Hood (22 page)

So why cry if you live or you die?

Take the F outta life and you livin a lie!

A FEW NIGHTS
later Egypt sat up on the side of the bed. She’d lain there for over an hour until she was sure Mont was asleep, and now the streets were calling her and it was time to make that move. It was getting harder and harder to keep him from peeping her game, and Egypt promised herself that after she copped these next few vials she was gonna try real hard to shake her crack craving for a little while because she had a feeling he was starting to get suspicious.

Dreko was making life so hard for her. Not only was he still being tightfisted and sometimey with the drugs, that fool acted like he didn’t even care if Hood busted them acting ill. He came around demanding pussy or salad or head whenever he felt like it, and that was usually at a time when Mont was most likely to catch them.

That shit always terrified Egypt. She knew exactly what kind of disgust Mont felt toward chicks who sucked off the pipe, and just the thought that he might find out how low she had sunk terrified her. But none of that meant shit to Dreko. He was the kind of cat who lived for danger. His dick didn’t even get hard unless there was something crazy about to go down and he might get caught, like waiting until Lamont got in the shower, then quickie-fucking Egypt right there in his boy’s bed. Or walking into the living room with her and snatching his long dick out, demanding she give him three big licks before he would leave her alone. His shit got turned on extra high when there was a house full of niggas present and somebody might walk in and bust them at any moment.

“Put that shit away!” Egypt would beg, wild-eyed and glancing toward the kitchen, hallway, and bedroom doors to make sure nobody was coming.

Somehow Dreko would find that shit real funny.

“Just three licks!” he would laugh. “I’ll put it back as soon as you give me three licks!”

Egypt would disgust herself by glancing around again, then running over to him and ducking her head down and licking the tip of his dick three times real quick. But sometimes he was satisfied with that, and sometimes he wasn’t.

“Nah, come on now, E. You know you didn’t do that shit right. I ain’t hardly even feel them last two licks. Hit me again.”

Oh, the fuckin torture! These days he kept her nervous and strung out on a crack string, only dishing that shit off to her when she was so gripped by a craving that she was begging and crying. Then he’d either fuck her, beat her ass, or call Zena in and humiliate her by making them eat each other’s pussies, or worse, do his back the way he liked it.

Egypt’s only escape was the glass dick she worshipped, but getting it was hard when Dreko was acting so stingy with his product. Sometimes even when she was obedient and did what he wanted he’d still only toss her enough for one or two hits, so both her and Zena were forced to go out in the streets to get what they needed from one of his trap boys, who would sometimes look out for them.

Egypt shuddered as she dressed in the darkness, preparing to cop the poison that she needed to survive. She had scraped real low to feed her habit, and she felt dirty all over. Filthy. Guilty. She missed her father. She couldn’t even sleep without having horrible nightmares behind the way her life had turned out.

Egypt gazed at Lamont as he slept. He was a true-to-the-game baller. No man’s doljah. It was only a matter of time before he found out about her and Dreko and a mountain of shit collapsed on top of both of their heads. And when that day came, Egypt knew both her and Dreko might as well be dead. Because there was no way in hell Lamont would forgive either one of them.

Egypt crossed the room and stood by the door. She glanced at Lamont again and tears came to her eyes. She loved him. God knows she did. But she loved crack too. Maybe even more.

“You want some eggs?” Egypt asked two days later. She pulled off her jacket and opened the refrigerator, scanning the shelves. She had just come in off another all-nighter, and found Hood already awake and moody and staring out the kitchen window into the dawn sky.

He turned around, his eyes cold and questioning. “No. I want some muhfuckin answers.”

Egypt sucked her teeth. “I already told you, Lamont. Zena called and asked me to come help her with the baby. She was running a fever and they didn’t know what to do.”

“They who?”

She shrugged. “Zena and Sackie. Neither one of them know nothing about babies. Just cause I went to Clara Barton they swear I’m a nurse. All I did was give her some Tylenol and a cool bath and she was straight.”

“So you telling me that shit took all night?”

“Not all night. We watched a movie too. Some stupid shit. I forgot what it was…”

Hood let her talk that dumb shit. She had turned into a big liar and he wasn’t impressed by none of it. This was the second time he’d woken up at night to find his woman gone, and wasn’t no bitch that slick with her game that she could run it on him.

He stared coldly as she moved around the kitchen trying hard not to believe his heart. She was skinny. She’d lost her ass. Her locks was nasty. She hadn’t said a word about college or bragged about all her hopes and dreams. Hood kept his eyes on her as she fixed a plate of fried eggs, ate a mouthful, then threw the rest in the garbage.

Either Egypt was getting high, or she was out there fuckin some nigga. She wasn’t the type to trifle with drugs, so she had to be slumming with some nigga. Fury washed over him as he visualized her getting dicked by some cat while he was sitting up in the joint. That’s probably why she’d fallen off on him for five fuckin months. Hurt and betrayal rose in him and his eyes were snakelike as he watched her. Just because he hadn’t said anything didn’t mean Hood wasn’t on it. He just couldn’t see her doing none of it. Fuckin with drugs, fuckin with some nigga…Yeah, they had been together since childhood and his was the only dick she’d ever had. Maybe she had gotten bored waiting around for him. Decided to sample some new shit and see if it was good. Still, it was all impossible for Hood to picture. He knew Egypt like a book, and his love for her made him give her the benefit of the doubt. But his rage had her looking like prey, and he wanted so badly to pounce on that ass.

He forced himself to be as still as he could. The only thing that moved was his eyes and a throbbing vein on his temple that beat dangerously. Shit had been hard for Egypt after Fat Daddy got killed. If she had stepped off into some lame nigga’s bed because she was hurtin and alone while he was locked up, that was one thing. But to have the bitch getting up outta his bed at night and running into the streets behind some dick now that he was back, oh…that was something else.

An image of his mother flashed through his mind and something so dark and menacing pulsed through his body that hot blood wanted to burst through his nose, his ears, and even his eyes.

This better not be what the fuck it looks like
, he thought.
It fuckin better not be.

Honor and respect never gets you no regrets, lady…

IT WAS LONELY
at the top, but Dreko wasn’t complaining. He had shit locked down in Brownsville and nobody could dispute the fact that he had risen to supremacy with nothing but his hammer and his heart, and niggas knew better than to test either one.

You couldn’t tell it from the outside, but on the inside Dreko was still furious over that battle rap that had gone down between him and Hood. That nigga wasn’t all that on the mic, and any other bitch who came up in his nest tryna rip him with them lame-ass lyrics woulda caught a hot round to his dome already.

But there were other ways to get at that nigga, and Dreko didn’t mind going around the back door when necessary. He was out there proving he was large almost every day, whether his boy knew about the greasy shit he did or not. He was still doing it. But despite it all, Hood
was
his nigga and while Dreko
did
have love for him, there was nothing about that fuckin Sackie that warranted an inch of Dreko’s restraint. Whether it was about Hood or that skank crack-ho Zena, that ghost muhfucka Sackie had been trespassing on his game for a minute now, and it was time to teach that bitch a lesson in street respect.

And that’s why three days later Dreko and his boys were sitting in his g-ride watching as Sackie walked out of his building next to a chunky dude with spiked red hair.

“Bitch-ass muhfucka,” Dreko muttered under his breath as the two white cats dapped out. Sackie looked around real quick, then stood outside the vestibule while the dude climbed into a black Mazda and sat there reading something as his car idled at the curb.

Dreko fumed in his seat. It was time to bust a fuckin move and he planned to bust one real hard. Sackie was a white boy with a big fuckin mouth. He’d been whispering shit in Hood’s ear ever since his boy hit the bricks, and his loose teeth was about to get him smashed.

The red-haired cat pulled away from the curb and drove toward them as he rolled down the street. Dreko grilled him hard, with recognition in his eyes. The last time he’d seen this cat had been the day Hood went to court and his witness bitched up and caught amnesia. The first time he’d seen him was the morning Hood had gotten knocked and tossed across the hood of a police car.

Gazing at the building, Dreko narrowed his eyes as Sackie turned around and went back inside. There could only be one reason them two white boys was fuckin around in the same airspace, and one of them was gonna catch it bad.

“Yo, who the fuck was dat white guy?” Black asked as the white dude rolled by. He twisted a toothpick around in his mouth, then turned a bottle of brew up to his lips and swallowed.

“Which one?” Dreko asked with a deadly grin. “The cat in the whip is a fuckin jake. A fat-ass DT from over at the 73rd. But the big-mouth fool who just went back in his building?” Dreko chuckled humorlessly. “Oh, that muhfucka is a dead man.”

“I’m hooking up with Egypt and we’re going out,” Zena called out to Sackie as she leaned over the bathroom sink and stared into the mirror. Her face was so skinny it made her eyes look huge. She pressed her tongue to one of her front bottom teeth and wiggled it. The shit was so loose she could have spit it out with one big sneeze.

Zena sighed and made sure her gear was straight. Her cute little Armani jumper had gotten three sizes too big, and the belt she had tied around her waist was on the last notch and still not tight enough.

Before she had hooked up with Dreko and started using, Zena had been a stunna who had all the brothas wanting her. There were a lot of Hispanics in the hood and a couple of Asian chicks too. But there weren’t a whole lot of straight up blondies walking around Brownsville, especially one who had an ass like a sistah. Zena peeked over her shoulder at the sag below her waist. Well, she used to have a big ass. That shit was dried up and gone now.

As usual her brother was on the computer playing with some stock charts. The small desk he sat at was only about ten steps outside the bathroom, so she knew he’d heard when she said she was going out.

“You still mad?” she asked, walking over to put her arms around his neck. She hugged him, her stringy blond hair falling over his shoulder. “Don’t be mad at me, Sackie. I said I was sorry and it won’t happen no more. I mean it this time. I’m through with all that. For real.”

Sackie grabbed her pencil-like arm, and pushed her away. “You gotta chill with all that shit, Zena. It’s fuckin you up real bad. Egypt too. Both of y’all was too busy getting high the other day to care about where your baby was and what she was doing. What if Dreka had swallowed that fuckin crack and died? Huh? What woulda happened then?”

Zena felt so guilty. Sackie had come home and found Andreka playing on the floor with a piece of crack in her mouth. She was almost walking now, and she must have pulled herself up and grabbed the drugs off the dresser while Zena and Egypt were busy sucking on their stems.

Sackie had picked up his niece to kiss her, then seen what was in her mouth and gone crazy on Zena and Egypt.

“I’m so sorry,” Zena said. And she really was. She might not have been the best mother in the world, but she loved her little girl with all her heart. She looked at her brother and bit her lip, on the verge of blurting out her plans. No, she held herself back. Miss Baker had told her to speak up and claim her recovery, but Zena didn’t want to tell Sackie about her plans until
after
she had taken that all-important first step.

Zena was nervous, but she was ready. Running into Miss Baker was the best thing that could have happened to her. So much of what was wrong in her life was wrapped up in her self-esteem and her need to fit in and belong somewhere. She’d never been enough of anything in her own eyes. And when Andreka was born HIV positive, that had been the ultimate proof of her inadequacy. Not only had she managed to make all the wrong choices in life, but Zena had given her innocent baby a deadly disease as well, and no amount of getting high in the world could help her forget that.

But then God sent Miss Baker back into Zena’s life. The older woman had hugged her tightly right out on the street that morning, holding Zena in her arms and admonishing her for not coming back to the clinic.

“Why didn’t you come back to see us? We’ve been trying so hard to reach you!” Miss Baker said beaming. “I’ve got some news that I think you’ll be happy to hear.”

Miss Baker couldn’t tell her what that good news was standing right out there on the sidewalk, so Zena had taken the bus with her to Brookdale Hospital and sat nervously in Miss Baker’s office as the older woman looked through her file.

“Now normally Doctor Beatty would be the one to tell you this, but since I’ve finally gotten you in here I don’t think he’ll mind if I give you the good news.”

Miss Baker had taken both of Zena’s hands in hers, then paused before speaking softly. “Your daughter’s latest HIV test results are negative. She’s seroconverted, and there are no longer any HIV viral antibodies in her blood system.”

For a long moment Zena could only sit there and stare, wondering if she’d heard correctly.

“Th-th-then I didn’t give it to her? Andreka’s not gonna die?”

Miss Baker grinned. “You gave Andreka your HIV antibodies, not your HIV virus. She’s fine, Zena. She’s healthy and just fine.”

Instantly a weight was lifted from Zena’s shoulders. That haunting, unspeakable thing that had terrified her so unmercifully no longer existed. If Andreka was okay, then everything else in Zena’s life could be okay too. There was no longer a reason to run. To live in a constant cycle of guilt, escapism, and destruction. Or to get high.

“Are you sure?” her eyes pleaded with Miss Baker as she wept into a wad of tissues clutched in her hand. “Are you really, really, really sure?”

“I’m sure,” Miss Baker affirmed. “I’ve seen this happen thousands of times and babies like Andreka go on to live normal, healthy lives.”

Zena put her face down on the desk and took a few deep breaths. She felt light-headed with relief and for once the high she was riding was all natural.

“But there is something else I think we should talk about,” Miss Baker said, her voice suddenly serious. “Andreka isn’t the only person we need to be worrying about here. Her mommy looks like she might be having a pretty rough time accepting some things about herself too. If you’re ready for recovery I think I know where you can go for help.”

Zena was wide open.

“How long have you been using drugs, baby?”

Zena shrugged and briefly closed her eyes. It felt like forever. “Three years. Since I was fifteen.”

“Have you ever done things to get drugs that you’re not proud of or maybe wish you could forget?”

Zena bit her lip, then slowly nodded.

“Do you want to stop using the drugs? Are you interested in recovery?”

“Yes,” Zena said in a strong voice. If Andreka was safe and healthy, then she wanted to be around to raise her daughter and take damn good care of her. “Yes.”

Miss Baker smiled. “My sister Aretha attends several Narcotics Anonymous meetings each week where people just like you gather to share their stories of recovery. There’s one being held on Watkins Street tonight. If you’re looking for people who can show you how to battle the disease of addiction I can call Ree-Ree for you. She’ll come by and pick you up and the two of you can walk to the meeting together.”

Zena thought about Egypt, and bit her lip again then frowned.

“What?” Miss Baker asked. “Tonight is no good? You need to find a baby-sitter?”

“No, tonight is good, but uhm, is this invitation only for me? I have a friend who needs help too. Can I bring my friend?”

“Oh yes,” Miss Baker laughed. “The meetings are open. You can bring as many friends as you like.”

Zena’s heart beat with excitement as she waited for Miss Baker’s older sister to arrive. She had agreed to meet Aretha Baker downstairs and she peeked out the window every ten seconds or so, afraid the lady might think she had changed her mind and leave without her.

Excited or not, Zena’s conscience was fucking with her hard. After receiving the best news in the world that Andreka was HIV negative, she’d been wracked with intense guilt all morning because of what she might have exposed her best friend to. It had taken more courage than she knew she had, but she’d come home from Brookdale Hospital and forced herself to sit down and write Egypt a long letter. It was one of the hardest things she had ever done in her life. A little devil on her left shoulder was steady talking shit the whole time she was writing it too.
Don’t go telling nobody all ya damn business! Egypt’s been out there doing bogus shit too. If she does have it, how do you know she actually got it from you?

But there was a voice of love speaking from her right shoulder as well, and Zena was torn between the two.
You’ve gotta tell her. It’s only right. Don’t mess around and jinx yourself or your baby, Zena. That shit could end up coming back on you. Be grateful Andreka is healthy and do right by your girl. Egypt’s been a damn good friend and she deserves the truth. If it was the other way around she would have never done something so grimy to you.

It had taken her the whole afternoon, but between the guilt and the tears, the remorse and the shame, Zena wrote the letter. As she signed her name she noticed that the pages were damp, and in some places the writing was shaky and smudgy, but it was done and Zena was relieved. She had managed to get the truth out and tell Egypt exactly what kind of horrors that she and Dreko had been exposing her to for all these months. Near the end of the letter Zena had begged her friend for forgiveness and urged her to get tested immediately.

Zena folded the letter into a small square and took it in her bedroom and stuck it inside her purse. Later that afternoon she walked the neighborhood until she caught up with Egypt outside of the pizza shop on Rockaway Avenue. She could tell Egypt was high, but she went ahead and told her about Miss Baker and the meeting that was being held that night anyway.

There’d been some hesitation in Egypt’s eyes and Zena feared her friend just wasn’t ready.

“Come on, Egypt. Please. Look at you! Look at
me
! That shit is killing us. We both look a mess and we
are
a mess. Just come to one meeting. Please, E. Do it for yourself, but do it for Hood too.”