginal student who smoked marijuana to exclusion of everything else. No church, no friends, no sports, if he held a job he'd soon quit it as his grades careened towards failure. Lounging around smoking endo and playing Wii, obviously he didn't care what his life choices did to his folks. Yeah, Rellik broke him down in an instant. Because he used to be this kid.

  "This is what's up," Rellik answered. "You ever point a gun at me again, I'll kill you. Now who am I talking to?"

  "You talking to me." The boy held his hand up to put his men on pause.

  "Am I talking to the right man?"

  "You talking to me." The boy's voice gained an additional measure of stroke to it.

"You know who I am?"

"If I had to guess, I'd say you Rellik."

"A man shouldn't have to guess. He should know."

  "I hear things. Heard you was getting out. Didn't think you'd jump back in as your first stop."

  "A man's got to go to the folks who'd have his back." Rellik turned to all the guns. With a nod from the boy, the weapons lowered. "Who am I dealing with?"

  "Garlan."

  "Garlan." The name brought to mind his little brother Gary. Maybe this was what he might have looked like as a teen. "The crew good?"

  "We got some niggas." Garlan hardened his face, except for the thin smile across his lips. It dared Rellik, let him know who had the power.

  Rellik learned early on that he was good at fighting. The anger and the darkness were his only friends. Gave speed to his hands, gave strength to his legs, thickened his ability to take punishment. And not only could he take it, he could dispense it without conscience. The pain demanded regular sacrifice to assuage its hunger. Though many thought he was an idiot because of his girth and his lumbering stalk, he sought it out. But he was no bully. If the fight was fair – against another boy his size or bigger – it was on. "Good. You don't trust me. Caution's good. Till I prove myself, I don't need to know shit. He who controls information controls power."

  "How you get in here?"

  "I'm strictly old-school. I'll tell you this much: there are many doors if you know how to open them. Night's other place, next door, anyone been in it?"

"Can't get in."

  "Good." The men still focused their wary intent on him. But they'd lowered their guard. Probably none had trained with Night. Assuming he was in a training mood.

  "You trying to take over?" Garlan asked.

  "I ain't trying shit."

  When Rellik was a kid, he began shoplifting; he rationalized his taking what he wanted because he was in need. A black hole of desire for comic books, action figures, clothes, electronics. He deserved it. He was hard and wanted to get high. And though he told the parole board about his plans for culinary school or maybe barber school, prison only hardened him further. And he sought power. Rellik gestured an all but Garlan collapsed. "We got a problem?"

  "They all right?" Garlan asked though he didn't back down in his posture.

  "Asleep."

  "I got some folks I want you to meet. Strictly introductions. You don't like them, they off in any way to you, we move on."

  "Yeah, I'm talking to the right man." Rellik took a seat on the couch. The other boys stirred to consciousness and cleared out for him. "I've been gone for a minute, so I'll need to go handle my business. We straight?"

  "Yeah, we cool."

  "Niggas will try to get at you all the time. Niggas take kindness for weakness. You have to be able to see the big picture, not just your next move. It's time to finesse this shit."