by K'wan
When he opened the door to his apartment, the first thing he noticed was the smell. It didn’t have its usual scent of faint musk and lingering nicotine. It smelled of bleach and pine. Curious, he went into the kitchen and found that the dirty dishes, which had been sitting there for days, were washed and put away. When Monk snatched the refrigerator open and found it full of food, he figured he had to have come into the wrong apartment.
“What the fuck is going on?” Monk wondered aloud, making his way to the back of the apartment, where Li’l Monk’s bedroom was. He didn’t bother to knock before pushing the door open and what he saw tickled him.
Li’l Monk was sitting on his lumpy mattress, back against the wall and his eyes rolling back in his head. Between his legs was a girl with her big yellow ass pointed heavenward and her lips wrapped around Li’l Monk’s cock. Within spitting distance of them at the other end of the mattress, Omega had one leg out of his jeans and held a brown-skinned girl in what looked like a wrestling move, while he thrust in and out of her. The four teenagers were so busy going at it that no one noticed Monk standing in the doorway.
“Make sure you save a taste for your old man,” Monk finally announced himself.
“What the fuck, Monk!” Li’l Monk pushed the girl off him and awkwardly stuffed his sausage into his jeans. “I asked you not to just bust up in my room like that.” He got off the mattress.
“I called your name, but I guess you were too preoccupied to hear me,” Monk told him, glaring lasciviously at the two girls who were scrambling into their pants. “I see you finally cut them nappy-ass braids.” He rubbed his hand over Li’l Monk’s head, which was now cut low. “Looks good.”
“Thanks, now can you step out for a minute so my people can get straight?” Li’l Monk asked.
Monk took one last hard stare at the girls, committing their nude flesh to memory. “A’ight, meet me in the living room. I need to holla at you.” He left the room.
A few minutes later, Li’l Monk led his group from the bedroom to the front door. The girls looked embarrassed and kept their eyes glued to the floor. “Wait on me, O. I’ll be out in a few,” he told his partner.
“Do your thing.” Omega gave him dap.
“We still going out tonight, right?” the light-skinned girl who had been performing oral sex on Li’l Monk asked.
“Yeah, Sophie. I told you we are. Just give me a little while to handle some business and me and Omega will come through your block and scoop y’all,” Li’l Monk told her.
“Okay.” Sophie puckered her lips for a good-bye kiss.
Li’l Monk was hesitant. He could see his father watching him from the living room and it made him uncomfortable, so he kissed her on the nose instead. “See you in a few, ma.”
“It’s like that?” Sophie asked with an attitude.
“Sophie, just let me take care of this and I’ll get with you.” He ushered her away. When he closed the door he could still hear Omega laughing at him from the hallway.
In the living room, Monk lounged on the couch, drinking one of the beers he’d found in the refrigerator and smoking the blunt clip Omega had left in the ashtray. “That Marcy Jean’s daughter, from ’round 147th?”
“Yeah,” Li’l Monk answered.
“I remember her mama from back in the days. That bitch could suck loose change from a parking meter, and from the slob job I seen Sophie putting on you earlier I can tell the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree.” Monk laughed.
“Can you watch your mouth?” Li’l Monk sounded offended.
“That your girl?” Monk asked.
“No, me and Sophie are just cool,” Li’l Monk lied. The truth was, Li’l Monk and Sophie had lost their virginity to each other a few years earlier. They had never been in a relationship to speak off, but they could come to each other to fulfill certain needs. Li’l Monk always respected Sophie because she was still willing to hang out with him even when he didn’t have a pot to piss in. They had spent more than a few broke days together, which was why he made it his business to invite her out when he came up on a few dollars.
“Does she suck the dicks of every nigga she’s just cool with? If that’s the case, maybe it’s a good thing it’s not your girl,” Monk said.
“What the fuck is your problem?” Li’l Monk asked, tiring of his father’s taunting. It was always like this when they were in the house together, which was why Li’l Monk was always in the streets.
“I ain’t got no problem. I’m still the same old Monk; looks like you’re the one who’s changed.” He looked over Li’l Monk’s new sneakers and haircut. “New gear, food in the pad, and you cleaned up. You must’ve had one hell of a good night.”
“We paid Sophie and Tasha to clean up, and I caught the sneakers on sale on 125th. Ramses put a few extra dollars in my pocket at the end of my shift so I could get a haircut and something to wear,” Li’l Monk told him.
“And what does Ramses care about your appearance? You ain’t gotta be at the height of fashion to stand on no corners and sell crack for another nigga,” Monk taunted his son.
“I don’t stand on corners anymore. Ramses gave me a new position.” Li’l Monk brushed past him and went into the kitchen. His father followed.
Monk leaned against the counter, arms folded, watching Li’l Monk rummage around in the refrigerator. “Less than twenty-four hours and you’ve already gotten a promotion? That’s a mighty quick climb, even by the best’s standards. What did you have to do for this promotion?”
“Nothing, just held Omega down when shit got a little crazy. That’s all.” Li’l Monk twisted the top off the beer and took a sip.
“Just held shit down when it got crazy, huh?” Monk asked. There was something not quite right with Li’l Monk, but he couldn’t place his finger on it.
Li’l Monk shrugged his broad shoulders. “Ramses says he’s taken a liking to me, so he wants to take me under his wing.”
“More like under his thumb. People like Ramses don’t show kindness to nobody, unless they plan on using them,” Monk said in disgust.
“Just because you’ve always got an agenda when you get close to people doesn’t mean everybody else thinks like that,” Li’l Monk told him.
Monk laughed. “So what, you think you’re gonna be Ramses’s little play son, like Chucky and them? He tell you how he’s gonna make you rich if you stay loyal?”
Li’l Monk didn’t reply, but his facial expression spoke for him.
“Boy, you’re greener than I thought. If you believed that shit then maybe you should put down the gun and pick up a pen so you can fill out some job applications. The game ain’t for you, son.”
“I think you’re just pissed, because Ramses is trying to drop game on me instead of bullshit, like you always do,” Li’l Monk said.
“Ramses ain’t teaching you the game; he’s running it on you. He keeps dumb little niggas like you around to do shit he wouldn’t do himself. You’ll pop off without question, and never think twice about the consequences. Murder is a dirty, dirty business, Li’l Monk, and you don’t want that kind of stain on your soul. Right now you’re straddling the fence, but once you cross over to that side there’s no coming back. You ain’t ready for that, son. You’re my kid, and I know you better than anybody.”
Now it was Li’l Monk’s turn to laugh. “I never realized until just this second how fucking clueless you are as to who I am.” He turned his back and returned to his bedroom. He had barely crossed the threshold when he was violently shoved from behind. Li’l Monk tripped over his feet and dropped the bottle, spraying beer and broken glass all over his bedroom floor.
“How dare you give me your back?” Monk stormed into the room. His nostrils were flared and the veins in his neck bulged. Even strung out, Monk still had a very intimidating appearance.
“Don’t put your hands on me again,” Li’l Monk warned. He grabbed a towel off the chair and got on his hands and knees to clean the beer up off the floor.
In a fluid motion, Li’l Monk was on his feet and had one of his massive hands wrapped around his father’s neck. He slammed Monk into the wooden closet door and it splintered. Li’l Monk placed a piece of the broken glass from the beer bottle to Monk’s neck with enough pressure to prick him. Looking into the cold expression on his son’s face, Monk now realized what was off about Li’l Monk that he hadn’t been able to place earlier. The innocence was gone from his eyes.
“It’s too late, ain’t it?” Monk asked, sounding hurt. It was the closest to compassionate his son had seen him in years. “You plan to add my life to your list too?”
Li’l Monk blinked as if he were waking from a dream. Slowly, he released his father and took two cautionary steps back. “You ever put your hands on me again and the next time I’m gonna go through with it.”
“Ramses made you kill for him tonight, didn’t he?” Monk shook his head sadly. “I had a feeling the blood of them boys they found in the lobby was on your hands when you vanished all suddenly, but I didn’t want to believe it. I wanted to believe . . . I needed to believe that I didn’t pass my sickness on to my baby boy.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Li’l Monk grabbed his jacket and a plastic shopping bag before heading for the door. Monk didn’t try to stop him, but he did follow him.
“Do you know what’s waiting for you behind that door you’re about to open?” Monk asked.
“Not really, but it’s gotta be better than what’s waiting for me here,” Li’l Monk spat and left the apartment.
CHAPTER 18
Li’l Monk shoved the door of his apartment building open with so much force that it hit the wall and the glass cracked. As usual his father had managed to get into his head, and in doing so he forced Li’l Monk to face something that he had been trying to block out of his mind. Once meant you killed somebody; twice made you a killer.
He had recounted the story for Ramses, and again for Chucky during the ride back from the Bronx, but Li’l Monk hadn’t had a chance to process it yet. The scene had been playing on repeat all night and throughout the day in his head, the deafening bang of the pistol, the smell of gunpowder, the blood. It was the blood that stuck out more than anything. Li’l Monk could remember looking at the hallway floor and wondering who was going to clean up all the blood. Initially he thought that he’d be burdened with guilt after committing murder, but strangely enough he wasn’t. He felt neither good nor bad about the deed. It was simply something that happened, like stumbling on a broken piece of sidewalk, but not breaking your stride. What he’d learned was that the more you took life, the less complicated it became. It was the second person he had ever killed, and he knew he could do it again without reservations.
On the corner of his block, he saw Omega talking to Chucky. Chucky was one of the last people he wanted to see at that point. It was bad enough that Chucky already disliked Li’l Monk for reasons he wouldn’t say, but things seemed to get worse after what happened to Benny. Chucky hadn’t come out and said anything, but the way he glared at Li’l Monk and Omega the whole ride back from the apartment said that he held them responsible for what had happened to his friend. Li’l Monk walked up on the tail end of their conversation, but he didn’t miss the sharp tones being traded back and forth.
“Chucky, how many times you gonna ask me about this shit? I told you everything that I told Ramses,” Omega was saying.
“Maybe there was something you left out . . . something that you maybe told Ramses when you called to tell him about the murders,” Chucky said in an accusatory tone. When Chucky saw Li’l Monk approaching, he visibly tensed. He seemed jittery and his eyes were glassy. Li’l Monk had seen the look before, but kept the observation to himself.
“What up, killer?” Chucky asked sarcastically.
Li’l Monk fought back the urge to slap Chucky. “You tell me. I didn’t mean to interrupt your little chat.”
“Nah, you ain’t interrupting nothing. As a matter of fact, I’m glad you’re here. I’ve been trying to get ya man Omega help me to fill in some of the blanks about what happened to Benny,” Chucky told Li’l Monk.
Li’l Monk shrugged. “It’s like my man told you, we’ve been over all this already.”
“Well, if I wanna go over it one hundred more times, muthafucka, we will!” Chucky snapped. His eyes were wild and the corners of his mouth were white with dry spit.
Li’l Monk took one look at Chucky and knew without a doubt that he was high off more than weed and not in total control of himself. He would be mindful of it, but he wasn’t going to allow Chucky to disrespect him any further. “Chucky.” He set his bags on the ground and gave Chucky his undivided attention. “I’m gonna tell you like I told Ramses, and let’s hope that’s the end of it. Some niggas came through to rob the spot, and me and O laid ’em down. Unfortunately, one of them was connected to your peoples. Now I can understand you being upset, but your problem ain’t with me. You need to direct that anger at whoever it is you’re really mad at because neither me nor Omega has done anything to you.”
Chucky’s face twisted angrily. “What you dropping your bag for like you wanna do something?”
“Chucky, I ain’t trying to do nothing. I’m just trying to tell you what it is. I don’t want no problems,” Li’l Monk said in as calm a voice as he could muster. His patience was wearing thin with Chucky, but he didn’t want problems with Ramses. He was too new to the crew to make waves. It seemed like his attempt at diplomacy only made Chucky more agitated.
“You’re damn right you don’t want no problems. I don’t care who you killed, I’m still the top gun around this muthafucka,” Chucky sneered. “You think because Ramses gives you a pat on the head like a good little dog, you got a voice at the table? I’ve seen a hundred little punks like you come and go and they all thought they would be Ramses’s new number one, but I’m still holding that spot! You ain’t shit but a soldier and that’s all you’ll ever be, just like your daddy!”
“Fuck you say about my father, nigga?” Li’l Monk took a step toward Chucky, but Omega stepped between them.
“Be easy, my nigga. Chucky is on one right now. He don’t mean nothing by it,” Omega whispered to him.
“Fuck that, don’t hold him back. Let him go so he can come get some of what I got for him.” Chucky pulled his gun.
“You think yours was the last gun they made?” Li’l Monk drew the gun his father had given him . . . the gun that had cut the man down in the lobby. He could almost hear it pleading with him to feed it more bodies.
Before the confrontation could go on an unmarked police car slowed alongside them. The window rolled down and Detective Wolf glared at them. “Everything okay, boys?”
“Everything is fine.” Chucky hid the gun behind his back. “Me and the young boys are just talking a little shit. Ain’t that right?” He turned to Li’l Monk.
“Yeah, just talking shit,” Li’l Monk agreed. His gun was pressed to the back of his thigh, ready to give it to Chucky or the cop, if either of them moved funny.
Wolf’s thick lips parted into a grin and he nodded, like he knew something that he wasn’t telling. “Why don’t y’all go talk shit on somebody’s corner? This corner belongs to me. Ain’t that right, Chucky?”
“You got it. I got shit I need to be attending to anyway,” Chucky told him. He turned back to Li’l Monk. “We’re gonna continue this conversation another time,” he promised and hopped in his car.
“I’ll be looking forward to it,” Li’l Monk called after him as Chucky pulled off. A few seconds after he’d gone, the police car left too.
“What the hell is wrong with you? Chucky is a lieutenan
t out here!” Omega scolded Li’l Monk.
“I wouldn’t give a fuck if he was the president. If Chucky ever pulls a gun on me again I’m gonna kill that dude and take it up with Ramses after,” Li’l Monk said seriously. “What the fuck is his problem anyhow?”
“He’s probably going through the motions over what happened with Benny. That was some made-for-TV shit that went down.”
“True story,” Li’l Monk agreed. “What would make a nigga who is already in a good position fuck himself up like that?”
“Greed,” Omega said flatly. “It’s greedy niggas who are fucking the game up. A nigga like me, I ain’t hard to please. Pay me what I’m worth, according to what I bring to the table, and I’m good. It’s when niggas start feeling like they’re entitled to more when shit gets twisted and muthafuckas find themselves tied to chairs and shit.”
“I can’t even lie, I thought Ramses was gonna have that dude killed. I was surprised when all he did was exile him. Where do you think Benny is gonna relocate to?”
“Potter’s Field.” Omega laughed. “If I know Ramses, Benny is probably being committed to an unmarked patch of dirt as we speak.”
“But he said—”