One Last Secret
Rico
“Domino, bitch!”
Turk slammed down the piece on the rickety table so hard the other pieces shifted.
Set and Haze groaned, but I wasn’t tripping. I was still in second place.
“Yo ass cheating, Dub.”
“On my mama he cheating, that’s why I ain’t playing,” Nut bellowed before taking a pull of his blunt.
All of Turk’s nieces and nephews were in daycare and school, since we decided to have my going away party on a weekday. Sean and Shad were cutting school to chill with us, and promised they would do their homework on the backend.
“Do I be cheating, Auty?”
“You don’t be letting me win, so you cheating,” she pouted. I smirked, earning me a wink, before she began to wash the bones again.
“Don’t be playing Dominoes with them other niggas at camp, Dub. This for the home team only.”
“Don’t make no friends period or I’ma have to show my natural ass,” Peanut chimed in.
“I’m safe, since he can’t make no more cousins,” Ty-Ty boasted, dapping me up. “Ain’t no play-cousins ‘round this bitch, on Foe. In fact, just keep ya head down until you discharged.”
“Y’all lame as fuck,” Reem grumbled, making Set chuckle.
“Now y’all know Rico barely fuck with y’all, so why would he make friends with his fellow Marines?” Fredo cheesed. He placed the barbecue he made on G-Pops’ grill on the other table, and we all forgot about the game.
“I’m not included in that shit, Fredo. He can’t stand the young niggas, but he fuck with us the long way. Tell ‘em, Ricky Ricardo.”
“Nut you swear you somebody,” Ty-Ty spat playfully.
They ribbed on each other more as we ate, but my appetite slowed to a stop, as a lump formed in my chest.
I placed my half-eaten hot dog on my styrofoam plate and looked out into the small yard, at my niggas. That night, Fredo was driving me to Daygo, and the next morning, I’d report for basic training.
This was it. My last day as my own man. My last day as Luney, from Foe Dub, from the Birch.
I served crack. Now, I was serving my country.
“Damn nigga, the shit not good?”
I shook my head and chuckled. “Nah, it’s just… I’ma miss y’all dumb asses.” I turned to Peanut. “Reem and Ty-Ty are Beavis and Butthead foreal. You gotta watch them, Ty more than Reem. He’ll listen to you, because Set does.”
Next, I turned to Set. “I swear if we wasn’t locked in we’d be sworn enemies, Dub. Watch over Sean. He’s a knucklehead, but he means well. Keep him and Shad in the studio and out the streets. And keep my brother out of the bullshit. He’ll follow you gladly into it, because he’s loyal to a fault,
but that’s exactly why you keep him out the way, because there’s nothing like a nigga like Fredo in your corner.”
Set nodded, and dapped up Fredo, while I turned to Haze. Her eyes were glassy, and she placed her plate on the table to give me her full attention.
“You don’t know how much you mean to me, Haze. I need you to still be here when I’m done with this shit. Even if you barely holding on, hold on for me, and I’ll make everything right after. Aight?”
She bobbed her head, dislodging a tear that Turk wiped from her face.
I turned to Ty, who was trying too hard to be hardbody.
“You get on my fuckin’ nerves, Ty-Ty.”
He scoffed.
“But I wouldn’t have it any other way,” I continued, jumping from friend to friend until my gaze met Fredo. My brother.
“I’d die for each and every one of y’all, no hesitation. I know fasho by the time I’m discharged, we gon’ be running this fuckin’ city.”
“Hell, yeah, Dub,” Turk cheered. “Shit is rocky right now, but watch. You gon’ come home to cars and cash and bitches like them niggas who coming home from a bid.”
I chuckled, dapping my nigga up. It was wild; Turk started off close to Fredo. They’d do their dirt together, mostly because neither of them were as depraved or gutta as me or Peanut or Ty-Ty.
But he proved me wrong. Turk could get sticky when need be, and now we were as close as blood brothers could be.
“That’s crazy. This the most yo ass ever talked, foreal. I ain’t even know you knew all them words.”
Peanut cackled, dapping up Sean as he grinned at me.
“Fuck you.”
“Nah, but, we gon’ miss you too, brodie,” Set muttered, before he grabbed his phone out his pocket.
“Shol’ is!” Sean said. “You know, you my cousin too, no matter what Ty-Ty be saying. So many times you and Fred listened to me and Shad and shit. When I make it big, I’m shouting you out.”
“Yo ass… Good luck, Rico.” Shad came over to dap me up, bringing me to him.
He’d been struggling since he moved in with his father full time, but I knew that him being with Sean and Set more often would help.
As the day went on, we posted up on the Birch courts, where more people began to say their goodbyes like I was going to jail.
But shit, I was going away. Most people never left the Birch, except when they were going to jail or in a body bag.
Even Kisha’s old ass came and said goodbye, with a baby on her arm.
Haze sent me a long, heartfelt message before we left G-Pops’ house, and slipped me a picture of me, her, Fredo, and Turk. I hugged her for a long time, and promised her I would write or call whenever I could, and that she’d come to my graduation.
Ty-Ty cracked before Nan did, him and his granny and aunt hugging and kissing me and threatening me to make it out alive. I smirked as I told them the same things I told Haze, and only then did they leave Nan’s house.
She was more reserved. She made all my favorites, and we ate quietly, before she kissed my forehead and retired to her room.
She didn’t want me to leave. If she could, she would keep us in her apartment forever. But even though I never talked to her about much, I think she knew this was what I felt was best for me, so she supported me.
It was ten at night when it was just me and Fredo. We were in his room, passing a basketball to each other.
I knew he had something on his mind. I just didn’t know what or when he’d say it.
Not until I passed him the ball, and he placed it beside him on his bed.
“I want to tell Set about you and Wyn.”
I balled up my face. “The fuck that came from?”
“That night you was laid up, Wyn was caked up with Set the whole night. At first, she looked at me, but when me nor Ty-Ty said anything, she encouraged it. I don’t think they fucked yet, since he was drunk as fuck and then we had to do some shit the next morning, but I wanna–”
“Ain’t nothing to tell him.” I leaned back, holding Fredo’s gaze hostage as my insides were torn to shreds.
It’s one thing to see and hear about Wynter and the company she kept. It was quite another to know my day one was pushing up on her.
And she was encouraging it.
Fredo sighed. “You never told Set. You know he wouldn’t fuck with her if he knew y’all had history. You too prideful, but I think–”
“Don’t tell him shit about my business, Fred. She wanna be a flip, let her. He’ll find out on his own.”
“See, you say that, but I know you. I was in the car with you when you put a hot one in Trippy’s chest. So I wanna tell my nigga who she used to fuck with in case you learn some more skills down in Basic Training and get some ideas.”
My lips spread into a sinister smile, spreading more when Fredo met my gaze head on.
The only person in the world who got me. Because he was me, and I was him.
“Set’s our day one.”
“That don’t mean shit to you, and you know it. Promise me. Promise you won’t hurt him, nor anyone he loves, nor his blood or chosen family, Rick. No matter what. For the rest of your life.”
I blinked twice before I said, “Fine.”
“Put it on Ma.”
“Damn,” I chuckled. “I said fine, nigga. But okay. I put it on Ma, I won’t harm Set, nor anyone he loves or claims. Physically, nor mentally. Now, put it on Ma you nor Ty-Ty will ever bring up anything to do with me and that ice cold bitch.”
Fredo waved me off. “Ty-Ty don’t know shit besides y’all lil’ kiss that one time, and I’ll keep my mouth closed. Wyn needs someone looking out for her. Them west side niggas are one second away from doing football numbers. Maybe Set will be good for her.”
“Yeah, right. I’m going out.” I stood and saluted him.
“Don’t hurt her either, Rick!” he called out from his bed.
I stopped and turned, winking at my brother. “I can’t promise that.”
Wynter didn’t even know peace in her sleep. Her eyebrows were pinched, and she hugged her pillow tightly, her hands balled into fists.
Her room was much of the same, just that her sheets were leopard and black now. More clothes were everywhere, and bags of cash were poorly hidden underneath her bed and in the closet.
On her nightstand was weed and coke. A few empty bottles of Hennessy were lined up next to it.
Guess money wasn’t the only thing them niggas on the west side put her on.
When I shifted my gaze back to her, her eyes were open. Slowly, she sat up, keeping her gaze on me as she scooted as far as she could away from me.
We hadn’t been this close, with each other’s undivided attention, in years. Not since she told me she aborted my baby, and that she knew I’d fucked someone else.
I came here to threaten her. I came here to spew as much vitriol as I could, so she could feel like shit. She could be as low as she was for even thinking of entertaining my bro.
It didn’t matter if I told him about us or not. She knew, and yet she was all on this nigga. And she’d fuck him too, because that’s the type of bitch Wynter Snow was.
Her hand felt under her other pillow before she aimed a gun at me. Both hands, to steady it, as she rose to her knees.
“Get out.”
I took measured steps deeper into her room, watching her eyes fill with tears before they spilled over.
“I hate you.”
“I hate you, too,” I replied, placing a knee onto her bed.
“You’ve ruined me,” she croaked, gasping when my chest touched the barrel of the gun.
“You ruined us the second you let that nigga touch you.”
Her hand wound back, the hand steadying the gun, and I let her slap my cheek. I barely felt it, and I knew it didn’t make her feel better.
We were still just as fucked as we were before.
“There was never an us,” she cried, more tears spilling, making her words come out wet. “There couldn’t have been. We were nothing. Not one thing that was claimed. Which was why he was able to–”
I crashed my lips to hers, ignoring the sparks and zings ping-ponging from my lips to hers to her tongue to mine. My hands dug into her back, keeping her to me as I kissed her with everything in me. As I tried to tell her everything I couldn’t with words.
But she didn’t understand me anymore. And I couldn’t bring myself to wonder whose fault that was.
I pulled myself back to wipe her face, licking her tears from my lips.
It took a second for her to regain focus, before she was wrenching herself out of my arms and stumbling off her bed.
“I wish I never met you, Richard. Get out. And don’t come back.”
I backed off of her bed, all the way to the door.
“Keep a secret?”
She tilted her head, curiosity winning out from her anger momentarily.
“Your wish is my command, Wynter Snow.” I tapped my knuckles on her door frame, before I walked out of her house.
Out of her life.
For the last time.