Chapter 1
I’m not sure how taking a quick drive to clear my head ended with me parked across the street from my mother, Erika’s house, but somehow that is where my mind led me.
Sitting in the driver’s seat with the windows cracked, I watched her younger son dribble a basketball up and down the sidewalk like the little nigga was training for the league already.
The way he stayed focused on the rhythm of the ball and the control in his arms let me know he actually took that shit seriously.
Every time the ball hit his foot or rolled too far away from him, he’d get mad as fuck before starting over again.
Watching him was strange for me.
The idea of having more siblings had honestly never crossed my mind before all of this.
You would think I’d be scared of that shit or angry about it, but I wasn’t.
Siblings like him were all I ever wanted.
Neither one of my brothers had ever looked so innocent, and any time one had a basketball, they were throwing it at somebody’s head.
While staring at him, I noticed a group of little niggas coming down the street.
They were the complete opposite of what he seemed to be.
Smoke floated around them from a blunt one of them had hanging from his lips, their pants sagged damn near to their knees, and their white tees looked dingy like they’d been slept in for days.
Instead of passing him by, they stopped right in front of him and started saying something to him while laughing at each other and bumping shoulders.
I couldn’t hear their words from inside the car, but I saw one of them snatch the basketball straight from little dude’s hands out of nowhere, and that made me roll my window down.
“Aye, give my shit back,” he said, reaching for it.
One of the taller boys laughed and bounced the ball hard against the sidewalk before tossing it over the little dude’s head to one of his homeboys.
“Nigga, this is our ball.”
“The fuck it is,” Erika’s son shot back, trying to grab it again.
Another one shoved him lightly in the chest, making him stumble back a step while they laughed, and circled him like little vultures.
I watched it for a second, seeing how he was going to handle himself, but there was only so much a little dude could do with three niggas around him, all bigger than him.
I already knew I didn’t need my heat, but I grabbed it anyway because guns don’t have an age limit these days. I tucked it into my back pocket, pushed the car door open, and stepped out. The slam of the door echoed down the block.
The little niggas looked over one by one as I crossed the street toward them. Their laughing slowly died down the closer I got.
“Yo, what the fuck y’all doing over here?”
“Just getting our ball. The fuck does it have to do with you?” one of them mumbled.
“It’s not your ball, man. It’s my ball,” the little dude complained, trying to move around them again.
“It’s not, and you can’t prove it.”
I looked down at the nigga holding the basketball.
“How about I prove these bullets hot?”
They all got quiet.
“He doesn’t have to prove shit to you because he had this ball when I pulled up about an hour ago. Ain’t no way in hell that’s y’all’s ball, so leave him the fuck alone, aight?”
“Damn,” one of them said, sucking his teeth. “Who the fuck are you? Super Save a Hoe?”
“Nah,” I replied, gripping the handle of my pistol through my shirt, “I’m Mr. Make A Ghost. Now get the fuck out of my face, and if I ever hear about y’all fucking with him again, I will prove that shit to each and every one of you?”
Their eyes instantly dropped to my waistband.
One of them grabbed the blunt from his mouth. “Man, come on, let’s go.”
The three of them took off down the street, talking under their breath, looking back over their shoulders every few seconds to make sure I wasn’t about to put something hot in their asses.
“Thanks, man.”
The little dude rubbed the back of his head awkwardly while I looked down at him.
He had curly hair, but it was cut low, and its brown color looked exactly like mine used to when I was younger.
For a second, I caught myself staring too hard at him.
I couldn’t tell if he got that shit from our mother or if it was a trait Mecca had passed down.
“You're the same dude that came over here a minute ago, ain’t you?” he asked, finally putting two and two together.
“Yeah, I am. You alright though?”
“Yeah, I’m good. But who are you?”
“I’m just someone who knows your mother, Erika.”
“You know my mama? How?”
“From back in the day when I was younger.” I kept the shit vague. “But what’s your name?”
“Rami.”
“Rami, huh?”
The name made my chest tighten a little because it was way too familiar to my family and me.
“I had a cousin named Rami. He was my father’s age and his favorite cousin. He got murdered about fifteen years ago, though.”
“Oh, dang, that sucks.”
“Yeah, we all have to leave here someday, right? Where's your mom at?”
“At work.”
“Oh. You out here by yourself?”
“Yeah, but I ain’t supposed to be. My mama left me with my older brother Khalil, but he left to go make some money or whatever.” He bounced the basketball against the sidewalk once before catching it back against his stomach.
I frowned at his response because this wasn’t the kind of neighborhood where you leave kids wandering around alone.
Too many niggas standing on corners with nothing to lose, too many addicts floating around, and too many crash outs looking for somebody weaker than them to prey on.
The perfect example was those little niggas who just tried to take his ball.
“Do I know your dad?”
“I don’t know. I think he lives in Cuba or some shit.” He scratched the side of his face before continuing. “My mama said she lived there for years before she moved to America, cleaning houses.”
“The American dream,” I muttered under my breath.
I hated that the woman who is my mother spent her life cleaning up after mutha fuckas, even if it was my family.
That shit didn’t sit right with me, and honestly, never would.
I had to get her out of that situation. Only, approaching her was scary as fuck to me for some reason.
“So, your brother left you out here by yourself?”
“I mean, kind of.” He shrugged.
“He told me to stay in front of the stoop and play basketball until he came back. He said it wouldn’t take that long, but that was hours ago.”
“How old are you?”
“Eleven, just turned eleven two weeks ago, and you don’t know where your brother at?”
“Nah, he may be at some projects he always goes to.”
“Projects?” I rubbed my beard slowly.
“Yeah.”
“I’m sure there ain’t nothing good he could be doing over there.”
“Not at all. Mama always telling him not to go over there, but he doesn’t listen. Khalil likes money and wants a lot of it. He always says he wants to own a house like the one’s mama is cleaning one day.”
“Well, I hope you know money can be made in other ways that ain’t always illegal. It’s a big world out there, and plenty of opportunities to make it out of the hood.”
“Oh yeah?” He looked over toward my car parked against the curb. “What do you do? I see your car. A 1972 Mustang, right? That shit is nice.”
I glanced toward the car myself to buy time before answering.
“To be honest with you, I got that with inherited money.”
I looked back at him.
“But what do you know about cars, little man?”
His whole face lit up at the question.
“Oh, I know a lot. I collect toy cars and get some every year for my birthday and Christmas. Mama saves up for them because some of them are expensive.” He spun the basketball on his finger for half a second before fumbling it and laughing at himself.
“This year, I was supposed to get the Hot Wheels Porsche 911 Philippines car, but she said she couldn’t afford it.
Instead, she got me a few other ones. They were cheaper, but it was still cool, though.
” He shrugged. “One day I’m going to get it. ”
There wasn’t even disappointment in his voice when he said it either. Just acceptance. Like he already understood life wasn’t fair at eleven years old.
He shot the basketball into the air like he was going for a three in the 4thquarter of a game. The ball bounced off the bottom step, and I watched him run after it.
It was hard not to think about how easy it was for little niggas like him to get swallowed by the city. One wrong influence. One bad summer. One older nigga flashing money and guns around him, and suddenly basketballs turn into pistols, while dreams turn into long prison sentences.
Little dude still seemed untouched by most of that shit, though. Still talking about toy cars and birthdays while standing in a neighborhood full of addicts, hustlers, and crash outs.
My phone vibrated in my pocket, pulling me from my thoughts.
When I looked down at the screen, I saw Jasmine’s name.
Can you come?
I exhaled because I’d completely forgotten she texted me today because of Delilah making a big deal out of it. With her situation, I know standing her up wasn’t cool, and I wasn’t trying to play with her mental state.
“Well, little man, I’m about to continue down the block.” I nodded toward the house behind him.
“You might want to go inside and wait on your brother or your mama in case them knucklehead ass niggas spin the block again.”
“Yeah, I’ll go in.” He grabbed the basketball under his arm. “But thanks, man. I appreciate your help with them.”
“It was no problem, safety nigga.”
He smirked immediately.
“Safety,” he repeated like he was testing the word out.
“I like that. Safety.”
I laughed, and he jogged up the steps, before going into his house.