Slipping (8 page)

“Man, I don't know what the fuck you talkin’ 'bout. I know y'all don't believe that funky-ass half-breed. I been copping from him, but it was so I can get my swerve on. I been hustling so I can help out at the crib and shit with the bills.”

“See, I told y'all he wadn't fucking with that shit,” Dre said, wanting to believe that Don was straight. “He been copping pieces trying to get his pockets right.”

“Dre, shut yo ass up,” Carlos said. “Look at this nigga. Do he look like he been hustling? This nigga is clucking. Look at all the weight he done lost and shit. His face skinny as hell. Tell me he ain't starting to look like a baby crackhead.”

Don looked around at his friends. Dre was the only one that seemed to hope that the rumors weren't true. He decided to try and bullshit his way past them. “Come on y'all, this is Don-Don. Do y'all think I'm a fucking clucker? I done
lost weight 'cause I be stressing and I don't be eating right. Think about who it is y'all talking to.”

“We know who we talking to, a motherfucking crackhead,” Big Man said slowly. “I got enough of them in my family for me to know exactly what they look like from start to finish. Nigga, you know that all my uncles is on that shit, so I know.”

Don began to grow angry. He shouted, “Y'all sposed to be my niggas, but y'all gone let some motherfucka tell y'all some foul shit about me! That shit ain't cool. I ain't done shit to you niggas. How y'all gone turn y'all back on me?”

“Nigga, you turned yo back on us,” Big Man said with his usual country twang. “We been through a lot of shit together. If you had came to us with the real we could have helped you with whatever, nigga. How you gone play us?”

Semo said, “Man, fuck this crackhead-ass nigga! He better get the fuck out of my yard, before I whoop his motherfucking ass!”

Don was dumbfounded. “Semo, who the fuck you think you talking to, nigga? Yo pussy ass. Nigga, all of a sudden you tough. I'd still beat the dog shit out of you, bitch-ass nigga!”

Keno spoke up for the first time. He threatened, “No you won't, hype. 'Cause if you put yo hands on Semo we gone stump yo ears together in this motherfucka.”

Looking in Keno's eyes, Don saw that the lanky teenager spoke the truth. They were prepared to beat him down. With
a mask of scorn on his face he glanced at the others. He could tell that they echoed Dante's sentiment. Only Dre, his oldest friend, looked confused. In a last desperate attempt he tried to play on Dre's uncertainty.

“Dre, I know you ain't gone front on me like these niggas. Cut these fake-ass niggas loose and ride with yo man. Nigga, we been down since like eight years old. We don't need these punks. Scary-ass niggas. Come on Dre, let's be up.”

Before he walked out of the gate Don paused to see if Dre would follow him. He locked gazes with Dre and knew his efforts were futile when the boy dropped his eyes to his shoes. At that moment he knew that he would miss Dre the most.

Giving Dre a way to save face, he relented. “It's cool, Dre. Don't even trip. I don't need none of y'all. You niggas turned y'all back on me, but I'll be alright. Fuck y'all.”

Don slammed the rusty gate and savagely kicked an empty beer bottle as he stalked down the alley. As disgusted as he was at his friends’ treachery he had no place to turn now. He knew that if he went home empty-handed, Juanita would be talking shit. He walked and cursed his bad luck, especially the misfortune of having Diego run his mouth off to his friends.

Damn, I could use a blast,
he thought.
Then I could get my mind right.

With nothing else better to do, Don did what so many other tortured Black men do every day—he stood on the
nearest corner. He extracted a crumpled cigarette from his pocket and lit it. Gagging at the taste of the stale smoke, he spit a piece of tobacco out of his mouth. Deep in thought, he paid no attention to pedestrians. From the depths of his brain he recalled a small bit of information that could end his crack strike. If he remembered correctly, Diego gave credit to good customers. The interest on the credit was ridiculous, but that was beside the point. Paying back double wasn't so bad, especially when you could have a credit line of up to four hundred dollars. Snapping his fingers he put his feet in motion and headed for Harper Court.

Arms and legs pumping like pistons, Don ran like a world-class sprinter. By the time he reached the small neighborhood park he was out of breath and had to sit down on the curb for a moment. He didn't want to approach the crack dealers sweaty and looking like he was geeking for a hit. Coming off like a hype would destroy his chance for getting a piece on consignment. On the curb he rehearsed the lines he would use like a theatrical understudy. Using his T-shirt he wiped his forehead. He got a sip of water from the water fountain in the middle of the park. He spotted Diego. The drug dealer was doing his usual strutting in front of some young girls of suspect age.

“Yo, Diego, check it out,” he called pleasantly, closing the distance between himself and the drug dealer.

Diego instantly recognized from Don's patronizing tone that he wanted a favor. He had been selling drugs long
enough to know that when customers was short or didn't have any money they could be the nicest people on Earth. The closer Don came, Diego could see for sure that his old archrival was a fucking clucker. The sly smile that played upon his lips showed his pleasure at seeing Don like this. Now that Don was a crack monster he knew the boy wouldn't be challenging him anymore.

Diego asked, “What's up, Don-Don? How you living yo?”

“I'm tight, bruh. I just came to check you out. I done ran into a little snag with this scheme I'm running. My loot is low right now, so I was hoping that you could hit a nigga up wit a little something to hold me over until I get my paper in order. You know I'm good for it.”

Diego had heard it all before. “Yeah, you good for it. You done spent a decent piece of paper wit a nigga. But I'm duty bound to let you know that all credit cost double. And even a cool fella like you got a deadline like everybody else or …”

“Yeah, Diego, I know all that shit. But you don't got to worry about that shit. Once my little scam come through I'll have some nice paper.”

Nodding, Diego said, “Awight, Don. I hope you right, 'cause I don't want to have to come looking for you. What you trying to touch?”

Throwing caution to the wind, Don said, “Nothing huge, just a quarter. That should hold me until I touch this paper I've got coming to me.”

Diego looked him up and down. “Run over there and tell Lonnie that I said to give you a quarter ounce.”

“Thanks, bruh,” Don said, hoping that he didn't sound too eager. He backed away to find Lonnie quickly in case Diego changed his mind.

The business transaction with Lonnie took only a few seconds. Don had to admit that they did have a smooth operation. It took only a nod from Diego and he had seven grams of crack in his hand. He ran all the way home with the quarter ounce stuffed in his pocket with his hand on it.

Bursting into the house, Don bound up the steps and crashed into his room. Juanita was lying in the bed. She appeared not to have moved an inch since his departure. He walked over to the bed and triumphantly dangled the quarter ounce over her head. She bolted upright and retrieved the saucer from under the bed. Razor blade in hand, she waited eagerly for him to dump the contents of the plastic bag on it.

“See, girl,” he bragged, “I told you that I was gone cop. I ain't no shorty in this shit. If you stay with me and act like you got some sense, I'll keep both of us high.”

Stroking his ego, she said, “You know I love you, baby. I wasn't worried 'cause I know that my man can handle his business. I knew that you wasn't coming back without some shit. To celebrate after I take me a hit Imma try to suck you dick to the bone.”

Don took off his shirt and shorts. Chivalrously, he waited for Juanita to take a bump off the pipe so he could receive his reward.

A QUARTER OUNCE OF CRACK FOR SMOKING PURPOSES
was considered to be a lot, but Don and Juanita consumed it in record time. Two days of continuous smoking and sex was all the time they needed.

Juanita was relentless. “Don, you need to do something. That little shit we had is gone. I need something else.”

“I know,” Don said as he scraped res from the pipe. “You think I don't know that shit, girl. Shit, the way you smoke we need about a ounce to hold us for a few days.”

“I know you ain't talking the way you be sucking up the yams. I didn't see you holding back none.”

She was right, they had both grown piggish when it came to smoking crack.

Juanita got up and tossed the television remote on the
bed. She stretched and put her hands on her hips. “I'm 'bout to get up out of here.”

“What?”

“I'm 'bout to show at the crib,” she said innocently. “I ain't been home in a coupla weeks.”

“Who you live with?” Don asked. “You never did tell me about yo crib and you never act like you got to go there.”

“I live with my drunk-ass momma and my four brothers when they ass out of jail. They don't care if I come to that motherfucka or not. Plus me and my momma stay into it. Whenever she get drunk, which is all the time, first she want to be all happy. Next she get to doing all that crying and bringing up the old days. Then she get straight-up mean and start talking shit.”

“Okay, well, why you fixing to go there then?”

“I need to change clothes and see what's going on around the crib. I been cooped up in here for too long.”

Don thought about it. He guessed that if he let her out of his sight she might not be coming back anytime soon. No crack was one thing, but no crack and no Juanita was unfathomable.

“Bitch, you better sit yo ass down somewhere. You ain't been worried about changing clothes or going to the crib. Now all of a sudden when the rest of the yayo gone, then you ready to hit the crib. That's bullshit. I know what yo ass trying to do. You done smoked up all my rocks and now that we ain't got shit, you ready to be out. You got to be crazy than a motherfucka if you think that you leaving up
out of here. I'll kick yo head in. If you leave up outta here it's gone be in a ambulance.”

“Well, what you gone do?” Juanita said as she bounced onto the edge of the bed and folded her arms. “I want a bump.”

“Shut the fuck up so I can tell you what I'm gone do. A nigga can't even think or get a word in edgewise with you talking shit. Now look, I need you to call one of them jiffy cabs.”

“For what?”

Don reared up and raised his hand. “I swear if I got to tell you to shut the fuck up again, I'm gone slap the shit outta you. Don't worry 'bout for what, bitch. Damn! You getting on my motherfucking nerves with all these questions. I said call a motherfucking jiffy cab. Now gone head. I gotta do something.”

Don descended the stairs from his room to the second floor. He dipped into his mother's bedroom and began rambling through her dresser drawers. He found her old wedding ring, an antique brooch, and two gold chains. From the shelf in her closet he pilfered his mother's video camera. He fled his mother's room and pushed open his sister's bedroom door. From the top of her bookcase he took a 35-millimeter camera. He looked around for something else and found a thin gold chain on her dresser. He took everything downstairs and set it on the kitchen table. He slid into the living room and unhooked the VCR from the television. Back upstairs, he grabbed a pillowcase to stash the merch in.

Outside a car honked.

“That's the livery cab,” Juanita called out.

“Come on, girl. You going with me.”

“Where we going, Don?” she asked, eyeing the pillowcase.

Don rolled his eyes. “Bitch, you just don't learn. Stop asking so many questions and start waiting for instructions.”

She followed him outside the house to the cab. As they slid into the backseat, Don said, “A mellow, take us to 47th Street to the pawnshop. She gone wait with you while I'm the spot so you don't think I'm trying to get ghost on you for yo fare.”

On 47th Street, Don went into the pawnshop on the corner of Prairie. About ten minutes later he returned without the pillowcase and hopped in the backseat.

Juanita was excited. “How much they give you for that stuff, baby?”

“Don't worry about that,” he said, but he was thinking,
not as much as I should have got.
“A homie, you know where Harper Court is? Over by Stony Island?”

“Yeah,” the driver said. “You going that way?”

“That's right. Then take us back to where you got us from.” He lowered his voice to Juanita. “Look, when we get to the park, I want you to run over there and grab us a eight-ball.”

Juanita's lips instantly poked out at the word
eightball.
“That's all? We went through all this for a funky little ball?”

Don pulled out a couple of hundred dollars. “That ain't all we can afford. I got us enough for a piece, but we finta take it slow this time. When we through with that we gone get some more, but this time I want to make it last a little longer.”

“Oh, okay,” Juanita said as she snuggled up against Don's arm. “I knew you had more money, I just didn't know what you was trying to do.”

THE DEADLINE FOR PAYING HIS DEBT TO DIEGO WAS
swiftly approaching. Don didn't have four dollars, let alone four hundred. He knew that Diego and his cronies wouldn't be playing when they came to collect. The last thing in the world he needed was a pumpkin head. He had too much pride in his looks to be walking around with a swollen face. Things had changed. Don never thought he would see the day that he was prepared to duck Diego.

Back in the days when he was with his clique he had garnered respect from all the thugs, dealers, and bangers. Even the infamous Apostles had tried to recruit them, but they had decided that they didn't want anybody calling the shots for them so they declined the gang's offer. It had looked like it was going to get hairy for a moment; the Apostles weren't
used to being denied. But since they didn't want anyone to be a part of them that didn't want to be there, the Apostles backed off.