On the Other Side
Rico
“Look, I won’t pretend to get what the fuck y’all been through the last couple a days. All I can say is, each and every one of them niggas is either dead or finna be. So I’m asking–nicely–for y’all to shut the fuck up when the cops ask you what happened and how you got here.”
There was a reason Fredo spoke for both of us. My first instinct was to lie. My second instinct was to threaten.
I didn’t know how to be soft. And after a weekend of bullshit, murder, and mayhem, I didn’t have the bandwidth to try.
It was six of us piled into an old utility van. Six of us, barely breathing, the same dead look in our eyes.
But I was talking to the two girls huddled into the back corner.
One of them I knew from around the way; the other was a girl I’d never met before that day.
We were around the corner from Saint John’s, the county hospital in South Kenton.
It wasn’t the best, but they would still do their due diligence, and I needed to know if I was adding two more to my body count, or if they would do what I needed them to do.
The girl I knew nodded and held the other girl to her. Autumn had said there were five girls, including herself, when she first woke up in the boiler room.
We were only able to save three.
“What about her?” the girl I knew asked, gesturing to Autumn.
I glanced to my right. Fredo sat with his legs spread. Turk lay completely still, his head in Fredo’s lap.
Autumn straddled Turk, both hands steadying his left arm. We figured his arm was broken in a few places. He passed out a few times from the pain.
“She’s safe with us. On my mama.” I turned back to her, and she glared at me for a long moment before she nodded and began to shuffle out of the van with the other girl.
“Thank you,” the other girl whispered, but I couldn’t accept that. Guilt had been nagging at me for hours. How the fuck could I not see this shit coming? How blinded was I? Putting in work, all hung up on Snow, that I ain’t see the writing on the wall.
I slid the door closed, wincing when pain tore into my chest.
I looked down, and fresh blood poured out of the bullet wound. A twenty-two, a baby foreal. Autumn dug the bullet out and we packed it as best we can. I sent another prayer up to Ma as I climbed into the driver’s seat and pulled back onto the street, toward the freeway.
The girls could show up to a hospital and get care.
We couldn’t.
Not in Kenton.
“Can you make it?” croaked Fredo. I knew he was worried, because if he wasn’t, he would have kept his words to himself.
After what I had to do.
“Yeah, Fred. I’m straight.”
I wasn’t straight.
I was so lightheaded I had to keep pinching myself.
It was still dark outside. The dash read four-thirty. The only lights on the freeway were the few cars coming and going.
I just had to get us to San Joaquin. They were building up the town, but it was small enough. And there was a big ass pile-up right outside the town, so maybe the police were still occupied with that.
Too occupied to deal with us.
The weekend started off so good.
Fredo scored tickets to a concert in Victory City.
Of course, now I knew it was a set up, but back then, it was lit.
We hadn’t done anything, just us, in a while.
And it was a Torreign concert. He was a rapper, but surprisingly, had a diehard female base, so I knew it would be females there, and I could get Snow off my mind.
We were all set to go. I’d stayed over Kisha’s that Friday, and had clothes there, so I didn’t even have to go home.
But Fredo did. And that’s when shit started going haywire.
We got there early that Saturday morning, and Sean was there, sleeping on the couch. Said Ty-Ty told him to stay put. Same with Reem; he and his mama been holed up at Granny’s house. But no one can find Ty-Ty.
Then Turk called Fredo, frantic. Autumn was gone.
Narrowly, we were able to slip out before that bitch nigga Kilo gave the order to lock down the Birch. It took us entirely too long to figure out Snow was missing, too, but it was easy enough to break into her MyRoom, and see the last place they were, was at the Birch.
Nearly twenty-hour hours later, here we were, fucked up, but alive. That was more that I could say for half the Birch Babies.
But through it all, we still never found Snow. Kilo claimed she set Autumn up, but I refused to believe it. She loved her sister more than she loved herself. She wouldn’t leave her to rot. She wouldn’t give her away to be used and abused by them niggas.
My chest felt like it was being shredded every time I breathed, so I only took shallow breaths. We were in San Joaquin, and the hospital was the next exit.
But my eyes were feeling so heavy. And with every bump in the road, Turk cried out. And the smell of all our blood mixing was making me nauseous on top of everything else.
I was really finna die. I wasn’t even eighteen yet.
“Rick!”
My eyes stretched and I swerved away from the car at the last second, correcting myself just enough. But I blew through the light, going on two wheels as I turned right and then left, into the emergency bay of the hospital.
I ain’t even bother to turn the car off. I just put it in park in front of the sliding doors and got out.
Fredo and Autumn were already helping Turk out when I rounded the front. My energy was leaking out of me by the gallon. As soon as I crossed the threshold, I dropped to the floor.
I got us there. That was all that mattered.
The sun was going down when I finally opened my eyes. Fredo sat in front of the window, staring me down like he was daring me to die on him.
He smirked when my eyes focused on him. I looked around as I tried to sit up, taking in how nice the private room was.
“Of course, Pops knows the chief of medicine here. Big ass hulking nigga, who I don’t buy for a minute he’s just a doctor, but at least the pigs won’t be taking us in.”
“Of course,” I coughed, making Fredo hand me a cup of water with a straw.
“You needed two blood transfusions, but you should be good since you’ve been knocked out. Turk’s arm is fucked all the way up. They saying he gonna be in a cast for months, but they’re clean breaks, and he only needs casts, no rods and shit.”
“That’s good.” My throat was sore as fuck, and I felt like I could sleep for thirty more days.
“I don’t have a concussion either. Which I knew, but, it’s cool to get a second opinion.”
“What about mentally? You gotta know–”
“Not now.” His lips quirked, but I knew better. Nothing was funny. Shit wasn’t finna be funny for a while.
I swallowed, not wanting to ask about Autumn. She bossed up when it was time to, she came in clutch. Once again, she saved our lives.
But before all of that, I saw the look in her eyes. The same look Ma would have, like she was dead inside.
“They ain’t rape her.”
His voice was so small, I barely heard it over my ragged breaths. But I heard it. And I let myself melt into the uncomfortable hospital bed.
“She, uh, made me stay in the room. She ain’t wanna be alone.”
He scratched his scalp and wiped his nose.
“Her hymen’s intact. Just bruising everywhere. Handprints. Some bald spots from where her braids were ripped out. She fought back, so they collected DNA from under her fingernails and shit. Took pictures, in case she wanted to press charges. She flinched every time they touched her,
but then when they were done, I held her until she went to sleep from whatever they gave her.”
“I’m glad she was the one to kill that nigga,” I gritted. It was taking everything in me not to rip my IV out, but I was ready to go.
Them niggas was stinking up the Birch, and though muthafuckas was used to the gunshots, we still were running out of time. We couldn’t afford to be laid up.
“What we gonna tell the others? Peanut and Set on they way back.”
As Fredo was speaking, the door opened, and Turk hobbled in, his arm in a cast and sling.
“Tell them I did it,” he said, almost falling onto the end of the bed. He anchored his good arm onto the bed and winced as he cupped his head.
“Auty can’t be nowhere near that shit. They not gonna give a fuck she’s a girl. She took out Kilo, and they gonna want retribution. We say I did it, and we murk every nigga who seen her face–nigga and bitch.”
“You really think Peanut and Set gon’ believe you knocked his head off without cause? Everybody and they mama know the only shit getting you in that mode is Autumn.” I shook my head as pain began to bloom behind my eyes.
“Peanut ain’t fuck with them anyway, and Ty told Reem they was planning on taking y’all out. It’s plausible, Rico.”
Turk lay all the way down, facing the ceiling. Tears flowed freely down the sides of his face. “I’ll never forgive myself for this shit. I can’t have her any more involved than she is.”
My shoulders dropped as I exhaled. “It wasn’t your fault, brodie. And she’s safe now. We got her, for life.”
Turk nodded, before his face crumbled. It felt so wrong, watching him cry like that. A nigga who always had a joke. Always had a smile. His whole body shook, like its actions were foreign.
“Aight,” Fredo said, clearing his throat and wiping his nose again. “So, Turk killed Kilo ‘cause he was tryna kill us, and Pooh. We clean house, and then–”
“And then Set and Peanut take over. We getting the fuck out of here, Fred. I can’t do this shit no more.” I ran my hands through my scalp a few times, hairs sliding through the cuts on my fingers.
“Me neither,” Turk hiccupped. “Moving work, okay. Playing with guns, fasho. But I thought there was a code. Them niggas are sick, and I’on want no parts. My mama would roll in her fuckin’ grave.”
“And each and every nigga responsible gon’ be rolling in the dirt, too. I put that on my life, Turkey. We cleaning house.”
“Soon as we get Haze home,” I agreed, finally ripping the IV out. I was tired, but I was good, and I was ready to get the fuck.
“Go get Haze. Me and Fred finna get us a car.”
Turk nodded and stood up. Fredo got up too, and pulling Turk into his arms in a tight hug.
Fredo was the more social twin, but he didn’t have close friends, not really. He fucked with Peanut because I did, and Peanut fucked with Fredo because he was my brother, but they weren’t close.
I knew that wouldn’t be the case anymore. I knew after that weekend, Fredo claimed Turk and Haze as his own, just like I did.
“It’s gonna be okay,” Fredo murmured. Turk nodded, and left the room.
I pulled the blanket off my arm, and sure enough, it had stopped bleeding.
“Soon as we on the road, we call Peanut and Set and we tell them what’s what.”
“Aight–”
“Hello–oh!”
We both looked up at a pale woman in scrubs. I couldn’t get a read on her. She was pale as fuck, but I could tell she was Black. Maybe…
She looked young, too young to be a doctor, and honestly… too something else. The hairs on my arms stood up when she smiled.
“I’m Dr. Hudson. I was told you needed a car to go back to Kenton. There’s one parked out front. Pain medication has been filled at a pharmacy closer to you, as a precaution, but Miss Shaw does have a cut that needs antibiotics, and I have those for you here.”
She held up a white bag that Fredo took.
“Uh, thanks.”
“It’s no problem. Be safe, gentlemen. I’ve grown fond of the stories I hear. Oh! Speaking of… your cute little cousin has been with the authorities all weekend. My son has notified your father, so that someone could be in attendance to pick him up when court is back in session.
We’ve made sure he’s unharmed.”
Son? Fredo and I glanced at each other before nodding.
She grinned, revealing bright white teeth. “Tell Nancy that Imelda says hello. You guys should get going while there’s a shift change.”
She turned, her hair flowing with a breeze, before she left, leaving us more bewildered than ever.
But we couldn’t stop. Not when we were racing against time.
Turk and Autumn were outside, and just like the doctor said, there was a sedan parked and running at the end of the parking lot, keys still in the ignition.
We piled in, and thankfully, Fredo got in the driver’s seat.
“We taking you home, and then we gonna take care of the mess we left in the Towers,” I said, making eye contact with Autumn in the rearview mirror.
She nodded and leaned more into Turk. “And will you find Wynter, too?”
A shiver ran through my spine, and I looked away, toward the road.
“Yeah, Haze. We’ll find her, too.”