Raunchy (10 page)

“I got you.”

We pulled up at my house and I saw Tony’s Forerunner, which meant he was already inside my house. But my aunt Karen wasn’t home. I’ll be glad when I get my own crib to keep this drama out her house.

“Go in and get Tony for me. Hurry up ‘cause Paco just hit me and wants us to meet him at his crib. I’ma be out here waitin’.”

“Aight. But I left my bag in your house the other day. I’ma have to scoop it before we leave.” He said before dipping into the house.

The street was wet and my cousin’s car was shiny so I figured he had just washed it. I waited for fifteen minutes before my cousin Tony Wop walked outside
without
Kali. By the look on his face, I could tell he was shocked to see me out front.

“What you doin’ here?” He said walking up to my car. “I just got a page from Paco, he got some info on Star. I was just grabbin’ somethin’ out my truck real quick before I hit you.”

My heart raced because I already knew what was going on. Kali was in my house alone, with Bam and his daughter. “You ain’t see Kali?”

I got out of the car and approached my house. Before I reached the door, Kali bolted out of it with a crazed look on his face and his green bag in his hand. Tony and me approached him and I couldn’t ask what I already knew.

“Kali, please tell me you didn’t do nothin’ stupid.” I asked.

“I told you, I got you? So it’s done.”

Crazed Homies

Jace

Right before I walked into my house, Nut walked up on us. The three of us looked at her and I’m sure guilt was written all over our faces.

“Why ya’ll lookin’ all crazy and shit?” She said.

“Fuck you want?” I asked. I needed to get back in the house to see the mess Kali left for me. I also wondered how much of our conversation she overheard. “How long you been right there?”

“I just walked up. I came for Kali.” She said, her body covered in dry blood. I figured she was here to tell Kali about Cherry. So much shit had happened, that I forgot to tell him myself and I wondered did Harmony tell him either.

“What you want?” Kali asked.

“Some nigga cut Cherry. She’s at the hospital and the doctor saying she might not make it. She could be bleeding to death right now!”

“What?” Kali said walking closer toward her putting his bag down next to him. I could tell just like that, he’d already forgotten about the two corpses he left in my basement. “When this shit happen?”

“Earlier today, Harmony was there. She ain’t tell you?”

“Naw,” He paused. “Look, Jace, I’ma get up with you later. I gotta see what’s up with my peoples.”

I started to say fuck his people and that he needed to help me clean up the mess I know he made in my basement but the look Tony gave me told me to let him go ahead.

“Aight…But hit me the moment you get back. We got a lot to rap about.”

After he left, Tony and me went into the house and went downstairs. All I can say is I couldn’t believe the mess he had made in a matter of minutes. Bam’s face was smashed in partially with my aunt Karen’s old typewriter and a broken pool stick was lodged in his neck. Blood was everywhere and it looked like a horror movie.

I went into the corner over top of the tin Redskins trash can and threw up. When I thought I was done I threw up some more. My stomach tugged and pulled against itself as I released all of my meal for that day.

“Yo, this kid is sick, Jace. This don’t make no fuckin’ sense. He killed this nigga without makin’ sure we had all the information we needed first. Kali ain’t playin’ smart, man.”

I stood up straight threw my fist in my left hip for support and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. Then my arms dropped loosely beside me.

“But the nigga said he not even goin’ home first. What he gonna do, run around the hospital with a dead body in a green army bag?”

I looked at him. Although he hadn’t been around him more than me, he already knew what type dude he was.

“FUCK! THIS NIGGA GONNA GET US LATE!”

“You tellin’ me somethin’ I already know.” I said pacing the floor with my hand over my head. I wanted this shit to be over, all the way over. And I knew had I just had the strength to give the order, not even necessarily pull the trigger, we woulda had a chance to clean up our own mess. Now this nigga was running around town with a dead girl in his bag like he was Freddy Krueger or something. Or alive girl, with him you could never tell. “Get the crew on the phone and tell them to get over here.”

Tony made a few calls and when he was done, we sat in silence for a minute and looked at the work Kali put in.

“I know this is too late to ask, but where you get this dude from?” He paused. “Because the more I think about it, the more I think he may need to stay the fuck from around us, cousin.”

I sat down in a chair in the room and said, "Since we was younger I knew Kali was a killer. But he ain’t start out like nobody you know.” I paused.

“Well how did he start? By butchering old ladies?”

“I’m serious. Back in the day, on the block, it seemed like every other month our neighbor’s pets kept comin’ up missin’. Like, somebody would walk their dogs one day, and the next day they'd be gone." I paused, trying not to look at the body.

"One day, I saw Kali lookin’ at Dingo, my girl Harmony's dog from across the street.” I paused. “That dog use to bark her ass in the house every other day. I’m talkin’ about vicious ass barkin’ like if it got off the leash or somethin’, it would kill her.”

I could tell Tony wanted me to rush the story but I needed to take my time. It was like I finally understood something I already knew, that this nigga was off. Way off.

“That night I was outside, sneakin’ one of Karen’s beers, I saw Kali grab Dingo the dog by its neck and pick it up in the air.” I demonstrated the way he had Dingo with my hand. “Now I don’t know how tightly he had this dog’s throat, but it wasn’t barkin’ no more, cuz. Just whimpering loud enough for me to know it was scared.”

“I stepped to him about it a little while after that. At first he ain’t wanna tell me, and even tried lyin’, but I told him I’d seen him already. Eventually he kept it real and told me he killed it."

"Where was his peoples while he was killin’ animals and shit?"

"He lived with his grandparents. They were old as shit and died a few months after that. Then he moved with his moms who was on that shit, and we kinda lost contact after that. But he moved back in the house that his grandparents lived in now. ‘Cept for he don’t like to be there alone, so he’ll stay over here, or over his cousin Vaughn’s.”

“I’m just tellin’ you what I know. He heartless and I don’t know a nigga on earth like him, not even Russ, Rick's muscle." I paused. “Think of the place you’d have to be mentally to do some shit like that. Or to do some shit like this?”

We looked at Bam’s body again.

“Whatever happened to the old fashioned days of just bustin’ a nigga in the head?” I said feeling my stomach churning again. “Naw…He gotta go all Jason Voorhees and shit.”

“Whoa.”

“At the time when I asked him why he killed all them dogs he said,
'Would you rather it be some mutt or some nigga you know instead?'
I never forgot that shit."

We both looked at the dead body before us and swallowed hard.

“What’s up with his cousin Vaughn? Why you don’t like him?”

“’Cause he listen to anything that nigga tell him to do. And even though he said it was his idea to grab that girl outta school, I got five hundred that say the nigga Vaughn told him to do that shit.”

“But Kali do anything you tell him to do, too.”

“I know, but I ain’t gonna lead him astray.” I said. “The nigga Vaughn like to turn him against me. Like trying to get my own dog to bite me or somethin’.”

“I don’t know…Before he did this shit we were in the car talkin’. I sent him in the house to get Wop, and the next thing I know, all this shit happen.”

“Man…Why he do the nigga like that?” Kreshon asked.

“I don’t know but I do know my girl said some cops showed up at her place askin’ questions,” I said. Paco and Kreshon looked at each other and then at me. I wondered what that meant. “So they on to something but I don’t know what. She said they were askin’ her about the kidnapping.”

“Listen, that’s my girl, and bet not nair one of you niggas disrespect her again. She may have her shit with her but she still my girl and my future wife.”

“I’m not sure what happened. But I do know we don’t want them knockin’ on this door next. So I need this shit cleaned up quick. Then call somebody you trust to have them take out this pool table and burn it. I don’t want it trashed, I want it burned. We don’t need mothafuckas findin’ it and liftin’ our prints.” I paused looking at all of them. “Whatever you do, don’t tell nobody ‘bout his shit. If you got a mind to talk about it, then there’s enough niggas in this room to feed that need. Outside of that, this shit stays here.”

“Got it.” Kreshon said.

“So what’s up wit’ Star?” I asked Paco. “You get anything on him?

“He scared shitless. He must’ve heard that Bam was missin’ and decided he ain’t comin’ back. But we found out where he is anyway.”

“Where is he?”

“In Baltimore. I got somebody watchin’ his house right now. Whenever you want to get ‘em, we can move.”

I paused for a while and looked at the murder scene in front of me. Truthfully I didn’t know if I could take another situation like this happening again. And if we picked up Star, I was going to have to give the order.

“Jace, sooner or later you gonna have to get blood on your hands.” Tony said.

I looked at my men and I knew what they wanted from me. I had seen this look on their faces a lot lately. They weren’t sure if they could respect me as a leader if I couldn’t give the order to kill. And it wasn’t even like hustlers were automatically murderers…It was just that my father was a stone cold killer. He was vicious and cold and they expected me to be the same way, but I wasn’t.

“Have him picked up and taken care of.” I said, unable to say the word.

“I’ll put the call in when we leave here.” Paco said. “But what about our product? We don’t have the money to pay Rick off.”

“Have them do what they have to do, to get him to talk. If he don’t talk, take care of him. I’ll just have to tell my father what happened and get more product. But either way…Either way,” I paused. “I want Star killed.”

Paco smiled and said, “I got that.”

Five minutes later my aunt Karen came home and my crew was still downstairs. She never came downstairs so I wasn’t worried about her walking in on a crime scene in her house. That’s why we knew we could keep them here. She respected my privacy and I respected hers. We stayed out of each other’s way.

Tony and me helped clean up as much as possible, then we went upstairs to kick it with Karen while they did the rest. I didn’t want to risk her suddenly deciding to come into the basement, even though it wasn’t like her.

Before me and Tony went upstairs, I pointed my crew to the tools necessary to hack up the body. This included trash bags, hacksaws and bleach. I’m glad I didn’t have to see that part of it and to be honest I wanted the shit over and done with before I went back downstairs.