Chapter 31
Noah
An intellectual got a slave pregnant. At the birth, his father suggested that the child be killed. The intellectual replied: "First murder your own children and then tell me to kill mine."
–Philogelos (The Laughter Lover)
Wind whipped. The sky remained dark. Tonight, the moon held no glow through the cold sheets of water that blurred every unlucky driver on the flooded streets.
I could barely see in front or behind my car and had no idea if the Volvo still followed me.
Of all nights, did it have to rain this evening?
The storm poured down on Din City like an irritated mother pissed that her son had covered himself in mud when he had school in an hour—clumps of grass sticking to his hair, gunk under his fingernails, pebbles in his butt, and sandy snot dripping from his nose. The war with Butterfly had dirtied Din City. We’d coated this place in blood and bodies, fires and emptying businesses, fear and terror, despair and unrest.
Had God or some higher power rushed to the rescue to cleanse our city?
The windshield wipers screeched along my window. Other than that, it was a smooth ride. I drove slowly and headed North toward Mercury Hotel. Fuck the rain, the lightning, and thunder. I couldn’t wait and plot. I had to seize the moment, before Butterfly struck again.
Besides the long, lonely ride gave me time to rethink everything.
I considered my childhood. When I was young, I never thought about girls or love. Instead, I always imagined what a gunshot would sound like. Did the movies get it right? Were those noises at night from a gun or something else? The possibilities fascinated me. Guns filled my dreams.
I would ask my friends all of the time and they would all give me different answers.
“A gunshot sounds like a firecracker, but louder,” Domingo had bragged and then would go on to boast about all of his kills and all the sex he’d been having. All lies, of course. At that time, Domingo had only been eight years old.
“A gun sounds like a desk drawer being slammed shut.” Crusher did it to his kitchen’s fork drawer. “Like that. Mom used to take me out in Ebony Forest and shoot shit all of the time. We never saw any animals, but if we had, we would’ve killed them and Mom said I could’ve snapped their necks.”
Aristotle had the best answer as he lit one of the cigarettes he’d snuck from his father’s glove compartment. We’d cut class and sat behind the cafeteria, wondering what shit we could get into. “The sound of a gunshot? It’s like this thunderous roar. Ear shattering. Boom. Pow. But it’s more than that too.”
With my small hands, I grabbed the cigarette from him. “What do you mean?”
“It’s also the sound of power.”
I coughed from the nicotine, blew out some smoke, and gave the cigarette back to Aristotle. “The sound of power? You always talk like an adult.”
“If you want to be an adult, you have to act like one really early.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
I bit the inside of my cheek. “Why do you think the gun shot sounds like power?”
“Because of what happens around it. Everyone always stops when a gun shoots. First time I heard one, Mom shut off the tv. I’d been watching Batman and was so mad. She didn’t even say anything. She just slammed me to the floor and was shaking too. ‘Somebody’s shooting outside, baby. Be quiet. That’s why I hate this fucking city.’ The whole time I just thought, man, that guy out there just made the whole block pause. That’s power.”
I nodded. “That’s power.”
Later, I heard my own gunshots. By my teen years, I could tell a person what gun was shot just from the sound—a .22 made a cracking noise, a 9mm went off with a bam, and the large caliber weapons like a .44 boomed.
All guns made some sort of explosive noise due to high pressure gases exiting at hyper sonic speeds. Some popped. Others banged. Sounds varied because of the cartridge, shells, barrel-length, and firearm being used. The more gunpowder, the more noise. High velocity rounds had a deafening crack and then a soft whine. Shotguns produced piercing thumps. And if sawed-off, the noise ripped at the ear drums.
Sometimes, rolling thunder came when the bullets flew long distance, the echoes of the shots reflecting off nearby buildings. Sound carried more in icy weather. If freezing one could hear a gunshot several neighborhoods away. Summertime held quieter nights.
The moment I realized I could not live without Mary Jane reminded me of a gunshot.
It was an ear shattering realization. A boom inside my chest. A sharp noise that I could not deafen by cupping my ears. An intense roar that lasted five seconds and then echoed off of all the things around me—my men, the streets, my enemies, the reality of my life, and everything that I thought I’d loved. The moment I realized I loved Mary Jane was the same moment I realized that I’d never loved before.
How funny that love would teach me how to love.
When I drove away from Mary Jane, gun shots boomed in my head. Although the noise wasn’t real, I still flinched and gripped the steering wheel hard.
This is going to work. I’m going to end this with Butterfly.
These past months, I’d learned a lot. I thought street life was reality, that blood and violence steered the path of real men.
I was wrong.
Humans weren’t put on earth to kill each other.
I was so wrong. We are here to love. If my men could hear me now, they would laugh.
But it was true. We were put here to love each other. To embrace life and show the universe the many different ways our existence could happen. We were here to inspire, fuck, breed, pray, and spread hope, not tear down. Not destroy. Not murder and maim. Not kill our own brothers.
That was why the nightmares came. Was I ever happy? Had I ever truly lived?
When humans walked dark paths, bad things came. When we spilled blood and brutalized. When we took away the breaths from other people’s children. Bullied and filled the neighborhoods with drugs and broken homes. When we went against the light, evil sprouted. Wicked energy brewed and lurked within hidden places. Unexplained things occurred where they shouldn’t. Forests reshaped into spooky woods. Monsters bred and ate human flesh. Houses became haunted.
When we hated and killed, bad things bred and rose around us.
I didn’t want to add anymore death and evil to the world.
All of my life, I’d been fighting for the wrong side. In the darkness, I’d raced with the wolves and tore flesh with my fangs. I devoured the sheep. I helped the sky bleed rain and the air reek of death. I’d delivered chills up many spines and shivers within their hearts. Within the blackness, I served as an alpha of blood-thirsty wolves that would eat their own kind.
I was done with that. I would go toward the light.
Vinese had said, “Look for the light in the darkness and run fast toward that light, like you’re about to die. Never look over your shoulder at the darkness. Any light you see boy, you run for it.”
I was a wolf and a sweet sheep saved me by stumbling within my darkness and not realizing that I’d been a wolf the whole time. She sang her song of humor in my ears and my claws retracted. She placed her soft body against mine and rustled my fur. Her natural scent surrounded me, and my fangs withdrew. My appetite for violence left, while a new hunger grew for something more. Something I hadn’t known I could touch. Something warm and heart-pounding. Something only she could give me.
She showed me love.
I’m going to end this with Butterfly and go back to my lovely little sheep. I hope to God I never eat her. Just nibble and fucking savor the taste.
My cock grew hard. Every part of me wanted to turn around and go back to Mary Jane’s arms. Had she been pissed when I left? There could’ve been no other way. If another minute passed with me in her presence, I would’ve stayed there. I had to leave then. Aristotle’s house had shaken me down to my bones. Never did I think evil could manifest to so much more.
I’d remained blind to the reality around me. I pretended the Ebony Forest was nothing more than odd angles in moon lighting. I acted like Vinese and her people weren’t that harmful and not out of this world. I’d even made excuses for Aristotle’s house, pretending like it was more bad luck than cursed.
And I was blind to Butterfly for sure. She was her own special type of evil and I pretended that I could tame her wicked ways by giving her power away from me. That was stupid.
Thirty minutes passed as I rode through the storm, slowing down to make out the few hotel signs still on.
Was Mercury Hotel on this block or further up? Wait. There it is. Right there.
I made a left and turned into the hotel’s parking lot. Only one car was parked out front. A pink jaguar. Aristotle had been right. Butterfly lived in the past. That was her jaguar.
The Volvo parked several spots down from me.
I put away my weapons, placing the guns under the seat and sticking my knife in the glove compartment. The only thing I kept on me was a tiny razor blade—no more than two inches long. I folded paper around it and stuck it under my left foot.
Back in the day, before we could get a gun, my friends and I used other things to gain power. The older guys taught us the way. I remembered Aristotle’s brother, Tap, towering over Crusher, Rasheed, Domingo, and me and passing out razor blades to us.
“Here,” Tap had said. “Keep it in your mouth, under your tongue. If you get in a little confrontation, spit it out into your hand, slice, slice, and you’re done. Best thing about a good blade is that when you cut a motherfucker, he doesn’t even know he’s cut. He’s still fighting as he loses blood.”
Domingo stood up and pranced around like a peacock with his blade. “Yo, I’m about to cut tons of motherfuckers in their necks. Trust me on that.”
Tap knocked Domingo in the head and pushed him back to the bench. “Yo, sit your little ass down. This shit is mad dangerous.” He slipped the blade into his mouth, leaned over, and held his lips apart so we could see that the razor had disappeared. Seconds later, he spit the blade out in a blur and slashed the air fast in front of us. “Boom. That motherfucker’s cut. You get him in the gut slash anything else that’s near you and he’s down.”
“Rasheed isn’t interested.” Rasheed gave his razor blade back to Tap.
Tap shrugged. “The shit is dangerous. The mouth and tongue are very vascular—”
“Vasa what?” Crusher asked.
“Yo, basically if you cut those nerves on your tongue, you might be fucked. So this is how you do it.” Tap loved having an audience. Out of all of the older guys, he was the coolest. In some way, I think he figured he was a role model to us boys. He made it his mission once a week to search us out, smoke a joint with us, and tell us something he believed was important about street life. “So go ahead and grab your blade.”
We did as he said.
“Turn the blades so it’s flat and make sure the non-razor sides face to the side. Got it?” Tap checked us out and we nodded. When you put it in your mouth. Go slow, Domingo. Real slow, man. Okay. So when you put it in your mouth, hold those non-razor sides between your teeth. The sharp sides are going to be facing forward and back.”
Something about the metal being in my mouth made my stomach lurch a little. But I had respect for Tap and carried the terrifying task out with the rest of my friends.
Tap continued, “Keep your tongue under the razor, but your teeth hinged tight on the non-sharp sides. I’ve heard of guys putting it under their tongue. Stupid. That’s the best way to not have a tongue.”
We all tried it. Domingo seemed the most comfortable with his blade. Everyone else looked happy to take the things out of their mouths.
All covered in saliva, I studied my blade not sure if I liked the idea of something sharp sitting in my mouth. “Tap, where did you get this idea from?”
“Everyone do this shit in prison, man. But I was doing this shit back in the day, man. Fucking elementary school just waiting to cut one of those teachers if they kept running their mouths about me.”
“Thanks, Tap.” I put the razor in my wallet that Dad always made me carry around. It had been his little attempt to teach me how to be a man. Little did he know, I’d already decided I was a man that would soon be a king where the streets served as my castle.
I never used that razor blade, but I kept it with me all the time. Tap died a week later. Some West side gang member had shot his pregnant girlfriend by accident. The guy had been aiming for her brother, but shot her instead. Furious and hysterical, Tap and his friends drove over there and shot up the guy’s house—full of him and his family. Those events had started the war between the East and West which ended months later by my hands.
Tonight, I would use the same razor blade that Tap had given me.
I, too, can remain in the past, Butterfly. You will deal with the old me this evening. Let’s hope your death won’t take too long.
With the car off, I studied Mercury Hotel through the sheets of rain. It was still a broken down property. I’d spent a lot of time here, bringing tons of females back in the middle of the night. I’d sneak out of the house, grab my motorcycle that I hid behind Rasheed’s Dad’s house, call up any chick that was available, pick up some food, cop some weed and spend the rest of the night with her. Every girl treated those nights like the most romantic evenings ever. I saw them as a great way to spend a couple of hours.
Yet, the place was the pits. Cecil B Jenkins the third had owned the place and required everyone to refer to him by his full name. He’d inherited it from his parents, after their deaths. He never renovated, too busy shooting his veins with junk. Still he kept the place open and took money from anybody who was willing to stay in the piece of shit overnight. His customers tended to be hookers, drug addicts, and gang members. Cecil B Jenkins the third never required identification or gave two fucks about what you would do in his rooms. He only wanted his money in cash and the key brought back in the morning.
It was a two level hell hole of cesspool beginnings. All the hallways had a multi-colored décor like neither of his parents could decide on what wall paper or carpeting to use, so they used them all. It was a collage of peeling samples. Some walls had a flower print. Others patterns of stripes. Another displayed something garish and bright. Most boasted solid colors. The carpet mirrored the same sort of disorder with ragged edges to highlight the hotel’s disarray. Water always dripped from the ceiling, whether it rained or not. I suspected a pipe had burst and wondered if the whole foundation would crumble or be flooded one day.
A urine odor always mingled with the smoke from every drug one could imagine. Mercury Hotel patrons did it all in those rooms. Something burned and seared every minute on that property, filling the air in a depressing way.
The rooms were no better. I’d never found one that I enjoyed. I just never fucked with room 207. That place had been a setting for many of my nightmares. I’d never enjoyed myself in there. When I turned off the lights, bugs came out. Things crept in the bed and under the sheets. Little feet skittered by. I always had the lights on and barely concentrated on whoever I’d invited. Once the mattress on my bed had bloodstains and holes in the center. I’d discovered it from one of the girls moaning so loudly and gripping the sheets hard, until she pulled them off. We’d fallen to the floor and when I rose, the center of the bed looked like a crime scene that had been covered up. Another time, I’d accidentally fallen asleep in the room. In the dream, ghosts stabbed my chest and drank the blood. I’d woken up screaming and ran out of there with no clothes on.
I never rented that room again.
Everyone knew by the end of the week. It was the only joke I allowed among my friends back in the day. As I rose in position with the streets, others began to avoid room 207 too as if that had been my claim to fame. Cecil would complain to me about it, but once I shut down the East and West gangs, Cecil kept his mouth shut.
Room 207 never saw action from anybody after that. Years later, Cecil died from an overdose and the place rotted on the end of the city.
It was pure poetry that as I walked toward this decrepit place and stared at the second floor, the seventh room had a light on.
207. Very funny, Butterfly.
Climbing the stairs, I raised my hands above me, sure that people watched me from the roofs of other run down hotels. Butterfly would be too smart to be here alone.
After I kill her, how am I getting back out? I should’ve worked that out, before I left. Fuck it. Everything will work out.