“The guys and I got here two hours ago, and there were about ten people out there. It’s grown since then, though. It’s ridiculous out there now. I’m trying to get the cops to make everyone leave.”
“Why would you do that?”
“Because we didn’t come back here for a concert, Moe.”
I chose to ignore her as I made my way across the room.
“Can you believe I walked up to the window with almost no clothes on? What was I thinking? People could’ve seen me without my shades, my grill, my chains...man, I musta been trippin’.”
SaTia walked over and sat down on the foot of my bed.
“You’re not thinking about going out there, are you?”
“Hell yeah, I’m goin’ out there! Those are my fans!”
“Moe—people are trying to kill you!”
“What? I’m supposed to be scared of these niggas for the rest of my life?”
SaTia stood in front of me defiantly.
“The bodyguards will be here in two hours. You can go outside after they get here.”
I glanced out of the window at the sea of people who came to support me, and I decided not to wait.
“These people shouldn’t have to wait no two hours, SaTia.”
“These people should have never shown up here in the first place!”
SaTia was getting upset. Her voice was getting shaky and the chinks in her armor were starting to show again. She turned her eyes away from me and tried to compose herself. I lowered my voice and placed my hand on her shoulder.
“Aight, look, I’ll just go out on the porch, okay? I won’t even leave the house. I’ll take Ray, Brian, and Henry with me, we’ll stand out there for a couple seconds, hype up the crowd, and come back. And I won’t do nothin’ else without the bodyguards. Cool?”
She still would’ve preferred that I stay in the house, but she knew this was the best deal she was going to get. She nodded her head, conceding to my plan, and walked back over to the bed.
I began putting the rest of my clothes and jewelry back on. It wasn’t until I turned around that I noticed the look she was giving me.
“What?”
“I don’t want you to go out there, but if you insist on it, please give these people more credit. Moe, the people outside are here because they love you. Most of them probably remember you from high school battling and freestyling in the park. Honestly, I don’t think they care about your chains. They want to make sure you’re okay.”
“Whatever. They want the same Nigga everybody else want.”
“Why don’t you go out there and see for yourself?”
I put my shades down and looked at her. “That’s what I plan to do.”
“I mean, go out there with nothin’ but some jeans and a T-shirt on, and see how much love you get.”
“Now you trippin’,” I said as I grabbed my shades and put them back on. I was reaching for my cap when I felt a hand stop me. I turned my head just in time to see SaTia’s hands reaching up to grab my shades and pull them back off of my head. With my eyes now exposed, she looked right into them. “You’re home, Moe. Stop being Da Nigga for just one second. Show them the real you.”
Something inside me began to ache. I reached out slowly and grabbed my shades once again. They were heavier than bricks.
“This is the real me. In front of you, in front of Mama and Big Mama, yeah, I can be somebody different. But in front of them, this is all I know. Moses Jenkins ain’t no multi-platinum recordin’ artist, SaTia. Da Nigga is.”
I reached for my suitcase as SaTia’s gaze began to melt the self-respect off of my skin. Her face grew more and more somber as I put on the shades, chains, and pinky ring. When I reached for my grill, she turned toward the door.
“See you downstairs, Nigga.”
She might as well have spit acid in my eyes.
When I got downstairs, Big Mama took one look at me and put her attention back on her chicken and dumplings. She whispered just loud enough for God, Mama, and me, who was next to her making gravy, to hear.
“...be damned if he comin’ to the table like that...”
Ray was sitting in front of the television with a coaster under his glass of Kool-Aid. He was laughing at SpongeBob on the screen as I walked over.
“We been in six-star hotels where they got diamond dust sprinkled in the walls, and I ain’t never seen you use a coaster for nothing,” I said as I walked up behind him. “What you doin’ with one now?”
Ray jumped up from his seat when he heard my voice. He looked at me, then down at the coaster. When he looked back up, he shrugged his shoulders.
“I got mad respect for your moms, Moe. She tell me to use a coaster, then I’m usin’ a coaster.”
I reached out my hand to give him dap. He clasped my hand and we both leaned forward to tap each other on the back.
“I ’preciate the love, man.”
“No problem, Moe. You know your peoples is my peoples, real talk.”
“Get everybody together for me, dogg. Think it’s ’bout time we stepped outside and said hello.”
“We...umm...we was waitin’ on you.” Henry and Brian came from around the corner with their mouths full of food. Brian spoke up for the both of them.
“Hope you ain’t want us to wait on you to eat. Since you was sleep so long and SaTia wasn’t letting nobody wake you up, Ma Dukes fixed us a plate to hold us over.”
“Naw, it’s cool. Fix yourself up, though; we gettin’ ready to go outside.”
“What we gonna do outside?” Henry’s arm was still in a sling, and his face didn’t reflect the excitement of the other two.
“Just hype the crowd up a bit, probably sign some autographs. You know, just show ’em some love,” I answered, and then looked back at Henry. His face hadn’t changed.“Why? Is there somethin’ wrong?”
He took a step toward me and lowered his voice.
“Somebody’s tryin’ to kill you, Moe. You came back here for a break, right? What’s the point, if you gonna keep feedin’ the public?”
I was starting to get frustrated with people telling me what was best for me, even if they were telling the truth.
“They out there yellin’ my name, man! What you want me to do?”
“Send us out there. We’ll tell ’em you came here to be with your fam and get your head on straight. Won’t be no special appearances or nothing like that.”
“Naw...naw. I got my start here. My fans from D.C. put me on the map, man! And I’m supossed to ignore ’em now when they need me?”
Henry looked over at SaTia. She shrugged her shoulders and shook her head, as if to say, “I tried to tell him, but he wouldn’t listen.” Clearly, they had some information that I was not privy to.
Henry raised his voice level to reach mine when he responded. “Don’t nobody out there need you, Moe. Everybody that need you is right here in the house. I mean, what if P. Silenzas got another nigga out there with a gun, waiting for you to come out on the front step? What then, huh?”
The thought of being shot on my front step cut my next statement short. Mama and Big Mama came out to the living room to see what all the noise was about, and SaTia was staring at us from the steps. The entire house went silent. Henry looked around at everyone, then walked up to me and whispered in my ear. “Look... you know I’ma follow you wherever you go. If you wanna go out and hype up the fans, then do you. Just know that you ain’t doin’ it for them—you doin’ it for Da Nigga.”
When he finished, he took enough steps back to leave me by myself in the middle of the room. I felt like a bull’s-eye as the clock on the mantle continued to count seconds away.
“So...umm,” Brian said, breaking the silence with his anxiousness. “What we doin,’ Moe?”
“Get your gear on. We goin’ outside.”
Ray, Brian, and Henry all put on their shades, chains, and caps. Henry moved a little slower than usual, but when I walked toward the door, he was right beside me. SaTia took a s
eat on the steps while Mama and Big Mama returned to their cooking.
I stopped at the door. I could still hear the chants of the people outside, daring me to put myself in harm’s way to prove I was still a superstar.
I glanced over at Henry. I couldn’t see his eyes through his shades, but I sensed he was looking at me.
He was right. Moses wanted, even needed, to stay inside and figure his life out. But Da Nigga needed to be fed.
That’s what they don’t realize, I thought to myself as I took hold of the doorknob; If he starves, everybody starves.
I twisted the doorknob, counted to three, and threw the door open.
“AY YO D.C.! CHOCOLATE CITY, WHAT’S POPPIN’!”
Thunder echoed through the air. The crowd’s roar made the house shake. I soaked it all in like sunlight. The electricity went into my chest and through my entire body. It ran down my legs and stopped at my toes. It ran through my arms and lingered in my fingertips. I stood there with my arms outstretched and my eyes closed, and it felt as though lightening was pulsing through my veins.
“To hell with the Silenzas!” I spoke to myself as the crowd turned me back into a superhuman. “I run this right here! I run this!”
The mass of people almost broke through the line of cops at the front lawn. The officers waiting in their cars jumped out to help. I could hear Ray, Brian, and Henry screaming and jumping around, feeding off of the same energy I was. I couldn’t make out their words, and I didn’t care. They were here for me. Everyone was here for me.
I opened my eyes and realized I ruled the world. For the first time since the Phil Winters Show, I was invincible again.
I didn’t have a mic, but I belted out the hook to my latest single anyway. Miraculously, the crowd heard me, and began rapping it along with me.
“HOES IN DA ATTIC, YEAH! HOES IN THE ATTIC, YEAH! COME TO MY CRIB, I GOT SOME HOES IN DA ATTIC, YEAH!”
Now that I was back to being indestructible, I scanned the crowd for the female I was going to sleep with tonight.
That’s when I saw Orlando standing off to the right.
We caught eyes for two seconds before he turned around and made a gesture to the upstairs window of Mrs. Marble’s house, across the street.
He gave a speech with his eyes in those two seconds. He told me I’d broken his heart. He told me I forgot about the streets, and I forgot what it meant to be down for my niggas. He told me I’d chosen a female over him, and he couldn’t let that slide. He told me I should’ve been down to ride on the Silenzas no matter what, and he couldn’t let that slide either. He told me he didn’t know what he was doing, but he was so angry that it didn’t matter, and even if he regretted it afterward, I still deserved what I got.
And right before he pivoted on his front foot and turned his back toward me, he told me that he was sorry.
I realized what was going to happen before I had time to react to it.
The first shot knocked me back about two steps. Everything went quiet after that. I could see the crowd going mad, but I couldn’t hear them.
The second shot knocked me clear back into the house and turned all the sound on again.
I could only hear the screams of the masses. My eyes were fixed on no particular spot on the ceiling, and I couldn’t seem to move them. I lay on my back in the hallway where my father had come and gone so many times, and I could start to feel my blood pooling under my back.
There was a hole in my chest. I could feel air in places other than my lungs. I didn’t feel any pain, though. It felt more like my body was a puzzle, and my core had been removed from the board.
I heard Big Mama’s good china fall and shatter on the floor as she and Mama hurtled across the kitchen. SaTia’s scream pierced the chaos. She had stayed on the steps while the guys and I went outside. After the second shot, my body flew past her before it landed on the floor. She got to me before anyone else did and cradled my head in her lap.
“Oh my...oh my God...Moe...MOE! MOE!”
I couldn’t answer her. I began to feel blood in my throat, choking me. I gagged and coughed it up. When I saw how thick it was, I recognized that I was in trouble.
I could hear Mama screaming now, but her hysteria made her words hard to understand.
Big Mama came up and put a towel over the crater in my torso before she kneeled beside me. I believe she wanted to touch me, but her hands shook in mid-air. Her face seemed to melt into one big tear as she rocked back and forth.
“Here...here, baby...you gon’ be okay. Lord, he gonna be okay...Lord, I cain’t take another one...You save him, Lord...You save him ’cause I’m askin’!...and I ain’t done nothing but right by you! I ain’t done nothin’ to deserve losin’ my son and my grandson! You owes me, so you repay me now! You saves my baby!”
Henry, Ray, and Brian came in the doorway and slammed it behind them. Henry was the first to get a good look at me.
“Oh no...no...God...”
“CALL AN AMBULANCE!” SaTia screamed through her tears.
Ray already had his cell phone out, but sirens were coming down the street before he even pressed a button.
I only remember flashes after that. My memories turned into strobe lights. Being put on a stretcher, lying face down in a field, being in an ambulance, picking cotton seeds out of my fingernails, rushing through the hospital, aiming a rifle through my tears, all of it went by like a blurry movie with bad sound. The last flash was of SaTia, with makeup melting down her face, praying on the right side of my bed. My dad was on the left side, doing the same thing. Then everything went dark.
PART TWO
7
It felt as if someone had stuck an adrenaline needle in my heart. My head jerked up so fast from being facedown in the dirt that it threw me onto my back. I scrambled around, using my hands and feet to propel me, for about ten seconds before I realized I didn’t know who I was running from. There was no one around me. In fact, there didn’t seem to be anyone in the area at all. Just a big open field with golden grass and no shade.
I patted my chest lightly, expecting to be able to feel shredded clothes and flesh, but there was nothing there. No gunshot wounds. No blood. Nothing. I didn’t have a scratch on me. It was as if I had dreamed it all.
“What the hell is goin’ on?” I stood up as I spoke aloud.
The field stretched as far as I could see. There was nothing else around but grass and a scorching hot sun.
“SaTia? Ray? Brian? Henry? Where y’all at?”
I spoke but no one responded.
I began walking in an unknown direction. The sun was beating down against my body. When it gets this hot, your grill starts to give you cottonmouth. I could feel sweat gathering in my Air Force Ones and dripping down my face underneath my shades. I tried to wipe it away from my eyes and scratched my cheek with my pinky ring. My confusion took the sting away.
How had I gotten here? The last thing I remembered was lying half-dead on a hospital bed. People don’t get shot and then wake up in the middle of nowhere with the sun cooking their hair grease. I stopped and looked around again. Scanning all around me, again, all I could see were fields.
“Well, it’s too hot to be heaven...” I said aloud. “And too peaceful to be hell. And I’m not Catholic, so this can’t be purgatory. Where am I?”
I continued to walk through the field. After a while, I quit trying to wipe the sweat away from my face and dealt with the sting of it in my eyes. My white tee was completely soaked and I had puddles in my Nikes. It got harder to put one foot in front of the other, and my path through the field began to zig-zag like a piece of artwork done by a two-year-old.
Maybe this is hell... I began to think as I staggered from left to right. Before I could finish the thought, I was back on the ground again.
“SATIA!” I screamed out as I rolled around on the ground. “BRIAN, HENRY, RAY...WHAT’S GOING ON?”
I began reaching out for something—clawing at the ground as if it would somehow provide me
with an answer to my question. When I stopped, I considered lying there and letting whatever was going to happen to me play itself out. Then I remembered... I’m Da Nigga. I don’t lay down for nothing.
The thought itself wasn’t strong enough to get me back up to my feet, so I began repeating it aloud.
“I’m...Da...Nigga,” I coughed out as I got up to my knees. “I don’t...lie down...for nothing.”
As I swayed back and forth on my feet, I forced myself to begin thinking rationally.
I’ll probably pass out in a few minutes, I thought. I might as well get as far as I can get before I go down for good.
I could barely lift my head, but I took a step, and then another, and then one more. By the time I got to nine or ten, I lifted my head, expecting to still see an eternity of fields. Instead I saw a road. It looked like one of the back country roads that people have on their farms—as if someone had cleared all the grass and plants out of the way, but forgot to put down any pavement. I didn’t care, though. A road meant that someone would be coming by sooner or later. They’d recognize me and get me back to some type of civilization.
By the time I reached the road, I could vaguely see something approaching in the distance. My vision was blurred from all the sweat that had found its way into my eyes, so I wasn’t surprised when the figure began to look more like a horse than a car.
“I’m trippin’,” I said aloud as I began to wave down the car.
“Yo, yo, I need some help! Yo, stop the car, man! I need some help! I don’t even know where the hell I am, dogg! You gotta help me!”
There was something wrong with the car’s engine. As it pulled up, it sounded like some type of animal. Even with blurred vision, I could tell I had never seen any car like this before. And it stunk.
“Yo, what’s wrong with your....never mind, man. You got any water?”
I took off my shades and wiped my eyes with the back of my hands. Before I put the shades back on, I looked up. There were two horses in front of me, with two white guys on them that looked as if they were straight out of an old Western movie.
“Wow,” I said, looking at the men, then at the horses, then back at them.
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