Cracked Dreams (30 page)

After only fifteen minutes, Spits was already growing more and more impatient with the traffic on the street, or lack thereof. He relit the blunt that he'd put out and inhaled deeply. “Fuck!” he snapped. “Ain't shit moving out here tonight,” he said before blowing the weed smoke into the air and resting his head on the back of the bench.

Y
o, this nigga Spits is gonna go crazy when he find out,” said El to Poncho as they sat in court waiting for the judge to accept or deny their attorney's request to grant them bail. “Word,” Poncho agreed. “He can't say shit now. We gonna have to body that mu'fucka.”

“For realm,” El said. “Ain't no fightin' this shit. It'll be right there in the nigga's face. He won't have no choice.”

The judge made his decision and granted them each a five hundred thousand dollar bail. Once the okay was given, the Doberman attempted to inform the judge that they were prepared to post, when he was interrupted by some kind of commotion in the rear of the courtroom.

“What?!” yelled a young brother sitting in the back before he stood up to leave. “Goddamn, bitch-ass, mu'fuckin' judge! This nigga gonna let these niggas get right back out on the street? I've had it with this shit!”

He stormed out of the courtroom with his arms swinging wildly and his face screwed. Don P. only looked in time to get a glimpse of the guy's back side, but they paid it no mind. The important thing was that they were about to get back on the street. Their first priority would be to find Spits and let him know what they'd found out about his boy Ceelow. It seemed as though the Doberman was just there a little earlier trying to get a judge to grant him bail. When the Doberman saw the perplexed look on their faces, he went on to inform them as to why he was being kept too tightly. When they heard that shit, they put two and two together to make five. It
was obvious to them that Cee had snitched on the rest of the crew to get himself off, hence the simultaneous raids taking place all over the Bronx. Now, they were on their way home in a cab and Ceelow wouldn't know what had hit him when they caught up with his ass. They were so focused on that one goal that nothing else mattered, not even the car that was tailing them.

As the cab driver took the local blocks to get them to El's crib, they discussed what they would do when they found Cee. They spoke about cutting off a number of his limbs. They even thought about torturing him while they kept him alive to prolong his suffering. They went over every fucked-up thing you could do to a dude to make him feel it. One thing that real gangstas hated was a snitch. It was bothering them to know that they finally had a reason to body this rat mu'fucka, and they didn't know where to start looking for him. And then out of the clear blue sky, he drops right into their lap.

“Oh shit,” El Don said as his cell phone started to ring. “You ain't even gonna believe this shit, dog.”

“What?” Poncho asked as his brother answered the phone without responding. All he heard was him say, “Yo, what up, Cee?” It was like music to his ears. He didn't even know it, but he was smiling. He was genuinely glad to hear from him.

When El hung up the phone, the music just kept on coming. He told Poncho that not only did Cee think that they didn't know that he's the one that snitched, but that he was on his way to El's apartment right at that moment.

“Get the fuck outta here,” Poncho said as El told him the best part of the story. “You can't be fuckin' serious.”

“That's my word, my nigga,” El responded. “We probably got like an hour before he get there, then we gonna break that nigga off somethin' real proper, ya na'mean.”

“Yeah,” Ponch agreed. “Hell yeah.”

They reached El's building and hopped out of the cab in a hurry. They quickly entered the building and pressed the button for the elevator. When it arrived, they got in and pressed the button for El's floor and just as the doors were about to close, someone caught them and reopened them. A
stranger entered the elevator and they proceeded upward to the fourth floor. It should have troubled them that this stranger didn't even press a button when he'd entered the elevator, but maybe they thought it was just a coincidence that he happened to be getting off on their floor. They should have also noticed the look on his face the whole ride up. They should have taken into some consideration his heavy breathing and awkward grin, but they didn't. They hadn't even noticed that they knew this nigga from somewhere. They hadn't realized how much history him and them had. They just continued trading torture methods to perform when Ceelow arrived. Maybe if they would have noticed one or two of these facts, they wouldn't have let the nigga get the drop on them.

As Don P. were about to exit the elevator, El got a funny feeling. He turned around to face this stranger and said, “Yo!”

That was all he got out of his mouth before he heard, chic-chic. Just like that, there was a huge shotgun poking him underneath his chin. He could do nothing but shut his mouth and peek down at the cannon that had just taken his breath away. He curled up his lip and looked his assailant directly in the eyes before spitting in his face.

“Oh yeah?” he simply said. He lifted the gun from under his chin and in one foul swoop, knocked the daylight out of El with the butt of the shotgun. He then pointed it in the direction of Poncho and made him carry his brother to his apartment and open the door. When they were inside, he made Poncho tie El to a chair with telephone wire. When he was securely fastened to the chair, still out cold, this stranger proceeded to tie Poncho to a chair as well. When they were both gagged and bound, they would find out how much history them and this stranger had together.

“Ma, can you believe it's finally the year 2000?” Ginger asked her mother.

“It got here quick as hell, huh?” she responded.

“For real, right?” said Gin. “It's just messed up that the weather's so bad out. I really wish Michael could be here, though.”

For the past week Ginger and her mother had been having the best time
with one another during their trip to Florida. Her mother had missed how much they used to hang out before she'd moved in with Spits, but she didn't know how to deal with it before. This idea for them to go away for New Year's was the best thing she could've done to reach out to her daughter to let her know how she felt. She'd previously just hinted toward how much she missed her only child, but she also didn't want to drive her further away, so she kept most of her complaints to herself. In order to bridge the gap that was forming between her and her daughter, she'd planned for them to have this time just for themselves and it worked. Ginger and her mother were the inseparable pair they once were, and it made her feel exceptional. Unfortunately, it was now time for Ginger's mother to explain her ulterior motive for bringing her all this way from home.

“Baby,” she said, getting her attention from the storm that had developed outside. “I have something that I need to tell you.”

“What is it?” Ginger asked, not really giving her mother her undivided attention.

“I have something to tell you about Michael.” She could feel the tension getting thicker the moment his name was out of her mouth.

“What do you mean? What about Michael?”

“I want you to know that I always knew what he was about. In the back of my mind, I always hoped that you'd do what was right. But I couldn't just sit around anymore and wait for that to happen.”

“What do you mean, Ma?” Ginger asked, starting to worry.

Her mother took a deep breath and then continued, “I knew that he was nothing but a drug dealer for longer than you could imagine. Who did you think you were fooling, huh?”

Ginger began forming small drops of tears from her eyes. She made an attempt at hiding her emotions, but to no avail. “Well, what would you have wanted me to do? Was I just supposed to leave him?”

“Yes, that's exactly what you were supposed to do,” responded Gin's mom. “Immediately after he endangered your well-being, and sacrificed your safety, you should have stopped seeing him, plain and simple!”

“Is that what you did?!” Ginger yelled.

Her mother said nothing.

“It isn't, is it? Do you know why?” she asked her mother. She waited for a second and then answered for her, “Because you loved him.”

“That's right,” she admitted. “I loved him. But where is he now? That boy is nothing but a two-bit hustler. He is nothing like your father!”

“You're right!” Gin yelled, interrupting. “He isn't anything like my father. He's still here. He'll never be anything like my father because he would never leave me . . .like my father left you.”

“Don't you ever!” Gin's mother yelled with fire in her eyes. “How dare you?”

Ginger could do no more to hold herself back from letting her tears run. They began slowly, but then they ran as steady as a river. She couldn't even speak anymore.

“Well,” her mother said in a softer tone. “All of that doesn't matter anymore. Michael won't ever get another chance to hurt you.”

“What do you mean by that?” Ginger asked. “What have you done?”

“I haven't done anything,” she said. “But I'm positive that you won't ever see Michael again and there isn't anything I could do about that; not even if I wanted to.”

“Why?!” Ginger spat. “You can't do anything to keep me from him! He's going to be my husband!” She finally put the words together. She hadn't even realized what she'd said until two seconds after it was out of her mouth. She'd shocked herself, as well as her mother. They both just sat there in awe at what Ginger had just said. Spits had been waiting months to hear it, and he wasn't even there.

“Over my dead body!” her mother said coldly.

El Don was awakened from the disturbing feeling of ice-cold water splashed into his face. He quickly assumed the manner he was in prior to being rendered unconscious. “You pussy ass mu'fucka,” he said. “You gonna get ya shit twisted backwards as soon as I get loose. You better kill me, nigga!”

“Don't worry about that,” he responded. “You ain't gotta worry about
that at all, you little bitch-ass nigga.” He approached El until he was within arm's reach and then smacked him with an open hand across his jaw. “You gonna get yours.”

After smacking El once more with even more force and anger, he momentarily left them alone bonded to chairs in the middle of the living room. While he was gone, both Don and P. simultaneously began searching the room for a possible escape. When they found no visible escape from the torment this crazed unknown had in store for them, they searched their memory banks for potential diversions and again, they came up with nothing. They wouldn't let him see it, but they were actually growing somewhat afraid of what he was capable of; especially because they had yet to find out where he knew them from.

When he returned, he simply sat on a sofa positioned in front of them. He put his hands under his chin and rested them on his lap. He looked at Don, and then Poncho. Then, he looked back at Don. “Which one of ya'll mu'fuckas actually lit the match?” he asked the both of them.

They didn't understand. They just stared at him, and then at each other with bewilderment.

“Which one of you lit the fuckin' match?!” he yelled at the top of his lungs as his patience grew thin. “What, you don't remember now?”

An awkward calm fell on the room until Poncho broke the silence. “What the fuck you talkin' 'bout?”

“Oh, you don't know what I'm talkin' about, huh?” he asked. “Well, which one of you bastards killed Drew, and that nigga Pone then?”

“Drew and Pone?” they both asked in unison. They thought he had to be absolutely insane. “Who?” they said once again at the same time.

“Is ya'll mu'fuckas tryin' to piss me off?”