Thugs Cry Read online

  “Who? Me?”

  “No, you,” she said.

  “Trust, shorty, I’ma handle mines,” boasted CJ sucking on her toes.

  “You talk a lot of shit, dude,” Tamika teased.

  “Don’t I always back it up?”

  “Always, baby,” she purred, feeling his hand moving up her leg.

  “Yo, keep it one hunnid, ma, do you still got feelings for my boy?” CJ asked.

  “How’re you gonna ask me a question like that and rub my feet at the same time? CJ, you are so fuckin’ up the mood.”

  “Naw, I’m serious, yo.” His hand went under her shorts and he rubbed bare pussy this time.

  “Can we not talk about that? Dayum, a bitch tryna get fucked.”

  CJ loved when she talked gully like that. It got his dick hard as a hammer.

  “I’m just saying, Rah suppose to be coming home for spring break, you ain’t gon’ see him and catch feelings all over again, are you?”

  “No! And I’m about to slap the shit out of you if you don’t shut the fuck up and give me some of that goodness.”

  “What? This?” CJ held up the blunt that was in his free hand.

  “Don’t play!”

  CJ stopped touching her pussy, took one more pull from the blunt, then put it out in the ashtray by the bed.

  “You ready for this?” he asked, as he pulled out and then shook nine inches at her.

  She crawled to the edge of the bed like a minx and cooed to the thick pleasure in his hand. “Hey you. Mama miss you.”

  Tamika took hold of CJ’s half erect dick and kissed the head as she stroked it up and down with her hand. Then she took the bulbous head into the cavern of her warm mouth and slurped it like a lollipop. CJ stood on his toes and grabbed the back of her head and pushed deeper into her throat.

  “Don’t tease a nigga, shorty” he said, swelling to full erection when he heard Tamika making those slurping noises.

  Her tongue ring slid up and down the underside of CJ’s rock hard dick as she bobbed up and down on the pole. Tamika had CJ making fuck faces already and she was only warming up. She plopped the dick out of her mouth and dropped his boxers to his ankles, then cupped his balls. CJ had balls like plums. Tamika licked those bad boys while stroking his dick.

  “Put it back in your mouth, ma,” instructed CJ, and his desire was instantly fulfilled.

  Tamika’s neck game was sick because she straight up loved to please her dude. Sometimes, when she was really into sucking CJ’s dick she could have a mini orgasm just watching the effect her skills had on him. She knew that that was some narcissistic shit but CJ loved it.

  “You gon’ come for me, Daddy?” she murmured around a mouthful of dick.

  “Fuck…yeah,” grunted CJ feeling himself about to bust.

  “C’mon, give it to me,” urged Tamika, and a second later she got what she asked for. She swallowed the cum then licked the dick clean. Then she removed her shorts and baby tee, laid back on the bed and spread her thighs, crooking a finger at CJ.

  TWO

  Raheem looked around his studio apartment one last time before getting ready to walk out the door. The black Italian leather couch sat in front of the 54-inch plasma, on top of a Persian rug. The rest of the apartment was dipped too. The king-sized motionless waterbed that sat back and to the left of the couch and big screen had cost five stacks alone.

  The studio apartment was on Peachtree Road, a comfortable distance from Morehouse, where he went to school. Though he was a full-time student with no job, the reason Rah could afford such luxury is that he was living a double life. An A-student by day, who had just made the Dean’s list, and a hustla by night.

  Rah had only been in ATL nine months, yet the city was blessing him well. Soon after touching down in the Dirty South he had bumped into some New York kids that were bubbling in ATL. Whatever type of drugs a nigga wanted, those kids had it on deck, from weed and coke to X and meth. Rah wasn’t tryna fuck with no coke or meth, but mad muhfuckaz at school smoked the goodness and popped X, so he fucked with the New York connect on those two. Not that he had come down South with hustlin’ in the game plan but hustlin’ was in his blood. Besides, tryna survive on a student’s allowance and living on campus wasn’t an option, it would’ve suffocated his swag.

  Rah had intended to hustle just enough to keep his bills paid and his weight up. But he soon found out that tryna hustle a little was like telling a chick to just let him put the head of his dick in the pussy. Once a niggaz dick got wet, he was going all the way in.

  Rah grabbed the Gucci garment bag out of the closet and slung it over his shoulder. The rest of the gear he was taking back home with him while on spring break was already in the back of his Tahoe. He was locking up his $1,200 a month apartment when his next door neighbor Stephanie happened to be returning home.

  “Sup, Steph?” he spoke.

  “Hello, Raheem. Where are we going,” she asked, noticing the bag across his shoulder.

  “I’m going up top to kick it with my peeps for spring break.”

  “Oh. I bet they’ll be glad to see you. You’re from Newark, New Jersey, right?”

  “None other.”

  “Enjoy and be safe, and tell that CJ I said hello,” she giggled.

  Stephanie O’Neil was a sophomore engineering student at Georgia Tech. She was one of those little rich white chicks that loved everything black, from food to music to fashion, and probably black dick too, Rah guessed, judging from that Coco-like ass of hers. White boys wasn’t putting it down like that.

  Steph was cool, Rah liked that they could hold a deep conversation on various subjects and learn a little something about each other’s world. She loved to hear him talk about The Bricks, and she humored him with stories about her lily white upbringing in Maine. She thought that he looked like Mystikil, with his Hershey brown complexion, braids, and six-one, one hundred ninety pound build. He told her that she looked like Jessica Simpson with mad booty.

  On the way to his whip Rah saw Hakeem washing his Lexus Coupe with the factory rims.

  “Good morning, Raheem,” Hakeem called out, sounding like a white boy trapped in black skin. Rah hated muhfuckaz like Hakeem, brothers who thought that being born black was a curse. He gave Hakeem a curt nod and kept it moving.

  As soon as Rah pulled out of the apartment complex his cell vibrated on his hip.

  “Yo.”

  “What it do, shawdy? A nigga need some fuckin’ with,” said his dude DaQuan who was from ATL’s notorious Zone Three. Rah supplied DaQuan with that purp and that X.

  “Son, I told you I’m going back home for a minute, I’ll fuck witchu when I get back.”

  “Oh, damn! I forgot, shawdy. A’ight, hit a nigga up when you come back, shawdy.”

  “A’ight.” Rah chuckled before ending the call. He was still getting used to being called “shorty,” though ATL niggaz southern recant made it sound like “shawdy.” They didn’t give a fuck if you were six or sixty-six, dude or chick, they called you shawdy.

  Rah thought back to when he first touched down in ATL, after he had cut into his connect Don from Brooklyn. Rah was rolling with Don and his mans and nem to the strip club The New Nikki’s…

  Rah was in VIP with Don, Grip, and Flatbush. All three were New York niggaz who was putting it down in ATL. Don was the HNIC but they were all getting cake and the strippers in the club knew it. As soon as they were seated in their booth, several chicks came over to entertain them. Before long, big asses and phat coochies were poppin’, and those New York boys were making it rain and poppin’ bottles. Rah didn’t fuck with intoxicants and his bank wasn’t official enough to be trickin’, so he just sat back and checked out pussy for free.

  After the night was over Grip and Flatbush left the club with two thick stripper hos, headed to the mo-mo to blow those hos backs out. Rah and Don rolled out in Don’s burgundy Escalade to the Waffle House on Stewart Ave.

  Inside the Waffle House, while they ate blueberry
waffles, scrambled eggs, grits and beef sausages, Don dropped jewels to Rah on hustlin’ in The Dirty. “You gotta keep niggaz out of ya BI ’cause these dudes play that snitch shit like it’s all good, yo. And they sick with the jack game, word.”

  Rah was nodding his head, soaking up the wisdom.

  They finished eating, chopped it up a little while longer, then bounced. On the way to the whip a nigga with a mouthfull of gold spoke to Rah, “What it do, shawdy?”

  “My name ain’t no fuckin shorty!” Rah snapped.

  “Yo, chill,” cautioned Don, who’d overhead his mans agitated reply even though he was talking on his cell.

  “Whatever, shawdy,” dude said in response to Rah and pushed on to his car.

  As soon as Don pushed the button on his remote and unlocked the doors on the Escalade Rah reached under the passenger seat and grabbed the burner he had put there before they went inside the strip club. He was up on Gold Teeth just as dude was opening the door of his ’64 Chevy Impala.

  “Yo, shawdy, what da deal is?” asked Gold Teeth, throwing his hands up in a gesture that meant that he didn’t want any trouble.

  “Shorty” is a little kid or a bitch, I told you my name ain’t no fuckin shorty!” Rah spat. “Now break yaself, nigga!” he barked, slapping the dude with his chrome.

  Dude emptied his pockets.

  “Come off that chain, too!” He was rockin’ a nice Jesus piece, which he surrendered with a scowl on his face.

  Rah snatched the chain out of his hand, patted his waist to make sure that he wasn’t strapped, and out the corner of his eye caught Don coming up to his side, gripping his own strap.

  “Run, pussy!” commanded Rah.

  Dude was about to take off running in the opposite direction when Don let loose. Boc! Boc! Boc! Two up top and one to the chest, Gold Teeth’s body smacked the pavement, bloodied and twisted.

  As they dipped away from the scene Don explained, “You don’t sleep on these country niggaz, yo. Or they’ll send you back to The Bricks with a tag on ya toe. Real talk, these ATL dudes are trained to go, they nice with that gunsmoke. That’s why I went ahead and finished what you started. Ain’t no telling, dude might’ve caught you with ya pants down one day. Nah mean?”

  “I feel you.” Rah nodded his understanding.

  “Now you owe me, son. One of these ATL cats owe me a grip and don’t wanna pay. I’ma need you to get at him. I’ma get Flatbush to point the kid out to you, he be hangin’ out on Wesley Chapel, can you handle it?”

  “I got you, dawg,” Rah said, though he hadn’t ever got a body. He wetted a nigga back up the way with CJ before, but the dude hadn’t died. Still, Rah knew that he wasn’t afraid to put in work.

  “That’s what’s up,” Don reached over to give him a pound, acting hella calm after just getting a body. “But yo, you can’t spazz out on these cats for calling you ‘shawdy’, that’s just their flava,” he laughed.

  Two weeks later, Rah handled his business for Don.

  Recalling it now, Rah could only smirk at the way he had flipped over being called “shawdy.” Since then, Don had told him, “Nigga you the most gangsta muhfucka to ever make a goddamn Dean’s list.”

  Rah laughed at the memory of Don’s comment as he pushed Lord Tariq’s CD in the deck and hit the interstate. It was going to be a long drive to Newark but the Tahoe rode lovely. He couldn’t wait to see the look on his dawg CJ’s face when he pulled up on him in the SUV sitting on chrome. He had left The Bricks in sneakers, now he was returning stuntin’, just eight months later.

  Rah had heard from his peeps that CJ and Tamika were hooked up now. Everybody and their mama felt that it was some shady shit, but Rah didn’t see it that way. For one, CJ had never stepped to Tamika while Rah and her were kickin’ it. Two, he had always sensed that Tamika was drawn to CJ’s go-all-out swag. He also knew that CJ had mad love for him and would lay his life on the line any day to prove it. It was no sweat that CJ had not told him that Tamika was now his boo. Rah figured that CJ was the type of dude that would prefer to tell him face-to-face.

  It’s all love with me and my nigga, Rah thought as the Tahoe reached ninety miles per hour.

  By the time he reached Newark and pulled up in front of his grandmother’s, Big Ma’s, building it was damn near midnight the next day. Rah got out of the Tahoe with his fitted pulled down low, carrying the Gucci garment bag and a suitcase. He chirped the alarm and walked toward the front door of the building. Suddenly, he was accosted by a fiend that looked like a skeleton with big bulging eyes about to pop out of her head.

  “Sup, man? I’ll suck your dick for five, take you around the world for ten, I got the tightest pussy ya dick has ever been in.” The fiend made her pitch as she reached out and grabbed his crotch.

  Rah smacked her hand away and stared into her face, horrified.

  “C’mon, man, just ten fuckin’ dollars and I’ll fuck and suck you so good. C’mon, man.”

  “Kayundra! What the fuck happened to you, yo?” Rah shouted in disgust.

  “I’m good, baby. I’m tryna make you good too,” she replied, not recognizing him in the darkness. Rah sat down his luggage and removed his fitted. Then he grabbed her face with both hands and grilled her.

  “Ma, this is Raheem you’re talking to!”

  Kayundra’s eyes got even bigger as she recognized his face and his voice. Rah, the only dude that she had ever loved. She was so embarrassed; Kayundra snatched away from him and ran off.

  Rah couldn’t believe what he had just seen. “Not baby girl!” he uttered in total disbelief. He couldn’t move, he was so distraught. The sight of Kayundra reminded him why he didn’t sell crack. Even when he used to be out on the block with CJ, Rah adamantly refused to sell rocks to females. He hated to see what crack did to women because it reminded him of what it had done to his moms before she was killed.

  Coming out of his trance, Rah retrieved his luggage from the ground and headed inside the building up to the sixth floor where Big Ma stayed. He heard the echo of gunshots ring out in the night and knew for certain that he was back home in The Bricks.

  His was still able to use his key so he unlocked the door and let himself in.

  “Big Ma! LaKeesha, I’m home,” he called out.

  Seconds later, Big Ma wobbled out of her bedroom wearing the same frazzled housecoat she had worn for years.

  “My baby!” she cried, pulling Raheem into her ample bossom. Her head barely came to his chest. Rah kissed her on her cherubic cheek; he loved Big Ma to no end. His mother was Big Ma’s only child. After she was killed Big Ma took Raheem and his sister LaKeesha in and raised them both. Raheem was eight at the time of his mother’s death eleven years ago. LaKeesha was only five at the time.

  “I missed you, baby!” Big Ma cried, still hugging him tight.

  “I missed you too, beautiful,” he said.

  “Hey, Rah. Why y’all making so much noise? What time is it?” asked LaKeesha coming out from her bedroom, rubbing sleep from her eyes.

  Rah looked at his sixteen year old sister and his mouth hit the floor! LaKeesha’s pregnant belly stuck out like a beach ball. He looked from her to Big Ma.

  “I asked her not to tell you,” volunteered LaKeesha.

  “We didn’t wanna worry you at school,” Big Ma cosigned.

  “Don’t be disappointed. I’m good,” said LaKeesha.

  “Are you still in school?” Rah asked.

  “I’ma go back in the fall.”

  Rah sighed, he had kept a close eye on LaKeesha when he was at home; had tried to protect her from the potholes of their environment. Now look, he thought.

  He asked who is the baby’s daddy.

  “Dawoo,” said LaKeesha.

  “From down the hill?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Didn’t I hear something about him catching a body in New York? He up on the Island, ain’t he?” Rah asked.

  “Yeah” replied LaKeesha.

  Rah dropped his head;
disappointment choked off any response he might’ve had.

  THREE

  It was early Saturday and Tamika was out doing her usual weekend thing, which was tearing the mall up. She was inside the Prada boutique tryna find something cute to wear out tonight. Tamika and her girl Star were going to a new club that had opened in East Orange. Star was twenty-two but Tamika was only nineteen, not even old enough to get into the club because the minimum age limit was twenty-one. But bouncers and doormen never turned away a chick with an ass like hers. CJ, who was under age too, had already promised to meet them at the club. CJ never got carded at any club, he would just slide the dude on the door some grip and bop right on in.

  Tamika had on a peach colored zip-up jumpsuit, the kind that was like shorts not pants. Her smooth caramel thighs were like a very young Chaka Khan’s. The zipper of the Dior jumpsuit was zipped down so that it revealed mad cleavage. Niggaz had been clocking her since she walked into the mall, and bitches had been hatin’. Tamika loved both.

  Not that she entertained another nigga’s holla, she was too sprung over CJ to do that. Although he wasn’t a boss yet, Tamika believed that it was his destiny, and she planned to ride with him all the way. She loved his arrogance, even his flashes of jealousy. Shit, she loved everything about CJ. He was kinda sexy, kinda dangerous, kinda mean, kinda nigga that other hos be all up in his face. That’s why she tried to keep his face in her coochie so much that the next bitch would smell it on his breath.

  Tamika found just the outfit that she was looking for; a sexy tube dress with the stomach cut out to show her flat tummy and navel ring, and a portion of her lower back. It was so short and sexy it would show all of her thighs.

  Wait ’til y’all envious hos see me rockin’ this! she thought as she prepared to drop down $700 for it. The Prada purse that she found to match it cost $500, and the stilettos cost another $675. CJ had only given her two stacks so that ended her shopping for the day. Tamika wasn’t mad, she was gonna be too damn cute tonight.