Chapter 7 Prime #2
It was a Tuesday in March. Cold as hell, but not cold enough to keep us inside during recess.
I’d been taking beatings from Tre Johnson and his crew for months.
Every day, something new. Tripping me in the hallway.
Knocking my lunch tray out my hands. Shoving me into lockers.
Calling me “Retard” and “Prime Rib” and “Pussy Banks.”
The Monday before had been particularly bad. They cornered me after school, just off school property where the cameras couldn’t see. Three on one. Tre, Derrick, and Keyshawn.
“Y-yo, leave me alone,” I managed, my voice catching on every word like it always did.
“Aw, he scared,” Tre had laughed. “Look at him shaking. Fat-ass pussy.”
Then they jumped me. Fists and feet coming from everywhere. I curled up on the ground, trying to protect my face, my ribs, but they’d gotten me good. Black eye. Busted lip. Bruised ribs. Scraped knees.
I limped home, hoping maybe Vivica would be at some political function. No such luck.
She taken one look at me standing in the doorway, face swollen, shirt torn, blood on my collar and her expression had gone from surprise to disgust so fast it made my stomach drop.
“Again?” Her voice was ice. “Again, Prentice?”
“Th-they jumped m-me—”
Her hand came out of nowhere. Open palm, right across my already-swollen cheek. The impact made my vision white out for a second, pain exploding through my skull.
I stumbled back, hand flying to my face, tears springing to my eyes before I could stop them.
“Stop crying!” She’d grabbed my face, her manicured nails digging into my skin. “You let them do this to you? You let those boys beat you like you’re nothing?”
“I c-couldn’t—”
Another slap. Same side. The pain was blinding.
“You’re pathetic. Nothing like your father. All that Banks blood in you and you can’t even defend yourself.” She shoved me away from her, disgust dripping from every word. “If you let someone beat your ass, I’ll beat your ass twice as hard. Maybe then you’ll learn.”
She’d walked away, leaving me there in the foyer, face throbbing, ribs aching, heart breaking.
Quest found me there twenty minutes later. He helped me upstairs, gotten me ice, told me Vivica was just stressed from the campaign. That she didn’t mean it.
But I knew better. She meant every word.
That night, I didn’t sleep. Just lay in my bed, staring at the ceiling, something cold and hard forming in my chest. Something that felt like rage but sharper. More focused.
I thought about my father. About how Vivica said he was violent. Ruthless. A nigga who didn’t take shit from anybody.
Maybe I was more like him than she thought.
The next morning, I walked into school with a plan. My face still hurt from both beatings. My bruised ribs made it hard to breathe deep. But none of that mattered anymore.
I stopped by the gym on my way to homeroom. Taken a padlock from one of the lockers that was already broken. Big, heavy, solid brass. I slipped it in a sock. The weight of it in my hand felt right. Felt like power.
I found Tre before class started. He was by the basketball courts with Dre and Keyshawn, talking shit and laughing. Probably about me. Probably about how they’d made the fat kid cry.
My hands were shaking, but I kept them steady. Practiced the grip the way I’d imagined it all night.
“Y-yo, Tre.”
He turned around, that same smug-ass grin on his face. “Oh shit, look who came back for more. Fat retard want another beatdown?”
Dre shoved me. “N-n-nah, he came to c-c-cry some more.”
I didn’t respond. Didn’t try to explain. Didn’t stutter through some weak-ass excuse.
I just pulled my hand out of my pocket and swung with everything I had.
The padlock connected with Tre’s temple and the sound—God, the sound—was like a homerun. Crack. Wet. Final.
His head snapped sideways so violently I heard his neck pop. Blood exploded from the impact point, spraying across my face, my shirt, the concrete.
Tre dropped like someone cut his strings. Just collapsed, his legs giving out, his body hitting the ground hard.
But I didn’t stop.
Couldn’t stop.
I was on him before Dre or Keyshawn could even process what just happened. The padlock fell somewhere and didn’t need it anymore. My fists were enough.
I hit him again. And again. And again.
His face changed with each punch. Nose caving in with a crunch. Orbital bone shattering. Teeth breaking. Blood pouring from his mouth, his nose, bubbling up with each ragged breath.
“Pren! PRENTICE! Stop! You’re killing him!”
Dre and Keyshawn were screaming, trying to pull me off, but I shrugged them off like they weighed nothing. The rage made me strong. Made me fast. Made me someone else entirely.
Every punch was for every day they’d made me feel small.
Every punch was for every time Vivica looked at me with disgust.
Every punch was for being born looking like a dead man she hated.
“SOMEBODY HELP! HE’S GONNA KILL HIM!”
Teachers came running. Security guards. They dragged me off, but by then it was done.
Tre wasn’t moving. His chest barely rising. Blood was everywhere, pooling under his head, splattered on the concrete, soaked into my clothes.
His face didn’t look like a face anymore. Just meat and broken bone.
“Call 911! NOW!”
I stood there, breathing hard, covered in his blood. My knuckles split open, bone showing through. My shirt ruined. My heart pounding, but my mind was clear as Caribbean waters.
I didn’t feel weak anymore.
I didn’t feel scared.
I felt powerful.
Tre died three hours later. Never woke up. The doctors said even if he had, there wouldn’t have been much left of him. Traumatic brain injury. Multiple skull fractures. Massive hemorrhaging.
I’d beaten him to death with my bare hands.
And when they told me, all I felt was satisfaction.
The memory sat in my chest like an old friend. I’d replayed it a thousand times, sometimes with regret, sometimes with pride, mostly with cold acceptance.
Tre had pushed me. Vivica had pushed me harder. And I’d finally pushed back.
The trial had been a circus. My mother stood in that courtroom dressed in all black, looking like the grieving widow she’d been playing for years, and told the judge I needed to learn consequences.
“Your Honor,” she’d said, her voice steady and strong, “I’ve taught my children the difference between right and wrong.
I’ve instilled values in them. And Prentice chose violence.
Chose brutality. Being my son doesn’t mean he deserves special treatment.
Justice must be blind, even when it breaks a mother’s heart. ”
The courtroom had eaten it up. The media ran with it for weeks. “Mayor Sacrifices Son for Justice.” “Vivica Banks: When Duty Comes Before Family.”
It was all performance. All bullshit.
She wasn’t sacrificing anything. She was getting rid of an embarrassment. The fat kid who’d killed someone. The reminder of her dead husband. The stain on her perfect political image.
I got tried and sentenced as an adult at thirteen. Fifteen years for manslaughter, but I was released early on parole, which Rashid helped me with. Vivica’s approval ratings jumped thirty-two points overnight.
She never visited me. Grandma Rita came every week, but Vivica? She was too busy with her re-election campaign.
But Rashid saved me. Met him my second week inside, and he saw something in me that no one else did. Not a broken kid. Not a monster. Just someone who needed direction. Purpose.
He taught me discipline. Control. How to turn rage into precision. How to make violence an art form instead of a reaction.
By the time I got out at twenty, I wasn’t that fat kid anymore. I was something else entirely.
Something Vivica had created and then tried to destroy.
On the TV, she was still talking, shaking hands, playing her role. America’s mayor. The devoted public servant. The woman who’d made the hard choices.
“She’s something else, isn’t she?”
Rashid’s voice pulled me back. I looked up to find him standing beside my table, dressed immaculate as always—three-piece suit, bow tie perfect, beard trimmed sharp.
He glanced at the TV, then back at me with knowing eyes. “Your mother.”
“My egg donor.” I corrected. “I don’t claim her.”
“Hmm.” Rashid settled into his chair, his Hennessy appearing without him asking. “Bitterness doesn’t suit you, young blood.”
“Neither does fake concern for at-risk youth.” I nodded at the screen. “She’s up there talking about saving kids when she’s the one who made sure I got tried as an adult. Used my case to win an election.”
“And look what you became anyway.” Rashid’s voice was gentle. “Strong. Wealthy. Disciplined. Everything she tried to break, you made better.”
I took another drink.
“Tell me about Saturday,” he said smoothly. “Everything arranged?”
“Yeah. She’ll bring him.”
“Good.” That warm smile. “I knew I could count on you. Meech will be grateful. Family is everything, Prime.”
I nodded, but that uncomfortable feeling in my gut twisted tighter.
Family.
Right.
Saturday was right around the corner.
And for the first time, I wasn’t sure I was doing the right thing.