Chapter 15
"Yeah, but if I ain't here leave the gat in them bushes right there, okay?"
"All day."
"Righteous."
I went in the house through the back door and made my way through the kitchen. I watched as Joker and Li'l De told the other homies that I'd be out later. The small crowd went one way and Joker and Li'l De went the other. Joker had the big.45 in his waistband, so I didn't worry about them out in the street.
I had brought a collection of my best tapes home: Jimmy Reed, Otis Redding, the Temprees, Barbara Mason, and Sam Cook. I went into the den and put on Jimmy Reed. When it came out over the speaker it sounded foreign to me. Jimmy didn't fit home like he fit jail. I couldn't rightly put my finger on it, but I knew that I wasn't going to be listening to too much Jimmy Reed out here. When I came back into the living room, Tamu was sitting there looking through my photo alb.u.m. I sat next to her and played with her hair.
"Kody, let's leave. Let's go and be alone," she said, never taking her eyes off the photo alb.u.m.
"Awright, but let me eat somethin'."
"I want to take you to dinner. I know a nice little place you'd like."
"Okay, let me tell Mom we're leaving."
"She already knows," Tamu said, looking up at me seductively.
"Well, well, what is this, a conspiracy?"
"No, babes, just natural instincts."
"And what about this?" I said and fell hard upon her, crus.h.i.+ng the photo alb.u.m between us.
"That is called smas.h.i.+ng your girlfriend."
"And this?" I kissed her full on the lips, my tongue darting in and out of her mouth.
"That," she said between kisses, "is called animal instinct."
"Well call me King of the Jun-"
"Kody?" Mom interrupted, appearing in the doorway.
"Huh? Oh, Mom, yeah?" I stammered, struggling to get off Tamu.
"I'm going to lie down. If you leave, lock the house up, okay?"
"All da... I mean, yeah, sure Mom."
I had been so used to our natural response to "okay"-meaning Sixty-Ninety killer-which would be "All day," that it just came out.
Mom looked at me then turned on down the hallway.
"Let's go," I told Tamu, and we left.
She took me to a small restaurant on Crenshaw Boulevard called Aunt Fish. We could sit in the window and look across Crenshaw and watch the D.J. spin records at Stevie Wonder's radio station, KJLH. We ordered jumbo shrimp and red snapper. Tamu, who ate like a horse, matched my appet.i.te, and we tore that food up. The entire time I was eating, the woman at the cash register kept making hardcore eye contact with me. Naturally I flirted back, though only when Tamu wasn't looking. We kept eating and the woman and I kept flirting, right up until it was time to pay the tab. The bill was forty-nine dollars. When Tamu went to pay she found that she was short ten dollars. The woman at the register gave me a look that clearly said "Help her," but I didn't have a dime. I was so embarra.s.sed, as I'm sure Tamu was. But it was especially difficult for me because it became a "man thang" when I couldn't help pay the tab. It took all the strength I had not to shout "I JUST GOT OUT OF JAIL!!"
Surprisingly, the woman offered to pay as long as Tamu promised to return with her money. Tamu thanked her and turned to exit. As I turned to follow Tamu, the woman cleared her throat to get my attention. When I looked, she handed me a restaurant business card with her name, phone number, and address on the back side. I put the card in my pocket and followed Tamu out to the car.
In the car I tried to console Tamu, who was really bent out of shape about not having the money to pay the bill. I almost told her about the flirting and of the woman giving me her card, but decided against it. We went to Tamu's house and retrieved the needed money and drove back to Aunt Fish.
After paying the woman we went straight to the Mustang Motel on Western Avenue. From the moment I left the car I had a raging erection that threatened to tear a hole in the front of my pants. We hurried like eager children up to our room. Once behind the door we literally tore our clothes off. To my surprise, Tamu had on black stockings and garters. She knew I had developed a liking for such things while in Youth Authority. We wasted no time as we fell into one another immediately. We sinned for most of the night, taking occasional breaks to smoke pot, laugh, and joke. We really had a good time. By the time we were buzzed to leave we both were spent, and it was another day when we emerged from the room.
"You know, Kody," Tamu began, talking in measured tones as she drove down Western Avenue, "I want to get an apartment together, for us. You, me, Keonda. But you have to get a job, babes."
"Yeah, I know," I said, but I really had no intention of getting a job. h.e.l.l, I was going to do like Joker and Li'l De said they were doing: sell cocaine. Whiteboy Eric, who was like a cousin to me (we told everybody we were cousins) was already heavily into it. I knew he'd kick me down, but I didn't want to tell Tamu that.
"'Cause, babes," she continued, "with your job and my doing hair, we could get a nice little place somewhere."
"That's right, babes," I said, not really paying much attention anymore, as I was now watching a familiar face in the car next to us watch me. The man slowly began to roll down his window, so I started rolling down mine, all the while cursing myself for not getting the
"Hey," he hollered to me, "ain't yo' name Kody?" He didn't seem to have any venom in his voice, but it could be a ploy.
"Yeah, wha's up?" I said skeptically.
"Aw, n.i.g.g.a, you don't 'member me from Horace Mann, Terry Heron?"
Terry Heron, Terry Heron... I turned the name over several times before it caught, and when it did it was too late. Enemy Sixty!
He recognized the stages of change in my face and knew I had computed him amongst the d.a.m.ned. Not only had I fought him in school long before the Sixties-Eight Tray conflict, but during the conflict I had shot him. Luckily for him I was unarmed, because I had ample time after the recognition to aim and fire. But to my surprise he was making no threatening moves.
"Aw, Kody, man," he said as we drove along, "I ain't in that bangin' s.h.i.+t no mo'. It's all about that money now. n.i.g.g.a, you betta get wit' it."
"Awright then," I said with a slight hand wave, more relieved than anything. s.h.i.+t, I needed a gun. He turned right on Sixty-seventh Street and into his 'hood, and we drove two more blocks and turned left into our 'hood.
Tamu dropped me off and we made plans for later. It felt like my second day on a new planet.
The phone rang. It was Li'l Crazy De asking me if I had gotten the strap.
"Naw," I said, "where was it?"
"In the bushes where you told me to leave it."
I told him to hold on and went out back to retrieve the weapon-a.38 Browning semiautomatic pistol. I came back to the phone and told him I'd found it and asked how many hot ones-murders-it had on it.
"Oh, three or four," Li'l De replied, "but don't sweat it, 'cause you was locked down when they happened, you know?"
"Righteous," I said and s.p.a.ced the line.
I checked the weapon for rounds and went into the den to jam some sounds. I took Jimmy Reed out of the tape deck and put in a tape my brother Kerwin had lying around. "The Big Payback" by James Brown came roaring out: I can do wheelin', I can do the dealin',
but I don't do no d.a.m.n squealin'.
I can dig rappin', I'm ready, I can dig rappin'
But I cant dig that back stabbin.'
To me, "The Big Payback" was always the Crip theme song. I remember going up to Tookie's house-he was the West Side Regional Commander of the Crips-to watch him lift weights and to hear the original Crip war stories. I couldn't have been any older than twelve when I'd eagerly get dressed and scurry up to Tookie's to hold audience with the general. A lot of us used to go to his house to get firsthand knowledge of Cripism.
Tookie was a Crip through and through-walk, talk, and att.i.tude. He gave the name Crip a certain majesty and was a magnificent storyteller. For hours at a time he'd give us blow-by-blow rundowns on the old Tom Cross record hops at Sportsman's Park. Or he'd tell about slain members who would have loved meeting us, cats like Buddha, Li'l Rock, and Moe, to name a few. He had a Cadillac and never drove it, preferring to walk everywhere. And if the walk was too long, he'd call up one of his drivers. His entire living room was filled with weights. No furniture whatsoever, just pig iron. Tookie was huge, beyond belief at that time: twenty-two-inch arms, fifty-eight-inch chest, and huge tree-trunk legs. And he was dark, Marcus Garvey dark, s.h.i.+ny, slick, and strong. He had the physique, complexion, and att.i.tude that intimidated most American people.
I met the Original Crips at Tookie's house: Monkey Man, Bogart, G.o.dfather, Maddog, Big Jack, and Raymond Was.h.i.+ngton. I was a student of Crip, and Tookie liked me more than the others, as he saw that I was a serious soldier.
Every summer the city of Los Angeles held a Festival in Black at MacArthur Park and most everybody from everywhere would attend. Tookie and Jamael-who started the Avalon Garden Crips-would go to all the functions, concerts, parties, and parks and peel out of their s.h.i.+rts, amazing everyone with their size. Jamael's light skin contrasted hard with Tookie's dark complexion and made them look even bigger, like two gargant-uans. During the festivals in Black, Rennis and I would be designated by Tookie to carry the straps, which was more than cool with me.
Another time Tookie and I walked from Sixty-ninth Street to 107th Street so he could retrieve his shotgun. Eight Ball had been lent the gauge to bust on some Brims but had never returned it. So Tookie and I started walking to Eight Ball's, but before we got there we went around to a homie's house whose mother was selling angel dust-PCP. Tookie got two seams (a seam was a ten-dollar package in tin foil) on credit. He rolled each seam into a joint and we got high as we walked. By the time we reached the Nineties we were both whacked out of our brains. Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion, blurry and dark. When Took got high he walked like a cowboy in a High Noon duel.
When we got to 107th Street we ran into some Original Hoovers: Sam, Jughead, Andre Jones, Jinks, and Cobra. They talked with Tookie for a while and mostly ignored me. (Later on they would come to know me.) Took got his hair braided by a Cripalette-a female Crip-and we made our way over to Ball's house. I went to the door and got him.
"Cuz," Took said, "where's my gauge?"
"I put it under the mattress in the back where b.i.t.c.h sleep." b.i.t.c.h was Tookie's pit bull.
"You should've told me... "
"I knocked, but there wasn't no answer."
"If my gauge ain't there, I'm gonna kill yo' mama."
"It's there-"
"It betta be!"
And we left.
Although Eight Ball was my homie, Took was the general. On our way back down Normandie, the police stopped us. Automatically they handcuffed Took.
"What's his name?" the police asked me.
"Tookie," I said, like don't-you-know?
"No, his real name."
Now, I knew his first name was Stanley, because he told us that before he got the nickname Tookie. They used to call him Stanley Livingston. I also knew that his brother, Li'l Tookie, was Wayne. Wayne Holloway. So I took it for granted that because they were brothers, Took's last name was also Holloway.
"Stanley Holloway," I said.
The police came back over to me and said, "Hmm, that's funny. He says his name is Stanley Williams. Somebody's lying."
"Maybe I got it wrong, I just-"
"Why are you with this sc.u.mbag anyway, huh?" asked the officer, c.o.c.king his head.
"Well, he's... uhm... my friend," I said, but it didn't sound right.
"Bull-f.u.c.kin'-s.h.i.+t! Who you think you talking to? Huh?" he said, grabbing me by the collar.
"But he-"
" 'But' my f.u.c.kin' a.s.s. He is going to have you shooting up every G.o.dd.a.m.n Brim in L.A. He don't give a s.h.i.+t about you. He just wants to make you a Crip, one of his soldiers. Wise up, boy, you're still young."
So he did know who Tookie was. They uncuffed Took and we began walking off. Took asked what I told them his name was and I replied Stanley Holloway. He slapped me hard across the back of the head.
"Williams, dumb a.s.s, Williams!"
"Awright, awright, I got it," I said, rubbing the back of my head, which was stinging like crazy.
The payback song reminded me of Tookie. That's all he played over and over as he lifted weights. He and Big Jack, his roommate, had an old eight-track rigged up to a speaker in a milk crate. On one tape he had four songs: "Payback," "Girl Calling," "Happy Feelings," and "Reach for It." I learned a lot of Crip etiquette from Tookie.
Most Crips have not had the opportunity to meet him, or any other founders, so they tend to believe that they "created the wheel." No history whatsoever is attached to their banging. In early '79, Tookie and two other Crips, who subsequently gave him up, were captured for four murders. In 1981 he was given the death penalty, and he now resides on death row in San Quentin.
As the Payback song played on, I found it hard to shake my trancelike thoughts about the old days. I soon became depressed. I wanted to sleep, to dream, to escape. For the first time I felt South Central choking me. I didn't want to die without having made any substantial contribution to something. But what? Where was I taking this?
I slept as much as I could. That night the homegirls came by to see me. Spooney, who had a baby by Tray Stone; Bam, who was pregnant by Diamond; Prena, Crazy De's sister; and Sharon and China were all there. The first thing Spooney said was, "Monster, don't die on us!"
I promised her I wouldn't.
"Why would you say that?" I said.
"Because," she explained, "everybody seems to be doing it, like it's cool or something. Monster, just be careful, okay?"
"All day!"
"We know that, just be careful, all right?" Bam pleaded.
We talked late into the night. Bam kept asking me if I had f.u.c.ked any dudes in the a.s.s while I was in prison. I a.s.sured her that I hadn't, which I doubt she believed. The fire between China and I had died. It seemed that our only union gravitated around banging and it was quite apparent from our conversations that both of us had grown up and a little out of the banging circle. She even had a job.
"Where's your daughter?" Prena asked.
"Over her G.o.dparents' house. She'll be here tomorrow if you want to see her."