My brother.
The only person I truly had left, was gone.
It was just me now. No mother. No father. No brother. Just me. I always said I didn’t want to lose Meech. Always said since one of us had to eventually live without the other, that I wanted it to be me that left first. The pain that came with losing was too much for me to bare. I couldn’t do another funeral. Momma’s for me, was one and done. But look at what happened. Look at menow. I’d have to do another one. And this time, I wouldn’t have anyone to swap reminiscent stories with. This time, I wouldn’t have my brother there to hold me up. I’d have to suffer through it alone.
How could a family of four be reduced to just a family of one like that?
The ride back to The Woods was quiet. A blur, really. Spent with my head resting against the window, with my eyes closed. Thought of Meech and the last words I spoke to him. I swallowed and tears seeped through my closed lids as I thought about our handshake and those final I love you’s. We were supposed to have breakfast in a couple of hours. We were supposed to have more time…
When the car came to a halt in front of my building, I didn’t bulge. I was in no rush to go back to that apartment. I just… I needed a minute. They gave me that too. Sat there, quiet, idling in front of the building in silence for I don’t know how long before Zeke got out to open my door. He stood back, held his hand out for me to grab and I ignored it. With heavy shoulders and a pounding headache, I stepped out of the car without his help.
I walked towards the building, climbing the dirty, rickety staircase, the sound of birds chirping and my feet pattering against the metal stairs filling my ears. My bottom lip quivered the closer I got to the top of them. Heart raced too. My life was about to change. Majorly. Meech was all I had left. Yes, I had family in The Woods but that didn’t matter. The family I came from? It’d been reduced to just me. And I wasn’t sure if I would survive out here alone.
CHAPTER 2
EXODUS
“Shit wasn’t supposedto go down like that, bro,” Zeke said, repeating the same thing he said when he called me hours ago. “It was supposed to be easy. We were supposed to be in and out. Simple. Fuck was that nigga even doin’ there? Shorty said he was working. Said he wouldn’t be off until five. The house was supposed to be empty.”
“That’s not the point,” Kiss said, pulling from the blunt before attempting to pass it to me. I declined, gripped the steering wheel, and sped out of the parking lot at The Woods.
I’d just dropped Zeke’s boy Meech little sister off. He was killed. Murked because my fucking brother didn’t know how to follow direct orders. If it weren’t for him going behind my back, making plays he wasn’t supposed to make, Meech would still be breathing.
“You niggas weren’t supposed to be there at all.”
Zeke sucked his teeth. I watched him in the rearview mirror as he slouched into the seat, arms crossed over his heaving chest, his top lip curled up like he was ready to kill some shit. “It was an easy lick?—”
“Anunnecessarylick,” Kiss cut in. “Fuck what we said, huh?”
I didn’t say anything. I let Leviticus do all of the talking. Talking he shouldn’t have been doing. Talking he wouldn’t have had to do if Zeke had listened.
I was too pissed off to say anything, so I drove in silence. I tried to at least. Every five minutes or so, Zeke opened his mouth with the same sorry ass excuse and Leviticus played into it, giving him conversation I wouldn’t. When I was mad, I was quiet. I’d said enough. I didn’t repeat myself. Didn’t have a need to. If I said something, I said it with finality. Rather a nigga took heed or not wasn’t up to me.
Subtly, I shook my head and bit down on my teeth, clenching my jaw. I twisted the steering wheel, took my eyes off the road, and put them back on the rearview mirror.
“Run it back,” I said, finally speaking up, my eyes locked on Zeke when they should have been on what was in front of me.
He uncomfortably shifted around in his seat, tore his eyes away from me and looked out of the window. “I don’t want to keep replayin’—”
“You think I give a fuck?” I said through gritted teeth. “Run it back, nigga.”
He sighed and ran his hands down over the front of his black jeans. Shaking his head, he turned the corners of his mouth up and ran the story back. “We got to the spot. Put the code in. Walked in and?—”
“Oh, sothat’show the night started, huh?”
He didn’t say anything and I continued to stare at him through the rearview until Kiss roughly tapped me on the arm to pull my attention away from him and back on the road. Again, I bit down on my teeth, clenching my jaw as I pressed down on the brakes, a few inches away from colliding with the car in front of me, idling at a red light. Once I was stopped, I put my eyes back on my baby brother, waiting for him to start the story where I wanted him to start it.
“I left ma’s house?—”
“On your way out of the crib, what Genny say?”
I watched as his Adam’s apple rose and fell. “Told me to be careful because she had a bad feeling.”
I tugged on my beard, with my mouth turned down. “Mmh. And then what?”
Again, he shook his head and looked away, out of the window.
“Eyes on me, nigga,” I gritted.
