The Reason Why (13 page)

“All right, my man, I'm headed out. Sit tight.”

“Pooh . . . ,” Chino said weakly. “I need you, Pooh . . .” And then he blacked out.

“R
evenge is mine, sayeth the Lord,” Pam said, quoting the Bible and changing the bandage on Chino's head. “Let the Lord take care of them, Chino.”

“Yeah, He can, I'm just gonna give Him an assist,” Chino retorted. “The Lord's gonna be MJ and I'm gonna be Scottie. I'm just gonna give an assist.”

Pam couldn't help but laugh. She applied peroxide to the wound and Chino winced because he was still in pain.

“Ooooucchh!” Chino cried out. “You did that on purpose.”

“Boy, that did not burn. It's only peroxide.” Pam held up the bottle to show him. Cleaning off the wound, she continued. “You mocking the Lord the way you are, Christonos, He'll have something that's really going to make you hurt.”

“Baby, I'm not mocking the Lord. I just said that I was going to give Him a helping hand.”

“He does not need your help, mister.”

“I want to help. Me and my nina ross is going to send them
niggas on a trip to the other world. They moms might as well pull them black dresses out the closet.”

“Christonos!”

“What?”

“It was by the grace of God they didn't shoot you coming out of that store. It was by the grace of God they didn't shoot you while you were driving on the highway, and it was only by the grace of God did Joe Baby find you before the cops did. Just say your thanks, and move on.”

“I'll move on after I kill that bastard. Pooh, this is personal.”

“I thought you hit him. I thought that's why they crashed?”

Chino shook his head. “I thought I did too, but I ain't see shit in the
Dispatch
. I've been checking the papers and watching the news, and that son of a bitch ain't been in it. If any of them was dead, then they would have said so. No, those assholes made it, and the fucked-up thing is, I know they had to go to a hospital somewhere. How the fuck they get shot and get medical help without the police arresting their asses is beyond me. I don't understand it. Them niggas got angels looking over their shoulders.”

“Chino, you got God looking over yours,” Pam told him matter-of-factly. “This is the second time this month you've been shot at and look at you—barely a scratch.”

“A scratch?” Chino asked, pointing toward his head. “You call this barely a scratch?”

“At least it's not a bullet hole!” Pam scolded. “Christonos, God had his hands cupped around you protecting you, and now you want to go out and harm someone else?”

“Pam, that son of a bitch has terrorized Columbus for
the last two years. He's got everybody scared as hell. Well, he's fucked with the wrong nigga now. I'm going to kill his ass.”

Pam exhaled and shook her head. “Where is he from?”

“Some people say they think he's from Louisiana, but who knows? All I know is that I'm going to put a bullet in his shrimp-smelling, gumbo-eating, jambalaya-looking ass. If that fool is from Louisiana, he's going back to the dirty dirty in a pine box.”

“They don't send people across country in pine boxes anymore. This isn't the Wild West.”

“Tell them that!” Chino said. “Hell, I thought I was in the middle of the O.K. Corral the way them fools was busting at me.”

“Hold still, boy!” Pam said, placing a fresh gauze over Chino's wound. She grabbed some strips of tape that she had peeled off, and taped the gauze over his wound. “There, that should do.”

“Thanks, Pooh.” Chino pulled Pam close and kissed her. “All I could think about was you.”

“Boy, please!” Pam pushed him away from her.

“For real! All I wanted to do was make it back to my Pooh.”

Pam folded her arms and pursed her lips. “Yeah, right.”

“That's the truth, Pooh. Making it back to you is what kept me alive.”

“Okay, Christonos. You know what? You're a smooth-ass talker. I'll give you that much.”

“You gonna give me more than that!” Chino said, rising. “You gonna give me some of that suga!”

Chino grabbed Pam, lifted her into the air, and spun her around. She screamed the whole time.

“Boy, put me down!”

“I love you, Pooh!”

“Okay!”

“Okay? Okay, my ass! Let me hear it!”

“Hear what?”

“I love you, Chino.”

“Why would I say that?”

“Because you do!” Chino spun her around again.

“Aaaaaah!” Pam screamed. “Put me down!”

“Say it!”

“Okay, okay, if you want to make me say it, then I'll say it.”

“I'm making you say it because you're acting like a scary-ass punk. You can say how you really feel to me, Pooh. You don't got to hide your feelings. If you love me, then let that shit be known.”

“Chino, what are you talking about?”

“You love me, Pooh, but you're afraid to tell me. You act like if you say it, then I'll somehow hurt you. Well, here's a secret, Pooh. Whether you say it out loud or not, you still feel it. And if I fuck up, then you'll still feel the same amount of pain, whether you said that shit out loud or not. So you might as well say it.”

“What if I don't feel that way, Chino?” Pam asked. “You still want me to say it?”

“I know that you do feel that way.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I can feel it. I can see it in your eyes. I felt it when you thought I was asleep and you were crying and caressing
my face. Because I heard your big-head ass whisper it when you thought that I was still out of it.”

“Chino!” Pam shouted. She was embarrassed. He had heard her deepest feelings. “You asshole!”

“I'm not going to hurt you, Pooh.” Chino put Pam back down and pulled her close. “I promise you that, Pooh. I'll never hurt you or let anybody else hurt you. I'd rather walk through hell with gasoline drawers on than hurt you. Do you understand that?”

No man had ever professed his love for her. Tears welled up in Pam's eyes. She suppressed a sniffle and turned her head away. She couldn't cry in front of him, or let him know that she had bought into what he had just said. She had to maintain.

“Why do you do that, Pooh?”

“Do what?”

“Resist showing me your feelings?” Chino pulled her hands down away from her face and stared into her eyes. “Pooh, I'm not after you to hurt you. We're on the same team. This is not a battle between us, or a test of wills. We don't have to protect ourselves from each other. We have to protect each other from what's out there. Beyond that door is our enemies. That world is what we are fighting together. I need for you to understand that, Pooh.”

“Chino, you just have to understand that I've never felt like this about anybody before. I'm still young. I've never put my trust in anybody like this before. And then you have to understand that you're cute and you have a lot of money, and a lot of girls want to talk to you. I'm scared to get hurt.”

“Pooh, I chose you,” Chino said, softly. “Those other girls
can say what they want to say, do what they want to do, but that don't mean shit to me. I'm here, Pooh, because I want to be here, and because I couldn't help it if I tried. I'm in love with you, girl. You have my heart. I couldn't help it, or change it, and I don't want to. I like it like this, Pooh. I love being in love with you.”

Chino lifted her hand and kissed her fingers one by one. “I love being wrapped around this cute little finger of yours.”

“Oh, God!” Pam said, throwing her head back. “Chino, you better not hurt me! Do you hear me? You better not ever hurt me!”

“I'll hurt me before I hurt you.” Chino pulled her close and kissed her. “Now come on and ride with ya man.”

“Where are we going?”

“To the Benz dealership. Them fools fucked off my Porsche, so now it's time to step it up and go top dog.”

“Boy, being flashy is how they found you in the first place,” Pam warned. “When are you going to learn?”

“That's right. That Benz is going to draw the niggas like moths to a flame.” Chino smiled, pulled out his new handgun, and cocked it. “But this time, they ass is going to get burnt for real!”

C
hino pulled up to the spot in his brand-new, porcelain white Mercedes Benz 560SEL. It had a full AMG kit and porcelain white and chrome AMG rims. The interior was white, with black piping around the seats, and a dark zebrano wood trim. It was truly a sight to behold.

“What the fuck?” Ant said the moment Chino pulled into the spot. Chris turned to see what Ant was talking about.

“No this nigga didn't!”

Rock looked up and saw what the others were looking at. His mouth fell open when he saw the car, and he tapped Joe Bub Baby on the shoulder. Joe Bub looked up from the ground where he was shooting dice.

“Fuck me!” he shouted.

Infa stood staring at Chino and shaking his head. “This nigga is crazy!”

Chino blew the horn and climbed out of his Benz. “What up, my niggas?”

He and his new car were quickly surrounded.

“Nigga, what the fuck are you thinking?” Joe Bub asked. “A Benz? A five-sixty at that?”

“Didn't you just barely get away from Jo Jo and them niggas?” Chris J asked. “And now you go and knock off a Benz? What are you asking for—death, nigga?”

“Fuck them niggas!” Chino shouted. “Them niggas can't control what I buy. Fuck them hoes! If they want to try it again, bring it on!”

“I can't believe you, my nigga,” Corey said. “If it was me, I'd a bought another Porsche. A faster one than the one I had.”

The crew burst into laughter.

“Shut yo silly ass up!” Rock told him. He turned to Chino. “This bitch is clean, kinfolk!”

“I was gonna go and buy one of these bitches,” Joe Bub declared, “but now, since you got a white one, I'ma have to get me an ice blue one.”

“Like that one we seen the other day?”

“That's the one!” Joe Bub confirmed to Ant.

“That bitch was clean,” Ant told them. “It was ice blue, sitting on some chrome AMGs, with a cocaine white interior.”

Corey's eyebrows rose. “Why do niggas always describe white as being cocaine white? Nigga, just say white!”

“Fuck you, nigga!” Ant retorted.

Again, the crew laughed.

“I don't know if I would have did this, kinfolk,” Infa told Chino. “I would have laid low for a minute.”

“Fuck them niggas!” Chino said. “This is our muthafucking
town! I know we ain't gonna let some out-of-town ass niggas intimidate us like that.”

“Don't listen to this nigga!” Rock said, pointing to Infa. “He's one of them tuck-in-his-chain ass niggas!”

Again the crew burst into laughter.

“Man, I'm just being real. Let's find them niggas first and put some work in on they ass.”

“Man, them niggas is lying up somewhere, recuperating from them bullet holes I put in them,” Chino said. “Let them hoes know that a Cleveland nigga don't bar nobody!”

Rock shook his head to clear the memory of all the shit that had gone down and looked at Chino. “So, how you feeling, kinfolk?”

“Shit, better.”

“You sure?” Chris J asked.

“Yeah, nigga!” To prove it, he put his dukes up and started shadowboxing in Chris's face. “I'm good. Ready to dance.”

Chris J waved Chino off. “Not even on your best day, nigga. You couldn't fade these hands. These are lethal weapons.”

“Nigga, this is one bad-ass pussy machine,” Corey said, peering inside the Benz. “Hoes are gonna be throwing their panties at you now.”

“I can't wait to pull up to the club in this bitch and watch them haters' eyes pop out,” Chino said.