RedBone

by Styles, T.

  Without looking into the boy’s eyes, she pulled down his shorts.

  “Good ... Now get his drawers, too!” Brownie said.

  With her eyes slammed shut, Farah pulled the boy’s drawers down, exposing his penis.

  “Perfect, now get ready to kick him where it counts.”

  “But what if he gets loose and hits me?” Farah asked, this time looking at her classmate, a boy she liked very much, a kid who just a few hours ago loaned her a few pieces of paper and a number 2 pencil to do her work in class. Her light skin, riddled with old sore scars, was flushed and she felt like she was five minutes from breaking out in hives. All her life, she along with her mother, sisters, and brother suffered from what they believed were allergies of the worst kind. Although their attacks seemed to be few and far between, Farah’s were triggered by anything from stress to the scent of household chemicals. “I don’t wanna do it!”

  “They not gonna let him get you!” Brownie yelled, growing irritated with her daughter. “Are you, babies?”

  “We got him, Mamma!” Shadow said, gripping Theo Cunningham’s wrist harder, as his older sister, Mia, grabbed his other wrist and pulled in the opposite direction. Shadow’s face, which was deep chocolate like the rest of their family, formed a row of sweat, which he quickly wiped away with his free hand. “He ain’t going nowhere!”

  When they had a good hold of the twelve-year-old’s arms she said, “That’s good, Mia and Shadow! Keep him right there.”

  “Sure thing, Mamma!” Mia said as she struggled to grab a few much-needed breaths due to being overweight. “This nigga gotta pay for the sins of his mother!” she continued, repeating Brownie’s deranged words. Brownie smiled in approval.

  Farah stood next to her siblings, and looked at how they all seemed to enjoy what they were doing to the boy. Her confusion seemed to bring more attention to the fact that she was not like them. If you were to walk into the DC project they lived in, and pointed out the members of the Cotton family, you would surely pass over Farah a million times. People told her all the time how she was the pretty red one in the family and how she should be grateful she didn’t turn out as black as her mother, father, sisters, and brother. Farah never looked at the difference as a blessing. In her eyes, it was quite the contrary. She never wanted anything more than to look like the people she lived with every day.

  She felt like an outcast when people would walk up to them, single her out, and say, “You so pretty, even with them scars on your face, and you got good hair, too.” What she wouldn’t give to sit between her mother’s legs in the kitchen and have her hair pressed and then styled with green grease like Chloe. How she prayed she’d wake up with a smooth, dark complexion like Mia, but her wish was never granted.

  Her skin was yellow, her hair black, wavy, and shiny, and her heart was nowhere as hollow as the members of her family. It was true: nothing about Farah said she was a Cotton, except her last name. It wasn’t like the rest of the family wasn’t beautiful. When they weren’t fighting, and causing problems in the neighborhood, they were quite stunning to look at with their smooth skin tones reminiscent of the kings and queens of Africa. But because they were so unruly, nobody gave a fuck about outside appearances. They were ugly inside, so that made them ugly outside too.

  “Please let me go,” Theo begged, as long strands of snot oozed from his nose and fell into his mouth. He quickly lapped up the salty nasal mucus to continue his pleading. “I didn’t do nothing!”

  “Stop standing over there looking crazy, RedBone!” Brownie yelled, waking Farah out of her trivial thoughts. “Kick him in his dick! And do it hard, too, like we talked about!”

  Farah looked at Theo, who was crying harder. “I don’t want to do it, Mama,” she refused. “He let me use his pencil at school today. He’s really nice!”

  “You heard what the fuck I said, girl!” Brownie screamed as she pointed her long finger in her face. “That’s why I know you’re not no real Cotton! You not a fighter! And if Cottons don’t do nothing else, we fight and defend our name!”

  “I am a Cotton!” Farah said with wide eyes.

  Brownie always embraced an opportunity to make Farah feel inferior when she wanted her to do something. “Then do it!”

  Farah walked slowly over to Theo, closed her eyes, and with all her might she kicked in Theo’s direction.

  “Ouch!” Mia screamed, rubbing her knee. “Open your eyes and do it, Farah.” Mia knew her sister was scared but she also knew if she didn’t do as told she could end up in far worse trouble with Brownie. “So what, he gave you a pencil? We your family! Kick him!”

  She didn’t move and Brownie was growing impatient.

  “Do it, Farah!” Shadow encouraged. “Keep your eyes open and look him in the face, too!” Using Pig Latin, which his mother didn’t understand, he said, “Ihay ontday antway OmMammay otay uckfay ouyay uphay! which meant, “I don’t want Mamma to fuck you up!”

  Hearing her brother’s words, this time with her eyes wide open, she kicked him hard between the legs. Theo screamed out in pain and his body fell forward.

  “Let him go,” Brownie said. They released him, and Mia and Shadow laughed at the child crying out in pain. Brownie walked over to him and stood over his little body. She was a grown woman, orchestrating the beat down of a child, and she was emotionless. “Y’all go on over to the car.” She pointed up the hill. “Your father is waiting. Don’t spoil the surprise, either. I wanna tell him what happened myself. Before they left Shadow kicked him in the stomach before Mia hog spit on top of his hair.

  Farah, on the other hand, didn’t budge. She wanted to help Theo out, and tell him how sorry she was. He was the only friend she had at school, and now she was certain that he’d hate her. “Come on, RedBone,” Brownie said, putting her hand on Farah’s shoulder. “You did good today.”

  When Farah didn’t move quick enough for Brownie’s taste she yelled, “Bitch, get your red ass to the car. It ain’t like the little nigga dead! He just got his nuts pushed up. She laughed.

  Worried her mother would order her beat down next, she followed her family to her father’s car. They all jumped inside, and the moment the last door was closed, Ashur Cotton sped away from the scene.

  In the car, everyone but Farah seemed to be glued to the news announcer’s voice on the radio. A few days ago in Virginia, a pregnant teenage girl was stabbed to death in her stomach and face, along with her father. After a proper investigation, they learned that her boyfriend, who she dumped because he hit her in the stomach, in an attempt to abort the baby, murdered her. When the boy frantically escaped the scene, he left his high school ID and the knife with his fingerprints on her bed. When he told his mother and father about what happened, they were distraught, but decided to help him cover the crime. The plan was to get his ID and knife, after wiping the fingerprints away. But they didn’t account for her father being home from work early. Unaware that his daughter was murdered in the room, the boy’s parents killed him and went on the run. Somebody recognized the boy and alerted the police. Everybody in their neighborhood was up in arms about the heinous act, accept for the Cottons.

  “I hope they don’t catch him,” Ashur said, turning the radio down. “The little bitch probably deserved it.”

  “They’re probably in Mexico now,” Brownie responded, waving at the radio.

  “Y’all get him good?” Ashur asked his children, who were in the back seat. He put his Marvin Gaye tape in the deck, and cruised down the road on the way back to the house.

  “Yeah, Dad.” Shadow smiled. “We did everything Mamma planned.”

  “Just like we talked about, right?”

  “What you think?” Brownie asked. “These my mothafuckin kids we talkin about! She laughed. “They were born for war.” She crossed her thick, sexy legs, and wiggled her foot. “We ain’t come here for nothing.”

  He laughed. “You may have pushed’em out that fat pussy of yours, but it was this nut,” he said, gripping his
dick, “that made it possible.”

  “You right about that.” She laughed, and lit a cigarette.

  Brownie looked back at Mia and Shadow, who were smiling slyly in the back seat. She hated that Farah’s head hung low as she looked at her shoe, which was tinged with Theo’s blood. What’s wrong with Mamma? And Daddy? Farah thought, looking at everyone. I don’t wanna be like them. He was my friend.

  “You thirsty, baby girl?” Ashur asked Mia, waking Farah out of her thoughts.

  “You know it, Daddy.” She rubbed her ashy hands together. The smoke from her mother’s cigarette choked the air.

  “Y’all thirsty too?”

  Shadow nodded and Farah said, “Yes, Daddy.” Ashur tossed eighteen-year-old Mia a beer, and threw Shadow and Farah an RC Cola from the small cooler in the front.

  “I want a beer too.” Shadow pouted, frowning at the drink.

  “Not if you want teeth,” Ashur countered. “You want your teeth or a beer?”

  “I’ll drink the soda,” Shadow said, defeated.

  “That’s what the fuck I thought.” Focusing back on Brownie he said, “Did he cry? They swear the boy tougher than our son. So if you ain’t make him cry, it won’t make no difference.” Ashur handed Brownie a beer to open for him.

  She popped the top and handed it back. “He whined like a bitch.” She smiled. “Trust me.”

  Ashur had already gulped half of his beer as he continued down the street. “I bet you he won’t be playing no football now.” He laughed, incensed that his own son couldn’t even stand outside in the sun for long periods, because his skin would blister. His children’s condition was so bad at times that he would often stay out of the house for days at a time just to avoid hearing their cries. “I want him useless at the football game on Saturday, Brownie.”

  “Trust me, he was crying like a bitch.” Brownie laughed. “Mia and Shadow beat his ass and then Mia kicked him in the nuts.” She was laughing so hard she couldn’t contain herself. “You should’ve seen him holding his hands between his legs with his mouth all open.” She slapped her knee. “I’m telling you that bitch gonna get the message now, and the boy ain’t playing no football.”

  “It’s okay, because if that don’t work we’ll break his arms. He definitely won’t be playing then!” Ashur looked at his half-crazy wife, leaned over, and kissed her passionately, while barely looking at the road ahead of him. He almost hit a car and the driver beeped loudly to avoid a collision.

  Farah jumped and held on to her brother’s arm, praying they didn’t get into an accident. Since her condition could also be exacerbated by feeling panicked, Shadow whispered, “It’s okay, Farah. Don’t be scared. Daddy got the car.” The smallest matters always went from zero to one hundred when she was with her family. Every day she was learning traits that wouldn’t suit her well in life.

  Ashur broke away from his beautiful wife’s kiss and looked at the driver who had just beeped them out. Since both cars arrived at a light, Ashur rolled his window down to taunt the man. He was angry all the time, and loved antagonizing others. “Watch where the fuck you going, nigga!” Ashur yelled, pointing his gun in the car’s direction.

  “Unless you want me to bury you and that bitch!” Brownie added, aiming her gun also.

  The driver was so alarmed that he sped away from the scene with his life in tow. Ashur snickered and could feel his dick growing rock hard because of all the excitement. Every time they got into shit together, he wanted to bend his wife over on the front of his Lincoln and fuck her in her asshole. They were deliriously in love and they could not see life without savagery and pain. The Cotton family, with Ashur as their lead, was a group of fucking troublemakers and everybody in Southeast DC knew it. That didn’t stop them from moving about the city as if it were not true. Many said the world would have been better off if Ashur had never stepped to Brownie the first day he saw her face.

  Many years back, when Ashur Cotton pulled up on Brownie Johnson in the summer of 1972, it was a match made in hell. Before meeting the woman who would soon be his wife, Ashur was a small-time street thug whose heart was filled with rage and confusion. Although he was violent, women doted on him, not because of his smooth, chocolate-dark skin or fit body, but because he was unpredictable, and that made him dangerous and fascinating. If he wasn’t robbing hard-working citizens of their paychecks, he was defrauding insurance companies by purposely getting into car accidents. Ashur had a hustle in mind at all times, never wanting to miss an opportunity to hit his big payday.

  After leaving the bank one Thursday on June 29 from cashing in on one of his get-rich-quick schemes, he spotted the sexiest bowlegged female his eyes had ever seen. She was stacked like an Amazon with fat titties, a shapely derriere, and thick, pretty legs. Although he approached her with lustful ventures in mind, the average man would’ve kept it moving because nothing about Brownie at the moment was appealing. She was dripping in her own sweat, barefoot, and wearing a pair of dingy blue jean shorts and a white noxious-smelling T-shirt. Her fists were balled up tightly as she fought off three light-skinned females, who were tired of her fucking with their family.

  Brownie Johnson loved to cause shit. It was her life’s work. If you said it was Thursday, she’d purposely say it was Friday just to get a rise out of you. And if fucking with your head didn’t evoke the right response by mixing the truth, she’d throw a “fuck your mamma” insult your way, knowing that would always do the trick. On the streets of DC, Brownie slashed more faces of beautiful light-skinned women than the most popular Beverly Hills plastic surgeon. Her name rang bells and if you were in her presence and your skin was lighter than the color of a paper bag, you’d better split. It wasn’t only that she hated lighter women; she derived a sick pleasure out of seeing people cry and the color of blood. She and Ashur were undiagnosed sadists.

  On the day Ashur pulled up on her, the girls she was fighting were tired of being afraid. They decided to approach her when she was off guard, slash up her face and break her fingers so she would be out of the slicing business. They hadn’t counted on Ashur getting involved. Seeing her fight for her life, Ashur parked his silver Lincoln and strolled out of the car. At first Brownie thought he was coming to help them, so she pulled out her switchblade and pointed it in his direction. “You’s a pretty ass, nigga,” she said, looking at his fly brown suit and crocodile shoes. “And I sho’ would hate to stab your ass. But if you come near me I’ma slash you to the white meat, I swear before God.”

  He laughed at the woman he thought was stunning even at her worst. Directing his attention to the three sisters he said, “What can I give you ladies to drop whatever beef you have with this sister?” He reached in his pocket and pulled out the wad of cash he’d just gotten from the bank, envelope included.

  Brownie looked at Ashur and then her enemies. She knew their beef ran deep. Two generations deep. Their family didn’t like her dark family members, thinking they were too ugly because of their skin tone, and Brownie’s family couldn’t stand their mix-breed members thinking they believed they were better than the world. Society peppered the media with inconsistent images of beauty, and they were all brainwashed.

  “Nigga, this bitch is gonna get the business today,” sister one said. “So why don’t you just crawl back in that Lincoln and move to wherever you came from.”

  “I see she’s unreasonable.” He looked at sister two. “What do you say?” He raised the cash bundle. “You wanna make some paper or not?”

  “Why don’t you mind your fucking business?” Brownie interrupted, eager to add their faces to the list of slashes she’d created over the years. “I don’t need no fucking help from you or nobody else!”

  He laughed and said, “Listen here, bitch, you can talk swiftly to these three sluts over here, but you not gonna speak to me like you fucking crazy. Now I’m trying to save your life, and when I do you owe me, and you better be good at it too. We got an understanding?”

  Brownie had never met a ma
n who talked to her so seriously, so she remained silent. Most men knew about her cousins and wouldn’t dare break bad, knowing it could be hazardous to their health.

  “Like I was saying,” he continued, focusing back on the women, “what can I offer you ladies?”

  The sisters looked at each other and sister one said, “Unless you plan on killing this bitch, you can’t do nothing for me, man.”

  Then they turned to Brownie and sister two said, “We’ll see you again.”

  “Count on it,” Brownie said, wiping the sweat off of her forehead with the back of her hand.

  When the sisters walked away, he offered Brownie a ride and she accepted, curious. She wanted to know what kind of man Ashur was, and although she had a boyfriend named Jay, who she’d been with since high school, he never wanted to be with her in public.

  Before long, she started spending more time with Ashur, and less time with Jay. It wasn’t long before they realized they both shared the same sick personalities and traits. They both loved street boxing because of its gore and violence, and they both wanted children. They drank hard and played harder and, after a while, only the sickest pleasures could entertain them properly. At the end of the day, their happiness meant others would have to suffer and that was the bottom line.

  “You my crazy baby,” Ashur said as he tossed the empty beer can in the cooler and went to grab another. He was still thinking about the driver they’d just scared off. He handed the beer to Brownie so she could open it. “You know I would kill you if you left me, don’t you?”

  “What you think I’ll do to you?” Brownie smiled, handing him the beer. Thinking back on Theo, Brownie said, “I bet you that bitch will stay out our business now.” She was referring to Theo’s mother, Dinette, who used to be her good friend. “Telling mothafuckas we had something to do with that robbery at that convenience store last week. That bitch just jealous we ain’t let her and Tommy in on that shit. Everybody knows when it come to busting a gun, he suckers up.”