by Noire
The Crossover Community Center had cost Trey a nice hunk of change to get it up and running, but what went on inside the building was worth every dime he’d spent and more. Although the hypnotic lure of drugs, gang banging, and easy money reigned supreme all over Harlem, under Trey’s guidance The Crossover Community Center had become a life preserver for Black and Hispanic youths who were drowning in the gutters of New York City.
It was more than just a gym. The Crossover was a memorial to the friend he’d lost, and a bridge between a past life of crime and hopelessness, and a future filled with promise and potential.
Trey unlocked the front door to the center and stepped inside. For a long moment he stood in the foyer and stared up at the front wall. Centered on a basketball mural was a huge, custom-framed oil print that had been painted from a photo taken years earlier.
The picture was of two happy-go-lucky athletes sporting haircuts from back in the day. They wore matching yellow jerseys and their sweat-drenched brown faces were practically exploding in smiles.
Mayhem and Messiah. M&M. Double Trouble. The Twin Towers. The Dynamic Duo. Whatever you wanted to call them, they had been two peas in a muh’fuckin’ pod.
Trey had gotten the name “Messiah” because he was a savior on the court who always delivered, and him and his man Mayhem had wreaked havoc on the hardwood from junior high school all the way through college.
Trey shook his head as the memories flooded him. His boy Mayhem had fought a battle with the streets and the streets had won. But it was just another tragedy in a highly tragic town. Another waste of talent and another waste of life. It seemed like so long ago, but at the same time it seemed like just yesterday….
It was halftime and the cheerleaders had just run out on center court when Mayhem made his move toward the side door. It was a local hoop tournament and he played in it every year over the winter break. They were up 67 to 42, smashing the shit out of a team that nobody else in college hoops had been able to beat. The coach was giving a rah-rah speech, and the sound of the screaming crowd was still echoing in his ears when Mayhem faded toward the back of the locker room and disappeared into the shadows.
He was coming right back. He was still in his court shoes, and he’d be back in the gym before anybody noticed he was gone.
Except somebody did notice.
Somebody had eyes on him. And when Mayhem dipped out the door and into the cold New York City night, that somebody dipped out right behind him.
Messiah Jackson just didn’t get down like that. A man could only push his luck so far before that shit ran out. For almost four years his nig Mayhem had been playin’ both ends of the bridge between his future and his past. They had less than three months to go before college graduation, and there was a lotta buzz going up about both of them getting into the league as top-tier second-round draft picks.
That NBA cream was finally about to rise, and it was gonna rise for both of them. All they had to do was be patient for a little while longer. Just hold off until graduation. Leave the streets behind and put everything on the basketball court.
Messiah had watched his friend drift toward the back of the room while the coach gave his half-time speech. Even though he loved his town he didn’t love everything about it, and the greed and impatience that drove Mayhem to transact drugs in college was something he had no love for at all.
“Yo, come off that hustle,” he had warned his nig. “Give it up. That little change you be makin’ ain’t shit compared to how you gon’ be rolling when you get to the league, man. Don’t let this little street grind throw you off ya game. It ain’t worth it.”
“I got mouths to feed, niggah,” his boy had shot back. “I gotta look out for my moms and Lil Leek too, ya know?”
Nah, Messiah didn’t know. But when his boy dipped outta that locker room he’d dipped too. He’d hung back in the shadows and watched his friend jog across the street to an overflow parking lot where a black Hummer waited. It had chrome rims and a sports pack, and Messiah had seen it many times before.
A U-Haul truck sped past him. He used it for cover as he crossed the street too. He was standing behind a Toyota van when he heard the words he had been waiting to hear.
“Nah, I’m done,” Mayhem told the two dudes who had been his links to the street life for the past four years. “You can keep that package Peedee ’cause it’s a wrap. It’s over, man. I’m out.”
One of the dudes just laughed. “C’mon, my niggah. You been around long enough to know how we flow. You don’t just walk up outta this game, baby. You get carried out.”
Shit moved real fast after that.
Them niggahs pounced and violence exploded in the cold night air. Messiah didn’t even remember moving his feet. But somehow he got over there. They fought in a blur of tussling bodies, with Mayhem and Messiah swinging killer blows on K-Dawg and Peedee, two of the most feared drug dealers in Harlem.
It was Double-Trouble time, and just like on the court, they attacked. Mayhem handled one and Messiah handled the other.
It wasn’t until he had Peedee pinned against a parked car that Messiah saw the gat in dude’s hand. He lunged for it, and a shot rang out behind him before he got close enough to touch it.
It was about survival of the fittest after that. He clenched his big hand around Peedee’s gun-fist, and with both of their trigger fingers fighting for position Messiah came out the winner.
He swung around just in time to see his manz clutching his stomach and rolling around on the cold ground. Mayhem’s yellow jersey was dark with blood as K-Dawg stood over him and prepared to take aim again.
“Noooo!” Messiah screamed into the darkness, but not so much as a whisper came outta his mouth. Crushing Peedee’s hand, he swung the pistol toward K-Dawg and squeezed one off. Then he jerked his arm down and dug the barrel of the gun into Peedee’s gut and squeezed again.
By the time the boom of the bullets stopped echoing in the bitter night air, there was only one man left standing in that cold, inner city parking lot. One man left to tell the tale of how the streets could wrap their hands around ya throat and strangle your dream before it had a chance to take its first breath.
And that man was Trey “Messiah” Jackson.
CHAPTER 15
Rita undid her seat belt the moment the car came to a stop. She had spent the past few days grinding hard for Juicy and for Nooni too.
“You sure you’re gonna be okay up in there?” Dutchy asked. Instead of parking on the other side of the bridge and taking the bus over, they had just pulled up in a private parking area not far from the Rosie building on Rikers Island.
Dutchy was worried about letting his baby go inside on a visit by herself. Rita was just too precious and fragile to be stepping behind the walls of a violent jail.
“Yeah.” Rita nodded, keeping her eyes down. “I’ll be fine.”
Jail didn’t scare her. She’d had a little bit of contact with the justice system herself. Rita had vivid memories of her fifteenth birthday when her father came into her room in the middle of the night just the way he usually did.
She could still feel his blood on her naked body as she held open her sheets and, for the first time, welcomed him in. He had been coming to her for ten whole years. But this time, instead of suffering another incestuous rape, Rita had thrust a butcher knife into her father’s chest and held it there.
“I just wanna get Juicy out of there…” Rita stared toward the red brick building and said in a small voice.
Dutchy agreed. “I know, baby. Just a little while longer. We gotta keep working on it until something looks good.”
Rita nodded. As much as she had been relying on Dutchy over the past couple of weeks she had also been doing her own homework and trying to come up with some of her own resources too. If it was up to her she would have taken Juicy straight to her crib and guarded her friend with her Glock 24/7, but Dutchy told her that shit would be like committing a double suicide.
“The last
place we wanna stash Juicy is up in your crib, baby. That’s the first place they’re gonna look for her. Them niggahs get a hint that you’re hiding her and they’ll pull a kick door and lay your whole house down before you can get off a single shot. Nah, Rita. Juicy can’t come to the crib, baby. It ain’t just you and her we gotta worry about. You got Chub up in there too, remember?”
As much as it hurt, Rita had to admit that Dutchy was right. She couldn’t bring Juicy home with her. It was way too dangerous for everybody. But Juicy couldn’t stay in jail forever neither.
“Yeah, we had to pay off a few officers to make sure Juicy stays safe on the inside, but my sister-in-law said they ain’t gonna be able to keep her off the radar much longer,” Dutchy had warned. “It’s only a matter of time before some square peeps what’s up and drops a dime on her, so we need to hurry up and figure out our next move.”
Rita agreed, and unbeknownst to Dutchy, she had already made contact with someone she believed was lethal enough to hold those G-Spot niggahs off and protect Juicy from all the sharks who were looking to bite her.
Taking only her ID card and a roll of quarters for the vending machine, Rita listened to Dutchy’s last minute instructions.
“Remember, she ain’t in there under her real name,” he reminded her. “They’re calling her Yvette Williams, so that’s the name you gotta say when you go to sign in.”
Dutchy kissed Rita’s cheek, then got out and came around to her side to open her door. He held it open while she undid her seat belt and climbed out.
Smoothing down her wild curls, Rita glanced over her shoulder like she expected a stray bullet to come flying at her at any moment.
“Are you sure nobody followed us?”
Dutchy nodded. “Nah, we straight, baby,” he said, pulling her close to him. “But even if they did, this is a secure parking area. Not just anybody can roll up in here.”
The visitor center was packed with people who had come to visit their friends and family members. Buses pulled up regularly, and there was a long line of people waiting to get their IDs checked.
Rita knew it was a damn good thing that Dutchy had people on the inside. Otherwise, they would have had to jump on the back of the line and wait like everybody else.
“I hope we don’t get caught in the count,” Dutchy muttered as they waited to go through the first metal detector. There was no getting around that. Everybody had to be checked, and Rita stared as some chick started wildin’ out because the guards were making her go back over the bridge and leave her contraband cell phone in her car.
“I already waited forever to ride the damn bus over here!” the girl bitched. “On top of that, I got slobbered on by your drug fuckin-sniffing dog, and now I gotta ride all the way back over the bridge again? Y’all muthafuckas is a real trip!”
It was easy to see how stressful it was for those who had loved ones in jail. Little kids were running around going crazy, and the long wait combined with the strict rules and the shitty attitudes of the guards was enough to get people mad frustrated.
Rita tried to chill and wait patiently, especially when they searched her endless times. She had left her cell phone and all that other shit back in the car. The only thing she was carrying was her ID and her quarters. She hadn’t even worn any jewelry, so there was no threat of attracting any reprimands from the guards.
Since Juicy was just a detainee and not a sentenced inmate she was now allowed up to three visits a week. Rita planned on coming back as much as she could, and today she had brought a money order for a hundred dollars with her so Dutchy could take it to the cashier’s office and put it on Juicy’s commissary.
It was gonna be a big relief to explain everything to Juicy face to face, and Rita couldn’t wait for the chance to clear everything up. She had prayed day and night that her girl was handling the situation she had put her in, and according to Dutchy’s sister-in-law and his boys, Juicy was safe and sound.
Of course, Rita still worried about her, and she was still worried crazy over Nooni, too. Knowing who had snatched her sister was a long way from proving it or finding her, and Rita’s fear for Nooni was real and constant. Even though her sister had just turned eighteen, Rita had gone down to the police station and told the cops that Monique was holding a minor child hostage. Two days later she went back and they claimed they sent somebody to Monique’s apartment and there were no signs of Nooni living there.
The next logical place Rita thought her sister could be was the G-Spot. She remembered how G and his posse had held Juicy hostage, and just the thought of Nooni going through half of that was enough to make Rita shake in fear.
But not even Dutchy had enough pull to send the cops rushing into the Spot looking for no delinquent runaway. “Yo, them boyz is in the pocket,” he had said, shaking his head. “And I ain’t talking no low-level shit, neither. They got some real willies on the payroll at the G-Spot, baby. Ain’t no cop going up in that joint unless he’s tryna get his dick sucked.”
That left Nooni still missing. Still out on the streets somewhere, doing who knew what. As Rita sat and waited for her visit with Juicy, she looked around the room and imagined her sister alone and hurt, being abused and terrorized by the deadliest crew in Harlem.
Rita just couldn’t help it. A tear slipped from her eye and she sat there and cried.
$$$$$
It was Monday and it seemed like every other chick in the facility was hyped. It was a visitation day for everybody who had the right last name and a lot of girls were anxious to see their families.
No matter what a chick had come to jail for, no matter how busted she looked or felt inside, every hood rat wanted to show up for a visit looking like a fox. Maybe it was all just a front so the world wouldn’t find out how bad this shit-hole was kicking your ass, or maybe it was just the nature of a woman. Either way, there was a whole bunch of face primping and hair styling going on in almost every cell.
I had fallen asleep feeling sorry for myself, and it was close to lunchtime when I heard somebody call my name.
“Williams! Visitor!”
I didn’t even move. I knew they had made a mistake so I didn’t even get excited.
“Williams!” CO Gaines stood outside of my cell barking at me like she was my mother. “I know you heard me calling your ass!”
I kept my mouth closed and stood up.
“You got a visitor,” she repeated.
I tried to keep the shock off my face as I followed her to the visiting room. It was on jam when we got there and she led me to a small table that was off to one side of the room by itself.
I didn’t know who or what to expect.
My eyes scanned the crowd and I took in all the New York faces, sounds, and attitudes. Almost everybody looked like they could have come right off 136th Street, just like me.
I spotted Chiney sitting at a table across the way and she lifted her chin.
“Sup, homegirl,” she said. “I thought you couldn’t get no visitors?”
I shrugged and shook my head to tell her I didn’t know what was up.
Chiney nodded and turned away, but her visitor kept me on grill and immediately I knew exactly who he was.
Trey.
His name jumped right into my mind. It had been a long time since I’d seen him, but his eyes were still sexy and mad intense. I couldn’t help but stare back. He was fine as hell with his neatly groomed locks and long-ass legs. He was a lot more muscular than I remembered, but his piercing dark eyes, chiseled lips, and thuggish chin hadn’t changed a bit.
I looked away first. My eyes were steady roaming as I searched the room to see who had come to see me.
My visitor walked through the door with CO Allen. I took one look at her and rolled my fuckin’ eyes. She was so shook she almost tripped over her own damn feet as she walked toward me and I thought, good for your ass! If she was too soft and scary to be up in a jail how they hell did she think I felt?
I felt like a real fool, is how.
I had let Rita catch me out there when I was weak and grieving, and after being locked down in this shitty box I couldn’t think of a damn thing Rita could say that would make me forgive her.
In fact, as long as I was locked up Rita could kiss my black ass. If she wasn’t rolling in with a cache of Uzis and a helicopter to bust me out, then I didn’t want to hear a damn thing she had to say.
“Juicy,” she said softly.
I blasted her.
“You got the nerve to bring your ass up in here when you’re the one who sold me out?”
Chiney turned around in her seat and looked at me like, what’s up? Where’s the static? Show me which bitch I need to bite!
“It wasn’t like that,” Rita protested. “I swear to God! I can explain everything!”
“That wasn’t nothing but greed that got a’ hold of you, Rita. That little bit of money was just change, baby! Chicken change! That’s the price you put on our friendship when there was a whole lot more where that came from! Officer!” I stood up and started showing out as loud as I could. “Officer, I refuse this visit!”
I saw the look of shock that jumped into Rita’s eyes and I turned my back on it.
“Take me back to my cell!” I barked.
“Juicy, no…” I heard her say as I turned away. “No, wait…don’t leave…”
I folded my arms across my chest and kept my eyes aimed on the back wall. “Get me the fuck outta here! I wanna go back to my cell!”
It had gotten quiet in the room and I knew all the inmates and their visitors were staring at me. Fuck it. Let ’em. CO Gaines jumped on me real quick. Snatching my arm, she jacked me up on my toes and whisked me back through the doors in two seconds flat.
“You real stupid,” she declared as she led me away to get strip searched before returning to my cell. “I told you to keep your mouth closed and stay easy. Besides, whatever static you got with that bitch you should have squashed it. Sitting out here for a couple of hours with your worst enemy beats sweating by yourself in your cell all damn day, dummy.”