A Sticky Situation

by Kiki Swinson

  Now, it was still kind of dark outside and the fact that it was cloudy wasn’t gonna bring the sunlight into the sky any sooner. However, the streetlights gave me a little something to work with as I navigated down the narrow street. Dressed in my hooded sweatsuit and sneakers, I pulled my hood farther down over the top of my face and walked with my head down as I made my way toward Melody’s apartment. I found myself walking over dozens of syringes and broken needles. The sight of it was scary. I wondered how in the hell the children played out there. It was too dangerous, if you asked me. Someone definitely needed to clean up these streets.

  “Got them yellow bags,” I heard a guy’s voice yell, but I didn’t look up to see if he was talking to me. I figured whatever it was he was trying to sell wouldn’t do me any good. First of all, I didn’t have a habit, and second, it wasn’t gonna get me closer to my man so I kept it moving. I took a few more steps and ran into two women who were standing in the walkway. To keep from moving out of their comfort zone, so to speak, I walked around them. When I passed them I noticed one of the chicks pushing a needle into the other woman’s neck. The shit terrified the hell out of me, so I jumped.

  “Yeah, yeah, push all that shit up in me.” The woman smiled as she instructed the chick with the syringe. Then in the blink of an eye, her smile wasted away and was replaced with an expression of fury. “Bitch, you tricked me up again!” I heard her yell. She snatched the syringe out of the other chick’s hand. “This shit ain’t nothing but cold-ass tap water!”

  “Whatchu talking about?” the other woman asked.

  “You know what the fuck I’m talking about! Don’t just stand there and act like you didn’t switch the shit up.”

  “I didn’t!” the woman fired back. “I put every last bit of dope I had left in there, so the dope must’ve been bad.”

  “Come on, now. What kind of game you playing? That heroin came from the nigga that be in Melody’s house and his shit is always good, so you got one over on me this time. But that’s all right ’cause I’m gonna get your trifling ass back!” She threw the syringe on the ground and stormed off in the direction I was walking.

  “Yeah, whatever,” the other chick said and walked off in the opposite direction.

  I continued to walk forward, leaving them behind, but somehow one of them managed to catch up with me. “You got to watch out for these conniving-ass bitches out here. They will steal from you in a heartbeat, and the fucked-up shit about it is that they’ll do it right in your face and make you think they’re doing something else.”

  Instead of responding to her comment, I ignored her and started walking faster. She noticed me trying to be evasive and said, “Hey, what’s up? You holding?”

  With my head down, I said, “Nope.”

  “Whatchu trying to score?” she pressed.

  “Nothing,” I sighed.

  “What, you the police or something?” she asked, then stopped in her tracks.

  “No, I am not,” I replied, aggravated and disgusted.

  “Well, if you ain’t, then you better pull off that hood ’cause if you don’t, niggas around here are going to think that you’re either the police or a stick-up kid, and they’ll start shooting at you.”

  Alarmed by what this woman had just said, I stopped in my tracks and immediately pulled my hood off my head. At that very moment, we recognized each other.

  “Wait a minute, you’re that same lady I seen out here about two weeks ago, aren’t cha?”

  I nodded.

  She walked a little closer to me. “But I thought you said you didn’t get high?”

  “I don’t.”

  “Then what are you doing out here this time of the morning?”

  I sighed. “It’s a long story.”

  “Well, whatever kind of story it is, it couldn’t be worth you running behind it.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Listen honey, these streets aren’t no joke. They will swallow your ass right up if you let them, and then you’re gonna be walking around here looking just like me. And I’m sure you don’t want that.”

  “Look, ma’am,” I said, but was abruptly cut off.

  “My name is Faith.”

  “Well, Faith, like I was saying, I am not out here looking for drugs. I am out here looking for my man.”

  “What’s your man’s name?”

  “His name is Seth and he drives a green Magnum.”

  “Oh, I know who you’re talking about. That’s the guy who hustles out of Melody’s spot.”

  “Yeah, that’s him,” I replied eagerly, hoping that she would take the bait.

  “Well, he’s sitting down in her house as we speak.”

  “Do you know if he’s been down there all night?”

  “Oh nah, he never stays out here all night. He always closes down shop like about nine or ten o’clock, and then he turns right back around and comes back around this time.”

  “I wonder why he comes back out here so early?”

  “Shit, you don’t know?” Faith chuckled.

  “Know what?”

  “That’s when you make the most money. Dopefiends like me wander all over the city this time of the morning, looking for a pill of good dope. To us, it’s like waking up and going out for breakfast. We have to have at least one or two pills of some good heroin to get our day started. As soon as we run across some dope that’ll knock your socks off, we’ll tell everybody we know. Believe me, word of mouth around here will either kill ya or make you rich.”

  “Well, let me ask you this.” I pulled her to the side when I saw a guy walking in our direction. After he passed us, I said, “Have you dealt with him directly?”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Have you bought heroin directly from him?”

  “A couple of times. Why?”

  “Have you ever been into the house?”

  “Oh nah, he won’t let anybody in the house except for his little street crew.”

  “So, how do y’all make the trade off?”

  “Early in the morning, we got to go to the back door and hand our money through the window. But during the day time, we got to go through one of the little watch-out boys he has standing outside of the apartment.”

  “How well do you know Melody?”

  “Well enough. Why?”

  “Would you know if they were fucking around with each other?”

  “If they are, no one knows about it because she supposed to be messing with the big guy, Mike.”

  “Well, have you noticed anything between them two?”

  “No, but that still doesn’t mean they aren’t. Like I said, if they are sneaking around, they are keeping it on the D.L.”

  “Well listen, I want you to do me a favor.”

  “What’s up?”

  “Would you walk with me down to Melody’s place, so it won’t look suspicious when I try to look through her window?”

  “I’ll walk with you down there, but I know you ain’t going to be able to peep in her windows because she has black curtains covering every single window.”

  “Damn! What am I going to do now?”

  “I’ll tell you what: if you give me ten dollars, I’ll have a reason to knock on her door and look and see if I can see something.”

  I reached inside my sweatpants, pulled out the only twenty-dollar bill I had to my name, and handed it to Faith. “I want my change back,” I told her.

  “All right,” she replied and we started walking.

  My heart started beating like crazy. “So, what do you want me to do while you go up to the house?”

  “Just stand back a couple of feet and act like you’re watching my back or something.”

  “But what if he sees me?”

  “If you stand around the other side of the building, he won’t.”

  “All right,” I said again because at last, it seemed like a plan was coming together.

  When we got up to Melody’s apartment Seth’s car was,
indeed, parked out front. I walked by it and rubbed my hand across the hood to feel if it was still warm, and it was. “You weren’t lying,” I said to Faith.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The hood of his car is still warm so you were right; he did just get here.”

  Faith smiled, revealing her yellow-stained teeth, and turned to walk toward the back of the building. I followed her to the edge of the building and stopped. Faith tapped on the window, told Seth what she wanted, handed him the money and got her drugs in her hands in less than sixty seconds flat. I was truly amazed at how their transaction went so smoothly. When Faith walked back around the building, I held out my hand for my change and asked her if she was able to get a look into the house.

  “Nah, I couldn’t see shit because he turned off the kitchen light when he came back to the window with the dope.”

  “What about before? Did you get to look inside when he first took your money?”

  “Nope, because he only cracked the window just enough so that he would be able to take the money out of my hands.”

  “Damn!” I said as we walked back down the street toward my car.

  “What’s wrong?” Faith asked me.

  “I am so frustrated right now, I could scream.”

  “Well, don’t do that,” she warned me.

  I sighed heavily and was about to say something when I got sidetracked by someone’s screen door closing. When I turned around and saw Seth walking outside toward his car, my face lit up. Instead of bringing attention to myself by standing in the middle of the sidewalk, I pulled Faith over to a car parked a couple feet from where we were. I took a seat on the hood and acted as if we were talking. Faith stumbled a bit but she caught her balance. “Whatchu doing?” she wondered, and before I could answer her, Melody came storming out the front door behind Seth, with bare feet and wearing a skimpy-looking night gown.

  “Wait, Seth! I am so sorry! Please let me make this right. I will do anything,” she begged.

  Seth hit the alarm on his car to unlock the door. “You better get the fuck away from me before I smack the hell out of you.”

  Melody grabbed his shirt. “Please let me make this right!” she said again.

  “Didn’t I tell you to get the fuck away from me?” he snapped.

  “Please don’t go. I am sorry. I promise I won’t do it anymore.” She began to cry.

  “I know you won’t, because after Mike gets through with your ass, you’re gonna be sorry for real!”

  Melody literally got down on her knees and started sobbing uncontrollably. “Seth, please don’t tell Mike. He will kill me!”

  Seth burst into laughter. “Yeah, I know he will, and that’s probably what your silly ass needs. Now, get your dumb ass off the ground and get back in the house.”

  Melody got off her knees and before she turned around to go back into the house, she looked at Seth and said, “Please give me another chance.”

  “Come on now, how many chances do you want? This was my second time catching you sniffing that shit, so I ain’t gon’ let it slide this time.”

  Melody stood there in silence for about ten seconds and then I heard her say, “You know what? You can go right ahead and tell him but just know that when you do, I’m gon’ come right behind you and tell him me and you been fucking.”

  Hearing her come out of her mouth and say that they had been intimate gave me a queasy feeling in my stomach. I almost threw up, but I held my composure long enough to see Seth smack the shit out of her. He hit her so hard, I heard her ass slide across the rocks.

  “Yeah, and while you’re at it, tell him I smacked the hell out of you, too.”

  Melody gave him a look of disbelief as she held the side of her face with her hand. I thought she was going to get up and charge at him, but she didn’t. Seth got into his car and flew out of there like a bat out of hell. I started to get into my car and follow him, but I decided against it when I saw Melody trying to stand to her feet.

  “Where you going?” Faith asked me when I began to walk toward Melody.

  “I am going to go and talk to her.”

  “Well, I’m gone. I’ll be around here somewhere if you need me,” she said and walked in the opposite direction.

  By the time I got within a couple feet of Melody, she stood to her feet and began to brush the small fragments of dirt off her butt. “You all right?” I asked her.

  Startled by my sudden appearance, she looked at me and said, “Oh shit, you scared me.”

  “I’m sorry. But are you all right?”

  “I think I got a couple of scrapes and bruises on my ass, but I’ll be all right.” She limped toward her front door.

  I started walking along side of her. “Need some help?”

  “Nah, I’m all right.”

  “Hey, wait. Can I ask you something?”

  Melody stopped and turned around. “What is it?”

  I took a couple of steps closer to her, so I could get a better look at her face. “I just want to let you know that I saw what happened to you. Now, I don’t know what made him smack you like he did, but I just want to let you know that you shouldn’t tolerate a man putting his hands on you.”

  Melody smiled. “Girl, that wasn’t nothing. Me and him just had a misunderstanding. Trust me, he’ll be back after he calms down.”

  “Is he your man?” I asked, hoping she would give me the information I’d been searching for.

  “Nah, but we’re close friends, though.”

  “What do you mean by close friends?”

  “See, me and him got a thing where he’s got his girl and I got my man, but we still find the time to spend together while he’s here.”

  “It doesn’t bother you that he has a girlfriend?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because from what he tells me, she’s in jail. And what can she possibly do for him while she’s in there? Nothing. So that’s why I’m keeping her spot warm.”

  Listening to this fucking slut tell me that she and Seth been fucking, and that she was keeping Samantha’s spot warm until she came out of prison, sent me a clear message that I must’ve been out of the equation, for real. What really made me nauseous was the fact that I was standing directly in front of a Section Eight bitch that got to fuck my man more than I did. Now what part of the game was that? I mean, what did I have to do to get this man to see that I had more to offer than Samantha and this low-class whore right here? Did I have to lose everything I had worked so hard for just to get down to his level? I mean, come on. What was this world coming to?

  After going back and forth with this dingbat about her drama-filled life, I ended our conversation with my “I wish you the best,” spiel and got the hell out of Dodge. Believe you me, I wanted to burst her bubble and tell her who the hell I really was, but I figured if I had, I probably would not have gotten as much information out of her stupid ass. So in a way, I was kind of happy that I did the right thing . . . even though I would have liked to see her expression when I let the cat out of the bag that I was his woman, for real. Anyway, all was not lost. I got what I came out there for. Now, I could move forward with my plans to shut all this shit down.

  SETH

  You Gotta Watch Your Own Back

  Melody was one sneaky-ass bitch! I couldn’t believe she stole another pill of dope from me and tried to push the shit up her nose while I was in the next room. Was she crazy, or was she fucking stupid? Whatever the hell she was, I knew she’d better not try that bullshit again, because if she did, I was going to definitely have to tell Mike. Now, I knew he was not gonna be too happy about it but hey, what could I say? His bitch was a fiend and I was not gonna take the fall for her ass. It was not gonna happen. The best thing for me was to keep the dope on me at all times and make sure she stayed the hell away from me. I was not trying to fuck her no more, and I was not really trying to have too much talk for her, either.

  According to Mike, we only had about th
ree more weeks’ worth of dope and we were done. That meant that we were going to close down the shop for good and I could take my money and get as far away as I could from Melody’s dumb ass. Me and my baby Samantha could go live big and do whatever the fuck we wanted to; that was, if Maxine didn’t decide to wreck our plans. She did have the power to throw a monkey wrench at any given moment, so I was going to have to think of something to prevent her from doing it. Shit, I might have to start giving her the dick again and make her think that everything was OK between us. Knowing her, though, she’d probably see right through it. I just hoped she didn’t fuck with Samantha because she was the type of chick that would go upside Maxine’s head and wouldn’t think about the repercussions until later. I mean, Samantha would hurt her real bad. I didn’t want my baby going back to prison behind some shit I could have handled, so I was going to have to think of something real fast. Whether I wanted to believe it or not, Maxine hadn’t talked to me for over two weeks so I knew she was really upset with me and was plotting on a way to get me back. I was gonna have to put on my thinking cap as well.

  Mike and I hooked up at a nearby gas station so he could furnish me with another batch of dope. He handed me a Ziploc bag of twenty-five hundred pills. I looked at the motherfucker like he was crazy.

  “Man, we ain’t gon’ be able to get rid of all this shit by nightfall,” I told him.

  “Yo, I just heard it’s a drought out there, so trust me, dopefiends from all over are going to be coming at you.”

  “You know the police been riding real hard these last few days.”

  “That’s because niggas is running their mouths. But don’t sweat it. Remember, you got some thorough-ass young’uns out there with you, and the way I see it, they ain’t gon’ let the police kick up in that spot.”