by Coffee
They took heed to his lethal warning and spread the fuck out. Satisfied with the distance, he placed his gun on the ground as he kneeled down beside him. Removing the shirt off of his back, he covered BG’s face. No one else was going to get the opportunity to see his homie that way.
Snot ran from his nose and over his lips as he blinked back unstoppable tears. “God, why mannnn? Why the fuck you didn’t protect him, bruh?”
Ace looked at BG from top to bottom, noticing his finger curled around the trigger of his gun. He removed it from his hand, then he grabbed his off of the ground, placing them both in the small of his back.
He stood to his feet and hovered over BG in the same manner a watch dog would its property. He slid his arm across his face to remove some of the wetness as he mugged everyone.
Then chime of a BG’s phone ringing broke Ace’s stare down at every person who stood at bay, waiting to gather enough he say she say to run tell that.
The phone lay not too far from BG. He swooped down and picked it up to see Munch’s number across the screen.
“Fuck!” He didn’t want to be the one to tell him his little brother was gunned down but he knew he had no choice. His body shook from bad nerves, causing his voice to quake as he answered. “Hello.”
“B—Ace? Put BG on the phone, dawg.” Munch was looking at the time. BG should have been there by now.
“Ah. Umm.” Ace started to tell him but paused.
“Dawg, what the fuck wrong with you? Give him the phone.”
“Ahh, Munch, mann,” Ace began breaking down.
Ace was tripping over his words and Munch didn’t have the patience to coax it out of him. He knew enough to know something was wrong.
He didn’t know what the hell that something was but in about twenty minutes, he was sure to find out.
Uptown, New Orleans…
Turning down S. Claiborne Ave., Munch made a left on Louisiana Ave. where a mob of people and flashing lights on emergency vehicles congregated. His gut told him to pull over and when he saw Ace, he definitely parked and ran up on the scene.
Ace was standing off to the right with his hands on the top of his head and his eyes glued on BG when he noticed Munch run up on him from the side.
‘What the fuck happened? And where BG?” Munch looked around the crowd for him but the sky was darkening its hue, making it hard to distinguish faces from afar.
“He gone, bruh.” Ace started crying some more.
“Gone where?” His denial was ever-present. Munch noticed a body off to his side but he wasn’t about to accept that the corpse under the sheet had any business to do with him. But he had to be sure.
Munch pushed Ace out of his way, knocking him off to the side as he bum rushed a path to face his fear.
He ducked under the crime scene tape and made a beeline for the person he prayed wasn’t his brother.
“Get back behind the line.” One officer directed but Munch wasn’t hearing that.
He jogged over to the body, kneeled down by the head and snatched the sheet off of him. “BG! Noooo, man. Fuck no!” he said in horrid disbelief. Tears dropped on command as a surge of pain clutched his heart so strongly he thought he was about to stroke out.
Then suddenly, he was yanked away by Officer Santemore. “You’re contaminating the crime scene.”
“Fuck off me!” Munch growled, elbowing the cop off of him, jerking his way out of his hold so he could go back to where his brother lay.
Santemore pulled out his nightstick and hemmed Munch by the neck, cutting off his air supply and dragging him backwards.
“You think you can do what you want just ‘cause you mad? Huh?” Santemore spoke aggressively in his ear as he pulled the stick tighter against his throat. “You’re in my will house. You do as I say!” He removed the billy club, shoving a gasping Munch off to the side.
Munch stumbled into a few nearby people who caught him. Once he regained his footing and his breath, he charged back toward bitch ass Santemore but a different cop intervened, stopping him.
“Calm down, man. You don’t want to get arrested for whatever you’re thinking about doing. Now let me help you. Do you know the victim?” He started off asking when Munch overheard Santemore talking slick to one of his own.
“He’s one less criminal we gotta worry about,” Santemore said to his colleague, speaking of the deceased.
Munch looked past the policeman attempting to get information on BG and called out to Santemore as he sidestepped around the interrogating officer, pushing him out of his way. “Fuck you and that badge, you pussy bitch!” He pointed his finger dead at him, so there’d be no mistakes who he was gunning for.
His eyes were flooded with retaliation and he was going to make Santemore regret speaking so loosely about his brother. If he would have armed himself with his strap that was in the car, he would have given the coroners another body to examine.
He attempted to march into the lion’s den of cops, a black man’s last standing, but was taken down hostilely by three cops yelling expletives.
“Get down now!”
“Don’t move!”
With his arms chicken winged behind his back, one cop kneeing him in the back, another on his legs and the last one smashing his head against the pavement, all he could was watch his brother lay cold from ground level.
That one was for you, Hakeem, G’Corey thought before he disappeared into the night.
Chapter 30
A week later…
BG’s funeral was about to start but Munch couldn’t get out of the limo. He couldn’t look upon the shell of his baby brother, a boy he raised as his own son for twelve years, and not spazz all the way out. It was best for everybody if he mourned him in solitude.
Reds opted to stay with him. She was unsure how to console him. But she wanted him to know if he was feeling alone, he wasn’t.
The red rims circling Munch’s puffy eyes was evidence of hours’ worth of hardcore crying. He was so devastated. So angry. His fists were tightly balled into his lap. He looked crazed as he stared off into nothingness, looking like he was going to snap at any moment.
Reds was afraid, not of him but for him. His breaths were short, he was factually struggling to breathe. It seemed as if the loss of his BG was literally taking the life away from him.
There was no way the man responsible wasn’t going to pay with his own life.
Reds feared the consequence that the slaying of his brother would bring because she knew there would be one since Munch planned to take vengeance from the Lord’s hand and place them in his.
***
Hours later at the graduation…
The principal called the names of the graduating students one by one. “Shondrick Davenport.”
Ace stood in place, feeling throwed off. He was supposed to be joked out, looking back at BG off in the distant line. But he wasn’t. A day promised to the both of them was now only being given to one.
This shit ain’t even right, God.
“Shondrick Davenport.” He announced his name again when Ace didn’t budge, waving him onto the stage.
Ace stood at the edge of the steps, mesmerized. He heard his name being called but he couldn’t manage to lift his foot.
His classmate behind him understood his hesitation. Every student in the auditorium knew the reason for his pause.
“Come on, you got this.” She encouraged as she slung his arm around her neck and grabbed him around the waist.
As he took guided strides, his knees almost gave out on him, causing him to buckle but she caught him.
A minute later, he stood in of front principal, who handed him his diploma. The girl had stepped out of the way so the photographer could take his picture. But by this time, Ace had broken down fully. The photo was sure to capture the look of a young man who was suffering.
Several names were called after his but the one that brought everyone to their feet out of respect for a fellow Lion was the call of BG’s.
/> “Nicholas McMillan?” The principal announced and Munch, with a heavy heart, walked across the stage in his place and in honor of his brother.
The principal extended his hand to Munch and pulled him into him. “Our condolences are with you, young brother.”
He then placed the diploma in his hand and everyone cheered and began chanting: BG! BG! BG!
Tears welled in Munch’s eyes for mixed reasons. He was both proud and filled with unbearable grief. He took his hand with the scrolled certificate in it, doubled tapped his chest and then looked up, pointing it up above. That was how the photographer commemorated the moment. Munch saluting his BG.
Later that night…
Yuriah, Kamal, Ace and Keyz all sat in the living of Munch’s house. Everyone was processing their next moves as they kept an eye on Munch. There was no way to predict what he would do. He’d been too quiet for anyone’s liking.
“I can’t figure out for the life of me why that thuggah would come for BG. Mannn, Munch ain’t hard to find. Why didn’t he come at his neck?” Ace knew for a fact it would had been a different result had he confronted Munch.
Tonight they would have been partying, riding the highs of what spoils BG’s rap career would bring him with Ace as his hype man. But instead he trying to understand why life had to be so fucked up.
Munch sat silently as he listened to the evil inside of his head. He was consumed with hellacious fire that could only be extinguished with him knocking G’Corey’s head off of his shoulders.
Yuriah sat back and admonished himself. He took blame for everything. The shooting at his wedding, Munch catching a gun charge, Minnie’s paranoia and now BG’s untimely death.
Yuriah thought on a quote from Machiavelli: If an injury had to be done to a man, it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared. “Why the fuck didn’t I smash his bitch ass when I had the chance?”
“Fuck that! We ain’t takin’ no mo losses. I gotta a team of head bustas that are trained to go. If that boy is in the city, he will be found tonight! Give me the word.” Keyz looked to Munch.
Munch’s jaw was so tight it sealed his mouth shut. Kamal looked over to Keyz and answered for Munch. “That boy long gone but if he stupid enough to be here bring him back alive.”
Keyz’ adrenaline spiked. “A’ight. I’m on that shit. I’m out.”
“There will be no rest until that muthafucka is left with his dick in the dirt,” Kamal spoke to everybody.
“He gotta know his day coming.” Ace thought back two years ago when Magnolia Munch had to let it be known what time a day it was when it came to his BG.
The corner of Magnolia and Sixth was crunk as usual. Everybody was outside when Chuckie, 3rd ward’s biggest and most feared D-Boy, pulled up on the scene.
His presence commanded the attention of everyone because he flaunted how well he was eating off of the streets by the flashy clothes, jewels and cars his money afforded him.
He was an arrogant S.O.B., quick tempered and over confident and the only reason he hadn’t been faded was because of the gorillas he was associated with.
Chuckie parked his black on black Mercedes along the curbside. Then the three doors of his whip simultaneously opened once the engine shut down. One, his baby’s moms. Two, his lieutenant. And lastly, the man himself.
He stepped on the block, dapping up a few cats that worshipped at his Jordans. His baby’s moms and right hand man stood close in tow like two trained pits.
“What y’all thuggahs outchea doing?” Chuckie pulled out a joe, lit it, and puffed ringlets into the air.
“Bustin’ some rhymes. These dummies think they lyrical beasts, but they ain’t shit compared to me.” The neighborhood spitter boasted.
Chuckie prided himself on his freestyle abilities and thought to take the opportunity to shine brighter than the thirty thousand dollar jewelry that draped around his neck.
“Let me get in on this, ya heard me.” Chuckie inserted himself into the mix.
The two men went back and forth and the crowd that circled around them went wild. They went at it, spitting bars until Chuckie hit below the belt, making his opponent bow out. It wasn’t because he couldn’t come harder, he just knew it wasn’t worth the drama if he did.
“Awww, man, he so phony, dawg. He went in on that man, stuntin’ fa his bitch, no doubt.” BG sucked through the tight space between his teeth.
“Oh, but that boy still cold, though.” Ace gave Chuckie his props as he called out the next amateur to step up to the plate like he was on 8 Mile.
“Mannnn, get off his nuts. You actin’ like homie be giving you free turkeys during Thanksgiving or something.” BG clowned Ace as he elbowed him in the side. “I’m much colda than he is.”
“A’ight, then. Go eat him up.” Ace pointed in his direction.
“Like dog food,” BG pounded Ace with the biggest Kool-Aid grin. He hopped off of the porch and walked over to the inner circle, adjusting his nuts by lifting the crotch of his jeans. “Wuz’am? I got next.”
Chuckie looked BG down from head to toe and laughed. “Lil’ BG? I don’t wanna bring it to you, son. Let somebody else get this verbal lashing.” He turned to his lieutenant to co-sign.
“Yea, whoa. Get back on tha porch where it’s safe, lil’ hoe-mie. It’s piranhas outchea.” He G-dapped a laughing Chuckie.
BG caught the emphasis he placed on hoe but he wasn’t a sensitive dude, so he didn’t give a fuck.
“Man, fuck all that, ya heard me. Just gimme my rounds.” BG folded his arms across his chest as he waited.
“Should I give it to youngin’, baby?” Chuckie asked of his baby’s moms.
She nodded her head yes. “Give him the business, boo.”
He smiled at her approval, began a light sway and started the battle.
Chuckie: I got the “Blood of a Boss” in me/And when my “Thugs Cry” I let them slugs fly ‘til my guns empty/You’sa bitch and ya “Loyalty is Blind”/BG, Big Girl, likes to get it from behind.
“Ooooooo.” The crowd chorused, inflating Chuckie’s ego.
BG waited for the noises to die down and then he shot his verse.
BG: I’m fifteen with “A Hustla’z Ambition”/And he’s dumb as fuck on a suicide mission/I get love in these clubs and from the city blocks/And you get love from homo thugs in the jails, eatin’ cock.
“Ooohhhhh!” The people went crazier. Chuckie wasn’t feeling the shift of the oohs and ahhs to a pup twelve years his minor, so he turned it personal.
Chuckie: I’m allergic to the fake and “These N****s Ain’t Loyal” too/I’m talkin’ ‘bout you, ya pussy brother, and ya road dawgs too/They gon’ “Bury Me A G” when I go, neph/And my goons will get “Street Justice” when it goes left.
“Y’all all can get it!” Chuckie crafted his fingers into the shape of a gun, aiming it at BG. Then he smiled and soaked up the roars of those bucking him up.
BG looked over to Ace who stood at his side. “Were shots just fired?” Ace booted up and nodded his head up and down. Getting up on Chuckie, BG swiped his thumb against his nose and went for the jugular. It wasn’t over like Chuckie assumed. BG wasn’t bowing down.
BG: Dick sucka/ Forgot I know you silly fucka?/I got the scoop on you and ya crack head mother/And ya girl servin’ ass ‘cause she a “Silver Platter Hoe”/So when you kissing her, you kissing every thuggah I know/And that bastard ain’t yours, he fa the thuggah down the street/She the hood freak/Ya bitch lettin’ everybody skeet.”
“Ooohhhh!” The crowd egged.
“Talk that shit nah,” BG started off a DJ Jubilee hit.
“Roll wit’ it,” the people automatically finished the rest of the bounce verse for him in a boisterous manner.
BG dapped and slapped up a few females and fellas who cheered him on, declaring him the winner as he was stepping off.
“We ain’t done.” Chuckie informed on a low growl. There was no way he would let a kid disrespect him in front of his hood and his lad
y.
“Dude, take yo fuckin’ L and be easy,” BG said, trying not to take it there but Chuckie was already on his level.
Chuckie reached for his piece and pointed it at BG. “I said we ain’t done.”
Munch was at the other end of the block, talking to his dip when she pointed down to the ruckus brewing at the other end.
“It’s always some shit, I swear.” She shook her head, disinterested in the reason it began to sound like a jungle.
Munch looked down there and waved it off as he continued to run it with her.
He was seconds away from leaving off with his girlfriend when Ace ran up on him.
“Munch! Chuckie pulled out on yo brother and I don’t got my strap.” He hurried his words, taking no breaths in between.
At the little homie’s word, Munch took off running down the street, pulling his ratchet from out of his gym shorts. His plan was simple: Shoot first. Fuck asking questions later. When it came to his lil’ BG, any and everybody could end up on the coroner’s list.
The moment everyone saw Chuckie’s pistol, they moved out of the way as to not be in the line of fire.
“Apologize for insulting my gangsta.”
BG was itching to even the odds by reaching for his banger but he knew the first sign of him going for his waist would indefinitely have him chalked out and on the evening news.
BG didn’t flex, though. His pops told him, “A man dies on his feet, never his knees.” So if he had to go out, that’s how it was going to happen because he wasn’t giving him no apology.
“You’sa a thunder cat, huh, lil’ thuggah?” He glanced at his mans and baby’s mom to the left of him with his gun still trained at the center of BG’s face. “If he was humble, he could have been on my team.” He shrugged his shoulders. “Tell yo dead pops I said what up.”
Chuckie cocked one into the chamber and BG involuntarily squeezed his eyes shut so he wouldn’t see death coming.