by Natavia
I sat on the couch across from him. My throat was dry, and nausea was ready to settle in. My brother was a nightmare.
“I need some more cash. That one-hundred thousand you gave me isn’t enough. Now before you bitch about it, I know you have it. So, what can we do about that?” he asked, cracking his knuckles. The money I stole from Dream’s account is what I gave to Connery. I was going broke between Dream and my brother.
“I have a baby on the way. I need the money I have left!”
“Nigga, I don’t give a fuck about a baby! I want my money and I want it now. Don’t forget what I’ve done for you when you raped that girl. I had to cover it up! I could’ve ratted you out when I got locked up but naw, I told myself big bro was gonna look after me when I touched down. You will find a way to get me my money!” he said.
“I didn’t rape anyone!”
“You’re a crazy-ass nigga and you still won’t admit it, huh? Well, I’ll tell you what, I want to be your business partner. We can split it sixty-forty, how about that? That way I won’t keep asking you for money that you owe me, muthafucka,” he said. I wished I had the guts to kill my half-brother, but I couldn’t because I was too much of a coward.
“I’ll see what I can do,” I replied.
There was a knock on the door and the uncomfortable feeling I had got worse. Connery came back into the living room with two of his friends. One of them I’d met already but the other one I didn’t know. The stranger stared me down, maybe he wanted to rob me.
“Who is this cop lookin’ muthafucka?” the stranger asked.
“Oh, that’s my big bro,” Connery replied.
“How many kids your father got, damn?” the stranger asked.
“It’s about fifteen of us on my father’s side. But anyway, June Bug that’s Adrian. Adrian, this is my homie June Bug,” Connery said.
“I came here to talk business, fuck all that, fam. He gotta go before we talk,” June Bug said.
“Naw, he’s cool. Maybe the nigga can learn from us real OG’s with his nerd ass,” Connery said.
Rather be a nerd than a criminal!
Rizzo sat next to me and I scooted over just in case he wanted to pick-pocket me.
“We can’t just sit on those two bricks, Con. We gotta get rid of them. I didn’t betray my godson just to be broke! You said you knew a nigga from outta town that would pay more than they’re worth. What’s up with that?” June Bug asked.
“Just give me a little more time and we’re in there,” Connery replied.
“How much time? I gave you all the info you needed on Tryst and Dream. What you should do is kidnap that bitch. I bet she’d tell you where the stash is at. I’d rather do it that way instead of waiting for some out-of-town nigga that could be the cops,” Rizzo said. I met Rizzo once through Connery. He was an illiterate thug who could barely read the breakfast menu when we met at a restaurant. My brother wanted me around because he thought I wanted to know the game. I never sold a drug in my life!
“Kimberly is my wife! I don’t have any beef with Tryst, I have beef with Bentley. Kidnappin’ a little bitch ain’t gonna do shit but draw attention. We’re gonna sell Bentley’s work and make a come-up from it. This is our team now! I know what the fuck I’m doing,” Connery said.
“Dream is back at her old crib. This lil’ shorty I fuck wit’ back at Newtowne saw her taking bags in the house. She used to live wit’ Tryst so maybe they are beefin’,” Rizzo said.
Dream finally left Tryst. Great! Me and her can be a family.
I didn’t tell them I had a relationship with Dream because I wanted to keep her safe. She belonged to me and I couldn’t imagine them harming my sweet baby. That would kill me.
“Leave the girl out of it. I promised Kimberly I’d help her get Bentley’s estate and the money she deserves. Tryst and my daughter Deerie are out of this!” Connery said.
“How is Deerie? I haven’t seen my goddaughter since I been home,” June Bug said.
“Don’t ask me about my daughter, muthafucka! I know you like them young-ass girls,” Connery replied.
Great! I’m in the room with a child molester.
“Can I leave now?” I asked Connery.
“Naw, but Rizzo and June Bug can leave. We’re done talkin’,” he replied.
“I’m gonna take those bricks back if you can’t do anything wit’ it. Come on, Rizzo. Let’s get out of Kimberly’s house before her drunk ass comes home,” June Bug said to Rizzo. I could breathe again since they were gone. Connery came back in the living room after seeing them to the door.
“I have to figure somethin’ out, brother. If I don’t do what they want, they’ll kill me and you. We’re all we got,” Connery said.
“It’s getting late. I have to go work tomorrow morning.”
“Get out, my wife is on her way home,” he replied.
Connery looked stressed. I couldn’t imagine how my life would be if I spent twenty years in jail. He wasn’t the same anymore. I got up and left out of his house. I had to figure out a way to keep Dream safe without telling her why. A part of me wanted Connery and his friends to kill Tryst and anyone else he was related to. He was my biggest enemy.
You might be proud of me, brother, after all.
With Tryst out of the way, maybe Connery wouldn’t need my money anymore or share my business, and Dream could be with me. That cowardly feeling slowly faded away when I got into my car. I opened the glove compartment where I kept Dream’s pink thong that she left behind at the loft. The scent of the fabric softener was still there. I missed the smell of her clothes and the wet folds between her legs. The erection I had strained against my shorts. I unzipped my shorts when I saw Dream sitting in the passenger seat. She was rubbing on her breasts while playing in her center.
“I love you, Adrian. I want us to be a family. The hood is dangerous and I’m afraid for me and our baby’s lives,” she moaned while pleasing herself.
“I’ll do anything you want me to.”
“You gotta be a man, Adrian. Tryst is dangerous, you see what he did to your face. Imagine what he’ll to me,” she pleaded. I stroked my dick while I watched Dream continue to please herself while calling my name.
“I’m ready to explode, Dream. I want to be inside of you!”
“Get your nasty ass out of my damn driveway stroking that little dick! You dirty ass muthafucka! I just knew you was a perverted serial killer. Look at you!” Kimberly said, banging on my window.
“Move out of my way before I run you over!”
“You ain’t doin’ a gotdamn thing, Jeffrey Dahmer. Get your fly foot and country bamma dressin’ ass from out front of my house! The devil sent you, didn’t he? You wanna spray your demon semen all over my driveway to curse me?” she slurred.
I put the window down to give her a piece of my mind because I had enough of her.
“You say one more fucking thing about me and I swear I’ll tell your church sisters that you killed your husband. I know more than you think, thanks to a little birdie. You better keep this between us or I might get a little holy ghost that will help me write Tryst a letter about you and Connery’s plan.”
Kimberly spat on my window. “Nobody fucks me over and gets away with it. You bet to believe that. I am my father’s daughter. You get a pass for now,” she said.
I backed out of the driveway. When I looked over in the passenger seat, Dream was gone. I hated how she always disappeared in the middle of our lovemaking. I had to find another way to get Dream to talk to me. An idea popped into my head that I should’ve thought about a long time ago. I checked the joint account I had with my wife. Over the years, we’d managed to save a half of a million dollars.
I’ll give Dream her money back. That’s what I’ll do.
I drove home thinking of the new life we were going to have in Georgia.
Trell
Two days later…
Istared at the wall in my half-empty apartment. When Tryst and Dream moved in together in t
he new house, I should’ve made things right with Naya. My eyes were heavy from crying from my guilt. Three times I had put a gun to my head, thinking of ways to end my life. You don’t know what you have until it’s gone because I was loving Naya more than I ever did. David and Naya’s deaths made me want to stay away from the people I loved, and that included Tryst, Tierra and Deerie. They didn’t need me because I was poison.
My phone had been ringing nonstop for days. It was either J-Breezy, Aunt Tierra, Kabella or Deerie constantly blowing my phone up. There was a knock at the door after the phone stopped ringing. Nobody knew where I lived but J-Breezy and Aunt Tierra. Without looking through the peephole, I opened the door. I should’ve known shorty was going to find me somehow. Kabella was worse than the FEDS.
“Yo, not today,” I said.
“It’s really important, Trell. Tierra wouldn’t have given me your address if she thought I was going to bring drama to your home,” she replied. Kabella sounded serious and that wasn’t like her. Shorty was always either feeling herself or in a bad attitude. I let her in because my stomach was growling, and she had a bag of food in her hand.
“I know you don’t want to hear this right now, but I have to get this off my chest. The reason I disliked Dream and Naya is because they had a good life when they were younger despite them living in the hood. My parents were always gone, leaving me with my older stepbrother. He had done things which turned me into what I became. I think I’m attached to you because I see a lot of things in you that I saw in myself,” Kabella said.
She placed the bag on the coffee table before sitting on the couch. I went straight into the bag of food. It was from a Chinese carryout. She was crying about how guilty she felt because of how she treated Naya. Maybe that was what she meant when she said we were alike.
“You and Aunt Tierra are cool like that for you to be hittin’ her up?” I asked while chewing. Kabella picked up the napkin from the coffee table to wipe her eyes.
“Who doesn’t know Tierra? She’s cool with everybody. Plus, I told her that I had to apologize to you,” she said.
“You mean she told you where I lived cause she thinks you’re pregnant. Speakin’ of that shit, that was whack! I should shoot your ass.”
“I was desperate for you but now I see how wrong I’ve been. You had me thinking you was going to leave Naya! I only told you that so it could mess with your feelings. I’m here because I’m guilty, too. We can still be friends,” she replied.
“To be honest, I got too much shit on my mind to even talk about this. Let’s just forget we had a little situation going on.”
Kabella nodded her head in agreement. I forgot all about shorty. She was just a phase I was going through when I was doing my dirt. She took off her shoes to get comfortable on the couch.
“Thanks for the food but you have to bounce.”
“I’m scared to go home. I was robbed last night,” she replied. She pulled her weave back off her head. There was a nasty gash on the side of her face, next to her eye. The wound look like a pistol-whip wound.
“You need to go to the hospital.
“I feel safer with you. My house is big and empty. I already know I won’t be able to sleep. I can’t call Dream since she whipped my ass. She’s lucky I don’t know karate for her ghetto ass,” she replied.
It took me six minutes to eat the fried chicken with shrimp fried rice. Kabella pulled out a blunt and lit it as she got comfortable on my couch again. She seemed different for some reason. The weed she was smoking smelled different, too. Whatever it was had her relaxed.
“This will take all your problems away,” she said.
“You laced that with coke?”
“So, I won’t get addicted. It’s only bad when you snort it. I only use a pinch for my blunts,” she said.
I sold drugs but getting high off that shit never crossed my mind. The past few days I’d been thinking about suicide. I knew I wasn’t going to last long on Earth because I didn’t want to. Naya was my rock, the only shorty I told my secret to. She kept me sane and now without her, I was that little boy again fighting for his life. A tear fell out of my eye without me realizing that I was ready to break down again. I told Kabella to leave because she was at my crib longer than I expected.
“Hit this. It’ll help you feel better. Just one hit will make you numb,” she said. She held the blunt up to my face, but I smacked her hand away.
“GO HOME!”
“Not while you’re like this. I’m gonna straighten up while you relax,” she said. Kabella put her blunt out, leaving it on top of a soda can. I hadn’t smoked kush in a minute. Kabella was picking up the trash I had on the floor.
Fuck it. It’s only one blunt. She probably smokes this shit all the time and don’t be strung out.
I needed a temporary relief, even if it was only for a few minutes. I lit the blunt while staring at it, watching it burn.
We all gotta die someday.
I took a pull from the blunt and it was the same as smoking regular kush. Usually, you can smell the cocaine mixed with the weed when it’s burning.
“It’s not that bad. It just makes you high quickly,” Kabella giggled.
I smoked the blunt until it was gone. My vision was in and out; my body was floating above the couch. Naya’s voice was in my head, telling me how much she loved me. She told me that I could let her go since she was never coming back. The beat of my heart was pounding in my head. I laid back on the couch numb, speechless and emotionless. The high I was experiencing was too strong for me to feel anything. My crib appeared bigger than normal. The hallway to my bedroom was longer than usual. Kabella climbed onto my lap, straddling me with her thick thighs. My dick wasn’t supposed to be rock hard, I was betraying Naya again. The weed had me tripping because I couldn’t tell what was real or fake in the moment.
“I missed you so much. Make love to me,” she said. Kabella’s voice was in and out. I was feeling myself slightly nodding off.
“I always had a soft spot for you, but I’ll never love you the way I love Naya.”
“Shhhh. Sit back and let me take care of you,” she replied. I hadn’t showered in days, but it didn’t stop Kabella from sticking my dick in her mouth. It was the best feeling in the world. Naya was no longer a thought since I was above the clouds. Kabella guided my dick to the back of her throat. My eyes lazily fluttered because of the pressure building up—I was ready to nut.
“You my bitch now, K,” I told her. She looked me in the eyes, jerking me off as she pumped me down her throat. Kabella pulled away from me, leaving the tip of my shaft dripping. She went into her purse, grabbing a small blue box. She popped the box open then placed a clear blue strip on her tongue. It was a Listerine strip.
“OHHHHH FUUCCKKKK, K!”
I pumped in and out of her mouth. The high from the blunt hit me hard. I turned into a bull. Kabella started gagging, I was down her throat and didn’t give a fuck about how she felt. I let out a loud grunt after releasing myself. Kabella ran down the hall looking for the bathroom. I closed my eyes and took deep breaths to keep calm. Kabella came back into the living room. She threw a pillow when I clowned her. I couldn’t stop chuckling because shorty wasn’t that attractive without make-up.
“Yooo, you ain’t cute, bruh.”
“Excuse me!” she said with an attitude.
“You ain’t that attractive. You give a nigga good sex though.”
“I’m going to let that slide since you’re high right now. I’m ready to order more food,” she said. She went into her purse for her cellphone. I hated to admit it, but that blunt took a lot of my pain away. The down side was that it was only temporary. But it wasn’t like I was sniffing the shit. I had convinced myself that I deserved all of what was happening to me. There was no way I could be happy or move on with my shorty dead.
Deerie
The next day…
The woods were muggy due to the rain the night before. It was seven o’clock in the morning and I w
as half asleep, but I had to learn how to shoot. The last few days, we’d been together. He was a breath of fresh air since we had a lot of things in common like we enjoyed the same foods, guns and rappers.
“Lower your arm,” J-Breezy said. We had been in the woods for an hour, but it seemed longer.
“I’m tired!” I whined.
“Naw, fuck that. You gotta learn how to shoot and protect yourself in case someone runs up on you,” he said. He stood behind me with his pelvis pressed against my backside. His fresh scent deodorant was hypnotizing. I hated the smell of fragrancy deodorant. J-Breezy pulled away from me after my arm was in the right position to shoot the can hanging from a tree branch. I pulled the trigger, missing the can by an inch.
“You gettin’ close, shorty,” he said. My heartbeat raced whenever he called me that.
“Can we get breakfast or something?”
“Not until you hit that can,” he replied. I was trying my hardest to focus but J-Breezy was a distraction. The wife beater he wore hugged his solid frame. His shorts sagged slightly but not beneath his ass. The gold crowns he had in the top row of his mouth set off that hood appeal I was beginning to be attracted to. He got behind me again, his lips against my neck as he told me to try again.
“Try again, shorty,” he said.
“Back away from me.”
“I’m makin’ you moist?” he teased. I elbowed him so that he could move away from me.
“I did somethin’ to you just now,” he chuckled.
I aimed at the can with both hands. The can blended into the beaming sunlight, so I adjusted my fitted cap, pulling it over my eyes. I thought back to the day I killed Sebastian’s side chick. It was a one-shot kill without any hesitation.
“Good aim, now shoot!” J-Breezy said.
“I have to fix my posture!”
“What if someone breaks into your crib? Do you think all of this fancy shit gonna save you? Naw, shorty, you gotta just aim and shoot. Nothing else,” he said. I smacked my lips because he was on my back. I gave up trying to please him. I pulled the trigger and surprisingly the bullet hit the soda can, knocking it off the string.