Page 13 of Krist and Moanie (D-Ville Projects #3)

Krist

A fter I dropped Moanie off at work at two something this morning, I called myself coming back in and falling into bed, but I only slept another five hours before I got a call that interrupted all of that.

Saheed called me top of the morning and I thought it was an emergency.

I thought some shit was wrong, but according to him, the only problem he could think of was the fact that I was sitting on a mixtape that the culture needed.

It didn’t dawn on me what he was saying until his words had echoed in my mind a few times.

Kristless was finished. The mixtape I had put everything into was finished and there was nothing else to be done.

I mourned it first, because everything in me knew this was the end of an era.

To have worked so hard and put everything into something, only for it to be finished.

Like any creator, I wanted to celebrate my project being done, but I wasn’t much of the celebratory type.

I had something else in mind, something I was sure would have Moanie at my ass.

She had no choice but to accept it though. Shit, she’d be good.

Peeling my face from the pillow, I opened my eyes and looked for my phone. When I had it, I dialed up my guy DK. He’s been cutting my hair and lining me up since I was Jru’s age and the only nigga I trusted in my head.

“Damn, you up early, Krist. Do I wanna know why?” he asked, tone laced with sleep.

I laughed. “My bad. You available any time this morning to cut my hair?”

“Taper and line up will take me about fifteen minutes, you know that, bro. You can come through at any time.”

“Nah, I want it all gone.”

He chuckled. “You tryna turn into one of those pretty niggas, Krist?”

“Man, shut your stupid ass up. You got me or what?” I asked, also laughing at his stupid ass statement.

“Yeah, I got you, bro. Come through at one-thirty.”

I agreed and we hung up. I was almost about to close my eyes again when there was a knock at my door. I knew for a fact Jru wasn’t gonna get it because his young ass slept like he worked a night shift. He slept so fucking heavy he never heard anything.

I was on my feet moving toward the door in seconds. When I reached it, I lowered my head and looked through the peephole seeing it was Sazzy. The fuck did shorty want and why the fuck was she popping up at my spot?

I swung the door open with irritation. “What you doing at my door? Where the fuck your manners?”

“Damn, I can’t come by to see an old friend? I know you miss me.” She smiled. “Shit, if you don’t, your hair does.”

“Nah, I’m good.”

“You’re good? I can’t just come in and braid your hair? She got you sewed up like that for real. I’ve heard the tal?—”

“Look, I ain’t finna stand in this hallway and debate politics with you about mine. You wasted your time coming through. I’m good on your services.”

“About yours? She’s your girlfriend?”

“Ay, Sazzy, don’t be on no bullshit. Be safe ’bout yours because I’d hate for things to get critical just because you couldn’t let go of some shit that was never anything.” That was my one and only warning.

She sucked her teeth. “Ain’t nobody gonna do nothing to that girl, at least I’m not. I can’t say the same ’bout her blood.”

I wasn’t even about to answer. I was closing the door when what she said caught my attention. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

Sazzy sucked her teeth again. “I was eating with my baby when I heard Alley and her girls plotting on your girl. I know they were talking about her because her name is Moanie, right? And the girl was like, ain’t that your cousin, Alley?

Like she kept saying it. Then the other one mentioned your name and I really put two and two together. ”

I nodded, heat rising to my core at the thought of anything happening to Moanie at the hands of anybody. That created deadly thoughts in my mind.

“’Preciate the info.” I then closed the door before she could say anything else. The wheels were turning in my head.

I picked my phone up and dialed Ben immediately.

“Yeah, bro.” He was groggy, meaning he’d stayed out all night as usual.

“I need you to call Lexie for me. I need her to touch somebody.”

He perked up. “Nigga, who? Not the same girl whose name you just got tattooed on your neck.”

“Nah, not her. Getcho ass up out the bed and meet me at your grandmother’s house.”

“Nigga, I’m at my grandmama house. You late. Slide through.” He yawned into the phone.

“Bet.”

As soon as I was off the phone with him, I moved toward my room to get dressed. I was about to get this shit handled, get my haircut, and still be on time to pick up Moanie after grabbing her a meal because I already knew her ass hadn’t eaten. That, I’d call a productive day.

“You love her, don’t you?” Jru’s voice interrupted me from the intense pattern of thoughts flowing through my mind. I assumed he was asleep, but I guess he wasn’t.

I looked up and we locked eyes, him with a genuine question and me with an answer I wasn’t yet ready to utter.

“What you know about love, youngin?” I changed the subject at an expedited rate.

“I know what it is because I know what it’s not,” he answered in a duh type tone, which made me chuckle. How was my teenage, bird chested ass brother out here about to school me on love? The lil nigga was holding an X-box controller, the headset atop his head.

“Good logic.” I went to walk off, but his words halted my movement.

“So, you do love her?”

“Yeah, I think I do,” I responded honestly, with no intention of turning around.

“Good, I like her for you.” He didn’t wait for my response. He had already gone back into his room and closed the door.

After our exchange, it didn’t take me long to get fully dressed and out of the door. About ten minutes later I was pulling up outside Ben’s grandmother’s house. Just like I knew he would be, he was standing on the porch with a blunt to his lips.

Upon seeing me pull up, he descended the stairs and exited the gate. He met me at the sidewalk and extended the blunt.

“Hell nah, it’s too early.”

He laughed. “But it ain’t too early for you to get a motherfucker touched. Yeah aight, ol’ fickle ass nigga.”

I waved him off. “You talked to Lexie?”

He nodded. “Yeah, she’s pulling up. Who you want touched?”

“Alley. Moanie’s cousin. She was supposedly on some shiesty shit about setting Moanie up. I’on like that.”

“And that’s her blood? Damn. Broads will do anything nowadays. I’ll get her ass over here. You know it’s been a minute since I seen a good hood brawl.”

I chortled. “Hell yeah, since you’ve been keeping your situations at bay. What, didn’t your baby moms catch a case for beating up ol’ girl downstairs from me?”

Ben laughed. “Hell yeah. Shit too messy.” Then he pulled his phone out and swiped around until he found the number he was looking for. He put his phone to his ear about fifteen seconds later.

“Yo. Yeah, come get that bread you asked for. Yeah, you know where you pulled up on me last time.” He hung up seconds later. I felt his eyes.

“For a couple dollars, some of these chicks be going. She think I’m about to pay her rent just because she let me touch her tonsils a few times. Fuck outta here.”

I nodded.

“You must really be feeling ol’ girl ,huh?” Him calling her ol’ girl wasn’t out of disrespect but instead his way of showing respect. Ben was used to calling women everything but their names and them just going with it because of who and how he was.

“Yeah.”

“Good. You ain’t no outside nigga anyway. You my brother. Shit, always will be, but you been better than this hood shit they made us.”

I didn’t ask what he meant because one thing about Ben was that he could ramble and talk that fake wise shit for hours. He always made sense, like always, but it didn’t mean he followed his own words.

“You hear me, bro? You my brother for life.”

“Yeah, I got you. From the cradle to the grave, right?” I said, meaning every word since I became DP in my early teens.

He nodded, then mumbled the same words, eyes tracing every car that sped down the semi empty street. It was still early, so that was to be expected.

About ten minutes later Lexie arrived, and right after her, Alley.

Shorty hopped out a rideshare and walked right up to Ben.

Like the damn fool he was, he pointed in my direction.

I didn’t know what she thought this shit was, but she quickly walked in my direction like I was about to give her something.

What she didn’t see was Lexie’s gutter ass standing behind me, putting her braids in a ponytail.

“I knew my cousin couldn’t kee—” she started, but I put my hand up to stop her there.

“You plotting on my girl? Your blood?”

She blinked no less than ten times before she started to form a sentence, but Lexie’s fist connected with her jaw so quickly she probably swallowed her words. She fell instantly and let out the loudest wail I had ever heard.

“Answer his question,” Lexie demanded.

I glanced around the space, my eyes on everybody and everything. In this neighborhood this type of stuff was normal, so nobody in attendance would utter a word. This was entertainment.

“So. She wouldn’t give me the money and she’s fucking you. I gave you to her. I could’ve fuc?—”

I shook my head. “See, that’s that shit. She doesn’t owe you shit, and keeping it a buck, I wouldn’t have touched you with another motherfucker’s hand. Shit, I’m shocked my boy touched you.”

She looked pitiful. “What’s so special about her?”