Hard White

by Shannon Holmes

  Miss Tina turned her head away from Melquan. He stared at the back of her head. Melquan saw her wound, and it angered him even more.

  “Ma, I’m sorry you feel that way. I wish this happened to me instead o’ you. But I can’t undo what’s been done. I promise you this though, whoever did this is dead!” he said, walking out the apartment.

  After a few tense minutes of trying to defuse the situation, Mike Copeland walked downstairs and caught up with Melquan.

  “Mike, I don’t know who did this shit. But when I find out I’m a body ‘em.”

  “No doubt, my dude,” Mike said, reassuring him. “You already know I’m wit you. We gone find out who did this. Don’t worry about it, just keep ya composure, my dude.”

  They went out into the project and conducted their daily drug operation, hoping that would serve as the bait to lure the robbers to them. If that didn’t work then at least they could question some talkative drug addict or drug dealer about last night’s event.

  Melquan was in a murderous mood, but he had no target to unleash his fury on. He kept hoping that it would all change before the day ended. Charlie Rock rolled through the horseshoe, Melquan didn’t acknowledge him. He just wasn’t interested in a long conversation with anyone. For the moment, all the friendliness they shared was dead.

  “Lemme holla at you for a minute, nephew,” Charlie Rock requested.

  “Not right now, Unk!” Melquan answered. “I ain’t in da mood. I got sumthin on my mind and I ain’t really myself today.”

  “Nephew, what I gotta say is more than just idle chitchat. I gotta put a bug in ya ear. But everything ain’t for everybody. Walk over here with me,” Charlie Rock said, directing his wheelchair down the drive. “I’m sorry to hear about that situation with ya mom. How’s Tina doin’?”

  “She buggin’ out and I don’t know if the pain is physical or mental right now. Physically, she’ll be alright, but mentally…? I don’t know. She blames me for everythin’. She called me everythin’, but her son.”

  “That’s not a good look, but at the same time you can’t take that too personal. That wasn’t your mother speakin’ to you and callin’ you out your name. That was pain mixed with fear,” Charlie Rock said.

  “Unk, I’m ready to hurt somebody. I’m fuckin’ ready to show these niggas that I ain’t playin’. These niggas violated my mother. They gotta leave this earth for that!”

  “Yeah, and they deserve everything and anything you dish out. Just make sure you get who’s responsible for this. You gotta make the right man bleed. On that note, I think I got sumthin for you. I don’t know if you know this nigga from the north side called Justice…?”

  “Nah, I ain’t never heard of him. Why…?”

  “He a little older than you… Anyway one day he come around here talkin’ about he heard this spot jumpin’ and who gettin’ all the money out here. Askin’ me fifty questions... And he was with another dude a grimy lookin’ muthfucka. You know me, I ain’t telling shit. Ask me, I know that shit. Justice is a well-known stickup kid. He might be worth checkin’.”

  Melquan walked alongside him, staring straight ahead. He listened silently to Charlie Rock. His mind seemed to be in accelerated mode. He stared at Charlie Rock and knew his mind was made up. Justice was his prime suspect.

  “You know where they stayin’?”

  “No, but like I said the one named Justice is from the North Side. I don’t know where he lay his head. But I know his mother still live over there on Grenada Avenue. You know momma’s crib is like magnet. Eventually everyone winds up there.”

  “You right, Unk. So lemme get her address,” Melquan hurriedly said.

  Charlie Rock gave him the necessary information and Melquan hit him with a C-note. Melquan signaled to Mike Copeland, and they hurriedly set off together.

  “Charlie Rock just turned me on to a strong possibility. Justice, heard o’ him?”

  “Nah…” Mike Copeland answered, shaking his head.

  “He’s some ol’ school stickup kid. I’m a put a bullet in that muthafucka’s head. Let’s go squat on his mom’s crib!”

  “Yeah, that’s what da fuck I’m talkin’ ’bout! Let’s go light this shit up!”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  The One I Trusted

  They were about to recon the project’s ground and someone shouted at Melquan. He whirled ready to blast, but when he saw that it was Precious, Melquan put his gun away.

  “What da fuck you want, bitch?” he asked, giving the dirtiest of looks.

  “I heard about what happened to your mother last night. I wanted to know if she’s alright, and say I’m sorry…”

  “Whatever, bitch, you not on my team no more, right? So why you comin’‘round me for…?”

  “I just wanted to let you know, I’m sorry to hear… I mean, damn. I still got feelin’ fa you. I still care what happens.”

  “Bitch, I don’t have time to hear all da bullshit. If I find out you remotely connected to da situation, I’m a kill you too.”

  “Damn Melquan, why would I be even trying to get your mother hurt like that, huh? Tell me why, Melquan,” Precious said, on the verge of tears.

  Precious’ pleas fell on deaf ears. Melquan ignored her. He walked away like he had not hear anything she had said.

  It took around a week before Justice finally resurfaced. Unfortunately for him his visit did not go undetected. Melquan and Mike Copeland held an around the clock vigil on Justice’s mother apartment building. When they weren’t around they paid drug addicts and kids to be their eyes and ears.

  It was popular knowledge by now about what had happened. The underworld of the project was more than happy to help Melquan. Something about hurting someone’s mother spawned an outpouring of sympathy on Melquan’s behalf. Melquan got the call that Justice was in the vicinity. He and Mike raced over to the building to watch and wait.

  Inside his mother’s apartment, Justice was enjoying some leftovers before he hit the streets. He had come to his mother’s place to make sure she was taking her medication. She begged him to stay and offered him some food.

  “Ma, ya food was good as usual. I hate to eat and run, but I gotta go do sumthin,” Justice said, rubbing his filled stomach. “Ma, make sure you watch what you eat. You know you got high blood pressure. Stay away from all that pork.”

  “Oh boy, that pork ain’t never hurt nobody,” his mother countered. “Our people have survived for hundreds of years on pork. So if I want to have me some chitlins, or some pig feet, every now and then, I’m havin’ it. Shoot, ain’t nobody gone tell me what to eat now. It’s too late already.”

  “Here you go wid this again,” Justice said. “All I said was watch what you eat. Ma, you real stubborn, you always hollerin’ about goin’ ta meet ya maker. I guess you wanna meet him wid a pork chop sandwich in ya hand. I guess the doctor don’t know what he talkin’‘bout when he told you to lay off that pork, huh?”

  “I’m havin’ me some pork whenever the mood hit me,” the old woman said.

  “Okay ma, I done said all I had to say.”

  He got up from the table and headed to the door. Outside Justice’s ride was getting impatient. The man began incessantly honking the car’s horn.

  Melquan and Mike Copeland didn’t see the car before. The loud sound of the horn, clued them. They were able to put two and to the together. Discreetly, Melquan slipped out the car and took up a strategic position under the stairs in the building’s lobby. He left the driver for Mike Copeland to handle.

  “A’ight ma, goodnight… I gotta go. I’ll call ya later,” Justice said.

  “Take care boy, and stay off da streets and outta trouble,” she said, kissing Justice on the cheek.

  “I will ma. I love you, bye.”

  The sound of footsteps descending down the stairs echoed throughout the hallway. The heavy thuds snapped Melquan out of his murderous trance. He removed the gun from his waistline, hid beneath the steps and readied himself for his d
ate with destiny.

  Going down the stairs was an afterthought for Justice. His mind was thinking about finding Melquan and finishing what he had started. He couldn’t wait to run down on him, and hit him for his whole stash. He was about to do a sweep of the projects to see if they could spot Melquan. The home invasion on Melquan’s mother’s apartment was a nice come-up, but Justice wanted more. He hit the last step and suddenly he heard his name.

  “Justice…”

  Instantly he realized that there was no friendliness in the voice. Justice thought about reaching for his gun, but remembered he left it in the car. He spun around slowly, hoping it was all just a figment of his imagination. He soon realized it wasn’t. Melquan stood face to face with the man who violated his mother’s home. He clenched his teeth and tightened his grip on his gun.

  “Yo, I heard you was lookin’ me?” Melquan snarled. “Well you just found me, muthafucka!”

  Justice made a weak attempt to turn and run. Melquan’s quick reflexes wouldn’t have it. His muscle fiber twitched so fast, that three shots rang out before Justice could successfully take a step toward the door.

  Boom, boom, boom, three loud gun blasts shattered the tranquility of the neighborhood. The shots caught Justice’s accomplice completely off guard. He opened his car door and attempted to rush toward the sound of the gunfire. Before he could aid Justice, Mike Copeland cut him down in a hail of bullets.

  Melquan stood over Justice’s crumpled body and pumped three more slugs into his head and chest. He spit on Justice’s corpse on the way out the building. They fled the crime scene, vanishing into the project’s maze.

  The killings brought no cries of justice from anyone except Justice’s mother. Good riddance was the only sentiment of the community. Since he was an adolescent, Justice had been a menace in the projects. By all accounts he had reaped what he sowned.

  The murders had clearly taken toll on Melquan. He wasn’t accustomed to taking a man’s life so easily. Violence was one thing, murder was something totally different. The act weighed heavily on his mind. Melquan needed a break from the game, and he took one.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Mo Money Mo…

  “What’s the matter with you, Melquan?” India inquired. “For the last few weeks you haven’t been yourself.”

  Melquan took a deep breath and sighed. “Nothing is the matter with me. I just wish you’d stop askin’ me that question. It’s really gettin’ to be annoyin’.”

  “Well, how else I’m going to find out what’s wrong with you, if I don’t ask” India said. “I don’t care what you say either something’s the matter with you. You’ve been in a funk lately and you’re quiet, and moody. Are you having problems sleeping? If I didn’t know better, I’d swear you were getting high.”

  “Wow…” Melquan managed to say.

  There was no way in the world that he was going to come clean and admit to India that he had killed a man. Even if it was desperate, India would never understand the code of the streets. Melquan felt that all the explaining in the world wouldn’t help her comprehend the strange codes of ethics that belonged on the streets. Melquan chose to hide behind the estranged relationship with his mother.

  “Is the way you’re acting got something to do with the fallout you had with your mother?”

  “Yeah…” Melquan lied.

  “Maybe you should call her. Do you want me to—”

  “Nah, she won’t even take my calls. She’ll just…” his voice trailed.

  “Why don’t you just go over there and see her?”

  “You don’t really know my mother. She doesn’t wanna be bothered. Best thing I can do is leave her alone and give her some space.”

  “I can’t imagine my mother not speaking to me,” India injected.

  “This isn’t ya Cosby-like family household. Everybody deals with problems differently,” he proclaimed.

  Melquan walked away and went to the bedroom, leaving India in the living room with more questions than answers. India shook her head and mentally replayed the exchange. Her instincts told her there was more to the story than Melquan was telling. She just didn’t know.

  Melquan took a break from the streets, hiding out in Co-op City with his girlfriend. Mike Copeland conducted business as usual. He ran every aspect of the drug game. Mike Copeland liked the idea of being the man and was really enjoying it for the first time.

  There were great responsibilities that came with being the man. Mike was now in charge of all aspects of the drug operation, paying the workers, counting the profit, purchasing the product, and bagging it up. He took it upon himself to perform all these tasks with no help. It was a lot of work for one man, but Mike Copeland loved it. This was his chance to prove that he had the business savvy to run the entire show.

  Mike Copeland entered Tess’ apartment, thinking to himself that he had seen functioning crack houses that were cleaner than hers. Although he had manufactured crack in this apartment plenty of times it never ceased to amaze him how nasty the place always was. He walked to the kitchen cabinet, and removed his crack cooking utensils, Pyrex pot, baking soda, plate and razors.

  Tess mut have smelled him and magically appeared from her bedroom. She stood quietly at the enterance to the kitchen.

  “Hey yo, don’t start beastin’ and shit,” Mike warned her. “I don’t need you on my muthafuckin’ back, sweatin’ me fa no blast, especially when da shit ain’t nowhere near ready yet. Bye!”

  “Whatever,” Tess replied, rolling her eyes and walking back to her bedroom.

  Mike started the tedious process of transforming the powder cocaine to the hardwhite the street was buzzing about.

  The water was boiling and he opened several packs of glassine bags in preparation for the finished product. Mike had a lot of weight to cook up. There was no way in the world he was going to be stuck up in a crack house all day. He planned on preparing a half of the food now, satisfy the demand on the street and prepare the rest of the product later.

  Mike busied himself with all aspects of the manufacturing of the crack and time was rapidly flying by. About an hour in, Tess reappeared at the kitchen door. Mike slowly picked up his head from his work, and stared evilly at her.

  “You… You…” Tess stuttered. “You think I could get that blast now, Mike?”

  “Bitch you get on my last muthafuckin’ nerves. You always beastin’… Da shit ain’t goin’ nowhere,” Mike spat, turning away from her.

  He kept walking disregarding Tess’s presence. Suddenly Mike reached down on the plate and tossed a fat piece chunk of the hardwhite on the floor. Tess’ eyes lit up immediately, and she jumped on the floor, scrambling to locate it.

  Mike laughed out loud when Tess began crawling on her hands and knees to get the piece of rock. Her ashy fist clutched the hardwhite, admiring like it was diamond for a second. Climbing to her feet, Tess scurried off to her room. All she needed now was a torch and she’d be zooming to space. Raucous laughter from Mike Copeland’s belly filled the apartment.

  “Crazy Bitch…! Bitch you done lost ya goddamn mind.”

  Tess was too heavily addicted to care that she had been humiliated by Mike. She got what she wanted and Mike Copeland enjoyed a hearty laugh at her expense.

  The slamming of the bathroom door signaledTess’whereabouts. This small enclosure somehow eased her extreme bouts of paranoia. Tess opened up her medicine cabinet and removed her glass stem. The dark soot of the pipe was a telltale sign of high volume of usage. Tess broke a large chunk of the hardwhite off the beige boulder, placed it in the end of her crack pipe, and laid the rest of it on the sink.

  She jammed the stem between her trembling, overanxious, charcoal black lips. Tess simultaneously flicked the lighter with her shaking fingers. Tess inhaled the drug deeply, filling her lungs with a monster blast. The quick euphoric high, raced to her brain, quickly spreading through her bloodstream. Tess exhaled a large cloud of white smoke.

  Her heart thumped so fast,
it threatened to jump out of her heaving chest. Tess repeated the process again and again, but still couldn’t satisfy her unquenchable craving.

  In the kitchen, an assembly line of three packaging crack at Tess’ kitchen table was now reduced to a one-man team. Mike Copeland hurriedly found out there was no glory in bagging up this much crack by himself. Going through the motions, Mike’s mind quickly turned to other things.

  Meanwhile in a span of less than an hour, Tess high had come and gone in the blink of an eye. She touched down and all she was left with was an ever present need for more. It haunted way deep in her brain, Tess was now faced with a major dilemma. She knew Mike wasn’t going to be sympathetic to her crack addiction.

  “Damn,” Mike cursed under his breath. “I gotta piss bad like a muthafucka.”

  Shaking his head, Mike jumped up from the table, and went to the bathroom to relieve himself. He sucked his teeth when he saw that the door was locked. He knocked hard. The sudden pounding on the door frightened Tess. She was on all fours, searching for pieces of crack that she thought fell.

  “Bitch, come up outta there!” Mike shouted. “I gotta use da fuckin’ bathroom.”

  “Wait a minute.” She hastily replied. “Just gimme a second...”

  “Bitch, if you don’t come up outta there right now, I’m gonna kick this fuckin’ door down for real. C’mon, I gotta piss, man!”

  Tess opened the bathroom door and the stench of burnt plastic assaulted his nose immediately. The tiny place was filled with crack residue.

  “Goddamn bitch!” Mike shouted. “What you tryin’ ta kill me up in here?”

  Tess hurriedly brushed pass Mike with her head held low. Too paranoid and high, she was not looking him in the eye. This fact not lost on Mike Copeland.

  “What da fuck wrong wit you?” he chuckled. “What’s wrong? Can’t say nothin’, bitch? That hardwhite got you twisted, huh?”

  Mike stepped inside the bathroom, and whipped out his penis. He was about to drain his bladder, but felt a sharp pain in his anus. He not only needed to piss, it was also necessary for him to take a shit. Mike instinctively grabbed his gun out his waistband and placed it on the sink. Turning around, he pulled down his pants and squatted on the toilet. He shut the door.