Christmas in the Hood (18 page)

She hadn’t known if she would ever see Noelle again. She went into her sister’s arms and hugged her like she had never hugged her before.

“I missed you so much, Noelle! I even missed you telling me to do my homework.”

“I missed you, too, baby girl.”

“Carlos, you have visitors,” Cocoa announced, and swiveled his chair around just in time to see Gray and Parker walk through his office door. “Go on and say hello to your friends.”

Cocoa slapped Carlos on the back of his head and laughed. She loved her job so much. Being a female assassin was quite enjoyable. Especially when she got to deal with vermin like Carlos. Those were the kills she relished.

“Carlos, you sorry motherfucker,” Gray said. He walked over and spit in his face.

Parker stood his ground and kept an eye on Noelle and Paris. He was glad to see the sisters reunited. His plan had worked out well. Now he was enjoying every minute of watching Carlos’s soon-to-be corpse helpless in that chair.

“This will teach you to steal from me,” Gray told Carlos’s paralyzed body as he pulled out a Magnum .357 that would rival Dirty Harry’s gun any day. “I will see you in hell.”

Gray pulled the trigger and blew a hole in the center of Carlos’s chest.

“What do we have here?” Gray asked as he bent down to the duffel bag beside Carlos’s desk. He unzipped it and found the bag full of crisp benjamins.

Gray took his time and counted out one hundred bills, then repeated the process. He gave the first stack to Cocoa.

“Cocoa, thank you for being available on such short notice,” Gray told her.

“Anything for you, Gray. I think I’ll use this ten thousand to fly to Italy to pick up a few more pairs of shoes.”

“That’s my girl,” Gray said affectionately.

Gray handed the other ten thousand to Parker. “This is a down payment. I need another safe designed.”

“No problem, Gray. I’ll get right on it,” Parker replied.

Gray zipped the duffel bag, still full with the rest of the money, and handed it to Noelle.

“Give your mother a proper burial, put away a college fund for your sister, and have some fun. You have a lot of responsibility for someone so young.”

Noelle accepted the duffel bag with shaking hands. Her mind was spinning. The bag was
full
of one-hundred-dollar bills.

“I don’t know what to say,” Noelle sputtered.

“Say you won’t ever try to break in my house again.” Gray laughed. “All right, everybody, let’s get the fuck out of Dodge in case the neighbors heard that gunshot. It would cost a lot of my money to bail all you motherfuckers out of jail and even more for your silence.”

“Call me the next time you need me, Gray,” Cocoa said as she stood, adjusted her shades, and walked out the house.

“Parker, you’ll make sure Noelle and her sister get home safely?”

“It would be my honor, Gray.”

Gray winked at Parker. “She is drop-dead gorgeous, isn’t she? I mean, shawty is phat!”

Parker laughed. Gray always sounded as if he belonged on Wall Street rather than in the ’hood.

“I have to agree with you, Gray. I haven’t met someone as beautiful as Noelle in a long time.”

“Well, don’t fuck up,” Gray instructed.

“Don’t worry, I won’t.”

Gray walked out, leaving Parker, Noelle, and Paris all alone. “Well, ladies, after you.”

“How can I ever thank you, Parker?” Noelle asked, still clutching both Paris and the duffel bag.

“You and Paris can spend Christmas with me.”

Noelle smiled. For the first Christmas in a long time, she had a reason to celebrate.

A Christmas Song

Seth “Soul Man” Ferranti

Chapter One

“
Y
ou know I hate fuckin’ Christmas, so forget about it,” Johnny Two-Fingers told his paisano, Big Vinny, who nodded in agreement. “How the fuck am I supposed to buy my fucking wife and kids presents from here?” Johnny Two-Fingers asked.

Just then Mikey P and Tommy Boy, two other New York wise-guys, walked up. Fats, who worked as an orderly in the unit, watched as he swept up the front entryway.

“Hey, Johnny, what the fuck is up?” Mikey P said, shaking hands with Johnny Two-Fingers and nodding to Big Vinny. Tommy Boy greeted them, too.

“Fucking Mikey P. We got a motherfucking problem here,” Johnny Two-Fingers said.

Mikey P looked on and pushed his glasses up. “Oh yeah, well,
what the fuck is that, Johnny? We gotta bury somebody or what?” Mikey P joked, and all the Italians laughed as Mikey P jabbed Big Vinny in the arm. “Sounds like a job for Big Vinny, hey, Tommy Boy?”

As they all laughed, Fats thought about his own family and what he would get them for Christmas. Johnny Two-Fingers was saying how even for those with money, it wasn’t easy to get your family presents from prison. It wasn’t like prisoners could buy the presents and wrap them. The Italians kept talking, ignoring Fats as he swept up cigarette butts on the walkway.

“Now look here,” Johnny Two-Fingers said to Mikey P. “Youse a man with experience. Now I’m asking youse. How the fuck am I supposed to buy my fucking wife and kids presents from here? You know Christmas is right around the corner, and I gots to buy them something. They’re expecting it, locked up or not. I know youse been down a long time, Mikey P, and I remember your family getting all types of nice presents every year while youse was away. So tell us, how did youse pull it off?”

Mikey P got a real serious look on his face and pushed his glasses up his nose again. He was the reputed consigliere for the Luchasse family in New York, and as he composed his five-foot-seven-inch frame, Fats could see how he had risen to his position.

It wasn’t his stature
, Fats thought,
it was the way he carried himself.
The way he walked and talked. Like he knew the answer to every question. Fats didn’t know the Italians real well, but he said hi and ’bye to them in passing. They were all in his unit. Fats continued to ear hustle the Italians while he swept.

“This is hows I pulled it off all these years, getting my family presents for Christmas or whatever,” Mikey P shared. “I just tells
my cousin Johnny G. ‘Hey, Johnny, find out what the kids and missus want for Christmas and buy it for them, all right?’ Forget about it. That’s all you need to do, Johnny. A piece of work right?” Mikey P laughed and jabbed his partner Tommy Boy in the arm, and Tommy Boy took up the laughter, too. In a second all four Italians were laughing their asses off like what Mikey P said was the funniest thing they’d heard this year.

“So, what you gonna get ’em all for Christmas, Johnny?” Mikey P asked.

“Aw Mikey, I don’t fuckin’ know. I guess I better call my brother and tell him to get them something or I’ll never hear the end of it. Forget about it.” Johnny Two-Fingers laughed and looked over at Fats, whom he noticed for the first time.

“Hey, Fats,” Johnny Two-Fingers called. “What you gonna get your family for Christmas? I saw those little kids of yours in the visiting room. You gonna get them something nice, right?”

Fats looked up, making eye contact with the chubby Italian. He wasn’t used to them talking to him, but he guessed he’d been around the unit and on the compound long enough now for them to acknowledge him. It had been only eight months, but it seemed like much longer. All the Italians were waiting for him to speak.

“Yeah, I’m gonna get them something real nice,” Fats answered. All the Italians smiled.

Mikey P nodded and put his arm around Johnny Two-Fingers. “See Johnny, that kid ain’t even been here longer than you, and he already knows what’s up. He’s probably been planning it for a month already. And here we are two months away from Christmas, and you don’t even know what to get your fucking family,
forget about it.” Mikey P clapped Johnny Two-Fingers on the back. Johnny Two-Fingers cringed from the clap, but he didn’t say anything. All the wise guys laughed, and Fats walked away smiling, but honestly, he didn’t know what he was going to do for his family at Christmas. Unlike the Italians, who were known as the “Big Willies” and big spenders on the compound, Fats didn’t have any money to lavish on gifts for his loved ones. Actually, he didn’t have any money at all.

Fats was fresh in on a ten-year bid for conspiracy to distribute crack. Twenty-four years old and not a dime to his name. Don’t get it fucked up, Fats was a hustler, but he wasn’t a big-time dude like the Italians, and he had no money saved up. All the money he made serving dudes from the block went to support his three kids and two baby-mamas, that is, whatever he didn’t trick or gamble away. Now he was doing time in a new federal prison in West Virginia, FCI Beckley. Five hours from home and broke as a joke. He was lucky he had the twenty-five-dollar-a-month unit-orderly job that his homeboy Mel-Mel had hooked him up with when he hit the pound. And now it was Christmastime. Fats didn’t even want to think about it as he made his way back into the unit.

“What up, slim?”

A downcast Fats looked up and smiled at his man, Rock. “Ain’t but a thing, moe. What’s up with you?” Fats asked as he pounded fists with Rock.

“You looking all sad and shit, slim! Let me find out this time killing you already?” Rock jigged at his friend.

“Naw, dawg, it’s all good. I’m just thinking about my kids,” Fats said.

“Well, that’s all good, slim. The lil’ ones coming up on the bus this weekend or what?”

“Yeah, I gotta holla at my babys’ moms, but I think they coming up for sure, moe. Why, your peeps coming up, too?” Fats asked.

“You know it, baby boy! I’m trying to get my shine on up on that dance floor. It’s the only time these crackers let a nigga live,” Rock said seriously, and Fats agreed.

Doing time was rough. Especially up in these hills
, he thought.
With all these redneck guards always sweating a brother. Getting time with the family in the visiting room was one of the only reasons dudes in prison stayed sane
, Fats thought. But for real, this Christmas thing was killing Fats. He’d never spent a Christmas away from his family before. And now his kids Maurice, Yvette, and Demitrius—who were eight, six, and five—would not only have to spend their first Christmas away from their father, they might not even get a decent present from him.
I got to come up with something
, he thought.
Hopefully I can holla at Laquesha about it on the VI this weekend.

His homie Rock had been down a minute, but he didn’t have any kids. Maybe Rock might know of a way to come up. Fats would have to holler at him later; it was still only October.

Chapter Two

I
t was a long trip on the crowded bus with two kids all the way from D.C. to bum-fuck West Virginia, but to Laquesha it was worth it. Fats was her babys’ daddy, and when he was on the
street he always provided well. It had been rough for Laquesha since Fats got locked up. She was surviving, but it was by no means easy, and it hadn’t even been a year yet. She was lucky she’d had her mother to fall back on.

“Damn, girl, ain’t we there yet?” Melissa asked Laquesha. Melissa was Rock’s girl. She was the one who hooked Laquesha up with the bus-trip people. They picked up families all over D.C. and took them to visit at different federal institutions in Virginia, West Virginia, and Maryland, depending on the week. They charged only twenty-five dollars per person, and kids under twelve rode for free. After paying for a hotel and having money for the vending machines for two days, Laquesha could afford to do it only once a month. It was the least she could do—taking the kids to see their daddy—besides, Laquesha had a soft spot for Fats, too.
Even though he was a no-good, cheating motherfucker
, she thought. She was just glad that Kim, Fats’s other baby’s mama, wasn’t on this trip. She hated when she had to share the visit with that bitch, even though, Kim and Fats’s son, Demitrius, was cute as he could be.

It wouldn’t be long, and Christmas would be coming up
, Laquesha thought. She knew it would be a rough Christmas this year because, with Fats in jail, money would be tight. Laquesha would do what she could, but it wouldn’t be the same. Fats had always spoiled the kids, buying them whatever they’d wanted. But this year it would be different. Maurice and Yvette would just have to face the facts that their daddy was locked up and money wasn’t coming in like it used to. She hoped they were old enough to understand.

“We almost there,” Laquesha told Melissa, who closed her
eyes. The bus trip had picked them up damn near in the middle of the night so that they could get there by nine a.m. before the ten a.m. weekend count. Laquesha knew if they didn’t make it in before then, they would be waiting until almost noon before the count cleared and the prisoners were called. The prison staff acted like the families were the criminals, giving off attitude like they didn’t even want families to visit for real. It was an experience, but for the kids it was worth it to see their daddy.

Yvette opened up her big brown eyes, which were the focal point of her little face. “Mommy, are we there yet?” she asked.

“Yeah, we almost there,” Laquesha said, smoothing back her daughter’s hair which was braided the way Fats liked it.

Fats always insisted on Yvette having her hair neatly braided. Laquesha thought it was cute, so she always made sure to braid both her and Yvette’s hair before they visited. Maurice slept soundly in his Washington Redskins jersey. He was growing up real fast, Laquesha knew, and it wouldn’t be long now before he was a man. Fats didn’t want his son to follow his path, but Laquesha didn’t know how she would keep him off the streets. He was already starting to run wild with the neighborhood boys. As the bus pulled onto the road that led to the prison, Laquesha started getting herself and her kids ready for the visit.

*  *  *

“Daddy!” Yvette screamed as she flew into Fats’s arms. Maurice and Laquesha followed, and hugs and kisses were exchanged all the way around. They all took a seat off to one side.

Fats scoped out his man Rock and his girl, Melissa. He nodded
at both of them saying, “What’s up.” “You be talking to Rock’s girl on the trip?” Fats asked Laquesha. “Yeah, boo, that’s my girl, why?” Laquesha said.