Level Up

by Nikki Karma

  "Wait a minute," I smiled, "What the fuck they do to you? Not even five hours ago you were giving me shit.”

  She shook her head and laughed. "I'm not gonna lie I did get a little mad at first but I can't stop you from doing what you want.” She sighed. “I just hope your girl is real and gonna do right by you because I don’t trust her.”

  "Let me worry ‘bout her.” I said. “So what did you want to talk to me about because it seemed serious?”

  “Okay so it’s like this.” She paused and touched her side a little. “Do one more job with me, just one, and I promise I won’t ask you for anything else.” She paused again. “Please, Tasha. It’s time to level up and get this money. But just like I’m there for you, by understanding that you want to leave Adamsville, you have to be there for me too. So what’s it gonna be?”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  TASHA

  I was at the counter at the Post Office putting away stamp books while Crystal was singing and servicing customers. The few we had. As a matter of fact the most customers we had in a day was about eleven. She been cool all day like what we were about to do was as easy as breathing. We were waiting on the right mark.

  But today feels wrong. Like I’m walking into a trap.

  My stomach churned because I had a bad feeling about goin’ through with our plan tonight. It feels desperate, like life or death, which is an emotion I never had to deal with before a job. Plus we didn’t know who we would hit, just a few good ideas which wasn’t enough.

  While I was still putting up stamps, a dope dealer name Michael ‘Hollywood’ Lane who had a thing for Crystal walked up to her at the counter. He was all smiles and never gave up. “When you gonna let me take care of you?”

  “Ain’t you married?” Crystal said. “Because for some reason I remember you coming in here with your wife. Although I could be wrong.”

  He frowned. “Married?” He pointed to himself. “Me?” He paused and looked around as if someone was setting him up. “Who told you that shit?”

  I shook my head and laughed, knowing the last thing Crystal wanted was dick. Plus I’m sure this dude really was married and it was obvious that he was willing to throw his wife under the bus. “It ain’t true?” Crystal asked. “I mean you could tell the truth either which way. It probably won’t matter to me anyway.”

  “Nah,” he said calmly. He placed both palms flat on the counter. “I ain’t married and I’m never gonna be married.” He paused. “So now can I take you out?”

  Crystal looked over at me and back at him. “How can I help you today, boy?” Crystal said putting her hand on her hips.

  “You mean besides taking care of you?” He tapped the counter. “And spoiling your fine ass rotten? Something I been trying to do for months.”

  Crystal frowned. “You know what, I’m about to walk away from your ass. If you don’t need help I’m—”

  He reached over the counter and grabbed her hand. “Okay, okay, you don’t have to get so serious,” he paused and let her go. “I wanna stop the mail from coming to my house. Which form I gotta fill out to make that happen?”

  Crystal tried not to look at me but I understood what that meant. He was going out of town, which meant we could get paid. The only thing is I was afraid to hit Hollywood’s place. I knew he may have had a house in the neighborhood but he was still hood and dangerous.

  Crystal gave him the form and he filled it out while talking to her at the same time. “I wish you weren’t so mean,” he said taking off his NY black baseball cap and putting it on backwards. “You too pretty for all that.”

  “Well I am mean.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “And you bothering me.” She paused. “So you done filling it out yet?”

  He chuckled. “Alright, alright, I’ma leave you alone.” He slid the form over to her. “You looked like a friendly person and I wanted a little conversation. But if you serious about not being interested I’ll leave you be.”

  She cleared her throat. “So where you off too for vacation?”

  “My auntie just died so I’m going to Texas.” He paused. “Not looking forward to it at all. Not even a vacation but I still have to go.” He shrugged. “What you gonna do? When family calls you have to bounce.”

  “Wow, I’m sorry to hear that.” She said. “Don’t you have anybody to house sit?” Crystal continued. “Because these forms can sometimes not really work. Which means you’ll get a lot of mail in your box anyway.”

  “Like I said I’m single,” he winked at her and pushed the form toward her. Crystal accepted it and keyed in the information. “Although I don’t want it to stay that way.”

  “Single for now I’m sure,” Crystal said blushing. “If you keep up with your persistence I’m sure you’ll be bae’d up in no time.”

  “Come on,” he said playfully putting his hand on hers again as she keyed in his address. “Let me take you out when I get back. I know I been getting on your nerves but I’m really interested in you. Plus you look familiar. Like I’ve seen you some place else. And not just in here. Maybe in my dreams.”

  Crystal sighed. This dude was way corny. “You know what you’ve worn me down.” She paused. “So when you coming back?”

  He tapped the counter again as if he finally got what he wanted. “Next Friday.”

  Crystal looked at me and back at him. “Well, when you get back give me a call.” She wrote her number down. “We’ll start from there.”

  “Damn, you made my day.” He knocked on the counter again. “And I look forward to making that call.” He winked and walked out, taking one last look at her before he left.

  When he was gone I walked over to Crystal. “We can’t fuck with it! That nigga is dangerous, I’m telling you. Plus you been giving him shit and all of a sudden you interested. If something happens to his house he’s gonna suspect us immediately.” I shook my head from left to right. “We gotta leave it alone.”

  “No we don’t,” she said grabbing my hands. “This is the one that will probably give me enough money to live by myself. That way you can go on with your life, Tasha.” She picked up the Address Forward card, looked at it and inhaled. “Trust me this is the one. The big one.”

  “You not even listening, Crystal. The man will suspect you first if he gets robbed. You did way too much by asking who was house sitting. The shit is off and we done.”

  “Well, what about me, Tasha? You making decisions without even thinking about where I’m gonna be when you run off into the sun with Nikki.”

  “Are you listening to yourself?” I asked. “You sound like a lunatic out here.”

  “No, are you listening to yourself?” She pointed at me. “If we don’t do this job how the fuck am I gonna take care of the family? How am I gonna take care of ma? I mean I know I got this job but we both know with her insurance it ain’t enough for her meds. You abandoning us, Tasha and you wrong as fuck for that shit.”

  “You act like you gonna get a million dollars from this dude!” I repeated. “This is a dangerous move and I don’t like it at all.”

  “It don’t matter how much we get, Tasha! As long as we get something.” She paused. “What I do know is that you getting all scared for nothing. This could be the biggest job we’ve ever had. And you ready to let it go.”

  “You heard what I said right, Crystal.” I paused looking at her with narrow eyes. “The shit ain’t up for discussion, I’m sorry.”

  “I heard you but what if I don’t wanna listen?” She crossed her arms over her chest. “What if I do the job by myself? Or with Tiffani? It ain’t like I need you to get that money anyway. I’ve done plenty by myself before.”

  “If you rob that nigga you don’t have shit else to say to me.” I was completely serious. “I’m not even playing around with you. This would be the end of our bond.”

  “Well I’m gonna get it anyway. And if something happens to me that’s on you.” She walked toward the back of the office.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

&
nbsp; TASHA

  I let my sister rope me into some dumb shit once again. If Nikki knew what I was about to do she would be livid.

  I’m sitting in the passenger seat of a stolen car, dressed in all black smoking weed while Crystal drives. I got a lot of shit on my mind and I was in no mood to be robbing some trap nigga who was away at a funeral. But I couldn’t have Crystal going by herself either. She knew that about me which made me hate this situation even more.

  And then there’s this baby shit with Nikki. I’m not sure, but I don’t know if moving away is for me. I mean, what if Crystal’s right? What if Nikki is foul? Not only that but she hasn’t been answering my calls since I put her in a cab that day. Where she at?

  I didn’t just hit her house phone and her cell, I also called her best friend who does closures at a salon and she claimed she hadn’t seen her either. Any other time she’d be burning my cell phone up and I’d have to put her off but not today. She was definitely acting different.

  “Still trying to call that bitch huh?” Crystal asked as she steered the car down the street. “That chick really do got you on some soft shit. I swear, out of all of the bitches you came across I couldn’t see her being the one.” She shrugged. “If you ask me Carmen way badder than her but that’s just my opinion though. What do I know?”

  I shook my head. She’s calling her multiple bitches to get me mad but I don’t bite this time. Plus once again she not saying shit I wanna hear or talk about. “So you speaking to me now?” I asked. “Because you ain’t have no words for me earlier. When I said I wasn’t going.”

  “I never wasn’t speaking to you, Tasha.” She wiped her long hair out her face. “I just don’t like you faking like you don’t want this money. Like this is not what we do for a living. We robbers. Embrace that shit!”

  “If by faking you mean keeping us outta prison it’s whatever. Don’t forget you just got out of jail a minute ago. You got court next month and already you on your goon shit. You trying to add breaking and entering to your list too? What’s wrong with you?”

  “Yeah, whatever.” She held her head up and continued to drive. “That shit ain’t gonna stand. I be surprise if that bitch even shows up. As far as her fat ass knows I’m on some get back shit. Plus it ain’t like I don’t know where she lives.”

  When my phone rung I saw who was calling and shook my head. First I put out the weed and answered. “Fuck you been, Nikki?” I paused. “I been hitting your phone all day.”

  “What you want?” She asked with an attitude. “Because just like you don’t feel like the drama I don’t either. I been having morning sickness all morning.”

  “First off you the one calling me.” I corrected her. “So I should be asking you the same thing.”

  “That’s because you been ringing my phone like you crazy and unlike you I got shit to do too.” She paused. “Like get ready to be a mother. A single mother at that.”

  I looked at the phone. “You got a split personality. Has anybody ever told you that because it’s true?”

  “I’m just saying if you—”

  I hung up on that bitch. I didn’t feel like her shit right now because of what we were about to do. If she wanted to come at me like that we done. As long as I know she’s safe I’m good with everything else. When my phone rung again, I ignored it . It’s not until she calls me five more times that I finally answer again.

  “What you want?” I put my right foot on the dashboard and took a deep breath. Before putting the weed out in the ashtray. “I thought our conversation was over since you don’t know how to talk to me.”

  “Why you keep hanging up,” Nikki said crying. “You…you don’t”—she sniffled — “You don’t understand how you make me feel. I want the best for you, Tasha. I don’t want you robbing niggas to—”

  “Whoa!” I yelled putting my foot down. “All that on the phone? Are you crazy or just trying to get me locked up?”

  “Do you remember what happened last year when you…uh went to your aunt’s house?” She paused and sounded as if she was about to cry. “Because for me it was as if it just happened yesterday. I knew it was all over for you.”

  I think she talking in code but I couldn’t be sure. This pregnancy was definitely messing up her thought process. One thing for sure, after this if we worked out, I wanted zero more children. At least not by her. “Look, Nikki, don’t be doing all—”

  “Do you remember or not, Tasha?” She screamed, her breath heavy as if she were on the verge of passing out. “It’s a simple question and I would appreciate an answer.”

  I don’t answer.

  “She left her fingerprints in the niggas house because she used the toilet, I mean at your aunt’s house.” She corrected herself. “And you had to fem out because he was attracted to tall girls, pretend to meet him at the gas station and jerk him off just to get back in his house to wipe them.”

  I was heated. “You done being hot as fuck on the phone? Because this is way too much.” Crystal looked over at me.

  “Nah, are you?” She asked taking a deep breath. “Tasha, your sister gonna be the reason you get killed and or locked up.”

  I hung up and tucked the phone into my pocket.

  “You a stupid ass bitch, Tasha. Gonna let her guilt trip you into raising a sperm baby,” Crystal said under her breath. I looked over at her. “I’m not saying nothing else though. You already know how I feel about the shit but I’m just saying my part anyway.”

  Focusing on Nikki I said, “Like I told you a million times, I’m with her because she makes me better. And I really wanna see how far I can go with her. Let me live please.”

  When the car stopped a block away from the address, my sister grabbed something I couldn’t see from under the seat and stuffed it under her shirt. “You ready?” She asked.

  “This the place?” I questioned.

  “Nah, it’s the zoo,” she hit me on the thigh. “Now come on. We got a job to do and the quicker we do it the better. Plus I feel like you five seconds from pulling out.” She rushed out and closed the door.

  I got out slowly and looked around. When I didn’t see any nosey neighbors I entered the gate surrounding the property and moved toward the backyard. My heart thumped with every step I took. Why was I so nervous this time?

  When I bent around the side of the house my worst nightmare was realized. Crystal was at the door holding an iron rod making excess noise. This was way off plan. I normally popped the locks and disarmed the security system because she doesn’t know what she’s doing.

  “Move out the way so I can do it,” I whispered. “Plus you not as quick as me anyway.”

  “If you not gonna let me try it then go back to the car.” She whispered. “I gotta grow up in the game sooner or later. Since I’m gonna be by myself.” She continued to make extra noise on the lock.

  “Crystal, what the fuck are you doing?” I hit her in the back of the head with a closed fist and her face pressed against the door. “Move the fuck out my way!”

  I contemplated grabbing her and leaving because everything tells me that goin’ inside; will change the rest of my life. But she’s my kid sister, and I can’t let her do this shit by herself right? No matter how much I want to.

  I snatched the rod from her. “Move back, I got this.”

  She rubbed the back of her head and then said, “Put these on first.” She handed me a set of gloves and I slid them on. Within a second we’re inside.

  The house is really luxurious and smells of vanilla and cleaning products. We’re in the kitchen so I grabbed a trash bag and stuffed everything of value I could find inside. Once I’m done we moved throughout the house to see what else we could find and I can’t believe how much money and shit he has lying around this spot. Stacks of cash wrapped in rubber bands.