Karma's a Bitch

by J. Gail

  “Well, you can’t get ‘im down?” Scoop asked as his eyes became glued to the body of a girl passing by.

  “That’s jail bait nigga,” Tony warned Scoop when he followed his trail of vision. “I don’t know, he said he was gonna call me back. You know all I got is $10 right now. My mom’s check don’t come for two weeks.”

  “Yea, and I don’t have much cash on me either. And I’m tryin’ to eat in a little while.”

  “Man. I wanted to get this shit started tonight. This a big bar night. There’s probably mad drunk white folks leaving their cards at the bar by accident,” Tony complained.

  “Oh, I don’t know if I can do that tonight. I got an appointment. I gotta let you know.”

  “Aww man! What kind of appointment?” Tony said turning to look at Scoop with disgust.

  “A ‘nonna ya damn business’ appointment. I gotta be there at two o’clock sharp or they ain’t taking me. They close at three.”

  “Then what the hell you doin’ out here with me nigga? It’s almost 1:30 now!” Tony said throwing his cigarette down on the concrete.

  “What? I thought it was closer to twelve… I came down with you cause my appointment’s in South Philly,” Scoop said as he checked his watch. “Aww man, how I do that? Let me get outta here then man. You gonna be aiight?”

  “Yea I’ll just take the sub home.”

  “Appreciate it man, stay up.”

  “Yo call me later if you still wanna do this thing,” Tony said as he gave Scoop a soul handshake. Right after he and Scoop parted ways, Tony got the call from Lil Joe that he was waiting on.

  “Ya’ll gonna do $20? Aiight, bet.”

  * * *

  As Scoop sat in the chilly doctor’s waiting room, wondering when he was going to be called and why they were blasting the air conditioner, he flipped through one of the women’s magazines on the table looking for some good looking women. Unfortunately, in the one he was looking at none of the fine women were half naked like in his favorite magazine King.

  “Uhh, Mr… Boston? Eric Boston?” The receptionist called out the next name on her flip chart.

  “That’s me,” he said as he threw the magazine back on the table and headed straight for the back room. He figured it was about time for a doctor’s check up since he hadn’t been feeling well lately. He thought it might have been due to inhalation of the tar that they used on his job to fill up the potholes. It was well known at his job that extended exposure to the fumes could cause medical problems.

  Thirty long minutes later, the doctor finally came into the room.

  “Hello Eric, how are you doing?”

  “Fine, now that I don’t have to wait no more,” he said with slight attitude. He couldn’t stand to have to wait. Why did they even call my name if the doctor wasn’t ready yet? he thought.

  “So what are we in here for,” the young Italian doctor said cheerily. He was happy that his weekend was almost over, and he could go home to relax with his wife and kids. He remembered Scoop coming in to see him some months ago about an STD problem. He had been shocked when he learned that Scoop was sleeping with at least eight different women every week, and rarely using a condom.

  “I don’t know Doc, I don’t feel too well lately. I think it might be the fumes from my job getting to me.”

  “Okay, what exactly is giving you problems?”

  “Everything,” Scoop admitted quickly and then chuckled.

  “Okay,” the doctor chuckled along with him. “Well let’s take a look.”

  When Scoop emerged from the doctor’s office he cursed the doctor for wasting his time.

  “What the hell I come all the way down here and pay that co-pay for just so that nigga can tell me to get some rest and take some vitamins,” he spoke under his breath. He ripped the bandage off of the inside of his arm where they had stuck him with the needle. Looking at his watch again, he decided to call Tony to find out where he was. They might still be able to do that credit card thing with Lil Joe that night.

  “Yo where you at?” Tony asked. He was almost yelling.

  “Yo calm down nigga, I’m still down South Philly. Where you?”

  “I’m still on South Street. Come scoop me,” Tony commanded before hanging up the phone. Scoop hated it when Tony got like this – acting like he was the general and Scoop was his soldier, whenever they had something big planned, even just a party. But he wasn’t trying to worry about small issues right now, he was about getting some money.

  Tony and Scoop got the credit card from Lil Joe with ease. They even got a few free drinks at the bar that Lil Joe’s brother owned in Germantown. Everything was going as planned. It wasn’t even nine o’clock and they had a fully loaded credit card, all ready to get swiped at the Wal Mart on Columbus Blvd. When they pulled into the parking lot, they sat in the car to plan what they were getting.

  “They got that new Playstation out, and I wanted to get one of them big screened TVs. Naw, two of them jawns. I want one to keep at Quanisha’s crib. That’s gonna get me some ass for a whole week!” Tony said as he reached over to give Scoop a pound.

  “Aiight, so you do the TVs and shit, and I’ll go down that expensive computer aisle, grab some of them modems and laptops. Do they got computers down at Wal Mart?”

  “All I know is I’m grabbin’ everything I see,” Tony said as he opened his door to get out of Scoop’s truck.

  During the next hour Tony and Scoop filled up two carts with high priced merchandise and had two big screen televisions worth over $3,000 being carted out to the front customer service area. Scoop warned Tony that they shouldn’t go too overboard with their spending, because someone might get suspicious. But there was no shame in their game as they rolled both of the carts right up to the electronics register in the back of the store.

  “Wow, we’ve got a lot of stuff here…” the red haired female cashier said as she started ringing up the items one by one. “This is only $99.98? I might have to pick up one of these myself,” she said outloud to herself. The entire order took close to twenty minutes to ring up. Some of the people waiting behind them decided to go up front to ring their things up.

  “Okay, your total is $4,845.19,” the young lady said, trying not to sound surprised at the figure. But she was, and her prejudices overwhelmed her despite her self-proclaimed liberalism. How could these two young black men afford all this stuff? she thought. Tony smoothly swiped the credit card and wiped his nose. He had studied and practiced the signature on the back of the card several times to be accurate and was sure he had it down pat, but luckily, the cashier didn’t even bother to look at the card. Scoop was standing at the far end of the register, shifting his weight from side to side and trying not to look nervous.

  Tony signed the signature pad and everything looked like it was going through okay. But it was taking a lot longer than usual for the authorization to go through.

  “This never takes this long,” he said, trying to fill the silence. The cashier nodded and agreed. Scoop’s heart started beating so hard that he was afraid someone might hear it.

  Finally the signature pad read ‘Approved’ and the receipt started printing. It took some time, but finally the cashier ripped the receipt off and gave it to Tony.

  “You have a good night,” she said and watched as Tony and Scoop rolled their carts away.

  When they finally got to the housewares section of the store which was well out of sight of the back register, Tony stopped and gave Scoop a pound. They both could breathe easy now. They were afraid that the card was going to be declined, or even worse, reported stolen.

  “Whew. I didn’t think it was gonna go through,” Scoop said as he wiped some sweat off his brow.

  “I don’t know about you, but I was gonna haul ass if it didn’t,” Tony said chuckling.

  “Damn. You was gonna leave me wasn’t you. We didn’t plan that,” Scoop said, shaking his head as he began wheeling his cart again.

  “I’d think you’d already know
that nigga,” Tony said as he followed Scoop. “Man, I can’t wait to get home and show Quanisha that TV. She gonna love my ass.”

  On their way out they turned down the aisle where all the household cleaners were, and Tony stopped again. “Oh hold up, here go them Swiffers. Quanisha always talkin’ bout them jawns. I wonder if I can put another couple of these on that card.”

  “T, come the fuck on. You in here looking at Swiffers, and we gotta get the fuck outta here,” Scoop commanded. “And we ain’t putting nothin’ else on that card.”

  “Nigga, who the fuck you think you talkin’ to? You don’t tell me what to do. I’ll get a Swiffer if I damn well please!” Tony said as he picked up four Swiffer’s and threw them in the cart on top of all the other stuff.

  “Nigga you are retarded. I ain’t stickin’ around here while you fuck us up,” Scoop said as Tony started rolling his cart again. Tony threw a few more items on top as he rolled past. Scoop couldn’t believe his friend was playing with fire; he was about to go up a second time with the stolen credit card. Scoop considered leaving Tony and getting into his truck with his cart, but knew that at Wal Mart they wanted to see a receipt when you left. Tony had the receipt in his pocket.

  When they got up front, Tony put all of his new items on the conveyor belt. Scoop stood on the other side of the register closest to the door waiting for his friend to finish and hoped that everything would be alright. When Tony swiped the card, again it took a very long time to go through.

  Scoop heard two beeps from the register signifying that something had gone wrong.

  “Ummm, could I see the card? And your driver’s license?” the cashier said as he picked up his register phone to call a manager over. Tony handed him the card.

  “What for? Is there somethin’ wrong? I don’t got my license on me,” Tony said getting nervous.

  “Man, I don’t know. All I know is the computer is telling me it was declined and to call a manager… Roger to register four, Roger to register four,” the young cashier said over the loud speaker as he sat up on the edge of the register looking at the card. He was nervous himself, because he was really supposed to ask for a driver’s license before processing a credit card.

  “Here let me try it again,” Tony said as he grabbed for the card. Before he had a chance to swipe the card again, he saw the manager approaching. He was sweating by then. His instincts were telling him to run, but he just couldn’t bring himself to leave all of that stuff. Maybe it was something that could be resolved.

  “Tony, let’s just go. Maybe you’re over your limit,” Scoop said looking at Tony as if he were crazy for wanting to stay there and still try to get the other items. “Let’s go, we’ll figure it out later.”

  Tony looked at his friend Scoop and realized that he was being greedy.

  “What’s the problem,” the manager said as he took a look over the transaction.

  “Ain’t no problem, I think I just went over my limit today. I’ll come get this stuff another time,” Tony said as he wheeled his cart away from the register. Scoop followed quickly.

  When they got to the door, they saw the two large screen televisions waiting on a special cart near the customer service area. The lady asked for their receipt as Scoop went over to retrieve the televisions. She looked it up and down, alternating between the receipt and their cart for a few minutes, and was about to stamp it, but then she heard a commotion.

  “Stop those two!” a voice said from near the register area. It was the manager, Roger. He was signalling to the security guard to follow him. “Don’t let them leave with that merchandise!”

  Scoop and Tony pushed the carts out of the way and ran full speed out of the doors. Scoop nearly tripped over a little five year old girl who was in his way. Tony pushed people out of the way roughly as he made his way out to the parking lot.

  When they got to the truck they could see the security guards standing outside the store looking for where they had gone. Tony and Scoop dove into the truck and screeched out of the lot in no time.

  “SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT!!!” Tony screamed as he punched his fist into Scoop’s dashboard.

  “Yo, don’t be punching my car you stupid motherfucker!” Scoop yelled at Tony. “If your dumb ass didn’t go back to buy those motherfucking Swiffers we would have gotten out of there with all that shit!”

  “Fuck you nigga!” Tony said as he rolled down his window and spit.

  “I can’t believe your simple ass. We were home free!”

  Tony just left the window open and let the night air blow into his face. He was trying to cool off the deadly anger that was consuming him.

  “Damn, I blew it!” he finally admitted to himself. “Five g’s…”

  “Man, why did you have to get cocky? We woulda sold that shit in a day. Now they gonna be watchin’ for us… Fuck it, I ain’t doin’ that shit again. I ain’t goin’ to jail for your ass,” Scoop said more to himself than to Tony. “And who’s to say they ain’t got cameras in the parking lot that saw my truck?”

  Tony put his head back on the head rest and rolled the window back up. He had nothing to say. He had cameras, DVD players, Playstations and XBOXs, computer equipment, and all kinds of pricey electronic components in his cart, and he gave it all away for a Swiffer. Scoop was right – he had gotten greedy, and cocky. He had never felt so stupid in his life. All that trouble, and he and Scoop were still negative $20. They were worse off than they started. Tony knew that Scoop was telling the truth – Scoop would never try the credit card thing again after this. Scoop or not, Tony was going to have to find a way to get some money, and fast.

  Chapter 16

  Quanisha and her cousin Pamela walked down the stairs of the Gallery Mall, heading for the food court. They had been shopping all day long on Quanisha’s day off. Pamela didn’t work a steady job, she was doing welfare to work and this was the time in her cycle when she was receiving welfare instead of working.

  Pamela had three kids going on four and now lived in the new projects they had built in North Philly. She had been born in Philly originally, but moved to Camden, New Jersey when she had gotten married. The marriage lasted for two and half years. Pamela and her husband James had both been cheating on each other, even before they were married. No one understood why Pamela and James wanted to tie the knot in the first place since neither one of them knew the meaning of monogamy. But no one tried to stop them, not even her mother. After two years in the marriage, James came home early and found Pamela asleep in bed with another man. From that point on James had become very violent with Pamela, despite his own infidelities. Pamela couldn’t take the beatings anymore, and moved out with all of her kids in tow, right back to Philly.

  “What you eatin’?” Quanisha asked her cousin as they approached the food court.

  “I don’t know, whatever you eatin’. You know I’m broke,” Pamela said as she plopped down at one of the tables.

  “What you mean you broke? You just dropped $100 for that ‘fit,” Quanisha said as she pointed at Pamela’s bag.

  “That was my last. Come on girl you gotta spot me. Just get me a pizza or somethin’.”

  “Bitch, you knew we was gonna eat before we left. You shoulda saved some money,” Quanisha said as she walked off over to the chinese food area.

  Pamela smiled as if she had gotten over. “Good, I wanted some Chinese food. I hope she gets me a Kung Pao Chicken.”

  When Quanisha came back, Pamela was disappointed to see that she was only carrying one plate on her tray.

  “Where’s mine?” Pamela said.

  “I don’t know, where is it?” Quanisha said as she sat down and started wolfing down her food. She hadn’t eaten since 10am that morning. All Pamela could do was sit there with her famous boo boo face on. Quanisha wouldn’t even let her touch a piece of chicken off her plate. The smell of the General Tso’s Chicken with broccoli platter wafted over to Pamela’s nose, making her stomach growl. But Quanisha didn’t care. She was tired of Pamela alw
ays trying to mooch off of people.

  When they left the mall, Quanisha’s thoughts instantly drifted to what Tony was doing. It was Thursday and she hadn’t seen him since Wednesday morning. He had told her that he was staying at his grandmother’s house for a few days, to make sure she was okay. Quanisha was already feeling as if Tony was settling right back into his old ways. He had called her that past Saturday to tell her that he had a big surprise for her, but then she didn’t hear from him for two straight days. Her instincts told her that he was still messing around with other girls behind her back. She knew he was definitely still lying to her after Tony told her that he had supposedly gotten into a fight with Terrance and Terrance supposedly had left him in Darby. That didn’t even sound like Terrance to her. She knew that Tony was probably in Darby because he had been staying with the nurse girl and she kicked him out. But she wasn’t bringing that up so that she could keep the peace.

  Quanisha was actively ignoring Pamela’s silent treatment as they rode in the El train to Quanisha’s car which was parked in West Philly. She knew Pamela had an attitude about dinner, but didn’t care. Quanisha’s phone started ringing right before they arrived at their stop. It was Trina.

  “Hey girl, what you gettin’ into tonight?” Trina asked.

  “Nothing girl, it’s Wednesday,” Quanisha said as she walked down the stairs at 63rd Street Station towards her car. Pamela dragged along behind her, thinking that her attitude was actually affecting Quanisha.

  “Wednesday nights are hot at Chrome Nish, you know that.”

  “Oh yea. What, you wanted to do that?” Quanisha said as she turned down the street and saw her car sitting there. She almost forgot that Pamela was with her.

  “Yea, I’ll meet you down there, at like 11 aiight?” Trina said.

  “Aiight, see you down there,” Quanisha confirmed and then hung up the phone.