Nester’s homies jumped out of a raggedy old Buick and ran to his aid. So there Barry stood surrounded by 5 Cuban Gangbangers. Barry whispered, “What’s up? Y’all nigz wanna box?” They screamed, “Cracker ass wigger we gonna whip the white off your ass today!”
Barry explosively swung with so much force that I heard him break the first guy’s jaw. It sounded like when you break a chicken bone. He knocked two of Nesters teeth right out of his mouth. Nester was out cold twitching on the ground. His friends looked in utter amazement as Barry took out two more in record time. He Body slammed one guy against an old willow tree and broke the other guy’s arm by smashing it against his knee. The other two guys took off running, and as I looked from the screened in front door, a wind gust blew one guys jacket back. He had a pistol snuggly hidden in the small of his back! Maybe he was too afraid to pull it out.
Barry was a crazy motherfucker! It would take more than one pistol to end my brother’s life. Barry use to box when he was little. He joined the junior boxing league, and he won quite a few fights. He was a junior champion at the age of 12. I don’t know why he quit; maybe it was the streets that drew him away. He really loved making money.
Barry was jumped into the Thug Gang, the year he quit boxing. He immediately became a street icon. Barry was driving a hooked up 1984 Lincoln Continental by the age of 15. He was on the set day and night selling drugs and popping off machine guns. He was in and out of Juvenile Detention on a regular basis. Barry never got caught for anything serious, just petty theft and battery charges. The main thing he inherited from my father (other than his looks) was a bad temper.
My brother didn’t speak to me about the street very often. He would always make generic comments like, “Stay in school and don’t do drugs Shawn.” Or “Don’t get caught up in these streets like me little brother.” He would get mad as hell whenever one of his homies tried to let me take a sip of some beer or teach me the gang handshake. He wanted me to be a kid, and he was often very careful to keep me away from the dope spot when he was working.
I loved Barry because he never beat up on me. Sometimes I really did shit that deserved a smack or two. Things like playing with his gun, cursing at him, but he never got mad at me. He gave me all the love that I never got from my dad. I think he felt like a father figure to me.
After a while, my mother started getting really nervous about Barry’s lifestyle, especially after he went to jail again. He spent 21 days locked up for selling weed at the Mall. She started to give up hope for him by this time.
Barry swore he was just giving the guy something that he found on the ground. But my mother refused to pay his bond, and she let him stay locked up until his court date. My mom knew Barry was guilty. When he came home, she told him that if he didn’t stop selling drugs she would kick him out.
But unfortunately, Barry was high that day, and he became argumentative. I think it was a slip of the tongue when he said, “I just got out of jail Mom. You was crying and shit, and you still left me in there for three weeks. I aint even complain, so why you acting like a bitch now?” My mother wasn’t accepting that kind of tough talk at all. As a result, she kicked him out that very night. That’s when things started to go downhill for Barry. He had plenty of women in his life. About four babies mothers and countless easy screws. But I don’t think he was prepared for that sudden move.
He looked so confused when she kicked him out. He must have thought it would never happen. When I think about that day, I will never forget how he shrunk before my eyes when she kicked him out. Barry was always so cocky, so strong and fearless. But when my mother kicked him out his demeanor transformed to something much more helpless. His shoulders dropped down and his arms hung down to his sides like the branches on that willow tree he slammed that guy on when he fought Nester and his homeboys. Barry poked his lips out, scratched his stomach and shook his head from side to side as if he was having a conversation with himself. Barry wasn’t going to try and fight; he knew what Mom had been through with our father. I think Barry knew that he was going to get in trouble sooner or later. I guess it turned out to be sooner.
He had done so much dirt to people in the past; it was bound to catch up with him. I believe that in Barry’s mind, Mom’s house was his only sanctuary. It was his only escape from the madness of his everyday life. At times, Barry would sit in his room and just listen to old slow jams with his headphones on. He would lie on his bed and sink down into the sheets as if the bed wrapped him with a false security. As he was lying on the bed, his whole body would go limp, except for his index finger and his thumb.
I could always tell the tempo to whatever song he listened to, because he would tap on the bed very lightly as if he was the drummer in some imaginary band. That was the Barry I knew, a peaceful and docile person who loved me and took the position of protector over our household. I cried as Barry packed two garbage bags and a suitcase of clothes and personal items. He just put his hand on my head and spoke very softly, “Don’t worry Shawn, I’ll keep in contact with you, even when you aint thinkin bout me, I'll be watching over you kid, I promise.” I felt as if we were losing a vital and important piece of our household. We were losing the feeling of security.
My father didn’t clown with Mom when Barry was around. I wondered, what would happen now that he was gonna be gone? I walked in my room and fell to the floor like a lifeless doll.
The carpet on my floor felt like a humongous cushion against my body. But it wasn’t comforting. I think that was the second time I can actually say I was depressed. I felt a sense of hopelessness that overcame my body, mind and soul. And it made me scared. I was just a kid, but I knew how dangerous the streets could be. After about a week, Barry was staying with one of his baby’s mother when he got into an altercation with her ex-fiancé and hit him in the head with a bottle of Jack Daniels whiskey.
I guess the dude didn’t go down or the bottle bounced off his head, because he retaliated by stabbing Barry three times with a screwdriver. Barry ended up in the emergency room as a result of the fight. My mother wouldn’t allow me to visit the hospital to see him and I was very upset about that. She told me, “You don’t need to be around that shit little boy! Stop bothering me about seeing that fool! He’ll live, simple minded thugs like your daddy and your brother live to be 103!”
I felt so bad when she said that. About one month later I was at home by myself eating some captain crunch on a Saturday morning when the phone rang. My mother told me to never answer the phone, so I sat there and ignored it. That damn phone rang about 30 more times. I couldn’t resist, and I decided to knock it off the hook and act like I was picking it up. “Oops! Umm hello who this is?”
Then I heard my brother, “Ahhhhh! What’s up little brother? I knew your little butt was gonna answer that phone sooner or later, you never listen to Mama.” I almost started crying because I was so overjoyed, “Hi Barry!! I wanted to see you but Mom wouldn’t let me I swear! I swear!” He paused, then replied, “Oh don’t worry about it bro, I wouldn’t want you to see me like that anyway, I was looking pretty bad.” Hey hold on one sec.” I could hear him talking in the background. It sounded like he was in a car or something because I could hear the wind from his open window beating against the Brick cell phone. It sounded muffled like a sheet being blown in the wind. Actually it kind of sounded like that flag on the flag post at my school, when we stand outside and sing the pledge of allegiance.
He was talking to one of his buddies in the background. I heard him say the name “Roscoe” and I felt really scared because he only hung with Roscoe when he is going to do something really bad. He was holding a conversation with Roscoe and talking to me at the same time, like he always does people when he's on the phone. He said, “A Roscoe, pass me that Joint, hey is this shit cocked? Hey just chill for now, roll over there and park.”
Roscoe was the only person I knew that was as fearless as Barry. The two of them have busted into clubs and done stuff that made the front page o
f the newspaper. But whenever the police tried to identify the two individuals who caused the commotion they couldn’t. Roscoe and Barry would always flee on foot and they never got caught. Both of them were so athletic. I don’t think there was a fence made in the entire city that those two cats couldn’t jump, scale or just plain ole knock down! When they were together they made an intimidating couple.
Roscoe looked big and mean, like the rapper Rick Ross, but on steroids. First of all, he was half Nigerian and Half Jamaican. Now I love black people like anybody else, but this nigga was so black that he was purple! He had a big beard, and these long thick forearms. He was so muscular, and compact that he looked like it was hard for him to breath. Roscoe had these huge fat hands that were burnt dark at the knuckles from years of fist fighting. His head was shaped like an upside down combat boot! His forehead protruded and the back of his head hung over just enough to cause it to look like a cliff.
I mean if you poured water over his head it would probably run straight off his head to the ground and not even get his clothes wet at all. He was one mean looking bastard though. He had a temper that was almost as quick as Barry’s. I never saw Roscoe and Barry argue though; I think they were childhood friends or something. I could tell Barry was plotting something that morning. But I didn’t know the streets at that age. Thus I didn’t understand that the guy who stabbed Barry with a screwdriver couldn’t live to see another week, according to Barry’s law. Barry got back on the phone,
“Hey I’m back bro, listen closely now.” He paused and then said, “I’m gonna be gone for a few months because, well, I’m going on a little vacation.” I yelled out, “a vacation!” I held my breath and sighed, “Where at?” He paused and replied, “Don’t worry about that right now, but I just want you to know that I’m gonna be thinking about you, and I wanted to tell you to take care of Mom okay?” I started to cry, “Alright Barry” I said, “I love you” Then he warmly replied, “Yeah, me too kid, I mean, me to you. Bye.” That was the last time I talked to Barry for many years. I was just a little kid. Later that night Barry and Roscoe kicked in this guy’s front door. He told me about the whole ordeal in a letter, years later. Barry pistol whipped the dude who stabbed him with the screwdriver, for about 15 minutes. “Bitch you must have lost your mind stabbing me with a mother fuckin screwdriver!”
The guy screamed out, “Barry please!” Barry told him, “Shut the fuck up!” So the guy jumped up and tried to run to the rear of the house. That’s when Roscoe shot twice and hit him in his shoulder and his leg. This guy must have been on cocaine, because the newspaper said he still ran 50 feet to the back of the house and jumped through a two story window.
Then he landed on a Ford Escort, rolled off to the ground and took off running. Barry and Roscoe jumped through the same window like two cowboys. They gave chase and Barry wildly swung the gun sideways and shot him once more in the back.
That shot took him off his feet. It was also the shot that paralyzed him from the waist down for life. When Barry and Roscoe finally caught up with him they were going to finish the job, but the police were hot on their tail. A neighbor heard the argument and called the cops when Barry was whipping the dude’s head inside out.
Barry and Roscoe tried their infamous escape act, but this time they ran out of luck. Barry jumped a gate behind a retired couple’s house. His leg was slightly injured from that cowboy stunt, when he jumped out of that second story window, so it took him a couple of tries to get over the fence. Then to make matters worse, he landed himself in a fight for his life in the backyard with two huge junkyard Dobermans. But that wasn’t the most unfortunate turn of events for the night. Roscoe ran into a coffee shop waving his pistol and cursing. He put his gun to one of the waitress’s head and tried to hide in the rear kitchen.
If it wasn’t for this waitress, who hand signaled police through the window, he may have had a fighting chance at getting away. Instead, he was gunned down and killed in the alley trying to make a backdoor escape. The guy who Barry tried to kill lived to testify against him in court. I think the Judge tried to make an example out of my brother.
Barry was given 20 years in the State Penitentiary for attempted murder; because he was a repeat offender. When the judge announced Barry’s sentence, he slammed the gavel down with a smile on his face. But he wasn’t happy; it looked more like a smile of contempt and malice.
He was an old black Judge, probably in his late 60’s. I could tell he was sick of murderous gang bangers in his courtroom. Barry just stood there, shackled up with a stone face. He was so stoical. He didn’t even flinch when the Judge gave him all that damn time! He looked over at Mom and I saying, “Just a vacation, see you in a while.”
He turned to the judge and gave him a dirty look. He tried to lift his hand shackles up and give the judge the middle finger, but the Bailiff realized what he was doing and walked over to him waving his hands. Then the Sheriff’s grabbed his arms and rushed him out the courtroom. Damn, that was fucked up.
Chapter 5: The First Shot
The man who helped create me was also the person who destroyed my family. Craig Brown was born on the West side of Chicago to a single white mother of six children. He was the 2nd child in a poor and volatile family and he never met his real father. My mother believes his father was a black man, because of Craig’s skin complexion, which is almost fair-skinned African-American or Hispanic in appearance. His stepfather was a well-known Black gang leader, who took in Craig’s mother and helped raise her remaining children. Some say my Grandmother was built like a stripper, and in fact she did strip for a few years.
When Craig was 23 he began hustling for money by performing card tricks on the Chicago L-train platform.
After a few years of hustling, he started selling cocaine. Later he met a couple of prostitutes who were working without a pimp. Craig took them under his wing and provided protection for them in exchange for 10 dollars a trick. After a while, the word got around there was a pimp who didn’t take all of the whore’s money and soon Craig was flooded with hookers looking for help. At one time he had 24 whores working for him, and of course his fee went up to 60 percent of their profits. Plus he was still selling cocaine, but they were snorting most of it up.
This was still a pretty competitive deal for a whore, since most pimps take it all. That was his key into the game. He provided quality protection for a low cost and he treated his women well and kept them coked up. Craig eventually blew up and received the name “Big Craig”. It has been told that he was one of the cleanest and coolest gangsters from the south side to the west side of Chi-Town. The fact that he was White drew him a lot of fame in the hood, because he was an oddity. He wore fur coats, thousand dollar suits and alligator skin boots whenever he stepped out to the club. The ladies loved him because he treated them with so much respect. He would bring them to the club all dressed up and showcase his finest ones.
This was a complete opposite of the man he grew to become. Many people believe that he fell off, or lost his edge because he was too good to the whores. After a few years, Craig began to lose his women to a new breed of Pimps in the area who used violent tactics to overcome and turn girls out. His reign lasted for 4 years.
At the end of his triumphant walk down the halls of Pimping, he found himself left with a few heroin addicts and some teenagers from Indiana. That’s when Craig started gambling
He met my mother a few years later at the riverboat Casino. When she met him, he presented himself to her as a businessman that was down on his luck. I don’t quite know what my mother saw in him. Maybe she thought he was a man filled with promise and dreams. He really had the gift of gab. I guess she fell for it like a ton of bricks. My mother was raised in the Catholic Church; she was a stereotypical white girl, whom I suppose was fascinated by this white man with a black man’s swagger. Unfortunately, she wasn’t too familiar with the street game. They dated for a few months and he eventually impregnated her with Barry. My mother begged him to marry
her, because her family looked down on bastard children, but he held off for almost a decade. During this decade, which we call the “grey area,” my mother got into a lot of trouble with my father. The details are still unclear, as to what happened. But after he was totally on his ass, he decided to marry her, and she became pregnant with me.
That’s when the bigger problems began and the marriage only lasted a couple years. For most of my life I was never informed why they broke up, but I heard from Barry, that Mom caught a drug charge and was a felon as a result of meeting my father; and he promised to change when they got married, but he didn’t. So as the story goes, she left him because she didn’t want to get in more trouble as a result of his wild lifestyle. But my mother still has never told me from her own mouth, what really went down between her and my father. She just says he is crazy and her family disowned her for getting involved with my father.
After him, she started dating Black and Hispanic men, and we never left the ghetto again. I believed my dad was crazy, because every time I saw that guy, he was acting like a complete lunatic! My earliest memories of my father stem from him coming by our house drunk and angry with my mother. He would come at late hours of the night banging on the door and demanding to see Barry and I. But my mother would never let him in and that made him furious. Barry would talk to him through the curtain, until my mother would snatch him away and send him to his room.
On one night in particular, when I was a kid, way long before Barry got kicked out the house, my dad got so angry that he kicked the door in and snatched the phone out the wall. We only had one entrance and one exit to the house, the front door. He was standing there in the hallway breathing hard like a bull with fire in his eyes. He told my mother, “Bitch you’re going to talk to me today whether you like it or not!”
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