Luney Tune #2
“It ain’t that bad,” Fredo said as we made our way to the meetup. The only light outside were spotty streetlights, but I still saw Fredo’s grin when I glanced at him.
He got away easy, with a couple scratches on his face. That bitch Remy was giving out body shots, so Fredo’s stomach was a mottled up, but he more than held his own.
I was proud.
“I told you not to look back at me. The one time you don’t listen to me and now you fucked up.”
“Well, now you know I’ma always listen,” I snap, shoving my hands into the pockets of my jacket.
“There will be other times you don’t, and I’m sure you’ll be fucked up then like you are now.”
I chuckled, shoving my brother away from me, but then I immediately sobered up.
In the belly of the beast, there's no room for jokes and smiles.
Yesterday we were boys. And though I’d been doing plenty of shit that grown men do, I was now a man foreal.
A Birch Baby.
The second part of getting put on is to kill someone.
I’d seen dead bodies before. Pooh had always been adamant about showing us our legacy. Sometimes that meant seeing new bitches broken in. Other times, it meant seeing him slice a john’s face off when he got fresh with one of his honeybees.
We hadn’t gotten around to me or Fredo doing the killing.
If I was being honest, I was scared. Fighting is one thing. Or defending yourself. When it came to my family, I would have liked to think I could kill a nigga.
But for the gang? For no reason, if only to cement my place in another type of family? Could I take a life?
I could, and I would.
I was scared of enjoying it too much.
My hands itched as Fredo banged on the door. A second later, the door opened, and there that nigga was again.
He nodded to us, opening the door so we could come in. Tiny was gathering her coat and smiled at us, eyes lingering on me longer than Fredo before nodding to Set and leaving.
“My bad about your eye, Rico,” he said after closing and locking the door behind Tiny.
I grunted as I took in the small apartment. There was a couch and two fold-up chairs, and a table in the living area. The kitchen looked bare, too, and the carpet had been pulled off the floor.
It also smelled weird in there, not like the regular smell of piss in the hallway, or stale cigarettes and weed.
Fredo and I sat on the couch while Set hopped up on the counter by the kitchen. He couldn’t keep his smile off his face, and I wanted to knock it off him. It was six in the morning, on a weekday. What the fuck had him that happy?
“I chopped it up with Reem last night. He told me y’all are pretty solid.”
“That’s our young nigga. He’s locked in with our cousin Ty-Ty,” Fredo replied. He knew I was seconds from tackling this nigga, and I was glad he answered, even though he gave away way more information than he should have.
Set’s eyes brightened, and for a second, he looked like a normal kid. “Ty is y’all cousin. You taught him how to squabble huh? I thought you was finna knock me on my ass.”
“That why you snuck me?” I blurted.
Bitch ass nigga had the nerve to throw me a rueful grin. “I can’t cut you no slack, even if we go way back. But you stayed standing, and Fredo even dropped Remy, and no one has ever done that. Y’all the talk of the Birch, foreal. Which is why I’m coming to y’all with a proposition.”
Fredo and I glanced at each other, before giving Set the floor again.
“Be a part of my crew?”
“Crew?” I parrotted, balling up my face.
Like I said, Tiny took Set in, and Tiny damn near employed every Birch Baby in her drug operation. Set may had only been eleven, but age was just a number with that nigga. He was Tiny’s right hand and head enforcer.
I didn’t know he was actually hugging the block anymore.
“Tiny’s expanding faster than she thought… she sees how hard I work, and think other niggas, niggas our age, got the same work ethic. But anyone we know, anyone we got classes with foreal, I want under me, starting with y’all.”
“Under you?” I balked, looking him up and down.
Set hopped to his feet. “Look, I get you still salty about yesterday, and I know you was cool with Peanut, so I’m stalling you out way more than I ever would. But let me be clear, Rico. It don’t matter who the fuck yo daddy is, niggas in the Birch don’t know you, and don’t trust you.
And you know that, or yesterday wouldn’t have went down like that. Shit ain’t like it was before; shit, shit ain’t like it was a year ago. Lem think he running shit, but Tiny the one who got the Birch on lock, and what she say, goes.”
His eyes hardened as he continued. “When someone cross her, she send ‘em to me, because she knows I don’t give a fuck. Haven’t since… for a long time now. Niggas fuck up, miss the count, try to skim off the top, and I’m the last face they see. If yo number ever comes up with her, I’d dead you,
no issue… but I don’t want it to come to that, if I could help it. And having you in my crew… anyone of my Uncle’s homies’ kids in my crew, keeps me from having to dead y’all if you fuck up. When it’s just us, I’m cool on all that top dawg bullshit the other Babies be on. It’s always gon’ be love,
‘cause of my uncle and Pooh. But when we out there on the courts, it’s on me, and know that I’d never ho you or be weird just ‘cause you Pooh’s sons, like the other niggas will, guaranteed.”
Set folded his arms and leaned against the counter as his words settled.
It was bad enough we even felt like we had to get put on the BBs. We’d only been out the way for a couple years, but that’s all it took. When we went to the courts the first day we were back, niggas acted like we were strangers.
Outsiders.
Pooh confirmed it, too. He and Nan argued about it as Ma packed her things. She’d always said she didn’t want us nor Ty-Ty being in the gang, and he’d said if she moved back permanently, she was signing us over to them.
It didn’t stop her, though.
Just like I knew if we didn’t take Set up on his proposition, it wouldn’t matter that we just got our asses beat by four niggas. They’d ho us out off the strength of being Pooh’s sons, and he lived outside the rules and ways of the BBs.
I sighed, glancing to Fredo before he grinned at Set.
“We down,” he shrugged. “I wanna be Tune though, and Rico’s Luney should be spelled like Tune, since we twins.”
“Fasho,” Set grinned back. “If I get y’all mixed up after his eye heals, my bad in advance. But now that y’all agreed, we just gotta shake on it.” He reached into the pocket of his hoodie, and pulled out a gun. “Y’all ever shot one of these before?”
We both stood, our eyes glued to it.
“Hell, naw,” I replied, as he set it in my hands. It was heavy as fuck, with the serial number shaved off.
“It’s loaded, and got one in the chamber. I got more back at the trap we gonna be at, off Jute. We only here right now because we need to go next door.”
“Next door?” Fredo asked before grabbing the gun from me.
“Yeah.” Set’s grin dropped from his face, before he locked eyes with me. “Like I said, when it’s just us, I’on give a fuck. But when we out in the wild, I tell you to do some shit. You do it. No questions. No hesitation. Aight?”
I clenched my jaw, but nodded. It would be an adjustment, but this was different, and I had to obey the pecking order.
This was a test.
And hopefully, for me and my brother’s sake, I passed.
We left the apartment and walked a few steps to the next door.
“Y’all ever heard a gunshot?” Set whispered. We both shook our heads.
“Aight. Cover your ears.”
I had on a hoodie, so Fredo handed me the gun to put in my pocket before we both did what he said.
He aimed his bigger gun at the lock before shooting twice. Even with our hands covering our ears, the shit was loud as fuck, but I fought it off as Set pushed the door open and we rushed into the apartment.
He seemed to know where he was going–straight into the bedroom, where there was a man and a woman in bed, bewildered.
Set pointed his gun at the man, so I took out my gun and pointed it at the woman.
“Living in the projects and calling the police on some shit that ain’t yo business is a lil’ off, don’t you think?” he asked, tilting his head.
“P-p-p-please–”
“Shoot her.”
My head twisted to my left, eyes stretching as far as they could go. Set was the picture of calm. His eleven year-old hand almost too small for the cannon he carried.
His body too young for all the shit he’d done.
I turned my head back to the front, aimed at the woman in the bed, and squeezed the trigger.
I wasn’t ready for the recoil. My hand shot back, so the shot landed in her shoulder, instead of her chest, where I wanted it. Her body shook, and she screamed before her other hand reached up to touch the wound before she thought better of it.
“You got ‘til the end of the weekend to get the fuck up out the Birch, nigga. Lucky you caught me on a good day.”
We kept our guns aimed as we slowly backed away. When I glanced at Set, he nodded, and my lips spread before facing the couple again.
This time, I was ready for the recoil. I braced myself, aimed where I wanted, and fired.
This bullet struck the woman in the middle of her forehead.
The nigga next to her gasped. Fredo snorted.
He took the gun from me and put three into the nigga’s chest, not taking his eyes off him until he slumped over.
“Well, damn. I mean, y’all both needed y’all stripes anyway. Luney Tunes.”
We both looked at Set, who showed all thirty-two of his teeth.
I cut my eyes to Fredo, before throwing up the Birch. We all cackled as we bounced out the apartment.
My hands itched even more, and though my fear came true, it wasn’t dread I felt at the realization, even if my first kill was a woman.
I enjoyed shooting a gun. I enjoyed taking someone’s life. And I couldn’t wait to do it again.