by Roy Glenn
“You don’t have to come in with me, Mike. Pam ain’t that bad this time of the month. She’ll talk some shit, I’ll ignore her and she’ll go to bed.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah, it’s cool, but come on in anyway. Have a drink.”
As they entered, the house, Pam was sitting in the living room watching Letterman. “Are you alone?”
“No, Mike’s with me.”
“Oh, come on in, Mike. He got you to come in with him to try to wait me out?” Mike and Bobby went into the living room. Bobby poured a couple of drinks as Pam continued. “Well it won’t work. Freeze, maybe, but I don’t care if Mike hears what I got to say. But you know what? I’m not even mad at you, baby, but what I am is tired, so I’ll say good-night.” Pam got up from her chair and went into the kitchen for a second before starting upstairs.
“Hey, Pam, how’s Regina?”
“What!” Pam said in shock. Mike started to repeat himself. “No, no, I heard you. She’s fine. I talked to her tonight as a matter of fact. Do you want me to tell her that you asked about her?”
“No. I’m just asking, that’s all.”
Pam shook her head and giggled. After a few steps she stopped. “You know, whatever happened between the two of you that day didn’t make any sense at all. At least not enough to stop speaking for six years. Maybe the two of you should talk.”
Mike finished his drink and poured another one. “Goodnight, Pam.”
“Goodnight, Mike.” Pam went upstairs and shut the door.
Bobby sat down and picked up the remote. He is a chronic channel surfer. “So what is this, comeback night or something? First you wanna go run with Freeze, which I can see, it was kinda fun. Then you wanna know about Regina. I never told you this because I didn’t think you’d care, but for more than a year after that, Regina would call me every day, asking me if you asked about her. So, what’s next man?” Bobby asked, flipping channels, before stopping back at Letter-man.
“I don’t know, Bobby. I guess I’m just bored.”
Bobby smiled at his partner. “You just miss the old days, man, you and me, running the streets. We were pretty rough back in the day. I miss them days sometimes too, but I get to spend a lot more time with Pam and the kids.” Bobby and Pam had four kids, Bobby Jr., Barbara and the twins, Bonita and Brenda.
“Do you remember when me, you, Nick and Jamaica were on City Island?” Mike asked. “Waiting on André to come out of his meeting with Frankie and them and everybody came running out shooting at us.”
“Yeah, yeah, what was it six, seven of them? I shot the first two, then you, Nick and Jamaica started poppin’ them as they came out the door. You didn’t think I’d remember that, did you?”
“No, Bobby, you don’t remember much. That’s another reason why I miss Jamaica. He never forgot anything.” After Vickie’s death, Jamaica started shooting heroin on a regular basis. He disappeared after a job nine years ago. No one had seen or heard from him since. “When we’re old, sitting in rockin’ chairs reminiscing about the good old days, you won’t remember any of it. Anyway, then we went inside and André was on his knees beggin’ Frankie not to kill him. I knew then that he was weak.”
“What’s your point, Mike?” Bobby asked after a long silence.
“André was livin’ it up, lettin’ us do all the work, you know.”
“Stop right there. You just getting a little off the chain. You ain’t weak like he was. What’s really bothering you, Mike?”
“To be honest, I don’t know.” Mike looked at Bobby and shook his head. “I really don’t know. I really just feel kinda, you know like —like watching something else.”
Bobby laughed a little. “Guess that means you don’t feel like talking about it?”
“No it means that I don’t know what to talk about, so I guess I’ll go home.”
“Okay. Well, if you feel like talking, you know where to find me. You want me to drive you home?”
“No. I’ll walk.” Mike finished his drink and left.
Bobby finished his drink and straightened up the living room before going upstairs to bed, or at least that was his intention. As he entered, he found Pam laying on the bed, watching Letterman again. Waiting.
“Mike gone?” Bobby nodded his head in response as he got ready to join Pam in bed. “What’s wrong with him? Does he ever ask about Regina?”
“No.”
“I almost fainted when he said that. Wait until I tell Regina.”
“You’re not going to tell her anything. If he wanted you to tell her he woulda said so.”
Pam rolled over and folded her arms. “Why not? You know she asked about him tonight. She hasn’t asked about him in a long time.”
“Pam, that’s between them.”
“No, they are both my friends. Anyway, I’m gonna call Regina, tell her what’s up. I think she has a right to know that Mike asked about her. Regina hasn’t been happy since they broke up, and it seems to me that he’s pretty fucked up too. We should do something. And the answer is not being out there running the streets with Freeze’s wild ass. You been running pretty hard with him and Mike the last few weeks, hanging around with those wild ass bitches.”
Bobby rolled his eyes and shook his head. He knew where Pam was going with this and he really didn’t want to go there with her. But before he could say anything, Pam continued. “Now, baby, it’s not you that I’m worried about, but I used to be out there. I know how they are, half-naked, shakin’ their ass all up in your face. Yeah, I know how they are,” Pam said as she sat up in the bed.
Bobby looked at Pam and laughed. “So that’s what this is about. Why does it have to be about other women? There ain’t nothing out there that I’m interested in. They want money and you know I’m not the one. You know it’s you that I want. They can kiss my hungry black ass.”
“You wouldn’t be hungry if you had brought your hungry black ass home for dinner,” Pam said jokingly.
“You think you’re slick, don’t you? You think if you can get Mike and Regina back together, he’ll stop wantin’ to hang out and I’ll be here with you. That’s your plan, ain’t it?” Bobby laid down, thinking that he got her off him.
“So what’s so bad about that?” she came back with attitude. “You make it sound like being with me is the worst thing that ever happened to you.”
“That’s not what I’m saying, Pam.”
Pam stood up and put her hands on her hips. “Well, just what are you saying then? Come on now. This is not a real tough question.”
Bobby got out of bed. He didn’t like anyone standing over him.
“If you’d chill for a second,” he paused, “you know I love you and I love what we got going here. You know that. But you don’t understand.”
“Well, make me understand!” Pam said, head and shoulders rockin’ from side to side.
“Look! Mike is my friend and I thought he was your friend too. All that ‘you’re like a brother’ shit you talk. Now there is something buggin’ him. You can see that, can’t you? So I don’t care if he wants to run the streets or if he wants to start making the rounds for Freeze. I don’t care. I’m down with him. So it doesn’t matter to me what you say, I got his back! Just like I always have and just like he’s had mine hundreds of times.” Bobby opened the bedroom door and started down the stairs, slamming the door behind him. Pam fell in behind him.
“Wait, Bobby. Come on! Wait a minute. Don’t walk out on me like this.”
“What!” Bobby headed for the bar in the living room. Pam sat down on the couch. “Come here, Bobby, please. Come here and sit down. Please, baby. Come sit down with me.” Bobby didn’t answer her, so Pam continued anyway. “I just wanna say I like what we got going on here, too. I always have. But the last couple of years with you being home more have been great. I’m sorry, but I’m not ready to give all that up. Not for Mike, not for anybody. Now I’m not askin’ you to choose; but try to see my point here.”
“You sti
ll don’t get it, do you, Pam?”
“No, Bobby, you don’t get it. What happened tonight?”
“Some toy gangsters stepped to us, that’s all. No big deal. Why?” Bobby asked, wondering where she was going with this.
“See, Bobby, that’s my point. It was no big deal tonight, but what about the next time? How many was it?”
“Four. If you count the girl.”
“You could have been killed, baby. Maybe I’m getting to be a punk or something, but it worries me more now than it used to. Now, I just keep thinking about being broke with four kids and no man. All I’m saying is to think about that when you’re out there running the streets.”
Quiet set in, as each simply looked at the other. Finally, Bobby sat down next to Pam. He grabbed her hand, kissing it gently. “All you say is true, but you don’t have to worry about money, Wanda got that handled. But this is something that I have to do. I gotta be all over this for him. I’m not gonna let him go too far and I’m not gonna let him get us killed.”
Pam leaned over and kissed Bobby on the cheek, patted his hand and said, “Problem is, you can’t promise me that, now can you?”
Mike walked over to the window in his bedroom, his mind racing. His mind began to drift to the events of the evening. Not that people stepping to him was any big deal. Back in the day, that type of thing would happen all the time. The question was why they stepped. As far as he was concerned, he was just admiring the lady. She was quite a lady, all dressed in black. He couldn’t help feeling that there was something about her. It wasn’t just because she was pretty. Like Smokey Robinson says, ‘Pretty girls come a dime-a-dozen.’ Maybe it was that she’s a player? Doubtful. He’d been with female players before and always found them to be a little too much like the brothers for his taste, so that couldn’t be it. There was something about her eyes. They were very expressive eyes, like an open window to her mind. Although he was happy for the little excitement tonight, he still felt empty.
“Black, is everything all right?” said a soft voice from the bed. The voice belonged to Melinda Brown. When he got there, she was waiting in bed. He noticed that she was asleep, so he didn’t say anything to her. Melinda was twenty-five years old, the youngest of four beautiful girls, each of whom had their first child before turning sixteen. Melinda knew that wasn’t what she wanted. She parlayed her looks into getting what she wanted.
“Yeah,” he said.
“You’ve been real distant the last few days. You mad at me? Did I do something wrong? What’s up?”
“I just have a few things that I need to sort out, that’s all. It’s not you.” But maybe it is you, Mike thought.
Melinda was tall and fine. Her hair was cut short, which highlighted her features. Melinda’s eyes were oval-shaped, high cheekbones, full lips and her skin was light brown. Mike had been introduced to Melinda by Freeze, who else, at a strip club. Melinda was trying to get a job as a dancer, but she just didn’t have the patience for dealing with the clientele. It definitely wasn’t because she couldn’t dance. What Mike liked most about Melinda was that she was no trouble at all. Like the man said in Total Recall, Melinda was ‘respectful, compliant and appreciative, like a woman should be.’ His problem with her was that she didn’t have any fire. “Baby, why don’t you come to bed, I’ll make all your problems go away.” Except in bed, there the girl definitely had skills. Mike sat down on the bed and she began to dance for him. Slowly, she moved her hips in a circle, arching her back, and then she dropped slowly down to the floor. Melinda crawled to Mike and kissed her way up, first one leg and then down the other, before joining him in bed.
CHAPTER TWO
The one good thing about being stuck in traffic is that it gives you a chance to think. Mike sat in the back seat of a cab on the Cross-Bronx Expressway on his way to Impressions from Wanda’s Manhattan office. Mike owned a black ‘78 Seville, which he drives when he has to, and a black ‘89 Corvette convertible, which he drives on rare occasions. Mike had gone to see Wanda about some legal matters. She had played around in the game for a while, but Wanda always wanted to be a lawyer. So Mike paid for her to go to law school. He used his influence to get her an internship in the District Attorney’s office. When Wanda passed the bar, she went to work as a prosecutor for the District Attorney. The association didn’t last. It wasn’t long before she went into private practice, with one major client. Wanda had gotten them out of more cases than he could remember. She was smart, careful, and just a bit ruthless. Over the years, Wanda managed the money, making a small fortune for her partners, in addition to developing a reputation as an excellent entertainment lawyer.
Mike relaxed on his way back uptown. His mind began to drift once again, thinking about the things that have been bothering him the last couple of weeks. Mike continued to focus on one of the symptoms—boredom—instead of focusing on the real issue. And what about her? The woman that had dominated his thoughts since he saw her the night before. Traffic finally broke loose.
“A cop had someone pulled over, I hate rubberneckers,” the lady cab driver said.
“I hate cops.”
The driver laughed, but she had to agree, “I hate them too.” As they passed the cop, both Mike and the cab driver gave him the finger as they drove by.
Upon arrival at Impressions, he made his way through the crowd, on his way to Bobby’s office on the second floor. The office overlooked the dance floor, with a two-way mirror so you can see the stage from the office. It was also equipped with video monitors. Cameras were located throughout the club for security reasons, not to mention watching women. The office was well furnished with a small, but well-stocked bar and a small kitchen. Mike entered the office to find Bobby sitting at his desk looking over some paper work.
“What’s up, Vicious?” Bobby always thought the whole Vicious Black thing was funny and would tease him about it from time to time. Mike didn’t answer; he went behind the bar and poured himself a glass of Remy Martin VSOP, drank it down like water, poured another and sat down.
“Looks like you’ve got a real crowd. What’s the count?”
Bobby looked through the papers on his desk. “Nine hundred sixty four.”
“Pam coming out?”
“No, she couldn’t get anyone to watch the kids, so I can hang tonight,” Bobby said with a smile.
“She still sweatin’ you about hanging out with me?”
“Mike.” Bobby looked down and shook his head, his smile had turned into a frown. “You just don’t know, she’s been on it hard. Every time you call, she starts losing it. She just don’t get it. I’ma do what I’ma do. You’re my partner, she can’t come between that. Besides, she thinks we should hook you and Regina back up.”
“You know, as soon as I said it, I knew it was a mistake,” Mike said. “As far as I’m concerned, what’s past should stay there.”
Bobby laughed and pointed at Mike. “Still kinda touchy about this Regina thing, ain’t you. What really happened that day?”
Mike looked at the monitors. “You still don’t get it, do you? You’re just as bad as Pam. It’s over! And not worth talking about!”
“What ain’t worth talking about?” Freeze asked as he entered the office.
“What’s up, Freeze. Bobby and Pam on this Regina kick, that’s all.”
“Regina, now there’s a blast from the past.”
“And that’s where she should stay!” Mike walked over to the bar. “Anybody want a drink?”
“Who are you?” Bobby asked. “You don’t even got to ask.”
“Freeze, I want you to do something for me.”
“How long I been working for you, Black? I know what you want me to do, had Jap check it out this morning. Them boys stepped to us last night because they think we trying to roll on them. Two of them been asking questions about you and about the operation all day,” Freeze said as he sat down at the monitors. “Yo, Bobby, there sure are some fine-ass woman up in here tonight. Talking about fine-ass wom
an, yo, Black, there goes your girl.”
Mike walked toward the monitors. “Who, Melinda?”
“No, Shy.” Freeze pointed to the front door monitor. “Right there at the door, with the red dress and black coat.”
Mike walked to the house phone and called the front door’s security station.
“Security.”
“Yeah, this is Black, who’s this?”
“Yes sir, this is Greg?”
“Greg, right in front of you there’s a lady in a black coat with a red dress and hat. I want you to keep her and her party there until somebody from hospitality comes for them, got that!”
“Yes sir.” Mike hung up the phone and dialed another number, while Bobby and Freeze looked on in disbelief.
“Hospitality. This is Tara, can I help you?”
“Tara, this is Black.”
“Hey, Black.” Tara responded with a smile and nasty thoughts on her mind. Hoping that he was calling with an invitation to go fool around above the stage again. “What do you need, baby?”
Mike checked the monitor again. “I have some guests, who don’t know they’re gonna be my guests, at the front door with Greg. Go get them, take them to my table and have a waiter bring them a bottle of Dom ‘87.” Tara wrote down the order and handed it to a waiter. “Anything else, baby?”
“No, Tara, that’s it for now, but come see me later.” He hung up the phone and dialed again.
“Coat check.”
“This is Black. If the flower guy’s near you have him take one red rose to the lady at my table.” And hung up. Mike sat down at the monitor to watch the drama he had set into motion unfold.
Meanwhile, at the front door, Greg proceeded to carry out Mike’s instructions. As Shy moved toward him, Greg moved to block her path. “Excuse me, would you and your party mind waiting here for a minute please.” Shy stopped and her associates gathered around her.
“Why, is there a problem here?” she asked. Before Greg could answer, Tara arrived. “That’s okay, Greg, I’ll take it from here.” Greg returned to his station as Tara posted her best smile and continued. “Welcome to Impressions. My name is Tara. I have a table waiting for you. Would you follow me please.” Tara started to walk away, but Shy stopped her.