Mecca's Return

by Anna J.

  “Thirty ... Time’s up!” Breeze barked.

  Ruby removed the clip from her silver and black .40-caliber Smith & Wesson after cocking it and placing one in the chamber. Then they dragged Tah Gunz back into his wheelchair, while Mo Blood shit his pants, pleading with them.

  “Word to Blood, Ruby. I didn’t do anything to your peeps. I had to come with him. He is the general. If I didn’t go, they would have put the green light on me!”

  Ruby looked at Breeze, who shrugged his shoulders.

  “You damned if you do and damned if you don’t. You caught a bad break, Mo,” said Ruby. Mo sighed as Ruby removed the gag from Tah’s mouth.

  “Ruby, listen. I’ll work for you for free if you let me ride,” he wailed.

  “I can’t believe these are the niggas that had everybody shook. Yo, y’all niggas, man up!” Ruby barked as she handed Tah the gun. “You got one shot in there. Now, you can get stupid and shoot me or Breeze, but you can’t shoot both of us.”

  Breeze cocked his Desert Eagle .357. “All you gotta do is shoot Mo. It should be easy for you because he gave you up immediately. This boy would definitely snitch on you.”

  Breeze pushed the wheelchair directly in front of Mo Blood. He and Tah looked at each other, their eyes filled with tears. Mo was taking deep breaths as his life replayed in his mind. He thought about his mother getting herself together in rehab. He remembered how proud he was of her when she checked herself in the rehab, realizing that she had hit rock bottom when she sold almost every piece of furniture in their apartment. He thought of his twelve-year-old sister, now living in Manhattan with their aunt, and how happy she would be when their mother got out and got her own apartment. Then he thought about seeing his dead homies once he was dead. Tupac’s words played in his head as he wondered if his homies had saved him a place in Thugs Mansion.

  Boom!

  “Whoo! Now, that was some shit!” Breeze roared after Tah pulled the trigger, hitting Mo in the forehead. The back of Mo’s head exploded, and blood and brains spilled down his shirt.

  Tah sat there with the gun in his hand, his arms down on both of the wheelchair’s armrests. He stared at the lifeless body of his dead homie. His thoughts were blank. Then Ruby took the gun from his hand, put the clip in, and cocked it. One thought surfaced.

  “I’d rather you kill me, instead of doing it myself or this dude.” Tah nodded toward Breeze.

  “What difference does it make if it’s me or him?” Ruby asked.

  “’Cause you’re from Brownsville,” Tah replied.

  Breeze chuckled. “Any other dying wish?”

  Tah kept looking at Ruby. “You’re a Brownsville legend. That’s why I want it to be you. Another thing ... Can you place my body on Rockaway Ave.?”

  Ruby smiled at Tah. “Yeah, sure.” She nodded to Breeze. “Go ’head.”

  Breeze put the Desert Eagle to Tah’s temple and squeezed the trigger.

  Afterward, they crept out of the abandoned warehouse in East New York and walked to Ruby’s car. The block was empty except for the rats rummaging through the vacant lots and streets. There were no other buildings on the block, so more than likely Tah’s and Mo’s bodies would be devoured by vermin before they were ever discovered. And by that time, they would need dental records to identify them.

  “Don’t forget my five hundred.” Breeze held his hand out as he sat in the passenger seat of Ruby’s car.

  “You don’t forget nothing, huh?” Ruby grinned as she pulled the five hundred dollars out of her pocket and handed it to him.

  “Never that. You see, I never forgot your pretty face,” Breeze flirted. Ruby took the remark for what it was and simply shook her head.

  “I guess your memory ain’t that good, ’cause you would have remembered I like pussy.”

  They both laughed as she turned up the car’s system and Donell Jones began to sing.

  The breeze blowing through the open sliding glass door cooled Mecca’s and Miguel’s sweating bodies as they lay entwined on the ocean blue satin sheets, listening to Mary J. Blige’s voice serenade their lovemaking. The ocean waves could be heard crashing against the shore just outside of the beach house that Miguel rented during his off-season.

  Mecca squeezed Miguel’s tight ass while pushing him deeper within her gash. Just as she moaned, she heard footsteps enter through the glass door. Immediately, they turned to see a distraught Karmen standing there with a gun in her hands.

  “I thought you loved me, Miguel. I thought I was your Puerto Rican princess,” Karmen cried, pointing the gun toward them.

  Miguel jumped up, while Mecca covered herself with the sheets. Karmen had the gun pointed at Miguel, who stood in front of her, with his manhood wet and dangling between his thighs. Sobbing, Karmen looked down at his pole, then back at him.

  “Why, Miguel?”

  “Karmen, put the gun down and let’s talk. You don’t have to ...” Miguel was suddenly cut off as something hit him in his chest. He fell backward, landing on the plush white carpet. Mecca jumped out of bed immediately.

  “Miguel! Oh God, Karmen! What did you do?”

  “He’s my man, Mecca! Just like Shamel was my man before he met you!” Karmen growled. Miguel was trying to catch his breath as blood seeped though a small hole on his chest. Mecca could see the carpet under him begin to turn red.

  “Is that what this is all about? Shamel and me? Why didn’t you tell me that you and him were dealing with each other?” Mecca asked, rubbing her fingers through Miguel’s hair.

  “I love you, Mecca,” Miguel whispered.

  Karmen snapped out. “Fuck you, Mecca!” Then shots went off.

  Mecca’s dream switched to her sitting in Lou’s office, with him folding his arms across his chest, looking at her as if he were waiting for an explanation.

  “I’ll be honest with you, Lou. My intentions at first were to get even with her, but as I get to know him, I’m falling hard for him every day.”

  “Will you be honest with him and tell him the same thing?” Lou asked.

  Mecca was taken aback by the question. “For what? Why do that? All that matters now is how I feel about him at this present moment.”

  “I guess it’s all fair in love and war, huh?” Lou shook his head in disbelief. Standing up from behind the desk, Lou walked around to Mecca. “Can I show you something I didn’t show you before, when you were in your coma?”

  “How much worse could it get? You gonna show me, anyway, Lou, so get on with it,” Mecca sighed.

  Nervous at what Lou would show her, she told herself that it could not get any worse than it already was. He’d already shown her how her aunt had set her parents up to be murdered, so if he’d held it back from her, it had to be deep. Lou placed his hand on her head, and the vision began.

  Flashback, 1974

  “Ever since you got pregnant, you act like having sex with me is a terrible thing,” Bobby Sykes yelled at the woman everyone in Brownsville called Big Mecca once she gave birth to her daughter.

  “Bobby, it’s not like I don’t want to, but, baby, I’m eight and a half months pregnant. My back hurts, and sex isn’t helping,” she told him in a low voice, trying to conceal the argument from the rest of the projects.

  “I got needs, Mecca, and you’re supposed to fulfill them, like I do yours,” Bobby growled.

  “You make it sound like you’re my pimp or something. Bobby, go on with the bullshit.”

  Angered, Bobby simply shook his head. He grabbed his suede jacket and keys off the kitchen table.

  “So you’re just going to leave? Every time we get into an argument, you quick to run outside. What you going to see another woman?” Big Mecca screamed.

  “I don’t have time for the bullshit. I’ll be back,” Bobby replied, walking out of the door. A porcelain ashtray crashed into the door, shattering into dozens of pieces.

  “Don’t come back, you bastard!”

  Bobby made his way out of the building, and when he got to R
ockaway Ave., he spotted a friend of Ruby’s. She was a fine sister who always gave Bobby a flirtatious look. It was no secret that all the girls in Brownsville found Bobby “Blast” Sykes to be the finest brother in the neighborhood, and he did not hesitate to cash in on his sex symbol status.

  “Hi, Bobby,” said a voluptuous, thick woman wearing her hair in two Afro puffs. Her tight blue jeans revealed how thick her thighs were. The three-quarter black leather jacket tied at the waist with a belt hid the plumpness of her bottom, but Bobby knew from seeing her in the summer what she was hiding under the jacket and clothes.

  “Hey, baby. How’s it holding?” Bobby flirted. He was already sexually frustrated after two months of getting no sex from his girl. It was time he made his move.

  “I’m fine. Not as fine as you, though,” the woman replied seductively.

  That was all Bobby needed to hear. Minutes later, after some liquor and some lines of cocaine, Bobby and the girl were sucking and fucking savagely in a seedy motel on Pennsylvania Avenue. After four hours of sweat-drenched fucking, it was time to check out. As they both dressed, Bobby turned and looked at the girl.

  “Damn, baby, I forgot your name. I always see you with Ruby, but I forgot.”

  The girl rolled her eyes at Bobby as she put on her clothing. “Bobby, you know my name is Monique.”

  A month later Bobby ran into Monique on Mother Gaston Boulevard, at a grocery store. He nodded to her as he paid for a pack of cigarettes. She had a sad look on her face as she said, “I need to talk to you outside.”

  Bobby stepped outside while removing a cigarette from the pack and lit it. He deeply inhaled the smoke while Monique blurted that she was pregnant, causing Bobby to choke.

  “What? What you telling me for?”

  Monique placed her hands on her hips, sucked her teeth, and rolled her eyes. “I’m no whore, Bobby! You’re the last person I fucked. It’s yours.”‘

  “You know I got a newborn baby girl and I love my woman. I don’t need no controversy now. If you’re gonna have the kid, I’ll help you out, but please keep this between us,” Bobby sighed.

  “I want this baby, Bobby. I just wanted to let you know. Don’t worry. It’s between us.”

  When Monique gave birth to a healthy, seven-pound-two-ounce baby girl, she put the baby’s name on the certificate and listed the father as unknown. A nurse placed the baby in Monique’s arms and asked what her name would be.

  “Her name is Dawn.” Monique smiled.

  The baby looked just like Blast. Not too long after she got out of the hospital, Monique moved out of Brownsville and relocated to Coney Island. Still, the word spread through Brownsville of who the father was. When the vision was over, Lou sat back at his desk while Mecca cried.

  “Is it fair that Monique and your father told no one?” he asked while Mecca’s mind flashed back to the time she sat on the park bench with Dawn and shot her in the head.

  “Baby! It’s okay! It was just a dream!” Miguel said, holding Mecca in his arms. He could feel her heart thud against her chest as they lay naked in his bed. After she calmed down a bit, he got up to use the bathroom and get a facecloth to wipe the sweat off of her. When he came back in, Mecca was getting dressed.

  “Where are you going? I thought we were having breakfast together,” Miguel said, confused.

  “I have to go home,” Mecca said while dressing quickly.

  “I’ll drive you, but why do you have to go?”

  “You don’t have to drive me. I’ll catch a cab,” Mecca said, fully dressed and grabbing the phone from his bedside table.

  “What’s wrong? Did I do something?”

  “No, Miguel. I just need some time alone, that’s all,” she replied as she listened to the phone ring. She responded to the operator’s question once her call was answered. “Yes, I need a cab. I’m at ...”

  Chapter Eight

  Can it be that it was all so simple then?

  —Raekwon and Ghostface

  Junior McLeod sat on a white plastic chair in his lush garden, chopping a pineapple he had just picked from a tree. His long dreadlocks with sprinkles of gray hung loosely down the side of his face, down to his stomach. His light brown skin was smooth and flawless, belying his sixty years. The strict vegetarian diet he maintained kept him fit and lean. His gray eyes were bloodshot from the weed he smoked daily. Small beads of sweat coated his shirtless body as he chopped the fruit while holding a conversation with Daphne, who sat in a similar plastic chair across from him.

  “So many years have passed since my son’s murder, yet you still hold on to the pain. This is the life chosen by so many youths, and the consequences are known,” Junior said in a heavy Jamaican accent. His voice was a raspy sort of whisper. Every time Daphne looked at him, she thought of how Donovan would have looked if he hadn’t been murdered by the police.

  Marley, as he was called, had looked just like his father. Junior McLeod left the streets of New York after making millions, returning to his native Jamaica and living a simple, but comfortable life in the mountains of the island. He had had a large house built that was straight out of a House Beautiful magazine. The mini mansion overlooked lush green hills. Daphne loved the peaceful surroundings. It was a relief from the concrete chaos of New York City.

  After his son was murdered by FBI agents, Junior sought to find out who was responsible for snitching on him. If the person had been hidden by the government, he wanted their family dead. There was no room for mistakes, and plenty of people paid with their lives. When word got out on who the snitches were, the murder rate in New York City reached unbelievable numbers. The city was under siege.

  Members of the Shower Posse and their rivals were being slaughtered. It was nothing for a kid playing in a vacant lot to stumble upon a corpse with some of its limbs missing. Junior was finally convinced by his wife that enough was enough. If things continued the way they were, Junior would be dead or would be sent to prison—with so many numbers, his sentence would sound like a Social Security number. When Daphne was convicted, Junior went to Jamaica.

  Before leaving, he made sure that Daphne wouldn’t spend a day in jail wanting for anything. He loved her like she was his own flesh and blood. She was one of the most loyal people he had ever met, and he knew she loved his son to death. To this day, he could see the pain in her eyes from the loss.

  “It was a piece of my life that made up half of my soul. The other half was Donovan,” Daphne said in a measured tone as she stared off into the valley. She watched the wind gently blow through the trees from behind her D&G shades.

  “Your other issue is trust, I assume?” Junior asked while cutting pieces of pineapple with a small knife and popping the juicy fruit into his mouth. “Has she shown signs of mistrust?”

  Daphne folded one leg over the other and straightened the wrinkles in her linen capri pants. Her matching sandals revealed peach painted toenails to match her halter top.

  “Not exactly, but something in her niece’s eyes when she looks at her tells me there is something I don’t know about her. Something evil.”

  Junior was a very wise man, well learned in all aspects of life, the streets, and politics. It was well known that the Shower Posse, being an organization that was a political force that opposed the Jamaican government and its treatment of the poor natives of the island, at one time influenced many of his ideas and gave him a broader look upon the world. This, together with his dedication to the Rastafarian religion, gave a mystical aura to Junior’s person.

  Thinking deeply, he responded, “And you have grown close to this niece of hers?”

  “Close, yes,” Daphne answered in a tone that spoke of the lingering doubt deep within. “But not close enough for her to reveal what’s really the core reason I sense her resentment toward her aunt.”

  “You Yankees are so paranoid of each other. Trust is so hard to come by in the States, especially among our black people.” Junior chuckled, and then he asked, “Are you sure yet about yo
ur brother’s murder? And if not, will you trust your instincts?”

  Junior’s words were a sad reality. Daphne couldn’t even count on two hands how many people she had trusted throughout her life. She couldn’t trust her mother, because she was easily influenced by an abusive man that made their family’s life miserable. She and her sister were close, but not as close as she was with her brother. She had total trust in her brother. Then there was Donovan. She had trusted him with all her heart. She knew that he would never cross her, that he was a loyal man, and that this was in his blood. That was why Junior was another person she trusted. She knew that she had to earn his trust, and she did that by not snitching when she got locked up. It was clear that if Junior had had the slightest inkling that she was going to cooperate, he could have had her erased, even in jail.

  “The answers will come soon, Daphne. What’s on the inside of a person will eventually come to the surface. It’s a guarantee,” Junior said while standing up. “Until then, take a trip with me into town. I have some people for you to meet.”

  Daphne stood and stretched. “And I have someone I want you to meet,” she said with a smile.

  Before Daphne and Junior drove into town to meet the people he spoke about, they stopped at the airport in an onyx-colored, chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce Phantom with tinted windows. Daphne ran into the terminal and minutes later walked back, carrying a Louis Vuitton duffel bag, accompanied by Mecca.

  “Junior, I want you to meet my good friend Mecca,” Daphne said as they entered the backseat of the car.

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you.” Junior extended a soft, slightly wrinkled hand.

  Mecca smiled. “It’s nice to meet you.”

  Gazing into her eyes, he immediately saw the pain in them. It was a deep pain that, if not diffused, would eventually explode to the surface and cause a lot of damage to others as well as to herself. Immediately, she could feel his gaze and knew that he wasn’t just looking at her physically; he was studying her. It didn’t make her uncomfortable, because she would do the same whenever she met a person. She could also tell that he was a man of deep wisdom. In an odd way, he reminded her of Lou.