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nine

. . .

“Welcome home, nigga!” Keon shouted, throwing his hands in the air as Maximus walked out of the barbed-wire electric gates of San Quentino prison. “How does it feel to be a free man?”

Maximus inhaled the air and took it all in. “Surreal, actually. I don’t even know what to do with myself without a routine.”

“Well, first things first, we’re going to go back to the hotel get you in something that ain’t prison-issued, get you some food, maybe a bitch and be on the first thing smoking back to Waynesville in the morning.”

“I’m straight on the bitches,” Maximus muttered, recalling that the only reason he was in this shit was because of a woman and his brother snaking him out. “Some food, a shower, and sleep without niggas yelling and screaming all night is all I need.”

“Aight then, that’s the move we’ll make,” Keon shared, walking back toward the JoyRide.

The ride through the desert to civilization was long, but Maximus cherished every moment of it.

The cynical reminders pierced the recesses of his brain.

Augustus had set him up with the death of Wando to have Priya.

Funny shit about that was she wasn’t even a prize for real.

If she could dip out on a nigga who exposed his heart to her, she could and very well would do it to him.

He knew that when he returned home, he had no desire to see either of them. There was no talking about it. The way he met disrespect was with his fists. Round for round against whoever wanted to go there with him.

“You cool?” Keon asked.

Maximus nodded. This by far was his longest bid, and he felt like he’d wasted so much of his time going back and forth to jail, and now, prison. He’d gone in at twenty-seven and now, getting out at thirty-two, put him behind the eight ball.

“Thinkin’ about how starting a rap career at thirty-two is crazy as hell,” Maximus muttered.

“It ain’t how you start, it’s how you finish, plus you got some buzz around your name. You got new fans who are waiting on you to get home, the hood finna go up for you too.”

Maximus groaned. “I’m gon’ need a week just to lay low.”

“I’m not sure if that’s possible. UVE wants to meet with you the day after tomorrow to discuss this deal.”

“The deal sound legit?”

“Yeah, it all sounds legit. I got your lawyer looking over the details, but I think this is a great way to kick off the beginning of your career. I even lined you up with a brand consultant.”

“What the fuck is that? Some nerd telling me what and what not to do?” Maximus asked, frowning his face up.

“Sort of. They help you build your brand, put you in the room with the right people at the right time.”

“You speakin’ a foreign language to me. I don’t know nothing about that shit. You ain’t fucked me over yet so you can handle that.”

“Don’t get on your bullshit when you don’t like the way it’s going,” Keon stated.

“Nigga, I’m finna be on bullshit if that shit is stupid and waste of my time. Like my talent should be able to get me wherever I need to be.”

“This is true. But take LaRay Graham for instance, that nigga got sold out concerts and the highest streamed albums in history and he didn’t win an award for all that work until last year. All of it is because he didn’t have the right team.”

“Yeah, whatever you say. I’m just not on that fake, corny ass shit. My brand ID is Trae Way. I am Trae Way, and that needs to be represented everywhere I go.”

“I got you,” Keon said, placing his hand over his chest. “Don’t sweat it.”

Maximus was inclined to trust Keon. He’d been the only one by his side this whole bid.

Funny how they’d gone from serving corners together, breaking product down together, to now trying to cement their places in the rap world.

..together. It was unfortunate that Keon had been more of a brother than Augustus had.

Maximus settled into the seat, letting his eyes pull closed. When they arrived at the hotel, Keon retrieved two duffle bags from the trunk and handed one to Maximus.

“What the fuck you put in here? A dead body?”

“You’ll see when you get to your room. I’ll get up with you in an hour?”

“Yeah, bet,” Maximus replied, taking a room key from Keon and heading toward the elevator. Everyone watched as Maximus roamed past them in his prison-issued sweats. Keon had him in a bougie ass hotel where old women were holding their purses extra tight and hurrying away from him.

He kissed his teeth and rode the elevator to his floor.

Once inside his room, he peeled the clothes from his body, tied them up in a trash bag, and stepped inside the steaming shower.

For the first time in four years, he wasn’t standing in water full of other men’s semen and shit.

He could wash without someone plotting on taking him down or trying to take him period.

Taking a grown man off the streets and locking him away with hundreds of other grown ass men was a level of hell he never wanted to return to.

How niggas idolized this shit was beyond him.

They were never dragging his black ass off to prison again.

He’d have to go out in a rain of bullets before ever seeing the inside of a penitentiary again.

After he cleansed himself, he explored the duffle bag Keon handed over before they went their separate ways.

A few packs of t-shirts and sweats, his usual.

Branded t-shirts, jeans, socks, underwear, a pair of new J’s, and under all of that were stacks of money.

Maximus counted at least fifteen bands before finding a brand-new iPhone.

Inside the phone box was a debit card and all the info he needed to deposit his money into his own account.

The crazy shit about this was, Maximus had never had a bank account.

All his transactions were done in cash, stored in rubber-banded bundles in a shoe box.

Keon kept proving that he was solid, and for that, Maximus would be sure to look out for him when he got on. After donning a pair of sweats and a t-shirt, he slipped his feet into his sneakers and pulled his wet afro into a ponytail before he made his way back down to the lobby to meet Keon.

Finding him amongst the crowd with his phone pressed to his ear, Keon threw his hand up acknowledging Maximus’ presence.

“Aight, let me run over this with him and we’ll hit you up about it when we touch the soil again,” Keon said, appeasing whoever he was on the phone with.

Maximus’ thick, almost-unibrow knitted. “Fuck was that?”

Keon smirked. “Mama. She heard you were out, wanted you to come through rap, help you back on your feet.”

“I’m not taking no handout from Mama. That shit sounds like being indebted again and I’m not on that time. Indebted means slipping right back into the same bullshit we were on before.”

“Same bullshit you were on. I’m still hustling,” Keon admitted. “Your shit did good with you inside but I’m not the type of nigga to eat when my nigga is starving.”

“You ain’t take a cut of none of that?”

“Nah, I paid the engineer and the other fees associated with it, but all that is yours.”

“Nah, you got to take something. Four years, you were holding me down,” Maximus replied, not sure how to feel that Keon didn’t even bother to pay himself.

“I was doing what solid men do, MB. That’s just how the shit goes.”

Maximus bobbed his head. “Aight. But you gettin’ what I owe and that’s the end of the back and forth on this shit.”

“What about the Mama shit?”

Maximus groaned. “I’m cool on that. I’m down for another venue and her rolling through, but I’m not stepping foot back in Midnight. It’s the belly of the beast, and I want to focus on the upward movement.”

“Heard that. I’ll let her know. You down for some wings?”

“I’m down for whatever ain’t fucking prison food,” Maximus stated, strolling out in the night air.

The two walked to a nearby restaurant, chopped it up, and made plans on what was next. Just like they used to do in Trae Way. Two hustlers just dreaming of what life looked like outside of Trae Way.

“I looked shorty up,” Maximus spoke, placing his cup of water back on the table.

“Who? Eden?”

“Yeah, she been steady posting my shit.”

“Yeah, she’s from the hood too. Got some big modeling contract and moved out and ain’t stepped foot back in it.”

“That’s what’s up.”

Keon looked at him, a silly smirk forming over his face. “Fuck you want? A connect or something? You trying to come and get with that out that gate?”

Maximus schooled his smile. He wasn’t going to tell him that Eden’s features occupied his mind in the final weeks. “Nah, nah. Chill. Just wanted to reach out, say thank you type shit.”

“That’s why you got a phone nigga. Reach out, chop it up. Do what you want. But I’m going to warn you, she’s managed by MRA, and they got a tight grip on her. She don’t even step out with niggas for real.”

“She gay?”

“Nah, she got a brand and rules.”

Maximus hummed. “Saying thanks ain’t going to break none of her rules.”

“Yeah, the issue with that is, you like breaking rules.”

Maximus leaned back. “Chill out. I ain’t gon’ throw her world out of orbit or nothing. I got my own shit to worry about.”

“Uh huh,” Keon muttered, taking a bite out of his wing. “We’ll see ‘bout that.”