A Naked Singularity: A Novel (38 page)

“Well, first of all Red Bags had nothing to do with me getting started,” he said. “Nothing at all. Reds is nothing in the scheming of things. He’s a piece of shit, understand that. When I met him he took orders from me. I came back here, to this country, because of Escalera. Juan Escalera, he’s my cousin, asked me to come back here from the DR to work for him. He was supposedly making mad money over here selling and I wasn’t really doing anything good over there so I came. I’ve known Escalera since I was like five, well he’s not really my cousin that’s just something we call people we’re really tight with and shit. I grew up in this country and didn’t move to the DR until I was fifteen. That’s how come I speak English so good. I’m not like some idiot either, I went to college in Santo Domingo and everything. But over there it’s not like here. Here if you go to college and become like a lawyer or doctor or something then you’re guaranteed to have some decent money at least. Over there doctors and lawyers drive cabs and work in restaurants washing dishes. Even like Casi here and everything who’s like the most best lawyer I know.

So anyway I came back here and started working for the guy. That was about four years ago and I have to admit that Escalera was good to me at first. He worked mostly out of Queens at the time and I was staying at one of his apartments in Jackson Heights. The Colombians were everywhere in that area. That’s Little Colombia basically and they controlled almost all the selling in that area. Anyway, they weren’t crazy about E let’s put it that way. This was mostly because they knew he wasn’t Colombian, but also because of the way we made inroads into their business. Okay the way it works, I know you know this, is that at the level we were at we have someone getting us our stuff from Santo Domingo whereas the Colombians are obviously getting their stuff from Colombia somewhere and bringing it in through Tijuana. Now we’re turning around and selling our stuff at a hundred percent usually to one of these little street guys like Red Bags. Now I don’t know how, but E was able to get a great price from his guy in the DR. So in turn we were able to undercut the Colombians’ price and get more and more of the street guys to come to us including even some Colombians. Well this pissed the Colombians off because now they have to either drop their prices or convince us to raise ours. They decided they weren’t going to do neither. Instead they kidnap Escalera so they could give him their business proposition: either get the fuck out of Queens or start wearing your tongue through your throat. You know about that right? Well let me say that none of us had ever seen Escalera so freaked out. He was like let’s get the hell out of Queens I don’t need this shit. Suddenly it was Manhattan all up in his brain and that’s where our people are, blazay-blazay, and we needed to get over there and all that.

So that’s what we did and basically I was in charge of setting it all up. I had heard of Red Bags and maybe even met him once or twice. He was famous. Basically you heard about him because he was considered a violent fuck and he was like huge, his physics I mean. Also he was the only black guy you ever saw with fucking red hair and freckles. I thought he was stupid because basically those violent guys are. But I’ll say this and I’ll give the man credit. For his level of dealer, like those street guys with no foreign connection, he moved more than anyone in Manhattan really. So while some piece-of-shit street guys are buying maybe an eighth a week he would buy at least a kilo maybe two in that time. He could move that much because he controlled a bunch of spots around 127th Street and the reason he controlled all them spots was that people were afraid of him because of shit he had doned in the past. You have to understand that from our end we don’t give a fuck how many spots he has or how he got them just like our guy in the DR doesn’t give a fuck who Red Bags is. All we know is this guy has a lot of spots to constantly re-up and he stays clean, doesn’t pick up cases. What that means is if you get him to go with you, you’ve got a great head start to doing business in Manhattan and shit. And I knew that he was having problems with his guy and was looking for someone else. I also knew from looking into it that his current supplier was low-key and not someone you had to worry would step to us and trip out all violent and shit if we took one of his guys.

One of the big advantages we had was that we were like new and unknown being we were coming from Queens and whatnot. E was able to portray it like we had stood up to the bad big Colombians and now were looking to branch out to Manhattan when obviously that wasn’t the case at all and we were actually running for our lives. I give him credit for that though and we were able to shift to Manhattan and take over Red Bags and a couple other minor guys without any real problems. This was the best time. E knew he wouldn’t be where he was if I hadn’t had set up the whole Red Bags/Manhattan thing so he gave me a lot of responsibility and I basically answered only to him and this other guy who’s no longer around. Everything was peaceful too. On our end anyway. I mean Red Bags is a Blood as you know, he’s like a Four Star General and shit. That’s where the whole red thing comes from. And the hair too I guess. That and the way he packages his shit obviously. Anyway he’s a big Blood so there was always some mad violent shit going on with that between him and other blacks but that didn’t really affect us in any way. We stayed out of that shit and all we knew is every Saturday he was at E’s buying, like I said, one or two kilos and paying in full and in cash. So because of that it was all good you know what I mean?

We was making money fist over hand and that should have been the most important thing but fucking E had to be stupid about it. There was this whack girl. Okay she was amazing. I’m serious man you should have seen this chick. She was all that and then some more let’s say. And I took up with her or whatever but the truth is she never had any interest in Escalera from what she tells me. So that was the beef basically and, I don’t know, maybe I should have made a better effort to smooth things under but I didn’t and things just kept getting worser and worser between us. Next thing I know I’m being knocked down and shit and I’m not making any money. So I admit it. I basically went over his back or behind his head or whatever and went to Santo Domingo to talk to the guy who was getting us our stuff, to see if he would front me if I split from Escalera and whatnot. The truth is I didn’t have the money to pull off a move like that so I needed this guy to hook me up. He wouldn’t and when it got back to Escalera he flipped out. He got all in my face and shit. Then he also started talking shit about the fact I had used once or twice even though we both knew that was bullshit and he was just using it as an excuse. He was basically saying, well if you’re going to use you can’t be trusted with anything important and shit and junkies are the ones doing hand to hands on the street so next thing I know he’s talking to Red Bags on my behalf and I’m busted down to some bullshit four-hundred-dollar-a-week street seller working for Red Bags, but with supposably special status because I’m supposed to still be with E and whatnot. The whole thing was bullshit because it was really about that girl I’m telling you you should have seen. But the truth was I
had
gone behind his nose so I had to take it like a man. I had made my move and failured you know? The truth also is that even though I had been making sweet money for over a year, I was spending it just as fast as I could get my hands on it, mostly on this girl I’m talking about, and because of that I couldn’t really afford to tell E to go to hell and fuck off. I just had to like gargle my pride as they say, kiss his ass, and take whatever crumbs he threw at me.

So now I’m like the only white guy working for Red and he trains his guys to use crackheads and shit to do a big part of the sales for like a dollar or whatever. I hated that shit but I did it figuring it was just a moment of time before I would be back to where I was before and where I belonged. I knew no one could a did what I didded for E better than me. As far as Red is concerned he treated me well because everybody knew I was Escalera’s cousin or whatever. This went on for like six months or something and I’m doing street sales basically in that entire area of 127th Street until the day I got popped. Some fucking guy, I knew he was a fucking cop. I don’t know why I went through with that shit. I’ll never forget, I mean what kind of construction worker wears white sneakers? I felt like an idiot. Deep down I think I knew he was a cop but I was so sick of the whole shit I almost didn’t care. When I got arrested I kind of figured Escalera would let be-gones be gone and come to my defense. I was broke. I knew the deal. A guy like Red Bags, if one of his guys, someone who works for him, gets arrested, he’s not going to lift a finger to help them. I mean nothing, no bail, no paid lawyer, nothing. Everybody knows that. That’s just the way it is at that level.

But at the level that Escalera was at and that I had been at, it’s a different story. That shit don’t play. When one of those guys gets arrested usually his boss will post the bail and pay for a lawyer. It’s known that this is supposed to keep the person who was arrested from snitching on the boss, because of gratitude and also from the influence of the lawyer because that lawyer knows who’s paying his bill. I knew it was a little different in this case. First of all, what I just said usually happens on the federal level where the person arrested is charged with something a lot more serious than a dime street sale and is facing a lot more time than I was. Still it wasn’t like you guys were offering community service on the shit either. I was a predicate from a gun charge I picked up years ago that had nothing to do with the stuff I’m talking about now. Anyway I’m hearing three to six and shit and I’m freaking out cause I’ve never done so much as day one anywhere. Here or there. So I got word to E that I was facing real time and whatnot. I expected him to represent and shit, bail me out and get me a lawyer. But he didn’t. Nothing. Instead he treated me like some punk-ass bitch bringing people to spots for a dollar. The worsest part is that he like stringed me along and shit. He kept saying he was going to do something but he never did. There was always some excuse. That was it man! I swore Escalera was dead to me from that moment on.

The only side that was bright in all this, I’m serious the only silver lining that was cloudy, was that I had this man right here as my lawyer. I was even ready to take the three to six believe it or not until I realized this guy meant business. After Casi beat the case at trial and I was released that same night, I flew home and had my first
chuleta
in six months. That’s a pork chop and it tasted great, like freedom. The next morning who shows up at my door but fucking Escalera! He was like the guy who never got off the fucking bench and whatnot but was the first to spray champagne in the locker room after the win. All of a sudden all he can say is how he knew all along they had nothing on me and how I was right to take it to trial and all that. I wanted to tell him to go to hell since he had done nothing for me from the time I was arrested. He hadn’t even visited me or anything like that. But then I realized he was basically there to kiss my ass. Suddenly I’m his cousin again and I had shown I had true colors and whatnot because I took my case like a man and didn’t go snitching on anyone. And I should go back to working with him because he was working on something big and there was going to be a lot of money to be made and he needed my help and so on. I was broke man, I had nothing. What the hell else could I do? Do you know what it’s like to not have enough money to buy a token and get on a train? That business was the only thing I knew. So I went back.

But it was weird. Even though Escalera was kissing my ass like never before, it wasn’t like I went back to where I was before our beef. He gave me this long speech and dance about how it would be better if I went back to Red and worked my way back up from the street. I’m like
better for who bitch
? But he was like assuring me. You’re my number two man he said but now wasn’t a good time for changes. A lot of crazy shit was going on and he needed someone he could trust to be involved in the Red Bags operation, so he could have tabs on what was going on down there. He was working on something huge he said. Something that would make us so much money we wouldn’t have to worry about small-timers like Red anymore but for now he didn’t want to stir the waves. So now I’m back with Red doing street sales but at the same time I’m also getting a nice cut from Escalera and keeping him informed about what’s going down at those spots. I was like a double agent and shit. It was kind of cool actually.

The reason for all that? Well it took me a little while, but I got to the bottom of it and realized why I was so important to E all of a sudden. Why I was being treated more like a partner than before. What was going on
was
fucked up for sure. Below us and above us it was basically chaostic for sure.

As far as Red was concerned, his spots were being challenged. He was having Crips trouble. Basically the Crips were trying to extend some of their little, pussy operation into Red’s 127th Street spots. I guess their strategy was just to disrupt as much as they could. They were like slashing people who bought or sold red bags of crack at those spots and like trying to instigate a war and shit. This was not the biggest deal in the world, I’m not trying to say that, but it was still something E wanted to keep a close eye on. This was a big difference I noticed after I got out. Escalera seemed to have gotten a lot smarter during the time I was in Rikers. Red Bags was our best customer so anything that was bad for him, anything that disrupted his business, was bad for us. In the worstest scenario case, if Red Bags let those spots go to the Crips for whatever reason he would be moving a lot less shit and buying a lot less from us. The truth is E didn’t really have the muscle to back Red Bags up and none of the other dealers on E’s level were going to get involved because bottom line is those spots being down for grabs was good for them. This had never been a concern before because of the rep Red Bags had as someone not to be fucked with. That apparently had changed and I guess there was the preconception that Red was weaker. I later found out that this happened because one of Red’s most violent guys had been sent upstate for a body and also there was this time where Red backed down from a fight in a park or something. Whatever the reason, all the mayhem down there coincidenced with some crazy shit happening above from us in the DR. The craziness at 127th had to do with the Bloods and the Crips, in Santo Domingo it was about Fat Felix and Freddy El Flaco.