Chapter 14 ( Gabos )

Making Moves

After the party was over, everybody called it a night. After dropping Amanda, Rosie, and Shakia off at home, Pokey called it a night also. The next morning, he was awoken, bright and early, by his two friends Fatboy and Flick.

“Pokey, hey Pokey. Boy, get your behind up and see what them boyz want,” Mrs. Queen said.

“All right, Ma. Dang, I just fell asleep. Tell them I’ll be down in a minute or two,” he said, yawning, as he began to get outta bed.

“Y’all need to stop all that yelling, he said he’ll be down in a minute or two. So y’all just be patient,” Mrs. Queen said, slamming her door and walking back to her room to get some more sleep.

“Damn,” Pokey said, walking out the door. “What y’all niggaz want so early in the morning?” Pokey asked, still yawning.

“Damn, dog, it’s like that?” Fatboy asked. “Don’t tell us you getting brand new on a nigga all of a sudden.”

“Na’ll, dirty. A nigga just tired, that’s all. I been up almost all night, plus you nigga wasn’t nowhere around last night when I had to take my girl home and y’alls,” Pokey said, looking at his dogs.

“Oh, dog, my momma made me come home right before twelve,” Flick said. “But Rosie said her momma was gonna scoop her up, well, she didn’t. I took her home.”

“And where was you, dog?” Pokey asked Fatboy.

“Dog, I was tired, so I called it a night. But my shortie said her auntie was scooping her, and that she would be all right for twenty more minutes.”

“Well, that’s not the case. I took her home too, and that shit took like a whole hour to get there and a whole hour to get back,” Pokey said.

“Man, who let you drive they car to do all that?” Fatboy asked.

“Look, niggas,” Pokey said, smiling and pointing at the brand-new ride. “That’s my shit,” Pokey said.

“Yeah, right,” Flick said, “and I’m Roy Jones.”

“Na’ll, real shit. Mr. Big brought me this for my birthday. He said so we can get around better. Man, this bitch clean, and this shit sitting on 22 inches with a sound system in it. Guess who drove it here?”

“Who?” Fatboy asked.

“Sterling/Mr. Big’s daughter.”

“The one who was at his house when we went?”

“Yep, what’s her name?”

“Tri, Tir, Trirena.”

“Yeah, that’s her.”

“Anyways, what’s up? We setting up trap today or what, ’cause you know them niggas Shine and Boo Boo depending on us to open and close nowadays,” Fatboy said.

“Yeah, we gonna stick to the script, but in a minute we gonna change shit up. Check this out. Look what my basing-ass Uncle Sico gave me,” he said, going to the back of the trunk and opening it. “Man, y’all niggaz gonna flip when y’all see this shit,” Pokey said, unzipping the book bag that was containing the three keys.

“Now expose for us to see. Damn, dog, we can come up big time with all that shit,” Flick said.

Eyes wide now seeing the money, “Man, we already doing our lil thing, but with this, we can triple our money in no time,” Fatboy said.

“Yeah, dog, we can if shit goes right. But we first gotta find a place to sell all this shit, we can’t be cutting into the pie over at Shine’s and Boo Boo. Never bite the hands that feed you,” Pokey said.

“All right, why not just sell all this shit when they run out?” Flick said.

“’Cause then them niggas will catch on, plus Mr. Big gone wanna know why we ain’t asking for more product,” Pokey said.

“Yeah, you right about that,” Fatboy said.

“So look, let’s just get us a spot somewhere else and see what we can do, or we can just sell these shits for the low-low, eighteen to twenty thousand a piece and be done with it. It’s not enough money to live good on, but it’s enough to get our old girl up out the hood,” Pokey said.

“Look, let’s just chill. And when the timing is right, we’ll think of something to do,” Fatboy said.

“All right, we’ll do that,” Pokey said.

“Come on, let’s go ’head and open up shop. What, we just gonna walk ’round there, or you driving the whip?” Flick asked.

“Dog, remember we sticking to the script, so that means we walking,” Pokey said. “Let’s roll them to their surprise.”

Once they reached the spot, it was already jumping.

“Well, I guess them niggaz wasn’t depending on us too bad, ’cause shop is up and running.”

“Well, that’s good. It’s about time them niggaz do something ’round this bitch.”

“What’s up, y’all,” Shine said, as Pokey, Fatboy, and Flick stepped inside.

“What’s up, nigga? We see y’all up early,” Pokey said.

“Yeah, y’all know how it is. The early bird catches the worm,” Boo Boo said, coming from the kitchen. “Where y’all niggaz been anyways?”

“Man, you know last night was my birthday! So we chilled out and had a lil fun,” Pokey said. “Why you niggaz ain’t come?” Pokey asked.

“For what? Niggas ain’t worried about no motherfucking birthday party, niggas trying to make this money, so we can party every day, not no motherfucking one time out the year type shit,” Shine said. “While you niggas was acting like lil bitches at a party, me and lil bro was making this cheddar.”

“First off, nigga, you need to watch your motherfucking mouth, for a nigga get that shit right,” Fatboy said.

“Nigga, fuck y’all,” Boo Boo said. “My brother said just what he meant. If ya niggas don’t like it, do something about it,” Boo Boo said, pulling his gat out.

“Nigga, calm down, lil bro, look at these niggaz scared straight,” Shine said. “Man, we just playing with y’all, trying to clear the air,” hoping they wouldn’t tell Mr. Big about this shit.

“Yeah, we scared straight,” Pokey said. “But check this out. Since it feels like we ain’t wanted here, we gonna holla at y’all.” Not knowing in Pokey’s mind that he was now ready to move to the next level. “It’s only one way we’ll survive in this game, and that’s by getting rid of all our enemies one by one,” he was thinking, as he walked out the door with his dogs behind him.

“Well, fuck y’all niggaz then. Y’all niggas ain’t bred for this type of life anyways,” Boo Boo said, running to the door and shooting in the air. Boom, boom, boom, boom, the gun sounded. Fatboy and Pokey and Flick didn’t even flinch; they just kept on walking.

“Remember what Mr. Big told us?” Fatboy asked.

“Yep, don’t pull your gun, unless you intend to use it. See how stupid the lil nigga is. Them same four bullets, probably could’ve saved his life,” Fatboy said, looking at Pokey. As Pokey began to smile, he knew what time it was, and he was proud of his lil homie. “My nigga got heart,” Pokey was thinking.

When he heard Flick say, “Them niggas gonna be problems, but before they become a big problem we need to handle our business and solve the problem before it’s too late.”

“What you mean by that?” Fatboy asked Flick.

“Nigga, stop acting stupid. Y’all know what I mean. Them stupid niggaz pulled a gun like we was gonna run. Sad thing is though, they should’ve use it,” Flick said, “’cause payback is a bitch. Now we just gotta be smart ’bout the whole thing. We gotta make sure whatever we do we don’t get caught.”

“Word,” Fatboy and Pokey said.

“Look, I got a good plan. We just gotta get in touch with the nigga Turtle, and make some type of deal with them nigga,” Fatboy said.

“Now you thinking,” Pokey said. “We’ll let them niggas do the dirty work, and we’ll sit back and watch.”

“Word. I’m down with that. This what we gonna do,” Fatboy said. “Flick, when you go back to school tomorrow, holla at the nigga Turtle and his crew and tell them I got something sweet for them, but it’s more like a come-up, ’cause they’ll benefit from this lovely if they with this. Tell them to meet us at the auditorium on Martin Luther King Tuesday evening when they got the basketball games. For the jits.”

“All right,” Flick said. “I’ll handle that ASAP tomorrow when I see the nigga. Other than that, what’s up? What we ’bout to do?”

“Look,” Fatboy said, “we gotta plan this shit right. We got three keys that we can make money off. And the good thing is, if we get Shine and Boo Boo out the way without us being involved, I’m pretty sure Mr. Big will still let us do our thing out that crib.”

“Well, I’m in,” Flick said.

“Me too,” Pokey said. “So when the time comes, we’ll set everything up, and afterwards it’s on and popping. We’ll be selling our own shit. So what we make is all ours, and if we decide to get more, we’ll just cope from Mr. Big for the low-low,” Pokey said, smiling.

“So now that that’s over with, what we gonna do?”

“Shit. Let me take this shit upstairs right quick,” Pokey said, popping the trunk and snatching the bag. They held the dope hostage, and throwing the bag over his shoulder, he made his way up the stairs. After hiding the stuff at a safe spot, he left just as quickly as he came.

“Come on, y’all. Let’s ride around and see what going on in Ocala.” As Pokey dumped behind the steering wheel, Fatboy climbed in the passenger seat and Flick hopped in back.

“Let’s ride.”

As the car started backing up, Pokey hit the play button on the stereo, and all you heard was “Wonder Why They Call You Bitch” by Tupac.

“Damn, nigga. You just like ya Uncle Sico. All you niggaz listen to is some damn Tupac,” Flick said.

“Nigga, who better than 2Pac?” Pokey said, turning the shit up “That’s what I thought,” Pokey said.

“Nigga, you crazy. Biggie Smalls,” Flick said.

“He good, but Pac don’t see that nigga,” Fatboy said, siding with Pokey on 2Pac. “So where we going?”

“Shit, well just ride through the other projects and see what’s going on.” As they rode around, they came to the projects known as Parkside. As they slowly rode through, they saw three as bad hood chicks.

“Man, look, ain’t that Baby Tony? Fine as hell.”

“Yeah,” Flick said. “And that’s her sister Tiffany,” Flick said.

“Well, who is the dark skin chick with the fat ass?”

“Oh, that’s Nichol Mathis. She ain’t doing shit, she fucked up ’bout her baby daddy,” Flick said.

“Well, let’s see,” Fatboy said. Nigga tapped the horn. Beep, beep. As the horn sounded, all three girls turned around, trying to figure out who the hell these niggas were.

“Hey, Baby Tony, check this out!” Flick yelled.

“Boy, what’s up?” Baby Tony said.

“Nothing, nigga just chilling. Checking your fine ass but that’s all. What’s up though? What you ’bout to do?” Flick asked.

“Chill with my sister and cousin. Why, what’s up?”

“First off, tell ya cousin Nichol, my dog said check this out.”

As Baby Tony delivered the message, the girl Nichol made her way to the car.

“What? What y’all want?”

“Damn, it’s like that?” Fatboy said. “Nigga just trying to see what’s up with you.”

“What you want to be up with me?” Nichol asked.

“Hold up,” Fatboy said, hopping out the car. “Now let me holla at you in person.”

After ten minutes of talking Fatboy got what he wanted, a number and possibly a down-ass chick. Even though in his mind he knew his shortie Shakia would always be number one, it was just something about the way this girl swayed her hips.

“All right, y’all, let’s ride.” As they left Parkside and went about four blocks over to the projects called Marion Minor, they rode around but wasn’t nothing popping, no hoes outside, so we ended up in Buzz B Quarter, where shit always seems to be alive. We rode around, hollered at a few chicks, then left. ’Round 9:45 that night we pulled back up in our projects, K-Mart Projects, feeling good to be home. As all three boys exited the car, they said, “Dog, I’ll see y’all tomorrow.” Before everyone went in for the night, Fatboy told Flick, “Flick, don’t forget to handle that with the nigga Turtle.”

“Y’all, dog, I got you. I ain’t gonna forget. Word. I’m out.”