Wildin On Staten Island

by Noire

“In stunning and dramatic fashion, suspected murderer and jewelry mastermind Sylvester Mack Morales, also known as Sly McFly, was gunned down at La Guardia airport today while attempting to board an international flight to France…

  Sylvester Mack Morales? Honore sat up straight. Sly ain’t never told her that his last name was Morales too!

  Mr. Morales triggered the suspicions of TSA personnel when he refused to submit to a body cavity search, prompting a violent confrontation that ended with his detainment.

  According to TSA officials, security personnel were forced to open fire on the suspect when he became combative and lunged for their weapons. Early reports indicate that the infamous Pink Lady diamond that was stolen from a Brinks truck earlier this month was found on Mr. Morales’s body. Arrangements are being made to return the gemstone, valued by experts at more than forty-seven million dollars, over to officials at the new Sotheby Museum on Staten Island. More details to come at eleven…

  Honore jumped up from her chair. He had it! Sly had almost gotten away with the Pink Lady diamond! Here she was rotting away in a stankin jail cell and that old bastard had been planning to sneak up outta the country with that sparkling jewel stuck up his ass and then let her go down the tubes for stealing it! He was actually gonna shit on her and let her take the rap!

  “You old rat-ass turncoat!” Honore put her hands over her queasy stomach as she shrieked up at the television. The face of her lifelong mentor and guru stared down at her from the screen and she was glad as fuck that he was dead. “That’s what you get for leaving me by myself, you stank old bastard!” she screamed. “That’s what the fuck you get!”

  $$$$$

  Cucci Momma Jones was all lavender sass and glittering finery as she strutted her stuff through the doors of the New York Diamond and Jewelry Exchange. She was dressed in a slim-fitting lavender dress and sleek purple stiletto pumps, and her thick, wavy hair hung past her shoulders looking just like ebony butter.

  The news about Sly McFly getting popped at La Guardia airport was buzzing on the airwaves all over the city, and as Cucci walked toward her desk and greeted her co-workers she could barely hold back her smile.

  The last few weeks had been rough as fuck, but just like a lucky black cat Cucci had landed on her feet and came out on top. The massacre in the Goode Brothers maintenance warehouse had been enough to wreck her last nerve. That white FBI mothafucka had gotten his top blown off, but where in the fuck that fine Asian nigga had come from with his machine-gun blicky popping off mega bullets, was anybody’s guess. Cucci had recognized him as the dude who had yoked up Honore at the job, and he had jumped down outta the damn ceiling laying everybody down!

  Cucci had been lucky to escape with her life, but the cops who had yanked her outta the river and arrested her at the Staten Island Ferry had tried to fuck her sideways. They’d taken her down to the station house and put some work in on her ass as they questioned her to death and tried to make her spill the beans about the shoot-out in the warehouse and the secret heist of the Pink Lady diamond.

  “What fuckin diamond?” Cucci had stood up in that jailhouse and screamed on them over and over again as they tried to connect the dead bodies in the warehouse to the stolen diamond and then pin the whole shit on her. “Do you see me with any goddamn diamond? If I stole a diamond then where’s that shit at then? Huh? Where the fuck is it at?”

  Of course she knew exactly where that shit was! It was way down at the bottom of that nasty green river! But since the cops didn’t find nothing on her, they didn’t have nothing on her, and without any evidence of a crime being committed specifically by her, they had no choice but to let her go.

  At first Cucci had been puzzled as fuck about a few aspects of the Pink Lady heist, but after watching the news reports it only took her a quick minute to figure out what had actually gone down. Ice Pick was still out there somewhere on the run, but as soon as she heard that Honore had gotten locked up and was being charged with robbery and murder, she hurried up and used that shit to her advantage.

  “Mr. Goldberg,” Cucci had pleaded with the CEO of the New York Diamond and Jewelry Exchange when she was called in front of the big bosses the morning after they released her from questioning. “I swear to God I don’t know what possessed my cousin to do such a terrible thing. But if I had to guess I’d say it was greed. Greed and stupidity! Two horrible traits!

  “But I can assure you that I had no clue about what that silly girl was planning on doing! In fact, she had me suspicious with her shadiness too, and I’m the one who called the FBI hotline and asked them to investigate her! I really hate that people had to die behind the greed that my cousin Honore carries in her heart, but I’m happy the cops finally got to her and took her off the street. My job means so much to me that I wouldn’t risk it for nobody. Especially somebody as coldblooded as Honore.”

  Cucci had walked outta that meeting feeling like she shoulda won an academy award. She had bullshitted her bosses so good that not only had she kept her job, she had gotten a promotion to Honore’s old position, and now she was the bad bitch who traveled all over New York City going from jewelry store to jewelry store stealing discounted stones to be sold underground as crushed ice. She was now the leader of the Crushed Ice Clique. She was now the Queen of fuckin Diamonds, and she planned to reign over her queendom and sit up on her throne for many more years to come!

  Hell yeah, Cucci thought as she gathered around her co-workers in the employee lounge and listened to all the clear people act all happy to hear that the Pink Lady diamond had been recovered.

  “I heard they found it stuck up his rear-end!” one of the older white ladies giggled like she had never heard of such craziness in her whole life. “I mean that guy actually had an asshole full of money!”

  Cucci smiled politely at the old woman but she wasn’t impressed in the least. These basic white mothafuckas might be blinded by the news, but Cucci damn sure wasn’t.

  Because if she had had one Pink Lady diamond in her mouth, and Sly McFly had had another Pink Lady diamond up his ass, then how many more Pink Lady diamonds were out there floating around?

  Just knowing that there were probably multiple stones in existence told Cucci that somebody real cold and slick had been two steps ahead of them the whole damn game.

  And that slick-ass somebody probably had him a Pink Lady diamond too. A real one. And that meant that Handgun Goody, Ice Pick, Cannonball and all the rest of them cut-throat gangstas had gotten shitted on and played out, and screwed right up the ass too!

  Cucci laughed hard as shit as she left the employee lounge and made her way downstairs to the diamond vault. Somebody had gotten away clean with the real fuckin diamond and she wasn’t even mad about that shit. She couldn’t be. She respected the hustle too much to be a hater. It tickled the shit outta her to think that some slick nigga had beat these rich white mothafuckas at their own damn game. There was no doubt in her mind that the real Pink Lady diamond was probably somewhere in Venezuela or the South of fuckin France by now. Getting cut up like a mothafucka!

  Six Months Later

  Prisoner #104579 had beads of sweat dripping from her body even though she was shivering inside and felt a cold chill deep down in her bones. Her legs were gapped wide open on a hospital gurney. Her ankles were strapped to the foot stirrups and one of her wrists was handcuffed to the bedrail.

  She had tried to slip out of confinement twice and was considered a security risk so the room was guarded up. With a murder sentence of two dimes and a nickel hanging around her neck, she was on her way upstate and she had given up hope. She had turned into a real hell-raiser behind bars; stealing shit, starting fights, selling contraband, and shaking down other prisoners for their commissary rations.

  And now she was here.

  Contractions cut through her body at regular intervals and she felt like every muscle fiber she possessed was being torn in half.

  Another massive wave of pain hit her and she grit her teeth and stra
ined, but no matter how hard she grunted and bore down and pushed, the mass that was bulging between her legs refused to budge.

  “Get this shit outta me,” she pleaded under her breath to no one in particular. “Oh God, please get this shit outta me!”

  The pain that radiated within her womb was so intense that she wasn’t sure if she could stay conscious for much longer. But she refused to succumb to the agony and give the people standing around watching the satisfaction of seeing her break down.

  She took a series of shallow breaths as she glanced around the room at the two ass-ugly female guards who were posted up nearby. She glared at them and then looked at the fat prison doctor who was standing between her legs urging her to keep pushing.

  Suddenly reality slapped her in the face and this shit wasn’t about Prisoner 104579 being a problem child no more.

  It was about Honore Morales and the fact that she was about to have herself a brand new baby girl. And not only was she bringing a new life into this world, she had pushed away everybody who had ever loved her, so she was doing it all alone with no family to help her get through it.

  A violent burst of pain smacked the shit outta her and she opened her mouth and screamed at the top of her lungs.

  “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!”

  “Inmate Morales, pay attention!” the doctor said sharply. “Stop screaming and listen! I need you to breathe deeply and bear down. Push as hard as you can!”

  As Honore pushed and strained, various scenes from her life flashed through her mind. All the money, the ballers, the diamonds, the sex, the clothes, the scheming and the outrageous lies… all of that shit had been for nothing. She had chased all that materialism because she had wanted to be the queen of a life that had landed her right where she was at. In jail!

  Determined to make her get-money dreams come true, Honore had gotten burned by the game every which way she turned. And then when shit got real out there, the one man she had trusted above all others, the notorious Sly McFly had turned his fuckin back on her and left her hanging out to dry.

  As rage filled her heart Honore balled up her fists and clenched her teeth and pushed so hard that she damn near blacked out. To her surprise she felt a huge wave of pressure building down there and then something big and warm shot outta her coochie with a whoosh!

  Honore’s eyes flew open. The pain had disappeared and she couldn’t believe that the bloody, screaming little beauty queen the doctor was holding up had actually came out of her body. The baby was perfectly formed. She had all her fingers and toes and she also had a head full of jet-black hair. Her tiny lips trembled as she cried, and when she opened her eyes Honore saw her own hazel eyes reflected back at her.

  Completely mesmerized and in awe of the beautiful creature that she had just produced, Honore cuddled her squalling child against her breasts as the doctor sucked out her nose and mouth and cut the umbilical cord.

  Suddenly the loneliness was no more. With the gift of this child Honore was finally complete. She could give a fuck less about Sly, Cucci, Aunt Frita, or Slick. The only thing that mattered to her was the slippery little bundle that was nestling up against her breast as unconditional love and affection flooded her soul and damn near consumed her heart.

  “My baby,” Honore whispered into the infant’s ear as she cradled her in her free arm. “You’re really here now. Mommy’s baby! Thank the lord! Oh God, I love you so much!”

  Love at first sight was the best way to describe what Honore was feeling. After all those months of being locked down in a dull gray jail, she was finally seeing vibrant colors again and it felt so good.

  In that moment she had forgotten all about the jail sentence she was serving. In her mind she wasn’t chained to no prison gurney with her legs wide open, she was in paradise, holding tightly to her most prized possession. But all that joy and elation came to an abrupt end when the nurse suddenly reached out and took the baby from her arms.

  “It’s time for her to go now,” she said.

  “Wait,” Honore said, reaching out with wild, wide eyes. “What are you doing? Where are you taking her? You gonna give her right back, right?”

  “I’m sorry, Morales,” the nurse said quietly as she shook her head. “It’s time to get you cleaned up and get the child ready to be processed out of the facility.”

  “Outta the facility? Uh-uh, bitch!” Honore spit. “She ain’t going nowhere! Gimme back my goddamn baby!”

  Her maternal instincts kicked into overdrive. Instead of sorrow she felt anger and rage. She wanted her goddamn baby! She didn’t care about hell or high water, jail or no jail, all she wanted was her child!

  Honore struggled to sit up on the gurney as she strained against her handcuff. She couldn’t close her legs because her ankles were strapped down. “She’s mine! I pushed her outta my ass! Gimme back my fucking daughter, bitch!” she demanded.

  “Sorry,” the nurse told her. “A prison cell is no place for a newborn child, and that’s where you’ll be living for a long, long time.”

  “Bitch!” Honore lashed out and tried to smack the nurse with her free hand. She missed and started bucking up and down uncontrollably on the stretcher. “I want my babyyyy! Don’t take my fuckin babyyyyyy!!”

  Fighting like a wild animal Honore thrashed and shook and raged against the world. Ignoring the blood seeping from between her legs she screeched and snarled and snapped her teeth trying to bite the shit outta the nurse as the guards rushed over to immobilize her.

  “Where y’all taking her?” Honore sobbed pitifully. “Where the fuck are y’all taking my baby? Please! Just tell me where she’s going!”

  The prison nurse had witnessed these types of violent outbursts many times before and she went on about her business silently, displaying zero emotion. All the paperwork had already been approved by the department of social services and signed by a judge, and after recording the infant’s weight, height, and vital signs, she dressed the newborn and wrapped her in a warm blanket. Ignoring the chaos, she held the infant tightly in her arms as she stepped out of the room with the sounds of the mother’s screams echoing off the walls behind her.

  Standing under the bright lights of the hallway, the nurse approached a well-dressed young black man who stood anxiously nearby with his attorney. With a small smile playing on her lips, the nurse placed the precious bundle of joy into his waiting arms before turning away to head back into the delivery room. Before she entered she paused with her hand on the doorknob as she listened to the nutcase who had just given birth shrieking out the most horrible obscenities and threats that one could imagine.

  “Trust me, you’re better off without her, lil baby,” the nurse muttered under her breath as she looked over her shoulder and watched the new father cuddling his baby with tears in his eyes. “Thank God you got you a good daddy because your jailbird momma is crazy as shit.”

  A few years later…

  The elegant wedding chapel was packed all the way out. The bride was brown and beautiful in her off-the-shoulder lacy white dress complete with an elegant satin train that flowed behind her like she was a royal princess.

  The groom looked diesel and handsome in his white tuxedo, and standing beside him, dressed in black, his best man looked damn good too.

  Seated halfway back in the pews and on the groom’s side of the aisle was a beautiful young woman. Her waist-length natural hair was twisted in jet-black coils. Her brown eyes were serene as she looked toward the front of the church and listened to the binding words of matrimony as they fell from the minister’s mouth.

  “…To have and to hold, to honor and to cherish, from this day forward until death do you part?”

  The beautiful woman sitting in the pews smiled inside. They had history together, her and the groom did. Watching him standing up there holding onto his bride made her heart ache for all the things that she had missed out on, and for all the things that she would never have.

  She had been surprised to get th
e wedding invitation and the only reason she had come is because her and the groom used to be real cool. They had cared about each other back in the day. And even after all the crazy shit that had happened in their lives, she still cared about him now.

  She watched the groom’s hands tremble as he held his ring out to his gorgeous bride. The cute chocolate sista couldn’t stop grinning as the man she was marrying slid the symbol of his loyalty onto her finger.

  The beautiful chick couldn’t actually see the ring from where she was sitting, but she knew without a doubt that it was straight up top-shelf finery and that its diamonds were some of the best that money could buy.

  The preacher said a few more words and then the vows were completed. When it came time to seal the nuptials the groom raised the bride’s veil and kissed her full lips. The room erupted in clapping and laughter as the new couple turned around to face their family and friends as one.

  Somehow, the beautiful young lady found herself leaving the pew and joining the long line of guests who were waiting to congratulate the new couple. When it was her turn to greet them the beautiful chick smiled at the bride and shook her hand, and then she stepped over to the new husband and looked deeply into his eyes.

  “Never in a million years did I think you would do some crazy shit like this.”

  The groom bust out laughing and swept her up in his strong arms and planted kisses all over her cheek.

  “Jewelz! Goddamn, baby! It’s been a long time, lil sister! I didn’t know if you was gonna come, but I’m glad you made it.”

  Jewelz punched him lightly on the arm. “Stop playing, Wild Man. You? Getting cuffed?” She rolled her eyes and smiled. “Shit, I had to come see this for myself, homeboy.”

  Mindful of his bride, Jewelz squeezed Wild Man’s hand tightly and was preparing to move on when she felt somebody tugging at the back of her dress.