A Sticky Situation

by Kiki Swinson

  As soon as we entered into the supply room, he closed the door and flipped the light switch. We were in a room full of cleaning supplies, and the smell of the ammonia, bleach, and disinfectant permeated the entire room. It wasn’t too bad where we couldn’t breathe, but I knew we weren’t going to be in there long, so I was happy. Now Mendez didn’t waste any time to pull me into his arms. Immediately after I fell into his embrace, I stiffened up.

  “What’s wrong with you?” he asked.

  “I’m just not in the mood right now.”

  “What is it going to take for you to get in the mood?”

  “Nothing.”

  “What do you mean nothing?”

  “Want me to be honest? I’m just not feeling you anymore.”

  He released me from his embrace. “What the fuck you mean by that?”

  I stood there with my arms folded near my breasts and sighed heavily. “Do I need to spell it out for you? I don’t want to do this shit with you anymore!” I snapped.

  Mendez snapped too. He became so angry, he grabbed me by my neck and forced my back up against the wall with his right hand. His actions took me by surprise. “Bitch, do you know who the fuck you talking to like that? I don’t let my wife disrespect me, so I damn sure ain’t gon’ let you do it.”

  “You better let me go before I scream!” I threatened him.

  “Go ahead and scream. Ain’t nobody gonna hear you,” he dared me with a psychotic expression plastered all over his face.

  “Let me go!” I screamed.

  He added more pressure around my neck and then he pressed his body against mine. “Bitch, you owe me! So, I’m about to collect!”

  “So, what, you about to rape me or something?” I roared.

  Before he could answer me, someone knocked on the door and startled the hell out of us. He released me from his grip and immediately walked over to the door. “Who is it?” he whispered.

  “It’s me, Clayton,” his friend said.

  Mendez opened up the supply room door. “What’s up, man?” He smiled.

  “Yo’ man, you need to wrap that up. I can hear you out here.”

  “All right. I’m coming,” Mendez assured him and began to shut the door.

  “A’ight, well I’ma stay out here just in case some inmate tries to come around this door and snoop around.”

  “All right.” Mendez sighed with frustration and then he closed the door shut. And before my heart could skip a beat his body was pressed against me again, but this time he had his mouth pressed to my ear and the words he whispered made my skin crawl. “You better thank God Clayton saved your ass! But just remember that this shit ain’t over. I’m gonna get what’s mine.”

  When he took a step back from me I stood there and looked at him like he was fucking insane. It was obvious this man wasn’t dealing with a full deck, so I wanted him to get the hell away from me as soon as possible. As he moved toward the door, I followed suit. But he made it clear that he wasn’t through with me, because right before he grabbed a hold of the doorknob, he grabbed me by my arm, swung me around, and forced my face against the wall like a police officer would do someone resisting arrest.

  “What are you doing?” I snapped.

  “Shut up!” he demanded.

  Next thing I knew, this motherfucker had pressed his dick and started grinding on me while he unzipped my pants and slid his right hand down inside of it. At that moment, I started bucking at him by trying to elbow him in his side, simultaneously tugging on his hands because at that point, this nigga had my entire coochie in the palm of his hands. He was literally trying to get an arousal out of me.

  “Get off me!” I screamed once more.

  He tried to muffle my mouth to keep Clayton from hearing me, but it didn’t work. Clayton jiggled the doorknob and said, “Come on Mendez, we gotta go man.”

  Hearing Clayton’s voice gave me the notion that I was safe and that Mendez’s spree of sexual favors was over. When he finally let me go, which was about three seconds later, I gathered as much saliva to the front my mouth as I could and abruptly turned around and spit every drop of it right in his face. And when it hit him, the shit fell slowly down his left cheek. Lucky for me, it caught him off guard, so before he could get his thoughts together and react, I flew out of the supply room with my pants unbuttoned.

  “I’ma get you, bitch!” I heard him yell from behind.

  But I ignored him and kept it moving. Thankfully, Clayton was back there with him, because I truly believed that motherfucker would have tried to run me down and kill me. Lately he had gotten so possessive, and I couldn’t get with that shit. Other inmates had noticed it too, which was one of the reasons why rumors had been circulating about our relationship. Mendez’s lieutenant pulled me in his office and questioned me about my relationship with Mendez not too long ago, but I told him there wasn’t one. Since he didn’t have any hardcore evidence, he had to leave us alone. Boy, was Mendez lucky. He just didn’t know how heartless I could get. Because if I really wanted to bury his sorry ass, I could set him up and get his dumb ass fired. But the warden would launch a full investigation on our asses that would surely prevent these assholes from releasing me to go to the halfway house. They would make me do the six months halfway house time right there, and I couldn’t have that. No way. The best thing for me was to stay away from his ass and that’s exactly what I intended on doing.

  SETH

  Putting One In The Head

  Later that night, I was able to close the shop down early because we got rid of every pill of dope Mike packed inside the Ziploc bag. On my way out, Melody asked me for ten dollars so she could order a pizza for her son. Her mother was bringing him over in the next half hour, so I handed her the dough and bounced.

  Mike met me in our usual spot, but this time, he wasn’t alone. He had a couple of niggas posted up in his whip with him. One nigga was sitting beside him in the passenger seat, and the other cat was posted up in the back seat. It was too dark to see their faces, but I said, “What’s up?” to them anyway.

  “You ready?” Mike asked me after I handed him the dough.

  “As I will ever be.” I smiled and looked down at my watch; it was ten minutes after nine. That meant I had a couple of hours to play around with before I made my move on Jay. Since I knew that Jay wouldn’t be leaving his spot until sometime after midnight, I told Mike I was going to make a quick run and then call him when I was ready. After he said OK, I hopped back into my car.

  Before I pulled off, Mike instructed me to call him from a pay phone before I made my move. “Remember, you gotta give Trina enough time to run over there and pick up my dough first, a’ight?”

  “A’ight,” I said, and then we parted ways.

  Once I was back on the road, two things popped in my mind. The first was that I knew I had to stash my dough at my mom’s crib. I also knew I had to make a trip over to Maxine’s crib so I could do some making up. As much as it was killing me to give into that bitch, she had me by the balls. I figured I was going to have to do what I had to until I could come up with another plan to get from under her paws. I mean, that bitch was psycho, and I felt it in her voice that she wasn’t playing any more games with me, so I was going to have to lay down for a few. But as soon as I got a plan together, I was going to be ghost and it wasn’t gon’ be shit she could do about it. That’s my word!

  When I arrived at my mom’s house she was up watching television, so I kissed her on her forehead and went to my bedroom. I had this little storage compartment right over my bed in the air conditioning vent. I grabbed the screwdriver from the toolbox in my closet and loosened the screws on the metal plate to the vent. Once the plate was finally off, I reached inside and grabbed the small metal box that was attached to the wall with two magnets.

  “Seth, I’m getting ready to go to bed now so if you need me, I’ll be in my room,” my mother informed me from the other side of my bedroom door.

  “OK.” I snatched the box from th
e vent before she decided to be nosey and come into my room to see what I was doing. As I was about to lock my door, I heard her footsteps as she walked away. When I heard her close the door to her room, I sat on the edge of my bed and emptied out all the dough I had stashed away in the box. When I added the money I’d earned that night, I came up with a sum total of sixty-seven grand. And from the looks of things by the time I ran through Mike’s whole package, I was going to be at least three to four hundred thousand dollars strong. Just the thought of it began to get my dick hard. Not to mention the ideas that were going through my mind about how I was going to spend it. Shit, a nigga like me was going to be straight for a very long time. If I played my cards right, me and Samantha could escape from this bitch and head out to Mexico. Maxine’s dumb ass wouldn’t be able to stop our show then. Freedom from her would be a beautiful thing.

  As I was packing all my dough back into the box, my cell phone rang. When I looked down at the CallerID screen and saw a number I didn’t recognize, I elected not to answer it and pressed the IGNORE button. As soon as I stuck my phone back into the holster, it rang again. When I looked down at the screen once more, the same number popped up. I figured that whoever was calling me had to be important, so I answered it.

  “Hello,” I said.

  “Hey Seth, this is Trina.”

  “What’s up?”

  “I’m just calling to tell you it’s about to go down, so meet me at the spot.”

  “A’ight,” I said and hung up.

  From that moment, I knew that my actions were going to change my life forever. If I had an ounce of guilt in my heart for what I was about to do to Jay, it really didn’t matter at that point because I had already given my word to Mike. I told him I was going to take care of it, and in this game, you couldn’t give a man your word and go back on it. Actions like that would cause you to get killed. So I stuck an “H” on my chest, put my moneybox back into place, tightened the screws on the vent, and grabbed my keys to head back onto the streets. Before I exited my mom’s crib, I changed into a pair of dark blue overalls and slipped on a pair of old run-down Timbs I had in the back of my closet. I didn’t have a ski mask at my disposal, so I decided to do without.

  The whole time I was driving, my heart was beating one hundred miles per hour. It wasn’t like I was scared to do this nigga in because that wasn’t the case. What was fucking me up on the inside was that I was having an adrenaline rush. Picturing myself splattering this nigga’s brains all over the pavement for a large sum of cash put a huge smile on my face. I pressed down on the accelerator because I figured the quicker I got over there and got the job done, the sooner I got my money. And guess what? That was what I did. Judging from my watch, it only took me approximately fifteen minutes to get out there.

  I had surveyed the area the day before, so I knew which position I would take to do Jay in. I parked my whip two blocks away from the spot, but before I got out of my car, I dialed Trina back at the number she used earlier.

  “Hello,” she said.

  “Ay yo, Trina, this is Seth. Where you at?”

  “I’m about to pull up to the spot right now. Why? Where you at?”

  “I’m walking up the block.”

  “All right. Well, give me a few minutes to get in and out and then you can do your thing.”

  “A’ight.”

  I sat my phone down on the passenger seat of my car, pulled out my .50 caliber Desert Eagle from underneath the driver’s seat and made sure the joint was fully loaded with hollow points. I cocked it back, loading one in the chamber, and stuffed the pistol inside the pockets of my overalls.

  I paced myself as I moved toward Jay’s spot. My heart was still pumping mighty fast, but it wasn’t like before. I knew I would be able to function properly while I executed my mission. When I got there, I noticed Trina’s Infiniti parked on the opposite side of the street from Jay’s spot. When I didn’t see her in the car, I took a couple steps backward and knelt by a tree. Thankfully, the tree was big enough to hide my entire body, plus it gave me a helluva view to check out my surroundings. While I was back there, I was able to see everything moving. So far, I could see only one person hanging out on the streets. It looked like a fiend was searching for something on the ground, but after he found what he was looking for, he grabbed it up and scattered like a roach. About five more minutes had passed and Trina still hadn’t come out of the house, and I was getting tired of kneeling down on the ground. When I stood up to stretch, I heard their voices echoing from around the building. It sounded like they were both laughing at a joke Jay told her, so I knew this would be the perfect time to knock him.

  When they came from around the building, Jay was standing about five feet away with his back facing me. When I took the first step and aimed my pistol at him, Trina fucked around and looked into my direction, which caused this nigga to turn around and look over his shoulder. When Jay turned around and saw me aiming my pistol at him, he tried to make a run for it but I started busting my shit off at him. Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! My burner roared like a cannon when the bullets exploded from the barrel. I knew Jay didn’t have a chance of escaping. When I looked down on the ground at him, I knew he was gone when I saw two of the four bullets had struck him in his head. Homeboy was laid out, his head surrounded by a puddle of his own blood, with his eyes open as if he was still alive.

  Trina was struggling with her keys, trying to get into her car. All of a sudden, bullets started ringing out again. Two niggas dressed in black ran up on the scene and started firing shots. Bullets were flying everywhere, so I dove back behind the tree to take cover. When I felt like I was in a good position, I started busting my gun right back at them. Those niggas didn’t know what to do because they couldn’t see me, so they decided to retreat. I was glad, too, because I didn’t have enough ammo on me to keep those niggas off of me. I guess I did a good thing by diving back behind the tree, or else my ass would’ve been lying next to Jay. I didn’t make a move until I heard car tires squeal down the street in the opposite direction. I rushed over to Trina to see if she was all right but she was slumped over on the ground. When I turned her over, I saw that she had been shot twice. I also noticed that she was drifting in and out of consciousness, so I grabbed her into my arms.

  “Hold on shorty, don’t die on me. I’m gon’ get you out of here.”

  “Awwww, I’m in so much pain and my skin is burning so bad.”

  “Wait, Trina, don’t panic. Calm down, I’ma get you some help.” I lifted her from the ground.

  “I d-d-don’t think I am going to make it,” Trina said, her words slurring.

  “Yes, you are. Stop talking like that, shorty. I’ma get you some help, and then me and Mike are going to get the niggas who did this to you.”

  I continued to reassure her and carried her down toward my car. People started pouring out of their houses to see what was going on but I tuned their asses out after Trina said, “Mike is the one who did it.”

  “He what?” I stopped in my tracks.

  “Mike set this whole thing up so you and Jay could get killed.”

  “But why? I mean, what did I do? I ain’t been nothing but loyal to that nigga.”

  “What I am about to tell you, I want you to keep this to yourself,” Trina began. “And the only reason why I am telling you is because I want to clear my conscience and do what’s good before I leave this world.”

  “Whatchu talking about? I’m not gonna let you die.”

  Trina started coughing up blood, so I lifted her head up. She said, “Mike owes two brothers from New Orleans, named Bruce and Scottie, millions of dollars. And if he doesn’t pay them back by the end of the month, they told him they were going to kill him and his wife. So all the money you and Jay made for him, he needs that back so he can pay the people he owes. And to do that, he had to get rid of y’all.”

  “So, who are these niggas?”

  “His cousins. I’m sure you saw them earlier tonight when they were wi
th him.”

  “Ahh shit! That was them?”

  “Yep. Mike only had them in the truck with him so they could see how you looked.”

  “A’ight, but why didn’t he get his cousins to kill Jay, and then kill me next?”

  “Because he didn’t want to make it look like two isolated incidents. He wanted it to look like you and Jay were having a shootout, so he could kill two birds with one stone. Luckily for you, Jay forgot to bring his gun outside with him. So you better watch your back.”

  Bugged out by all the shit Trina was telling me, all I could do was shake my head. And right before I tried to ask her another question, she closed her eyes and took her last breath. I panicked and laid her back down on the ground and as soon as I stood back up to make a run for it, I remembered that she had Mike’s profits on her. I dug inside of the purse she had strapped around her neck and pulled out four stacks of money wrapped up in rubber bands, and a plastic bag. I snatched her Blackberry and the holster from her pants and made a run for it.

  SETH

  Trying To Figure Shit Out

  Since the whole thing with Jay and Trina went down the way it did, I decided to lay low at Maxine’s crib. I had been chilling with her for the past four days, and believe me, life there hadn’t been a bowl of cherries. She had been on my ass the last few days because she knew Samantha was coming home today. I couldn’t get out of the bed this morning without her saying something in reference to Sam.

  “Today is the big day for your girlfriend, huh?” she asked.

  I ignored her and headed to the shower. But that didn’t stop her, though. Before I could even blink my eyes good, she was on my heels, rubbing the shit in my face. I guess she wanted to get a reaction out of me.