“Terrica said he got into some stuff with Melo Barnes…and I counted out that wad of money he left for you. Four hundred dollars for a basic cleaning where there wasn’t really much of anything to clean? I even saw him pay off people’s tabs at Lucky’s—five hundred dollars worth.”
She cocks her head back as if my words are daggers flying toward her face.
“Training to be an amateur boxer pays nothing. So where’s all this money coming from?”
She furrows her eyebrows, letting out a loud cackle then huffing out, “Rich ain’t no damn drug dealer, girl.”
“Then what is he?”
Her mouth opens and closes as she rests her hand against the counter, shrugging. “He works.”
“Where at?”
“Just forget about the cake. I really think you should drop this.”
“We’re not sharing scandalous gossip. You said he had a legit job, and I asked, ‘Where.’ I don’t think it’s that serious.” I scoff.
“I promised Kenny I wouldn’t talk to you about this stuff with Rich because if I talk to you about one thing then I’ll have to talk to you about another…”
“Talk to me about what stuff?”
She shakes her head.
“You said yourself that Rich is a respectable man. He’s so respectable that you let me go to his house twice and you want to get him a birthday ca?—”
“He fights.”
“Well, yeah, that’s why he’s training with Unc?—”
“Down at Lucky’s.”
Rasheeda’s shrill voice bounces around in my head along with Ky’s baby face.
“What do you mean he fights down at Lucky’s?”
She rolls her eyes. “I don’t think I need to spell it out for you.”
“That’s…no,” I stammer out, shaking my head. “They stopped that.”
“It never stopped. Things are just…different now.”
“Differenthow?”
“Melo Barnes took it from Lucky.”
“So he’s like Rich’s boss now, except he’s not allegedly dealing with drugs…he’s dealing with a fighting ring?”
“I guess you can say that…” She shrugs. “And we don’t always get along with our bosses. So there’s that.”
“But why did the police have a press conference and say it was over back in the day? Why did Lucky almost end up in the feds? How the hell is Melo running for city council?”
“I don’t know, and most of the time it’s better that way. The less you know about what goes on in the Bottoms, the better.”
My mouth grows dry. “But Lucky’s is sanctioned now, right? It’s controlled? It’s not like back in the day where…where sometimes peopleyou know?”
I still can’t say the words even though I see them in my head, so they come out as “you know.” They were just too close to Mama.
Aunt Faye sighs. “Listen, in that life there’s three guaranteed things—violence, sickness, and eventually death either by their own hands or at the hands of somebody else.”
