Chapter 14
The air slapped me in my face as I stepped out of the gated doors of the prison. Six years down on my ass. Six years away from my life, away from my loved ones, away from my first love. The day I went down, I felt my world fall because Honey dropped off the face of the Earth. I hadn’t seen her since the night she visited me at the prison after my sentence hearing.
I sat behind the glass and held the phone in my hand. Honey’s eyes were red, and tears stained her cheeks. She’d gotten thick over the course of the trial. Her hips were wider, her face was rounder, and her titties were the juiciest I’d ever seen.
“Hey,” I said in a low tone.
“I can’t do this for fifteen years, Marquise. I can’t hold you down in prison. My life can’t stop because yours did.”
My chest tightened as I struggled to inhale a good breath. Of all the things she could have said, why did she say this? “Wait… Baby, what about our engagement?”
She shook her head. “What about it? In fifteen years, I’ll be thirty-five years old, Marquise. I want to have a solid foundation set way before that. I can’t wait for you. I’m sorry. Please, don’t contact me.”
Her lip trembled as she stood up and left.
“Honey! Honey, please!” I yelled after her.
“Hey, loser!” Dayari called out to me. Her voice pulled me to the present. She leaned her back against the driver’s side door of her car, while a pair of sunglasses shielded her eyes from the bright sun. I smiled and strolled over to her. When I was close, she jumped into my arms and pulled me into a tight hug.
“I missed you, too.” I rubbed her back for a few moments.
Dayari was one of the few people who supported me the entire six years. She let me call her every two weeks. She visited me on holidays. She kept me sane through a time when I really could have lost my mind.
She planted her feet and punched me in the arm. “Don’t get into any more trouble. You hear me?” She pushed my chest.
“I hear you. I didn’t plan on getting caught up this time either. Somebody snitched on me and?—”
“Aht. Don’t even worry about any of that right now. Focus on the fact that you are a free man who can go sleep in a real bed tonight. You can take a shower without having to watch your back. You can eat some real food without worrying about if a nigga spitting or shitting in your tray. Focus on the positives because if your ass goes down again, I’m not visiting you, calling you, putting money on your books, or anything.” Dayari’s face was stern and held no hint of a joke. She was dead ass serious.
“Look, I’m not trying to get lectured the first ten seconds I’m out. Can we roll through the hood, get me some Timmy Chan’s, and head to yo’ folks’ house?”
“Do you think riding through the hood is a good idea?” She unlocked her door, and we got in.
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“I don’t think you’ve got friends on the block anymore. You literally don’t know who could have snitched on you, and riding through might put a target on your back.”
She wasn’t wrong. I’d spent countless nights mulling over who could have dropped the dime on me, but I kept coming up empty. Despite the blood in, blood out fight, the only enemies I had were dead—or so I thought.
“You right. We can swing by Mouse’s crib if he’s still on the Northside on the way to Timmy’s on Cullen. I need to see my homeboys, at least.”
Mouse and TK kept in touch. They never came up to the prison, but they answered my calls every now and then. They also kept money on my account. I owed them big time for what they did. To know I didn’t lose everybody I cared for made the lonely days more bearable.
“Fine. You know the address?”
I shook my head. “Did you bring my phone? We can plug that bitch in to get a charge, and I can find his address in my contacts.”
She chuckled. “I put your phone on the charger last night. It’s in the bag in the back seat.”
“Good looks.”
I leaned over the center console and picked up the bag from the back seat. I pulled out my phone and tucked my wallet in my pocket. The court had seized all my digital assets, which was fine. I had a couple hundred thousand in my accounts for them to take. However, unbeknownst to a majority of people in my life, I kept a safe in a hidden location that held two million dollars in clean bills. Once these folks got off my back, I’d be up again.
“I’m about to text you the address I have on file.” I copied and pasted the address and hit send. Then, I tapped the number and put the phone up to my ear as Dayari adjusted her GPS and pulled out of the prison parking lot.
“Hello?” Mouse answered.
“What’s good, my nigga.”
“Marq?”
“The one and only. You at home?”
He laughed. “My dawg free! What happened to the fifteen-piece they dropped on yo’ ass? I know it ain’t been fifteen already.”
“Nah, man. I got out on good behavior.”
“Fa sho, fa sho. I’m not in that spot no more. I can text you my address. Who you with?”
“It’s just me and Ari’s bigheaded ass. We only swinging by for a second so I can get my grub on and wash the memories of the cell off my skin.”
“Fa sho. Pull up. It’ll be good to see you, dawg.”
“Say no more.”
We ended the call shortly after. Dayari had turned up the music once my call was over. I sat back and looked out the window, praying I never had to come back to the prison ever again.
* * *
“Marq!” Mouse greeted me with open arms as I hopped out of the car and pulled him into a dap and side hug combination.
“My boy getting fat,” I joked as I patted his stomach.
“Life.”
“What’s been going on?” I asked as I crossed my arms over my chest and looked out at the neighborhood he lived in. It was a wealthy-looking area, with SUVs and kids running around. He’d come a long way from the apartment on the Southside he’d been in before I got locked up.
“Shit. After the shit went down with you, me and TK figured it was time to do other shit. We both got jumped out together, made it easier to go up against them niggas too. Once we’d washed our hands of Merlot, I went legit by working a warehouse job. I started from the bottom and moved up to the manager’s position. The pay isn’t tens of thousands a week, but it keeps the bills paid and my family safe.”
“Family?”
As if the kids could hear us, two little girls ran out of the front door.
“Daddy!”
“Daddy!”
They both called out as they sprinted their little legs to the target of their attention. My eyes widened.
“You got kids?” I asked the dumb question.
Mouse nodded. “Yeah, two and one on the way.”
He kneeled to their height and asked them what was wrong.
“Can we have snacks, peas!” the older of the two asked. She couldn’t have been over four or five years old. They must have been the reason he went legit. The same reason as me—to protect a family from the streets.
“Your mama didn’t get you a snack?”
“Mommy seep,” the other little one answered.
“Hold on, Marq. Let me go get them a snack.”
“Don’t worry about it. I just wanted to see one of my day ones face-to-face. We need to keep moving, anyway. I’ll get with you.”
“Fa sho.”
We dapped each other up before I got back in Dayari’s car. Mouse ushered his two little ones back into the house as we turned around to head out of the neighborhood. I expected most of the folks I used to chop it up with were on the same tip as Mouse.
My mind wandered. How was Honey? I’d stop getting updates from my cousin, so I was completely in the dark about what she’d been up to the last six years. Was it too late to hit her up? Would she be open to spinning the block?
“What’s on your mind?” Dayari asked.
“Honey.”
She continued to drive. Her hands adjusted on the steering wheel as if she wanted to say something but held her tongue instead.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit. Say what you got to say. I know you were trying to avoid talking about her, but we are here now. What’s new with Honey?”
“She moved to California a little after you went down. She cut all contact with anybody associated with you, including me.”
“Damn, I’m sorry to hear that. I figured she didn’t want to speak to me, but I can’t believe she cut you off too.”
“Yeah.”
“What else?”
“Miss Janie passed away.”
My heart sank at the revelation. “What? Are you serious? When did she die?”
“She passed a few days ago. Mama and Daddy told me this morning. They saw the family pull up and sent their condolences.”
“Shit is tough. I’ll have to extend my condolences.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
I shrugged. “I have to do something. Miss Janie and Honey were kind to me when I first moved into town. They welcomed me with open arms, and I should do something for the family.”
“Don’t be surprised if they aren’t excited to see you.”
“I’m not delusional.”
She hummed and ended the conversation. I bobbed my head to the beat of an unfamiliar rap song as my mind took over again. Miss Janie was gone. Honey’s favorite person was gone to Glory with God. It was shocking, to say the least. I knew better than anyone what it felt like to lose a family member. I hadn’t known what it felt like to watch someone die of natural causes, though. All I knew was murder, homicide, and suicide. The number of inmates who took their own lives had been wild to witness in my six years in lockup.
We went through the hood and stopped at Timmy Chan’s. I couldn’t even wait to get back to our side of town. I bust the wing and fried rice combo down in record time. I scarfed that shit down like a wild animal. I damn near inhaled the shit like a vacuum cleaner. The ride back to my uncle and aunt’s house was long because we were in traffic. I’d dozed off after the meal.
“Wake up, loser,” Dayari said as she lightly tapped my arm.
I jumped up and looked around. “We are at the crib already?”
“Yeah. You slept for about forty minutes. Made the ride easier, I guess.”
“My fault. I appreciate you for picking me up.”
“Of course. Who else would do that for you?”
“Nobody.”
The six years I’d spent in prison were some of the loneliest years of my life. I kept my head down in a book or magazine while I stayed out of the way. I spoke to a few OGs, but it wasn’t nothing serious. My game plan was to blend into the background, keep attention away from me, and serve my time. I stayed in the ratty ass library when we got free time. Other than that, I slept in my cell and worked out when I got my time outside.
As I walked inside, I half expected a huge welcome home party, but I was never one to have a lot of friends. I spoke to Mouse, and TK was no longer in Houston. He’d moved to Cade’s Cove which was an hour or so out. Other than my aunt, uncle, and cousin, I had no one. After I got jumped out of Merlot’s Cartel, I was a lone wolf in the world.
“Welcome Home, Marquise.” Aunt Dee greeted me first.
She pulled me into a hug and rubbed my back. She was much shorter than me, so her head rested on my chest. When she pulled away, she looked at me with kind eyes.
I smiled at her. “Thanks for letting me come back here, Aunt Dee. Y’all didn’t have to do that, so I’m grateful.”
“You’re welcome. We love you. We also brought most of your clothes from your old home. From the looks of things, I don’t know if you’ll be able to fit those clothes anymore.” She squeezed my biceps.
I chuckled. “Anything is better than the raggedy clothes I wore in prison. I really appreciate you.”
“Your uncle is outside on the grill. You can go speak to him. Dinner will be in a few hours, so once you’re done, you can shower and nap or whatever it is you planned on doing today.”
I nodded and headed through the house to the backyard. Aunt Dee and Uncle Cee always had my back, no matter what. It was reassuring to have a home to come back to, even if I didn’t deserve their hospitality.
“What’s up, nephew? Glad to see you’ve bulked up since you been away.” Uncle Cee chuckled as he pulled me into a quick hug. The man had grown a beard full of gray and had gone bald since the last time I’d laid eyes on him. Even though they didn’t come to the prison, they answered my calls.
“Between the nasty ass food and dirty ass niggas, all I could do was work out and survive off ramen noodles.”
“I’m glad you get to eat real food again. Maybe now you’ll stay out of trouble.”
I chuckled. I had to prepare to be told the same shit by everyone I crossed paths with. It was annoying as hell, but they meant it from a place of love. “That life is behind me. All I can do is move forward and find a new outlet to make money.”
“There’s always a position at the warehouse,” he replied.
I nodded. “I’ll check it out, fa sho. I’m about to go take a real shower in a clean, sanitary bathroom, though. I’ll be back down for dinner.”
He nodded and focused back on the grill. When I made my way to my room, I exhaled at the familiar sight. I didn’t appreciate the room when I was a young knucklehead in the streets, but the room had brought me peace today as an almost thirty-year-old man. I’d had nothing but time to mull over my life, and now, as a free man, there were things I needed to do to get solid ground again.
What am I supposed to do first?