2. Juelz #2
His crew stepped up, pulling out their guns because I disrespected their boss. My friends were scared as shit. But for some reason, I stood there with my head held high and a mug on my face, with no fear of death in sight. Mone put his hand up for his men to put their guns away.
He walked up on me. “Oh, so you got some heart, huh?” He chuckled, mugging me.
“I mean, I’m not afraid of you. They might be scared of you, but I’m not. I was just watching you to see when it would be a good time to talk to you, without being rude.” I shrugged.
“Talk to me about what?” He asked.
“I want you to put me on, so I can make some bread.”
He looked at me and burst out laughing. “How old are you? Talking ‘bout you wanna be put on.”
“I’m thirteen. Age ain’t nothing but a number when it comes to these streets.
I know I can do this shit. I don’t care if I have to start from the bottom.
I know I’m young, but I got this shit. Plus, the cops won’t be looking at me; they would think I’m too young to be doing this type of shit,” I explained.
He watched me for a second, and then a smile spread across his face.
“Alright, I feel you. Look let me think on that shit and meet me back here tomorrow night at eight. If I show up, you in. But if I don’t, then you know what it is,” he said, and then turned to give his attention to his people.
I didn’t need him to say shit else to me because I was happy as hell.
I walked over to my friends, and we headed back to my block.
The next night, I was there at seven waiting to see if he showed up. Eight p.m. rolled around and there was no Mone. So, I waited until a little after nine before I decided to leave, and just as I was about to turn the corner a black Bentley pulled up and the tinted window came down.
“Yo, jump in,” Mone said.
After that night, he put me through some shit because he said I had to prove myself and my loyalty. I was fine with that and did everything he asked me to do. If you asked me, I did it better than the niggas that had been with him for years. Mone took a liking to me, and it was up from there.
A year later, he found out that one of his workers was trying to make side deals and stealing his money. Shit that most street niggas do, and it’s crazy as hell to me because most of them always get big-headed and show their disloyal ass hand, and that’s how they get caught.
I remembered that night so clearly, because it was the first time that I had ever seen Mone so damn pissed.
I was at home, and he sent me a text to meet him at this bar that his crew hung out at when we wanted to have a good time.
I walked into the bar to check things out, knowing that Mone was outside waiting for him.
He had already told me to just watch him from a distance and when he leaves the bar, to let him know and I did just that.
The nigga Tron was in the bar acting like he ruled the fuckin’ world not knowing that night would be his last night breathing.
The moment he stepped out of the bar and got halfway down the block, Mone rolled up on him said a few words to him, and it was lights out.
He emptied his clip in Tron and sped off.
I went the other direction and headed home.
I worked my ass off, becoming one of his top soldiers, pushing weed and cocaine through Harlem, and he finally pushed me out to other boroughs.
I was happy as hell, because I was really out there eating this shit up.
I was smart with my money, saving every dime I made, and I was making so much money I knew I needed a new place to hide it.
I would always sneak money into my mom’s purse, and when her bills came in the mail, I would pay them.
I didn’t want her to have to worry about anything but taking care of herself.
When mom went to pay her bills, she would always find out that they were already paid.
She would be confused as hell, but damn sure wouldn’t argue with them people.
If they said they were paid, then that's what it was; she wasn’t going to block her blessings.
The same thing with the rent every time she tried to pay it, our landlord would tell her that she was paid up for the next three months.
She would even try arguing with him about it until her best friend told her to hush up and let the shit fly.
She said that she didn’t want him coming back later saying that she owed him anything.
This went on for a couple of years, until one day I came home from school and she was sitting at the table when I walked in.
She looked up at me with tears in her eyes, causing me to run over to her.
“Mom, what’s wrong?”
“Juelz, I’m going to ask you this one time! Where did all that money come from that’s in your closet?” she yelled.
I put my head down and rubbed my face. I knew then that I was caught.
I would never lie to her, so I pulled up a chair and told her everything and the reason why I was doing it.
She was so hurt, and I hated to see her look at me with such disappointment in her eyes.
She looked at me for a long, uncomfortable minute, before responding.
“Son, I wanted the best for you and your brother, but if this is what you choose to do, you can’t live under my roof.
I will not watch you throw your life away and become a statistic.
Only two things will happen- death or jail, and I won’t stand by and watch it happen to you.
If you choose to keep doing what you doing, I want you out of my shit!
So, you have some decisions to make,” she stated.
“Ma, I love you. I’m doing this because I want better for us.
I’m tired of seeing you damn near kill yourself to take care of us.
I appreciate you and respect what you’re doing as our mother, but I’m the man of the house, and I wanted to help you.
I knew you wouldn’t approve of me being out here in the streets, so yeah, I hid it.
I’m out there, but I’m careful, Ma. I can’t stop doing it, though.
I refuse to go back. So, if I gotta get out, I guess that’s what I gotta do.
” I shrugged, because I didn’t know what else to say to her but the truth.
She just sat there with tears in her eyes and didn’t say anything in response.
So, I took that as my sign that she wanted me out.
I stood up and went into my room to pack my bags and grab my money. Once I was done, I walked back out to the front and my mom was still sitting at the table.
“I love you, Ma. I promise I'll be careful out there and know that one day I'ma be rich enough to walk away and make you proud of me. All I ever wanted to do was to help our family. Y’all mean the world to me,” I told her and walked out the door.
I didn’t know where I was going, but I guess I was going to figure the shit out.
I was on my own now. I didn’t blame my mom for her beliefs and how she ran her household.
I respected her decision. I could understand why she felt the way she did, I was her child.
From that day forward, I did what I had to do.
I was determined to make it, and I did just that.
I became Mone’s right hand and top Lieutenant that caused so much controversy in his camp because his right-hand, Dave, got pushed out and Mone sent him down South. He was pissed off about the shit, but he did what he was told anyway. It was either that, or he was out.
I hustled in these streets and became the nigga everybody wanted to be.
A year later, Mone was gunned down in his home one night.
We searched high and low to find the niggas that ran down on him, and I knew it had to be somebody close to us because Mone’s shit was tight.
You wasn’t just getting in his shit if he didn’t know you or if you didn’t know how he operated.
It took us some months, but we found out who was behind it, and let’s just say Dave’s body has yet to be found.
Loyalty was something money couldn’t buy and I lived by that code ‘til this day.
Every dude that had a hand in his death got the same fate as the nigga that put in the order.
As soon as word got out that Mone was dead, there were so many niggas trying to take his spot.
To their surprise, he had always been ten steps ahead of the game and left strict instructions that it all belonged to me.
He stressed that shit every day, but I thought he was playing around with me.
He’d say, “Ju, when I’m dead and gone, this shit will all be yours. You came in at a young age and you doing this shit right, proving yourself every fucking day!” He would pat me on my back and smile.
Truth be told, we were really close, and I looked at him like a father figure.
I even introduced him to my brother, and he would always throw him some money just so he didn’t have to be out here doing the same shit we were.
When he got killed, it hurt Zelan and me to our core.
I respected Mone more than he would ever know.
It was because of him that I was able to make the moves that I was still making to this very day.
I had been running this empire since I was seventeen years old and caught so many snakes trying to take me down.
Many felt I was too young, but I proved all those muthafuckas wrong.
If you didn’t get down with what the fuck I said, you had only one option; and that was the fuckin’ dirt.
I was at the top of my game, making my shit a billion-dollar empire.
I did shit ten times better than Mone ever did it.
I was stepping on toes and because I was a young dude and moving the way we were, niggas tried to move in on my territory.
I wasn’t having that; I built a crew with some of the deadliest soldiers in the streets. No one was touching us.