by Brick
Honestly, from that moment on, I had nothing to say because a brotha’s mind was on lockdown. I stood with my siblings staring in utter disbelief. What the hell was this?
Chapter 3
Shanelle
“Wait, wait, wait,” I yelled. “Slow down. Say that again,” I said to Uncle Snap.
“I guess you all know her secret now,” he replied while looking at all of us. “Your mother was many things. She was a chameleon. She could blend in wherever she went, which made her the best at what she did.” Uncle Snap stood, never letting that Mason jar leave his hand.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Javon asked, the frown on his face matching mine.
“Look at this,” Naveen said. In his hands was a gray and black lockbox.
Javon took the lockbox and flipped it from side to side. “Something’s in here but there is no key to open it,” he said.
“Sure there is,” Uncle Snap chimed. He pointed to the necklace I had on, then to Inez and Melissa. “All three of you have one of the keys that will open that there box. One can’t open it without the other two.”
Inez’s hand slapped against her chest. “She said she gave this to me because I’d always have one of the keys to her heart,” she said.
“She told me mine was because I would always have the key connected to her mind,” Melissa said quietly as she fingered her key like seeing it for the first time.
I placed a hand on my key, and glanced down at it then back at my sisters. “Mama said this key was mine because I opened her heart, her mind, and her soul. I was her first daughter.”
“Heart, mind, and soul,” Cory said aloud. I looked over at him. “That’s what’s written on the bottom of this lockbox,” he said.
Uncle Snap nodded. “Open it,” he said.
Inez and Melissa looked at me as if they were waiting to see what I would do. While I had a thousand and one questions, I knew the key to some of those answers would be in that box. I asked both of them for their keys, took the box from Naveen’s hand, and studied the keyhole. One hole was in the middle with two smaller holes outside of it. I placed the keys in each one and watched in awe as the locks clicked, clacked, and turned on their own. The lid popped open.
We all crowded around. Inside were more keys and tiny notebooks. Being the leader he was, Javon picked up the keys and small tablets.
“What’s in it?” Jojo asked. Melissa had bandaged the cut on his head. It wasn’t serious enough for worry.
There was a serious scowl on Javon’s face. It was the look he got when he was working and something was perplexing his mind. “Some kind of codes and monetary figures,” he answered absentmindedly. “Melissa, take a look at this,” he said, passing her one of the tablets that had money marked in it.
The girl’s eyes roamed like marbles back and forth across the pads. “Holy shit, this page alone has at least half a mil on it. Seems as if Fridays and Sundays are the days most money rolls in from whatever it was she was doing,” she said while flipping through the pages. “Holy shit,” she said looking at Uncle Snap. “Is this all Mama’s money?”
“All her money and all her drugs, too. Mama ran the Syndicate,” he answered.
“The what?” we all asked collectively.
“The Syndicate. It’s a criminal enterprise that traffics in millions of dollars of drugs throughout the United States yearly. From the Port of Miami to the border of Canada, the Syndicate is a force to be reckoned with. Your mother, Claudette, ran all of that. She’s been in charge for years. The only woman with enough balls and heart to do so.”
“So, wait, let me get this straight,” Javon cut in. “Mama was a drug dealer?”
Uncle Snap tilted his head from side to side. “Among other things. All this money you see, all these drugs, it belongs to y’all now. One of you gotta step up and take this thing over or all she built will be pillaged and stolen in the blink of an eye.”
“So this whole gotdamned time Mama has been preaching to us about staying out the streets, she was running the motherfucking streets?” Cory snapped.
“She owns these motherfucking streets and managed to take care of all you.”
“She was a hypocrite,” Javon added.
Uncle Snap snapped his attention over to Javon. His brows furrowed and the veins in his neck popped out. “You better watch your damn mouth,” he warned.
Javon squared his shoulders, not out of defiance, but because it was just who he was. He was never one to back down from anybody, unless it was Mama. “Or what, Uncle Snap? Huh? You gone lay hands on me because I’m speaking the truth?”
“Yo, li’l nigga, how the hell you think your mama managed to keep y’all in this uppity-ass neighborhood? How you think she was able to take care of y’all so damn well? Send y’all to that fancy-ass private school? You think them damn food stamps she was getting was cutting it? That damn sorry-ass piece of welfare check? You really think kissing those white folks’ asses was getting her by? No, nigga! She was out here, hustling, putting niggas in the ground who dared disrespect her. Claudette was out here in the streets while you li’l motherfuckers lay comfortably every night!” Uncle Snap roared.
Javon fired back, “Look at this shit! Look at all this shit! The money, the drugs. We’re standing in an underground bunker! For years we’ve thought Mama to be like Mother Teresa or somebody only to find out she is the thing that goes bump in the motherfucking night?” he spat. “And we’re supposed to be okay with this shit?”
“Javon, calm down,” I said.
“Calm down? Calm down?” he repeated while glaring at me. “Am I the only one feeling like I didn’t know the woman I thought I knew?”
“I’m not saying that, baby. I’m saying, can we try to go through all of this, whatever this is, before we pass judgment on Mama? For all we know, she did all of this to protect us.”
“Protect us from what exactly? The people she did business with? Her?”
“Baby, Javon, please. I’m not saying whatever this is she had going on was, is, right. I’m saying, let Uncle Snap tell us what she had going on in detail before we condemn her.”
“I’m not condemning her. I’m questioning who the fuck she was. Was she sweet little old Mama Claudette or was she something more sinister? Did you not hear Uncle Snap say she was murdered? Someone killed her because of all this shit, Nelle. And I’m just supposed to calm down?”
Javon’s legs were planted wide. He kept moving his hands in repetitive sharp gestures. He glanced around the room at all of us. I guess he was looking for one of us to do more than just stare at him. I knew he was hurting. Finding out Mama was a queen pin put the nails in our proverbial coffins. It was soul crushing to find out the woman who had nurtured us and taken all of us in off the street turned out to be the very thing she preached to us about staying away from.
When he didn’t get the response he wanted from the rest of us, he laughed with a hard edge, crossed his arms over his chest, and took the seat that Uncle Snap had vacated. He shrugged. “A’ight,” he said deploying sarcasm. “Fuck it. I’ll be quiet since I’m clearly the odd man out.”
“Javon—” I called out, but he cut me off.
“Nah. I’m cool. Y’all seem happy and content with it. I’ll shut the fuck up.” His body was so tense, he looked like a damn stone gargoyle.
Uncle Snap moved around the room. He grabbed a DVD case and shook it at us. “Y’all need to see this,” he said. “Javon, I know you’re mad and you got a right to be, but at least look at this video first.”
Javon didn’t move. He didn’t nod or acknowledge that he had even heard Uncle Snap. Once Snap had put the DVD into the player, we all stood around anxiously, eager to see what was on it. After a few seconds of a blue screen, Mama’s smiling face popped up.
Inez gasped and threw a hand over her mouth like seeing Mama alive again was too much for her.
“Hello, my beautiful children,” Mama’s motherly voice said. “If you’re watching this vid
eo then, unfortunately, I’m dead. And that also means my death was brought on by the hands of my enemies. By now I know Raphael, which is your Uncle Snap’s real name, has told y’all who I was underneath this façade of Mama Claudette. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still your Mama Claudette, but I’m so much more than that. I was about thirty or so when this life was passed down to me when my husband died. I took the hand life dealt me and I made it work. I had already been pushing dope since the age of fourteen. I could flip a brick in a matter of hours. My daddy taught me all there was to know. I won’t give you a history lesson right now though. Just know that I love you all and Uncle Snap is the only person you can trust right now,” she explained.
Mama stopped talking for a few minutes. She looked away from the camera and when she looked back, she was crying.
“I never thought I’d see the day someone would take me away from my babies. The eight of you changed my life in ways you’ll never know. Because I love you so, I zoned in on each of your better skills and I nurtured them because I knew this day would come. I run a whole empire, babies. As the young folk say, my name rings bells around every state in the U.S. and even internationally. I put in work and it all came back to me tenfold. We’re not poor. We never have been, but I needed to teach you all how to remain humble. So I made sure we lived levels and levels below our means. Is all the money legal? Hell no, but for the most part, I made sure all the legal businesses could never be touched or connected to the Syndicate. That brings me to my next subject.”
I listened, slack jawed, as Mama told us about the gas stations, clothing stores, houses and property, and car dealerships we now owned in the wake of her death. Some of the keys we had found were to safe deposit boxes in banks around the state, out of state, and even internationally.
Mama cleared her throat then stood. “Javon, I know you,” she said. “You’re probably standing around with your chest puffed out, pissed off that Mama has lied to you.”
She was right about everything but the standing part.
“You’re pissed because everything you thought you once knew has come undone.” She chuckled. “That’s because you’re a natural-born leader who, much like me, hates to be sideswiped by anything or anyone no matter who they are. You hate to be caught off guard, which is why you’re so good at always being in control. That’s all well and good because it’s you who I choose to take my place. I knew you were a leader from the moment I found out you had safely brought your little brother across state lines to the one place you knew you both would be safe.”
We all looked at Javon whose eyes were dead and flat as he looked at the screen. He shook his head and muttered something unintelligible. He uncrossed his arms and rolled his shoulders as if his shirt was creating discomfort.
“No one can run the Syndicate but you, Javon. You have to take up this mantel. At this point it should be four days after my death. That means you only have six more to decide what to do. I’m assuming that my death has only been mentioned maybe once or twice on the news. I had it set it up that way as I have friends in high and low places. In the case of my untimely death, I didn’t want too much media attention to come my way. I know you’re probably wondering why. Well, son, if the people in the Syndicate found out I was dead with no heir to take the throne, they’d run over metro Atlanta and we can’t have that. But, most importantly, they’ll come after my kids to make sure none of you got the idea to try to come for them. I’m already gone. I don’t want to lose Snap or any of you. Look in the lockbox, learn the numbers system I have going on. Look at the money I have coming in. Call a meeting of the Syndicate and let them know with my fall comes your rise to the head of the table. And these are some very powerful people, baby. As you rise, take your brothers and sisters with you. Make the Syndicate respect your conglomerate.”
She stopped again as if trying to get her words together before continuing.
“I’ve been training all of you for this. Javon, you have the business mind. Shanelle, you were obviously born with business savvy. You have the gift of the gab and your gun skills can’t be matched. You’re Javon’s backbone and you have been since you walked into this house. No matter what you two have been through, you both are the definition of ride or die. He’s going to need that more so than ever now.
“Cory, you’re the lawyer. You’re street smart with the book-learnt sense to match. You can do what nobody else can and that’s legally defend your brothers and sisters. Melissa is the accountant and not to mention she can use her talent to get what she needs as well. She knows what I’m talking about, too. Inez, you’re important. As the doctor and surgeon, if something ever happens to one of them they can come to you without having to need a hospital. Shit like that is very important. Trust me. As a doctor you can provide much needed medical attention if needed. Naveen, you’re a mastermind when it comes to engineering. The safe houses you can build can save your lives. Lamont, you are the muscle. Nobody packs a punch like you. I’ve seen what you can do and I know you’ll put any man on his ass quick. And, Jojo . . .” Mama stopped. Her eyes twinkled when she mentioned his name.
“Jojo, you’re my baby. And I really didn’t want to involve you in this. It’s Javon’s call whether he will let you at the table. But you’re a chemist at heart. You have the power to create product that can go unmatched. Your talent can and will, one day if Javon decides, take us to the next level in the drug game. Javon, you have the whole team you need, people you trust. You run the Syndicate with an iron fist with your conglomerate right behind you. I have to go now, but take heed to all I’ve said. Listen to your uncle. He won’t steer you wrong. I love all of you; and note that nothing and nobody in this world has ever meant more to me than the eight of you.”
Once the video was done, we all simply stared at one another. The silence in the room was deafening.
“So this isn’t a joke?” Cory asked, still in obvious disbelief.
“This is legit, nephew,” Uncle Snap answered. “It’s not a joke. I’m sorry you all had to find out this way, but here it is now. Out in the open. So the question remains, Javon, are you in or are you out? Without you, this shit is doomed.”
Javon didn’t say one word. He stood and left the room. I knew he was on his way back to the main house. I rushed behind him. I had no idea what to say to him. The revelation that had just been laid at our feet was mind blowing.
“Javon, wait,” I said as he walked up the final stair to come back out through the fireplace.
He turned and took my hand to help me out then glanced down at me.
“What’s on your mind?” I asked him.
“Nothing,” he answered.
“You’re lying, Javon. After all of that you just heard, you expect me to believe nothing is on your mind?” I asked.
He looked away and then shook his head. “Am I the only one put off by all of this? I mean, our whole lives was a lie, a big-ass façade. We put in all this work, going to school, getting upstanding jobs in the community, trying to make Mama proud and for what? For what, Nelle? Just so we could become the very things she always told us not to become? Fucking statistics? This life only leads to two places, Nelle, jail or hell, and I for one am not going to be the one to take us there,” he said with finality them stormed away.
He was headed upstairs to his old room. I fell in line behind him. The room still looked the same. The full-sized bed was made up with a black comforter. Falcons memorabilia was strategically placed about. That was about it. He had always been a simple kind of man when it came to things like this.
“Even so, baby, you can’t just walk away like that. The rest of them are waiting for you to say something. They’re waiting for you to tell them where to go, what to do. They look up to you and you know that,” I said, resting a calming hand on his back. “I . . . I don’t know what to think right now. We need time to process this, I know, but not if somebody is going to be trying to kill us. Not if Uncle Snap’s life is in danger. We have to do something.”
“So what you saying, Nelle? You want me to leave behind everything I worked so hard to become, and become the leader of a drug syndicate? A crime family is what you want us to become? Cocaine cowboys? Here we are thinking Mama was a saint and she was really the black version of Griselda Blanco. I can’t”—he stopped then took a deep inhale like it pained him to breathe—“I can’t willingly lead my family into this lifestyle.”
I moved to the front of him then kissed his lips.
He placed his hands on my hips and pulled me closer. “We already lost Mama,” he said, lips brushing against mine. “I can’t afford to lose any more of you. We’ll figure something out but, right now, I can’t make this decision, baby. I can’t.”
* * *
Over the next few days, the tension was thick around the family. Javon and Cory were on everyone’s ass to get up and get to classes or to work. My mind was all over the place. I honestly didn’t know what to do or what to think. I’d been searching Mama’s room left and right trying to find anything else that would tell us who she really was. Melissa estimated that there was close to $10 million in the underground bunker alone. She and Inez traveled to banks all over Georgia with Lamont in tow, opening deposit boxes and getting a tally on things. Naveen had gone through the house and found four more hidden entries and exits.
Cory had jumped head first into his legal studies. If shit so happened that we were going to become this conglomerate Mama wanted, Cory said he needed to know the ins and outs of the criminal justice system more so now than before. Jojo pretty much kept to himself or he was in the basement doing whatever it was he did in his chemistry lab Mama had made for him down there. He and Naveen weren’t fighting, but they kept their distance from one another.
While Javon and I worked for Reed and Haswell, a top-level financial advising firm, my mind was on the many times Mama had taken me to the gun range. There I was thinking she was training me to defend myself and in the end she was training me for something more ominous. Uncle Snap presented us with pictures of the people of the Syndicate. Twelve of them including Mama were all gathered around a long, rectangular table like the twelve tribes of Israel. Mama was the only black woman in the crowd. Two white women and an Asian woman were the only women besides Mama. I had to admit that Mama’s power was impressive.