The Hood Life

by Meesha Mink

  Zoey rubs her neck. Something she’s been doing a lot of lately while I pretend not to notice. One of these days I should make an honest woman out of her. It’s the least I can do after the shit I put her through.

  “I better go if I want to be on time for that appointment.” She turns up a heavy smile and I walk over to reward her with a kiss.

  “You still think we’re going to be able to make it through this?” she asks.

  “Of course we will. You’re my Bonnie.”

  “And you’re my Clyde.”

  “Damn right.” I kiss her again and she gets up and heads out the apartment. “Good luck,” I tell her, and then head toward the bathroom for a hot shower. It’s a good place for me to try and think.

  The stash I’d lifted off M. Dawg’s ass plus what I was able to get for his ride was enough to pay a few bills, get Tonya’s crazy ass off me, and even pay my parole fees.

  Now we’re flat broke again. I’ve picked up a few-odd construction jobs but only making about the same money the illegals make—which is hardly any money at all.

  Maybe Zoey is right. I should take Sweet up on his job offer. She and M. Dawg are right about one thing: We can’t eat my pride. Still, things gotta get a little more desperate before I show my ass up over at Club Diamond.

  I shut off the scalding shower and wrap a towel around my hips just as a mad hammering erupts on the front door. “Who the fuck?” I stomp out of the bathroom and about halfway to the door, it occurs to me that it could be the police.

  Shit. Maybe they found M. Dawg’s body and have come to arrest me. I stop. Think. There are no weapons in this motherfucker and I’m on the second floor where the only other way out is through the window.

  “Mr. Jones. Mr. Jones, are you in there?”

  My heart pound again at the sound of my parole officer’s voice. I open the door. “Ms. Harding?” I glance down the tattered hallway. “What are you doing here?”

  Her dark brow climbs toward her blond hairline. “It’s customary for parole officers to make house visits.” She folds her clipboard in her arms. “Now are you going to let me in?”

  I hesitate for a second and then step back.

  Ms. Harding comes through the door, glancing around like a health inspector. If I know this bitch like I think I know her, she came over for this house visit for one reason only. As I close the door, I start estimating when Zoey will be back from her job interview.

  “Nice place you got here,” Ms. Harding says, setting her purse and clipboard down on the coffee table.

  “Thanks.”

  When I fold my arms, her eyes lock on my muscled guns and chest. This is the first time she has seen me this close to naked. The times I fucked her in her office, I didn’t do more than just unzip my pants to give her what she wanted.

  “Interesting tattoo,” she says, reading KILLER etched out across my chest.

  I don’t say anything, but that doesn’t erase her wicked smile. Then her gaze drifts to the wall behind me. “What happened there?”

  I turn and see the dented space in the wall where I’d rammed Zoey’s head. I wouldn’t mind doing the same shit to her. I don’t like the position she’s put me in, but on the flip side, she’s also been pretty lenient about my lack of a steady job and few missed parole fees.

  “I don’t know,” I lie. “It was there before I moved in.”

  She accepts the lie and returns to looking around—and removing her jacket. “Where’s the bedroom?” she asks.

  “In the back,” I say without moving.

  She glances back at me over her shoulder, her smile still in place. “Show me.”

  My stomach turns at the thought of fucking her hairless, smelly-ass pussy, but I move away from the door and lead the way to the bedroom.

  “Ooh, now this is a big bed,” she says, sitting her ass on one corner and bouncing up and down. “I bet you can really do some damage to some pussy on this motherfucker,” she says.

  Again, I don’t answer.

  Harding stops bouncing and curls a finger at me. “Stop being all shy and get over here. I’ve been dreamin’ about that fat dick of yours.”

  “Look. My girl is gonna be home any minute.”

  “Then you better hurry the fuck up,” she says, finally losing her smile.

  “Look. People talk around this motherfucker.”

  “Relax. Nobody saw me come in, I parked down at Hollywood Courts and came in the building through the back after I saw your girl leave.”

  “You fuckin’ stalkin’ me or something?”

  “Or somethin’,” she said, finding her smile again. “What can I say, Killer? You got me whipped. And since I’ve been more than lenient on your shoddy fee payments and overlooking your inability to maintain a steady job, I figure you wouldn’t mind our little arrangement. Am I wrong?”

  I glare at her as she unbuttons her shirt. “Now, are we gonna get this shit started now or would you rather have your girl catch us in the act?”

  I walk over to the bed with images of me wrapping my hands around her throat flashin’ in my head.

  Harding whips the towel from around my waist and my cock doesn’t bother to salute her dyke-lookin’ ass.

  “There’s that pretty motherfucker,” she says as she wraps her fat fingers around my dick and then stuffs it into her mouth as if she hadn’t eaten in a week.

  My hand instantly falls to the back of her neck as I grind my shit to the back of her throat. Her hands slide and cup my muscled ass cheeks. Okay, the ugly bitch can give some good fuckin’ head. I’m strokin’ to the back of her tight-ass throat and slappin’ my balls against her chin and she’s takin’ it like a pro.

  She stops just as my nut sack tingles and rips out of her clothes. At least today she douched that shit and I have no trouble keepin’ my erection hard long enough to work it into her pussy from behind.

  She moans as I stretch her soppin’ wet pussy but I don’t wait for her to get adjusted to my size. I just start pounding away.

  I hear her say, “Wait” and “Hold up,” but fuck that shit. She wants some motherfuckin’ dick, I’m gonna give it to her. “Turn your ass around,” I growl, smackin’ her on the ass.

  She does it without question.

  “You really want to see how I get down?” I ask her, crammin’ my shit back into her and folding her over like a taco so I don’t have to look her in the face. “I’m gonna knock the wall out of this mutherfucker.”

  In no time at all, the bed is bangin’ the floor and slappin’ the wall and I’m fuckin’ killin’ this pussy like it’s personally the source of all my problems. At some point, I unlock her legs so they can fall down around my waist, but my hands are now wrapped around her throat.

  “You like this dick, bitch? Huh?” I pound against her with such force that there’s a sweet stinging pain when our flesh slaps together. I don’t even realize that she can’t answer me. I’m squeezin’ too tight. “This is what the fuck you came here for, right?”

  Her pussy is dryin’ up.

  “You gonna take this dick. And you gonna fuckin’ love it, you hear me?”

  I’m chokin’ the shit out of her, but I can’t let go. Not until I fuckin’ bust this nut. Not until I get what’s fuckin’ comin’ to me.

  Harding tugs at my hands, but it only angers me. “You wait for this nut, bitch. You wait for it, goddammit.”

  Finally my shit shoots off and I’m roaring like a damn animal. No shit, it’s the best nut I’ve ever had. I collapse on top of her, panting like I’ve just raced around the world.

  But the body beside me is still.

  23

  The Dealer

  Candy is dead.

  I shift in my seat on the front row at the funeral parlor. I try not look at her casket because the woman lying there doesn’t look like Candy. Not because of the drugs that claimed her body and her soul but because she lay dead for several days before her body was discovered in an abandoned building.

  I thin
k of the money I gave her. The dope I gave her.

  Guilt eats at me.

  “My baby, Lord why…why…WHY…you take my baby?”

  I cut my eyes up to where Candy’s mother is busy trying to climb into the casket with her daughter. She got a good three hundred pounds packed on her short-ass frame and I’m nervous as shit that the casket gone tip the fuck over and send Candy rolling out like a fuckin’ burrito.

  Thank God several serious-lookin’ dudes from the funeral parlor pull her ass right on out and lead her back to her seat.

  I ain’t gone lie, it’s hard as hell to swallow how Candy died. She was somebody I used to love. She was the mother of my son.

  I turn my head to look down at him sleeping peacefully in my girl’s arms. I shift the pants leg of my Gucci pinstripe suit. I want to run out of here. I never liked funerals but here I am. And footing the bill too. Fuck it. It’s the least I can do for her for bringing my seed into this world.

  And he is the most important thing to me.

  At one time I was just as addicted to the game as these heads was to my product. But I’m goin’ into my own type of rehab to get away from this shit cold turkey.

  A nigga is makin’ moves. Plans. Changes. Fuck it.

  And I don’t mean part-time slingin’ while I run a business or handing the business over to Usher the way Maleek put me on to dealin’ crack and coke.

  I’m already looking into using the money I got to get what the fuck I want. Just like I ran this dope game—this dope business—I can run some legit shit. Every hood can use more laundromats. Fly-ass hair salons. Clothing stores. Corner stores. Something. I got to find a new way to make a living because I’m out for good.

  My money’s going to change like a motherfucker.

  The people around me going to change like a motherfucker.

  The life I live is going to change like a motherfucker.

  I can’t explain why I held back from telling anyone. Not Usher. Not my girl. Not my connections. Nobody. I know I have to tell them sooner or later. But I keep pushing it away for later. Every day I feel like it’s not that day.

  Maybe I’m scared they won’t understand.

  I made sure these last few weeks to get my shit straight. I don’t owe nobody shit and I ain’t buyin’ more weight.

  “This is a sad-ass funeral,” Quilla leans over to whisper to me. The scent of her Gucci Rush perfume circles my head. It just a reminder that she loves the finer things in life just like me. The Yves Saint Laurent suit, shoes, and shades she is wearing cost more than this entire funeral.

  I’m prepared to downgrade from Gucci to GAP. Is she?

  “Hey…You okay?”

  I look down at her and then at my son and then back at her. She smiles up at me softly and I follow the impulse to lean down and press my lips to her. She tastes like love.

  An organist in the corner of the funeral parlor begins to play a soft tune as the fifty or so funeral goers are led up to view the body. Mostly young fellas still dressed in jeans and oversized, colorful polos or females in black skintight club clothes trail by to say good-bye to somebody way too fucking young to die.

  I feel a hand on my shoulder and I look up to see the funeral director ready to lead the row I’m sitting in up to the casket. I clear my throat, straighten my tie, and rise.

  Candy is dead. Damn.

  I reach for the gold-rimmed aviator shades in the inner pocket of my jacket. I need them because I feel the tears welling up in my eyes. Fuck that. Knuckle up, I tell myself.

  This shit don’t seem real.

  Candy is dead.

  I turn and take Dashon from Quilla before I walk up to the casket. I can feel the eyes piercing my damn back. If they waitin’ on a big dramatic scene they can forget about it. I’m just going to pay my respects and keep it moving. The family is waiting for their turn to say good-bye.

  I look down at her lying there so peacefully and I wish I could make our son understand this moment. This is the last time he will be near his mother.

  I can’t stop the tears that race from my eyes.

  I don’t stop Quilla from taking him from my arms as I look down at Candy.

  People always talking about the game but this shit is about more than the hustle and the hustlers. The game encompasses all. The users. The community.

  This. The death. The destruction. This is a part of that game, too.

  Humph. Game over.

  Click.

  I look over my shoulder to see who is walking into the funeral parlor so late. The double door to the rear of the funeral parlor opens and two masked men walk in with guns pointed forward.

  At me.

  For two seconds there is a calm.

  Then all hell breaks loose.

  Women scream as everyone hits the floor or runs out of side entrances just as the gunfire begins.

  Pow-pow-pow-pow-pow-pow!

  I’m not strapped. I drop down just as bullets fly at me. They hit the casket instead.

  Somebody is tryna kill me.

  Pow-pow-pow-pow-pow-pow!

  “Lord, why, Lord. WHY?” Candy’s mother screams at the top of her lungs from her spot behind a potted plant.

  I crawl across the floor…away from Quilla and my son. If I’m gone die I’m not gone let any bullets fly their way and hit them instead of me. I’ll gladly take the bullet first.

  Pow-pow-pow-pow-pow-pow!

  I watch from the floor as the force of the bullets entering the casket make Candy’s corpse move up and down inside it like a jumping bean. I keep crawling across the floor away from everyone else—away from my assassins—but I run into a corner. This is the epitome of a dead end for me. I ain’t gone lie. The sounds of police sirens ain’t never sound so fuckin’ good to a hustler like me.

  Hopefully these mark-ass niggas will—

  Click.

  I look up and one of the gunmen is standing over me with his gun pointed at my chest. My eyes meet his eyes. I see nothing but the desire for my death.

  My son will be an orphan. A motherless and fatherless child.

  “Noooooooooooo!” I hear Quilla cry out.

  I keep my eyes locked on him as I stand to my feet before him. I will die a man. Fuck that.

  The sounds of the siren get louder. Closer.

  POW! The gun fires and my body jerks back and hits the wall from the impact.

  No, I never did any damage with my own hand or my own gun, but I authorized it. I abided it.

  When you live by the sword you die by the sword.

  24

  The Killer

  “Oh fuck!”

  I scramble off the bed and blink down at the body. When the chest fails to rise and fall, I start to hyperventilate. I can’t think. If there was a gun in this muthafucka I’d probably shoot myself. Might as well put myself out of this misery and be done with it.

  I pace the bedroom with my dick slappin’ my thighs and my muscles coiled into knots. Two mutherfuckin’ bodies in two months. What the fuck?

  There’s a sudden hammering at the door.

  “Oh shit. Oh shit.” I squeeze my head in between my hands, hoping it will help pop out an idea.

  The hammering continues; I have to do something before whoever it is bangs the door down. I rush from the bedroom, closing the door behind me and then find my robe in the bathroom before heading toward the front door.

  I peek out the small peephole and damn near roll my eyes to the back of my head. “Go away, Tonya!”

  “Nigga, open this door!”

  I know she’s gonna start a commotion and draw a crowd if I don’t do something. I wrench open the door, grab her by the arm, and jerk her inside—almost all in the same motion.

  “Nigga, what the fuck do you think you’re doin’?”

  I slam her up against the wall and lift her off the floor until her head nearly matches Zoey’s imprint perfectly. “What the fuck are you doin’ here, Tonya?”

  She tries to jerk her arm from my gasp. “I�
�m here for my money, nigga. Let me go.”

  “I gave you some money last month.”

  “This is a new motherfuckin’ month. I got bills and your son needs to eat. Not that you give a fuck.”

  “I’ll get you your money. You need to stop rollin’ up over here. The shit ain’t cool.”

  “What? Am I pissin’ off your fat-ass girlfriend?”

  My hand tightened on her arm. “You fuckin’ watch your mouth.”

  “Shit. Motherfucker, stop. That hurts.”

  “That’s not all that’s gonna hurt if you keep bringin’ your sorry ass around here.” I smack her into the wall again. Fear creeps into her eyes when I’m two seconds from snapping her arm off.

  “All right. All right. I’m sorry,” she pants.

  “You gonna stay your ass away from here?”

  She hesitates a bit too long and I twist a little harder, causing her voice to hike a few octaves. “All right. All right. I won’t come by here again.”

  I plant my face in front of hers, and something about her naked pain gives me another hard-on. “I fuckin’ mean it, Tonya. You show your face around here again and it’ll be the last motherfuckin’ thing you do.” I release her and she scrambles out the apartment like a cockroach when the lights come on.

  I expel a breath and wipe a line of sweat from my forehead. Now how the fuck am I gonna get a dead body out this motherfucker with those two old biddy posted out front? Shit. They probably saw Harding come into the building.

  No. Wait. She said that she came into the building through the back.

  Shit. Shit. Think. Think.

  There’s an empty apartment on this floor. Maybe if I pick the lock I can move the body over there. But then what? I ask the voice inside my head.

  I can’t get a whole body out of here but I can definitely take it out in pieces.

  It actually took me seven days to get the last of Ms. Harding out of the empty apartment down the hall. Two more days to clean up the mess. It’s a good thing, too. I saw the superintendent go in that motherfucker this morning, checkin’ it out for a new resident.

  Meanwhile, I keep waitin’ for the shit to hit the fan. Zoey thinks I’m just worried about having another mouth to feed and she tries to give me my space. I haven’t even touched her in days and when she touches me, I turn away.