Backstage: Street Chronicles (25 page)

“Yo, the fuck is my point?” Crook echoed, staggering back slightly from the E&J he had consumed.

“Nigga, if you don’t know, I damn sure ain’t gonna tell you,” the tall slim hustler fading his bet hollered back.

“Just shoot the fuckin’ dice.” Crook straightened up to his full height, pulled up his sagging pants, and grilled Slim hard. Slim was taller than Crook’s five foot eight by several inches and out-weighed
him by a good forty pounds as well, but Crook wasn’t fazed one bit. He was already heated because he was losing the two hundred dollars his girl Sheena gave him to pay the electric bill, and now that he was down to his last fifty, this dude was trying to front on his point?

Crook could see the bulge in Slim’s waist, which made Slim smirk like he was safe. Crook wasn’t strapped because he had intended to pay the bill and return home, but he got caught up.

He turned to a heavyset cat to his left and asked, “Yo, what the fuck is the point?” He growled, getting madder at himself for even forgetting what he needed to roll to win his money back.

“Don’t tell him shit,” Slim snarled, silencing the fat cat. “If he don’t know, tell him to come off the fuckin’ bet.”

Crook crouched and kissed his closed fist before letting the dice tumble over and against the brick wall. Five-two.

The circle let out a collective holler at Crook’s bad luck.

“Five-Deuce! Come up off that, broke ass nigga,” Slim chuckled, referring to the money under Crook’s scuffed up left Tim boot.

Crook let his anger assess the situation. This cat had shined on Crook for the last time. It wasn’t enough that he had taken Sheena’s two hundred, talkin’ slick the whole while, but Slim wasn’t even from Clinton Avenue. Out there flossin’ in his new GS300, wearing the new Carmelo Jordans that Crook wanted but couldn’t afford. Above all, it was the way Slim thought his gun could speak for him that made Crook decide, not only wasn’t he getting the fifty underfoot, Slim was leaving broke as Crook now felt by his presence. The whole thought process took less than a second, and before Slim could react, Crook’s fist cut through the air with lightning-fast intensity and landed squarely against Slim’s jaw.

Crack!

Slim stumbled from the blow, dazed but ready to shoot, except Crook didn’t give him a chance to get his shit off. Lefts and rights came back-to-back like a swarm of killer bees, stinging Slim into
bloody submission. When he slumped against the wall, it was over.

Crook snatched the gun from Slim’s waist, yelling, “Oh, you was gonna shoot me, mu’fucka?! Huh?! You was gonna shoot me, bitch?!”

Then the pistol-whipping began. Crook smashed Slim mercilessly until he crumbled to the pavement, beaten and disfigured. Even then Crook wouldn’t stop. He had blacked out in a tyrannical spaz. To Crook, Slim represented all that was wrong with his world. Fake-ass niggas like Slim had it, while live niggas like himself starved and struggled.

“Bitch-ass niggas, this is Crook!” he bellowed between stomps. “Muthafuckin Crook!”

The whole corner watched in amused shock, because wolves loved blood as long as it wasn’t any of theirs. But Crook was making the spot hot! So it wasn’t mercy that saved Slim, but their own greed, because they knew if Crook killed this nigga, police would sweat the block for weeks.

“Yo, Crook, chill! Chill! Po-Po comin’!” someone yelled, even though there were no police in sight. Crook snapped back to reality, then went in Slim’s pockets, taking his money, white gold watch, and of course the Carmelo Jordans off his feet. Grimy.

“You wasn’t rockin’ ‘em right,” Crook hissed, giving Slim one last kick to the face, which sent his two front teeth flying. Then Crook dipped, taking the alleyway behind the old houses and stores that lined the block and disappeared in the shadows.

Two hours later, Crook sat in the staircase leading up to his and Sheena’s apartment. The place smelled of fishy urine and fried chicken, but Crook didn’t smell it; he couldn’t. His whole body was numb from what was left of the half ounce of coke on his lap. The tip of his nose glistened from the fish scale devouring his senses. He was fucked up and loving the fact he couldn’t feel anything but the cool sensation of nothingness. The comfort zone of escape that sniffing coke had become to him.

His life was in shambles, just like the raggedy clothes he had on. The dingy Def Jam University jeans and soiled G-Unit hoody had been his attire for the last three days. His Tims were scuffed to the point that they were on the brink of bursting at the toe. He was a smart nigga that had made a lot of dumb decisions, and now it seemed that he was continuously paying the consequences. He could’ve stayed in school and made something of himself, but he chose the street, yet, he wasn’t a hustler. He couldn’t come up in the game because he had a habit and no one trusted him with any substantial amount of weight because he’d crossed all that had extended their hands in the past. Cats had beat him, shot him, and stabbed him, but he always returned shooting, stabbing, and beating, scar for scar, so the money niggas figured he wasn’t worth the trouble.

He was a stick-up kid, but he wasn’t focused or patient enough to hit any major licks, so he stayed lickin’ petty. Then he’d get high, buy Sheena and the kids shit, pay a few bills, and with whatever was left, he got higher. But if anything else, Crook was an emcee. The nigga was that rose growing through concrete that Tupac mused about, because he was that nice. All he wanted to do was rhyme and he tried everything to get on, he just couldn’t get right. Regardless, it was in his blood like lava, bubbling to get out, and it was moments like this, filled with pain and anger that made it explode.

He gripped the pistol in his lap like a vice and pointed it at the world, pushing the lyrics from his soul through the rage and frustration.

He imagined a gun pointed at his every problem, embodied in a laughing shadow that his cocaine-mesmerized mind had conjured up in front of him. Then he realized that the shadow was his own, and his every problem was inside of himself. It was then when he put the gun to his temple and trembled for a reason not to.
Look at you … Look at you, you ain’t shit. Fuckin’ nothin’, a nobody mu’fucka. So broke you gotta rob a nigga for his kicks just to rock?! Go ‘head … Do it, coward. Who gonna give a fuck? Who, huh, who?!

His thoughts chided him, but his heart answered with one word.

Sheena.

He closed his eyes tight against the hot tears threatening to run free, just thinking about the only person he had, who stuck by him no matter what. Just on the strength of her commitment, he felt like he should pull the trigger and free her from his bullshit. But the love he felt, and the glimmer of hope it represented, made him lower the gun, take a deep breath, and head upstairs to their apartment.

Crook lumbered up the stairs, wondering what he would tell Sheena. He had been gone since four P.M. and now it was past eleven and the electric bill wasn’t paid. He knew she would flip, so he prepared himself for it. Crook slid the key into the door and entered their small one bedroom home. Every time he entered that place, he was reminded of how much he hated it. It was so small, it felt like a prison cell. It didn’t matter that Sheena kept what little they had in immaculate condition, there was only so much you could do with flea market furniture and meager means.

“Vic, I’m in the kitchen, baby,” Sheena called out, greeting him. He could hear the water sloshing from the dishes she was washing.

“The chicken’s cold, but if you’re hungry, I could warm it up for you,” she offered.

Damn
, his mind gasped, relishing the warm welcome but knowing damn well he didn’t deserve it. Crook didn’t answer. Instead he sunk into the couch and flipped on the TV.

“Vic, you hear me?” Sheena asked, coming out of the kitchen, wiping a plate dry. As soon as she saw him, she knew what was up.

“Again, Vic? You high again, ain’t you?”

He rolled his eyes at the screen, then replied, “Naw, I ain’t hungry,” trying to avoid the question.

Sheena walked closer wearing a frown. Sheena wasn’t model gorgeous or video chick thick, but she was definitely pretty with her smooth caramel complexion, big hazel eyes, and kewpie doll nose. Her figure was full, but she wasn’t fat and she was the sweetest person in the world, if Crook would let her be.

Sheena sighed hard, then asked, “Did you have any change from the bill? Did you show them the oversight?”

“I ain’t pay it!”

She let her eyes flutter closed and back open, thinking she heard him wrong.

“You what?” she said, her tone still even but ready to crack. Crook looked up at her, trying to look menacing, but instead he just looked pitiful.

“I said, I ain’t pay that shit, yo. I got caught up, and the shit was closed.”

“You what?!” she repeated with intensity.

“I’ll pay that shit tomorrow, aiight?” he answered and lit a Newport. Sheena was too frustrated to speak. All she could do was launch the plate she was holding in her hand across the room, and if Crook hadn’t seen it, it would have caught him in the face. He moved just in time to feel it whiz past before it shattered
against the wall. He jumped up, dropping his cigarette, and grabbed Sheena by her ponytail.

“You out yo fuckin’ rabbit-ass mind?!” he barked in her grill. “If that shit woulda hit me—”

She cut his sentence off with a blow that missed its target, but got her point across. Crook pushed her away from him, because he didn’t hit women, but he damn sure wanted to at that moment.

“Take yo muthafuckin’ ass somewhere and sit the fuck down! I said I’ll pay it tomorrow, yo. I still got your money, damn!” he hissed and handed her the rest of the money he took from Slim. It was all balled up, but there was at least six hundred dollars left of the nine hundred and fifty dollars he had taken.

Sheena snatched the money just so she could throw it back at him.

“Why do you always do this?!” she questioned accusingly.

“Why, Vic? All I asked for you to do is pay the damn bill so your children can have a hot meal, so your kids can have heat, and your black ass won’t freeze!” Sheena screamed, ready to really let him have it, but her eyes fell on the small fire behind him.

“Vic!” she pointed.

He turned around and saw the flames leaping off the carpet.
My cigarette!
he thought and darted over to the fire with Sheena on his heels. He stomped and stomped until he extinguished the small flame before it could spread. Crook looked down on the smoldering black hole in disgust. Sheena collapsed on the couch and covered her face with her hands.

“We can’t have nothing,” she sobbed. “I just bought this carpet! Just bought it. Now look at it! I’m tired of this, I can’t keep doin’ this.” She broke down. “I can’t, Vic. I’m working two jobs all day and I can’t do it anymore. I need you to help me, Vic. Please help me!” Her cries softened his hardened heart and he wanted to soothe her, but since he was the cause of her pain, he didn’t see how he could comfort her, too.

“So why don’t you just leave me, yo? Just fuckin’ bounce and get away,” he asked sincerely, feeling like it was the best solution.

Sheena looked up at him with tear-stained eyes and replied, “Is that what you want? You want me to leave you, Victor?”

Crook looked away. “Naw.”

“Then why you say it then? Where would I go, huh? I love you, Vic, and we in this together.” He dropped to his knees, holding out the gun to her. Sheena looked at it in confusion.

“Then shoot me. Fuckin’ kill me. Then you ain’t gotta leave but you’ll be free of my bullshit,” he stated with full conviction.

Sheena threw her arms around his neck and pulled him into her tight embrace.

“Why you say stuff like that? Vic, what’s wrong with you, baby? Please, leave that stuff alone. It’s killin’ you, and if it’s killin’ you it’s killin’ me and I swear I don’t wanna die. We can’t die. We been through too much to give up now.” Her words sunk in and took the place of his high. All the thug the world had made him, and all the gangsta life forced him to become, fell back for the moment and allowed him to cry in his woman’s arms.

Crook stepped out onto the streets the next day to a shining sun. He took a draw on his Newport and inhaled the nicotine deeply, then released the smoke in a steady stream to mix with the sounds and sights of the new day. He felt better … at least better than the night before. He was still broke, still ain’t have shit, but his woman made him feel like the world was his. All he had to do was name it to claim it. It’s amazing what good lovin’ and sweet pussy will do for a man’s outlook on life. Everything else might be fucked up and shitty, but as long as you have a beautiful woman to love you, then shit was bound to get better.

Besides, he had a brand-new, white gold, diamond bezel
watch, not to mention the crisp Carmelos on his feet, courtesy of Slim. He didn’t even care that they were a size too big. He just put on an extra pair of socks. Crook checked his watch then headed to see his man Larceny.

Larceny was just as triflin’ as Crook was, the only difference being Larceny didn’t give a fuck. His mother was constantly reminding him how he was an accident, and she even had an insurance policy taken out on his life. Then, two years ago, she tried to have him murdered.

He and Larceny had grown up together and now at nineteen they both had a similar outlook on life. Basically, fuck the world.

Crook cut through the parking lot off Howard Street and called out for Larceny beneath the fire escape.

“Yo, L! L, get yo ass up!”

He waited a few minutes before a third-floor window shot up and a bare-chested Larceny stuck his head out, smiling.