Push Comes to Shove (6 page)

“Mr. Lee, we must be going or we’ll be late,” another man in a suit and tie said.

“Just a moment, Hartford. You can wait for me in the car. I’ll be along in a moment.” Mr. Lee paid for his purchase.

GP watched the exchange from the pay phone. “Come on, Jewels, you know it ain’t even like that. That broad had me confused. I created the Prophet. He’s supposed to work for me; not the other way around.”

“You even talk like that damn drawing is real. Man, you bugging.”

“He’s real to me.”

“I gotta let this conversation go before you piss me the fuck off.”

“You do that, then.” GP waved at the owner of the costume shop.

“I’m taking Ndia on a boosting spree in the morning. Use your spare key if you need my ride. We’re taking the bus.”

“Where are you going?”

“The Big Apple. I called to see if you needed anything before I left. I’ll be gone for about a week, but if it’s good to me, I’ll be longer.”

“I’m good. Bring the kids something.” GP stared at his battered boots. “I might need you to loan me the balance of whatever I don’t come up with on this mortgage.”

“How much is it?”

“Forty-seven hundred.”

“What you got on it so far?”

“Including the hundred I got from you…about three hundred. And whatever we make today.”

“You already owe me your life, but I got your back. Hit me on my cell; I’ll wire it if I have to.”

“I’m gonna pay you back one day, Jewels, I swear. I’m gonna buy you that diamond, too.”

“I know. I’ll carve your black ass up if you don’t.”

Trouble nudged his partner when he saw Jewels sauntering down the avenue with a sexy woman on her arm. “How a butch snag a fine broad like that?”

Dirty took a gulp of beer from a forty-ounce bottle. “I don’t
know. Jewels did her thing. She got the finest bitch in the hood. If I had her, I’d be out here flossing with her, too.” They both watched Jewels and her beautiful companion close the distance.

Jewels slid her arm around Ndia’s neck and pulled her closer. “Listen here, baby. I’m gonna let you do what you do when we touch down in New York. I can’t afford for the order to get messed up like the last move did.” She caressed the small of Ndia’s back. “When I get this money together, we’ll be batting in the major league. These chump-change licks will be history.”

“Jewels, I’m gonna do my thing and give it my all.” She looked at Jewels with devotion. Ndia was a tall woman with boney extremities—model extremities. She wouldn’t have made it on a catwalk, though, because her buttocks and thighs were much too big. Just as Jewels liked them.

Jewels squeezed Ndia’s back pocket and kissed her cheek. “That’s what I wanted to hear.”

“We should have drove. This is going to be a long walk.”

“Don’t start complaining. I can’t stand that shit. I enjoy a good walk every now and then. Besides, you already know I don’t drive unless I absolutely have to. So what’s the point in bringing it up?”

“I don’t know why you even bought a car. Nine—”

“What is a pretty woman like you doing with that Amazon?” Trouble stepped out of the foyer of a building. “Come spend a few hours with me and let me show you what a real man’s dick feel like. I know you’re tired of the rubber she’s packing.”

Dirty stepped outside, laughing, as Jewels’s face hardened.

Jewels turned her apple cap to the back. “I’m not with no disrespectful bullshit. These motherfuckers about to make me hurt something.”

“Forget them clowns…let’s go.” Ndia pulled on Jewels’s wrist but failed to move the solid muscle.

Trouble leaned against the building and put a foot on the wall. “Ugly bitch, you ain’t tough. Don’t act like it ain’t a pussy in them jeans.” He touched fists with Dirty.

Jewels snatched away from Ndia. “They got me fucked up.” She was swift as she closed the gap between her provokers. She staggered Trouble with a head-butt across the bridge of his nose.

Dirty had a change of mind when she yanked a nickel-plated .45 from beneath a throwback jersey and pointed it at him.

She spat a razor from her mouth, caught it with her free hand, and held it to Trouble’s throat. “What you say to me? I don’t think I quite heard you right.” She pushed the razor just enough to draw blood. “Go on, tough punk, fix your mouth and say it again.”

“Jewels, baby, let’s get out of here. They were just talking shit.”

Jewels refused to take her eyes off of Trouble. “Check these lames for pistols.”

“Jewels, come on.”

“Do what the fuck I said!”

Trouble pressed his head against the brick building as hard as he could in an attempt to ease the blade’s pressure on his Adam’s Apple.

Ndia found a Saturday Night Special on Dirty and a Beretta .22 in Trouble’s back pocket.

“Now what I want you lames to do is apologize to my lady for being disrespectful.”

Dirty was moving too much for Jewels’s comfort. She pulled the trigger and blasted a chunk of brick inches away from his ear.

“I’m sorry.” Trouble was as still as paralysis.

“That you are.” Jewels pushed the blade. “Sorry for what?”

“Being disrespectful.”

Jewels stroked the handle of the .45 with a thumb and averted
her piercing gaze to Dirty. “Something wrong with your noise-maker?”

“I apologize for disrespecting your woman.”

“Now if you poor-excuses-for-men will excuse us, we’ll keep minding our business.” She considered something else. “On second thought, you look like you’re gonna need a constant reminder of how you should address ladies.” With one motion, she had left behind a cut across Trouble’s cheek.

Dirty’s heartbeat quickened. The bones beneath his hips trembled. His eyes bulged. “Goddamn, Jewels. What…Why did you have to cut him?” He spoke over his ringing ears.

After hearing the word
cut
, the left side of Trouble’s rugged face began to burn. He covered the burning sensation with a hand. “You cut my face! On everything I love, you started some shit that I ain’t never gon’ let go.”

“Shut the fuck up before I slice your bitch ass again,” she spoke through clenched teeth with a scowl on her face. “Pussy, you don’t stand a chance in hell fucking with me. Your soft ass better recognize.” Jewels backed away and collected their guns from Ndia.

Trouble and Dirty watched as Jewels threw the first gun up on the roof of a nearby vacant building. When she launched Trouble’s .22, her cell phone popped from her waistband and fell between two bags of garbage. She put her arm around Ndia and continued down the avenue.

Blood oozed between Trouble’s fingers. “I’ll be damned if I let that bitch get away with carrying me like I’m some chump. On my dead mama, Jewels is gonna feel me. That’s my word.” He tapped Dirty. “Go see what she dropped.”

“You’re gonna need a gang of stitches.” He stalked off toward the garbage bags.
I’m glad it was his ass and not mine
.

Bright and early the next morning, a taxicab driver leaned on his horn outside of Jewels’s apartment.

She lifted the window and stepped out onto the fire escape. “I’m coming, dammit! Chill with the noise-maker.” She pulled herself back inside. “Ndia, let’s go before this impatient punk leaves.”

Ndia came out of the bedroom carrying a pillow.

“What are you doing?”

“It’s a long ride. Them Greyhound seats get uncomfortable after you sit on them awhile.”

They headed to the door. Jewels hesitated. “I still can’t figure out where I lost my phone.”

The horn blew.

“Fuck it, come on. I don’t need no one keeping tabs on me anyway.” She patted Ndia’s ass, then picked up their luggage. “Let’s ride.”

Trouble sat behind the steering wheel of an old Buick, picking at the stitches in his face. He frowned as he watched Jewels and Ndia get chauffeured away by Yellow Cab. After a few moments of thinking, he picked up the cell phone from his lap and pressed redial.

The phone rang twice.

“Ninth Street Artwork, home of the Street Prophet. Kitchie speaking, how may I help you?”

Trouble terminated the call, climbed out of the car, and made his way over to a man who was constantly peeping out of a stairwell door. “Slow out here this morning, huh?”

The frail man nodded his unkempt head. “Yeah, I ain’t got high since last night. It’ll pick up soon, though. The banks just opened and welfare checks is circulating.” He checked out Trouble’s urban attire and assumed that he was a go-getter. “Don’t you hustle at the bottom of Cliffview? I’ve seen you before.”

“You know the butch that just left?”

“Jewels? Sure, I know her. Who’s asking?”

Trouble dug in his crotch and pulled out a sack of crack rocks.

The man’s eyes widened.

Trouble took out a tiny rock. “How would you like to be my main man and make one of these every day?”

“What I gotta do?” He held out his hand.

M
iles removed the headphones from his ears. He stood in front of Squeeze’s mahogany desk, a fiberglass cast covering most of his boney arm. “I need a few more days. I’ll have it all put together for you by then.”

“I see a broken arm don’t mean a damn thing to you.” Squeeze zoomed in on Miles with a set of cold eyes. He had the face of innocence and the grin of corruption. “You turned a forty-thousand-dollar loan into a ninety-thousand-dollar calamity.”

“Ease up on me some. I just need a few more days.”

“I won’t ease up on my mama when it comes to my cash.”

Miles sighed. “I bumped into an unexpected situation, but everything is together now. Five more days; that’s my word.”

“Your word don’t mean a motherfucking thing to me.” Squeeze rested his square chin on a fist. “You fucked that up when you reneged on our agreement. I gave you until tonight to have my cash, but I guess you’re gonna need some more motivation.”

Miles held up his good limb. “You gonna break this one, too? I can’t conduct my business—”

“That’s exactly why I don’t have my cash now; you’re selfish. You only think about yourself. My cash is much bigger than you. How’s your family? Your brother? Is everybody in good health?”

Miles felt weak. He leaned on the desk. “You know where Jap is? Don’t hurt him; my mother is worried sick about him.”

Squeeze threw his hands up. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I just asked if your people are all right.”

“I’m gonna get your money.”

“I know. The problem is that I need that little bit by tonight.”