27. Rico
Rico
Palm trees line the quiet street in Mid-city. It’s the middle of the day, right after street cleaning, so I luck up and get a park in front of the orange apartment building that’s our destination.
I don’t turn off the car when I swoop in. I just let it idle in park, and turn toward my nephew.
He’s looking out the window still, not realizing we stopped. Once he does, he rips off his seatbelt, but I engage the locks before he can hop out. Only then does he turn toward me, frustration marring his little face.
“Mind your manners. Don’t be mentioning Nan and what she be saying. Remember, no matter who says what, and who does what, she’s your mother. She made you.”
Mars nods his head, absorbing every word. I hold my fist out to him, and he grins, dapping me up.
We’re ready.
I turn the car off and disengage the locks for him. He hops out, but waits at the door for me to round the car.
Holding his hand, we go deeper into the driveway of the apartment building.
Ju said she’s in the back unit, so we pass the first building to the second orange building.
It only has one door in the middle, and I know I’m in the right place because there’s a mix of big and little pots of plants and flowers surrounding it.
When we get to the welcome mat, Mars knocks nearly a million times.
“Coming!” Ju yells, but Mars keeps knocking.
Over and over, until the front door opens and he launches himself at his mother.
“Hi, baby!” she gushes, dropping down to pick him up. Mars is more than half her height, but she still holds him up, waddling deeper into her house.
I cross the doorway and close the door behind me, staying behind while they walk away from me to show Mars the room she decorated for him.
Her living area is an open concept, and is as eclectic as she is. Plants are everywhere, in freestanding pots, hanging pots, on the windowsill. The couch is shaped like a strawberry, and there’s so many knick knacks on her kitchen table, I doubt she actually eats there.
It suits her, from what I know. My lips twitch as I try to picture Fredo in here.
I’d be right here chilling on my strawberry couch.
Sure enough, this nigga is lounging on the seeds. I snort, shaking my head at him. Fredo’s the type of nigga to be content with a mattress, a laptop, and a tv. Haze was the one who decorated every apartment he had.
“Ricky! Ricky! Mommy said Santa’s coming to her house! Can I stay in my new room?”
I look around the living room. “It ain’t no tree in here.”
“It’s being delivered today,” Ju snaps, folding her arms. “I… wanted us to decorate it together. Me and Mars.”
“And Mommy said she can watch Christmas movies until we fall asleep! And bake cookies! And–”
“Mars.” I crouch down to his level. “Go in your new room and play with your toys. I’ll be in there in a minute.”
His light dims, just a little, but he turns and does what I say. I stand at my full height and call on my brother to give me strength and patience and understanding to deal with his baby mama. When I hear the door close, I go in.
“You been ducking and dodging your son’s calls for years and now you think I’m finna let him spend Christmas here? You don’t even have a security gate.”
Ju kisses her teeth, but then she sighs, and her attitude leaves her. “I dropped out of medical school.”
“Shit.” I sit on the back of her strawberry couch and wait for her to explain herself, since that’s the very last thing I’d ever expect her to say.
“I’m not going back after this break. I can’t do it anymore.
This was never my dream anyway, and I owe it to myself and my baby to live my life for me.
I start this remote job after the New Year, and it pays very well.
Well enough for me to support both of us–eventually.
I didn’t mean to spring this on you, I swear.
It’s just… he loved his room, and I got caught up in the moment.
I’d planned on putting up with your grandmother for the holidays, but…
if it’s okay… I mean, you can come, too–”
“Some shit went down,” I blurt. This is so out of my regular, but there are players involved now that are too volatile and unpredictable for me to keep anything too close to the chest.
I take off my sunglasses and meet Ju’s gaze. She cups her mouth, gasping and blinking.
“What happened?!”
It looks worse than it feels. Ty-Ty got me good, and now I have two black eyes to go with my healing nose.
“I told the family about Mars. My cousin was less than thrilled. My homies, too. Shit’s all weird right now, and honestly, if it wasn’t, I would let Mars stay. But how it’s looking, I don’t even think you can be here, foreal.”
“Well, I move into a new building in the New Year, too. I only set up Mars’s room to show him how it’ll look, and that building has security. But… why wouldn’t I be safe? All your friends paid me dust before.”
I crack my knuckles with my thumb, holding her gaze. “Slime texted me.”
A host of emotions play on her face before it settles perfectly blank. “Again, everyone paid me–”
“Yeah, Ju. Paid you dust. Mars is half you, half Fred. And while muthafuckas may could give a fuck about you, everyone loves Fred, and everyone wants a piece of Mars. And Slime ain’t the same timid ass pretty boy you knew. That nigga…” I shake my head.
Slime was never a timid ass pretty boy. That’s just one of his many masks he presents, the one he presented to Ju. It was easier, since she met him after he hooked up with Fred. Looking back, I almost feel stupid I didn’t see they were more than homies.
Slime is one of the most sadistic niggas I know.
He yielded only to Fred. Cool as fuck. Loyal, too.
But cross him, and he’ll make you feel it.
And the sickest part is, he’d been like that since we was kids.
Niggas been calling him Slime since he was in diapers, ‘cause that’s how long he’s been a slick, slimy ass nigga.
His levels of vindictiveness rival Shad, and now both me and Ju are on his radar.
And since Slime is now Councilman Jackson, beloved by the people while also calling shots in the Birch, that nigga is very capable of following through on that threat he texted me.
“Look,” I say, coming out of my head and pushing off the couch. “How about you and Mars spend the holidays in Belize? I’ll get you moved into your new place, and let shit blow over with my niggas.”
She looks like she wants to decline, but she knows if I’m offering, it’s more serious than I’m letting on.
“Fine,” she sighs.
“Good. I’ll text you your flight details. You’re leaving tonight, tomorrow at the latest, and you're staying until… when you start your job?”
“January seventh,” she answers, eyebrows pulling down.
“Aight. You’ll stay until the sixth.”
“Rico… what aren’t you telling me?”
I call for Mars, before smirking at her clueless ass. “I just told you, Ju. Slime ain’t who you think he is, and the nigga he is now? I doubt you wanna meet him.”
Mars comes running toward us.
“Guess what?” I ask him, ready to sell this shit again.
I see this nigga all the way from Ju’s front door.
My whip is gone, replaced by Set’s matte black lamb truck.
He moved most of his car collection to the warehouse he and Nut have when he and Brina moved to their crib from his penthouse, and only keep that and Boog’s Monte Carlo for his everyday cars.
We all got them. An ode to our fathers. That’s the only reason I know he didn’t fuck my shit up. Though, I can’t really be sure.
He’s leaning on the hood of his car, smoking a wood as he watches us walk toward him. Mars gasps, and I know it’s because he’s checking out the car. He’s gotten into building cars like we used to do.
Set’s face is blank as we stare each other down. I wasn’t expecting to see him so soon. If I were alone, this would go differently. But I’m trying as hard as I can to keep Mars from seeing sides of us he doesn’t need to see.
Set drops the wood on the sidewalk and stubs it out before standing straight. “Waddup, Luney?”
His gaze shifts to Mars, and a corner of his mouth lifts. “Waddup, lil’ Tune?”
I glance down long enough to see a grin spread on Mars’s face. “You knew my dad?”
Set nods. “Yup. My day one. So you know what that makes you?”
“What?”
Set opens the backseat of his car and grins. “My day two.”
“Go get in the car, Mars.” He shoots away from me to climb in the backseat. I can’t hear what Set says to him, only his giggle as Set buckles him in and closes the door.
“The fuck you do with my car, Set?”
This nigga shoves his hands into the pocket of his jeans and shrugs. “You had four flats. Pook came to change ‘em out and took it to your crib. I volunteered to bring you and my young nigga home.”
“Nah–”
“My nigga, you really don’t have no choice,” he says casually, even as the air around us changes. I reach behind me and rest my hand on my gun, and that pulls a smirk out of him.
“I know you not tryna be on that type of time in front of my young nigga. That’s why you told him to get in the car instead of going back inside with his mama.”
I narrow my eyes but don’t reply. Set chuckles, his hand rubbing his waves.
“You know Ju is Bleach’s blood cousin? The only real family she claims… and she don’t know shit about her having a son, specially having one with Fredo. Y’all really all been pulling the wool over our eyes. You been fucking her, too? Wyn know–”
“The fuck I tell you about mentioning my bitch?” I seethe, taking the three steps to get in his face.
I don’t see him pull his shit, but I feel it digging into my abs as he flicks off the safety. My nostrils flare, feeling the metal through my shirt, and I wrap my hand around the barrel, pulling it up until it rests on my heart.
“Do it,” I call his bluff.
We glare at each other for a tense moment, until grins break both of our faces. He pushes me off him, chuckling as he walks around the front of his car. “C’mon, bitch ass nigga.”
I slide into his front seat, barely getting my seatbelt on before he peels off the corner.