Chapter 1
Gio’s World
I finished my scroll and rolled back to the apartments just as my nigga stepped outta his crib.
“You never sleep!” Big Bully yelled, laughin’ cause he already knew what I was on.
I shook my head. “Sleep? Nigga, if you sleep, you don’t eat.”
He nodded, smirkin’. I climbed the steps to my door just as my baby boo was opening it. She jumped back a lil’ with a smirk on her face.
“Damn, girl, you good?” I asked as I stood back and looked at my baby girl.
Islah was five foot two, slim, thick, with eyes that lit up as soon as the sun hit them. When she smiled at me, it melted my heart as if it were the first day we met.
She laughed. “Yeah, boy… You scared me. I was just about to set things up.”
I looked down. Comb, gel, rubber bands, and shit in her hands, ready to retwist my hair. I nodded. “Iight, let’s get it.”
I reached inside, grabbed a chair, and took a seat on our porch. As I scanned the block, a black bag fell in my lap.
I looked up at Islah.
“I know the calls ain’t gonna stop while I’m tryna do this,” she said calmly. “I put everything in the bag to catch plays.”
I peeked in the bag. She was right, she was always right. She sets her nigga up proper.
I smiled and pulled her down for a kiss. Islah thought for a nigga, took care of me better than my momma ever did.
“Always lookin’ out for your man,” I said, smirkin’ against her lip.
She shrugged, like she ain’t like hearing that shit, and started to part my hair. “You act like I have a choice.”
“Oh, you have a choice,” I said softly, making her stop parting my hair and come around and look at me. Her smile lit me up inside, and I smiled back. “Your choices are to ride with a nigga or…ride for a nigga.”
Islah sucked her teeth with a lil’ laugh.
“Come on, baby, you know we’re locked in for life.”
“Locked in for life with no ring, no house, no kids?” she shot back.
I paused, leaning back in the chair, lettin’ her tug and twist my hair.
“No ring, no house, no kids…yet,” I said, teasing her. “But that don’t mean we’re not locked in for life.”
She stopped for a second, then pulled my hair tight as shit, making me flinch.
“Locked in for life with no guarantee,” she shot back, voice sharp, like she was trying to test me.
I adjusted myself in the chair, hands rubbin’ my knees. “Guarantee? Girl, I’m the fuckin’ guarantee! You think any other nigga out here gonna treat you the way that I do?”
She hummed, still tuggin’ at my hair with all her damn might. “Gio, you think too much of yourself.”
I smirked, letting it roll off me. “Maybe… shit, you know better than anybody, so you should know what the reality is—”
“And what is that, Gio?” she cut me off, asking.
“The reality is that you are mine, and we have our whole lives to make those moves. Besides, you know a nigga is grinding.”
“Your grind don’t mean shit if you don’t have a plan,” she said, her voice low but sharp, right behind me. I could feel her leaning in, her chest pressed against the back of my head.
I smirked again, letting my body relax enough to show her I wasn’t fazed. “Everything I do out here has a plan that you are a part of. Nothing moves right without you.”
Her hands paused for a second. I knew she was trying to think of somethin’ smart to say, but what I said was what was needed.
She sighed and continued palm rolling my locs.
“Well, I just want some movement soon. You are getting older, and so am I.”
I jerked away from her hands to look at her.
“Slim, you are thirty, I’m thirty-two. We have time.”
Islah nodded softly, brushing her hair outta her face, and I sat back.
For a second, it was just the feelin’ of her hands movin’ through my hair and the normal noise around the block, bitches yellin’ tryin’ to get attention and niggas tryna make moves.
“Time waits for no one,” she said under her breath.
She was startin’ to get to me. “Why the fuck are you talkin’ like we on a fuckin’ deadline?”
“Because I don’t want to wake up ten years from now still in this lil’ ass apartment, still on this porch doin’ your hair.”
That shit hit different.
I kept my face straight even though she couldn’t see it. “You won’t, Islah. I got us.”
“How you so sure, Gio? We—”
“Because I don’t lose,” I said, cutting her off. “We don’t have to race against time.”
“Gio, we have been together for seven years; it’s been enough time.”
I clapped my hands, rubbin’ my palms together.
“Iight, Islah, you want the house? Cool, we will get the house. You want the ring? I’ll put a big ass rock on ya finger.
And kids? We can have as many kids as you want, baby.
We can get busy right now if that will calm ya ass down.
I’m not rushin’ shit while I’m buildin’. ”
“What are you buildin’ for us exactly?”
“An empire—”
“I don’t want a drug empire, Gio. I want us to have something more than this. I…”
She stopped touching my hair, and I turned and looked at her. She was givin’ me that pouting face, the one that always got to me. I grabbed her hand and walked her around the chair, sittin’ her on my lap.
“What is it, boo? Talk to me,” I said, brushing her hair outta her face.
Islah let out a deep breath. “I don’t question where I stand in your life. I just question where we are goin’. I just thought we would have one of those things knocked off by now.”
I nodded. I understood where she was comin’ from, but again, a nigga was grindin.
“Islah, my baby, my love, my boo thang…at the end of the day, you are not leaving me, and even if you tried, I won’t let you. You will get every single damn thing you want; you just need to stay down for your nigga.”
Islah stared at me for a second after that. Not scared. Not impressed. Just lookin’ at me like she was weighin’ what I said.
“I’ve been down; that is not the issue.”
Her tone wasn’t loud, it wasn’t dramatic. It was like she was trying to say somethin’ but didn’t know how to say it.
“I know,” I muttered.
She sucked her teeth as she rolled her eyes. “I don’t want to drag you down, baby. I don’t want to fight you. I just…I just want more for us.”
I nodded. “And we will more.”
“When?” she responded. I felt the pressure.
I studied her face for a second, thinkin’ about what she asked. It wasn’t a question of if I loved her; she knew I did more than anything in this world. She just wanted proof in a different form.
“Give me a few weeks, baby. I got a new connect, and once I get that new shit on the block, we are gona take off and be straight for life.”
She tried to hide her smirk, but couldn’t. I pulled her in for a kiss, and she stood up.
“We went deep with it, lemme finish your hair.”
We laughed, and she got back to retwisting, just in time for my phone to start buzzin’ and the birds started flockin’ to me. By the time she was done with my two-strand twists, I made a few hunnit dollars.
As I stood up and stretched, I watched her pick up the hair shit, lookin’ her over.
“So you want to get paid with money or dick?”
She stopped what she was doin’, turned, and looked at me.
“How about you get dressed and hit the block so we can work on that empire you’re building for us.”
I smirked, tappin’ her butt.
“Why don’t you get dressed and hit the block with me?”
She thought about it, as if it really was a question.
“Give me a few minutes.”
I nodded and watched her walk through the crib back to our room. Having a minute to myself, I checked my phone and responded to some people who was lookin’ for me.
After a while, Islah came out dressed in a tight lil’ dress and some sandals, lookin’ good as ever. Her hair was down, and her curls were the first thing that caught my eye about her seven years ago.
She smiled as she got close to me, and I reached out, pullin’ her into my arms, taking a handful of her ass and kissing her neck with a lil’ bite.
“Oooou,” she said, trying to hide her neck from me. “What is all that for?”
I pulled away. “Because you’re mine and I can, come on.”
I grabbed the duffel bag with my free hand and held onto her with the other. We didn’t have to go far, just took a lil’ walk around the corner and were met by a gang of niggas and bitches who were with the shit.
Islah quickly got pulled away from me by the girls who was waiting for her, while I continued walking a lil’ way up to my right-hand Big Bully and a few other niggas who was holdin’ up the corner.
I dapped everybody up and looked at the dice game I was tryna get in.
“How money makin’ been out here?” I asked Big Bully.
He smirked. “Nigga, I know ya phone was goin’ off. Everybody was waitin’ for you; I told them to hit ya line.”
I nodded. “And they did, man. I can only imagine how these fiends gonna be when I get this new work in a few days.”
Before I could finish what I wanted to say, I served some niggas in passing and talked shit to the officers that drove by trying to catch something. They drove off, and Big Bully leaned in.
“This drop you talkin’ ‘bout, was this the one you been waitin’ for?”
I nodded. “Hell yeah, I saved up the money to get my crack from one of the OGs of South LA. Once I get this shit, it’s over for any nigga that’s gonna try to sell out here. I already got shit on lock, I’ma be a whole bully after this drop.”
Islah walked up on me as Big Bully was takin’ in what I said. I wrapped my arms around her and was ready to serve the next nigga who walked up on us, but she took care of that.
“I’m proud of you, nigga,” Bully said. “It’s ‘bout time ya dedication to the streets pays off.”
I nodded, glad that niggas saw my grind.
“Hell yeah, nigga, me too, and it will,” I said, eyes drifting toward Islah. “More ways than one.”