High school was fun and strange I lost many friends to drug related gun violence, friends I tried to talk to about the dangers of living the fast life. For some odd reasons allot of my friends were always coming to as the end of the spring drew near to talk about their plans for the summer. One in particular was a Jamaican kid name Joseph. For some odd reason Joseph stuck to me like a little brother. Light skin, big eyes, not very tall, and had a mouth like a rabbit. He was a spoil kid, and this was his first year of High School. He was constantly in my shadow and would ask me to hang out with my friends and I. I would usually tell him to head to class and that he could hang out with us at lunch time. A few time I literary had to play kick him in the butt to keep him out of our circle. After school was a no no. Joseph was a kid who was too eager to please anyone because he wanted to make friends. I was sitting on the side rail one day when he approached. “Yo twin, you want me to box the bwoy dey. Just tell me to do it and I will.” Why would you want to do that, did the youth did anything to you. “No, but sometimes you have to let them know who is boss yuhzeemi.” No you don’t Joseph and you should never trouble anybody who nuh trouble you. The bwoy you wanted to box is mi good good breddren Shannon Brigg and he is an amateur boxer. Now do you still want me to give you permission to go over there and box a future heavy weight champion. “Oh word, damn glad you never told to do it.” I would never tell anyone to attack someone who has done them nothing. I pulled him to the side after and told him not to hang out around us because I knew if I was not there to keep him in check he was going to get himself into some serious shit.
A few week later he asked me to come over to his crib to meet his mother Claudia and his newborn baby sister. “Twin I’ve been telling my mom I made a best friend and his name is Neil. I told her you always look out for me and tell me to attend my classes and stay out of trouble. I was happy that he felt he had a good friend because I’ve always tried to be the kind of person that looked out for my friends, had their backs and would defend them when they were wronged. However I told them that if they ever provoked some shit for no reason then deuces. All of my friends for the most part were well mannered and well behaved and we never had any issues while attending high school. One afternoon after school ended we walked to his crib on Montgomery Street between Schenectady and Utica Avenue. “Twin my mom’s is mad cool but she crazy yo.” Crazy why you call your Queen crazy mi lion, should I be worried. I said laughing. “Nah man, she knows you the coolest dude I’ve ever met and she is excited to meet you. We arrived at the house which is situated in the middle off the block as the brisk wind finally seemed to simmer down a bit. He went inside and bought his mom to the front door. She had his baby sister in her arms. Hello Ms. it’s nice to meet you. “Hello Neil I’m so glad Joseph has a best friend that looks out for him.” I try to be a good guy to all my friends. Joseph spoke “This is new born sister.” The little baby girl looked liked Joseph, she had big eyes and the same skin color as him. She was gorgeous and when I grabbed her little hand she held on the my index finger as if she did not want to let go. I asked Joseph where is his father. "My pops not around, he gives mommy money and comes by once in a while but other than that, mom's basically raised me." what's you dad's name? "Dem call him Sugar."
I left shortly because I was meeting a shorty to head to the library to do our homework together. Joseph Freshman’s year went off without any incidents, he was warned that my friends and I were serious business and that he should stay clear. He did as I asked because I know that he was the kind of kid that if someone boots him up he would be the aggressor and end up badly hurt or worse. A few days earlier before the last day of school arrived and once again him and I found ourselves having a familiar conversation. “Yo Twinnie, I’m thinking about making some serious money moves this summer.” I knew what he meant and I reminded him that he has a mother that loves him so much that she gives him everything and a new baby sister that will love having her big brother around to help her grow up into a wonderful person. When people such as my friends and I had to work to get money or flex with older cats who were generous enough to hand us a few dollars, or play ceelo on the block to make money, he had every thing he needed. “Yeah I know my mom gives me whatever I want but she think I’m a little kid.” And what’s wrong with being a little kid Joseph, every person attending high school is a little kid. Dude stay home enjoy your summer and well hang out sometimes. I knew he did not like what I was telling him so I put my arms around his shoulder and said I was tired of seeing the friends I cared for get caught up in the drug game and not many survived their illegal summer jobs. I told him I loved being his best friend and pleaded with not to go. Stay and love up your baby sister and call me whenever you want to hang out. Do I have to come over and tell your mom that you planning to leave to sell dope. “No Twin are you crazy, my mother will kill me. I told you she was crazy.” Then promise me you will not go anywhere with anyone. “Okay I promise, just please breddren don’t say anything to ma dukes. I won’t I said and we exited the school building together. It was about one p.m. in the afternoon and we stood outside waiting for my ride to come through and pick me up. I wanted him to rethink his plans. When mi breddrens Scully and Bees Eye arrived I told Joseph to come lime with us and took him with me to Catherine McAuley High School at 710 East Thirty Seventh Street in East Flatbush. Summer time was upon us and every man wanted a summer flex to bounce with. I met a pretty pretty Dogla/Cooley girl (an Indian girl) named Mya and my homeys were trying to secure theirs shorties for the summer as well. Joseph was shy and I kept trying to edge him on this cute little blasian chick. She was slim thick and had track shoes in her hand. He kept making excuses about how he is not ready and he likes them dark skin. I’m like yo don, the only color I’m concern about is the pinkness between them bow legs to blouse and skirts.
I was determine to get him a shorty to chill with for the summer to keep him busy in the hopes that he would forgo his plans of leaving to sell dope. We headed over to 2839 Bedford Avenue, which is the street address for Midwood High School. Constructed in 1940 as part of the WPA (Works Projects Administration) under President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal initiative in response to the great depression. The high school is a city block long with a Georgian Cupola on top and six huge white columns in the middle at the front of the building just above the three front entrance doors. There were at least three school buses parked at the font. We parked a block away next to Brooklyn College. We arrived at around two thirty p.m. The school day had already ended and while standing directly across the street I saw a few of my acquaintances. “Yo Twin, look pon that gal deh,” Joseph was trying to get my attention to look at the beautiful browning. She stood about five foot two inches in height and had a thick phatty frame. I mean solid, not an ounce of fat on her delicious looking sweet ass. She was gorgeous with nice lips, Asiatic eyes and had short hair which was worn in a big fluffy bun directly on top of her slender head. I could see her long nails with a clear finish while she placed a big blow pop in her mouth sucking then removing it as she spoke with her girls. The mustard khaki thigh hugging fitted shorts and chocolate colored cut off T’shirt showcased her ripped midsection, curves and voluptuousness like a museum piece. The white leather belt around her waist was unnecessary because the short was tight and there was literary no space between the short’s waist and her Nubian skin. She was also rocking a pair of white fitness lo Fila sneakers, pom pom socks with Carolina blue balls attached to the back of them, and big circular reflective sunglasses which were raised on top of her forehead. On the ground laying next to her was a very large Jansport book bag.
I noticed that five or six of the girls that she was parlaying with had bolted in two black Maximas. One of the Maximas was blasting a King Jammy’s dancehall cassette tape. I pushed up my gun finger in the air and screamed out pram pram as the chopter lick tooot tooot toooot tooot tooot tooot and Major Worries started chanting “Rrrriiip pi pi pi pitpiitibonskeng daddy Major come fi ripittit again, want a lover, mi want a lover aye," on the part two/riddim side of the Horace Andy song SkyLarking. The heavy bass line of the riddim made the entire car and everyone standing next to it shake. “Yo breds, di gal phat, sexy and rosy to bloodclaat. Joseph go over there and get the digits. “Nah man I’m cool.” Ah wey the blouse and skirts you ah talk bout you cool. Idrene if yuh nuh go over there right now I’m going to holla. And when me throw hard Grenadian cocky underneath her phat punany I’m going to knock on your door and mek yuh smell my fingers. The whole crew started laughing. Scully yelled out “More Fyah! bumboclaat twin ah pussyclaat don man,” then sang out loud in Joseph’s ears “yuh better screechie, mi seh screechie cross the border and kill another Sound Gyal whoa oh hoooy.” I turned toward Joseph and said, look Iyah, just walk over there and introduce yourself. Ask her name, how her day was, what is her plans for the summer and if she got a man. “Okay, but if she ignores me then what?” Here I said, I took off my eighteen karat solid gold herring bone chain, my link bracelet and four finger ring and placed them on him. I gave him a dap and told him to make me proud. He headed across the street for a good twenty minutes then returned with a big cool aid smile on his face. While he was walking toward the crew I peeped shorty shaking her wide juicy hips and fat little ass onto one of the busses and rode off. A few minutes later a few chickens came in our direction. Two of the chickidees was all up on Joseph, I made a right turn and headed back to where the cars were parked. I literally G’d off. The Indian shorty that I bagged at the other high school was the cream of the crop. Joseph’s shorty was a very close second.
I waited by the cars for them to arrive. Joseph came running up to me, “Neil I just got two more digits.” But it was all hype because on the way home to drop him off all he kept talking about was the browning. In my head I was smiling. He had found someone to keep him home for the summer. The next and final day of our classes every man came to school trash out in them two toned jeans, with rags hanging out of them back pocket to wipes them sweat even though the whole ah we hardly perspire. Travel Foxs, Clarks and Bally shoes were our kicks of choice and even though I was a big Ralph Lauren and Lacoste Pique Polo fan which I would usually wear throughout the summers, we rocked red, yellow, green and white shiny silk shirts that day. I accented my outfit with a Louis Vuitton wristlet which was given to me for my sixteenth birthday by Lisa, one of my older sisters. We attended to a few classes until around midday then left to begin our summer vacation. I had found work with the New York City Summer Employment Program after applying for and receiving my working papers and was sent to the Kings County Hospital job site. For the next seven weeks throughout the summer I would be working six hours a day four days a week delivering stationary to the doctors offices and nurses stations.
Summer came and I had not heard from Joseph, I figured shorty had that nigga pussy whipped and he would take his sweet time to link me. One day in August as I was walking down my block after I got off from my summer job, I was heading to the corner store on Troy Avenue and President Street when I was approached by my bonafide breddren little brother named Chris. “Twin I have to tell you something. The look on his face was not a happy one and by the tone of his voice I knew someone had left us. However I was not expecting to hear Joseph died come from out of his mouth as we walked side by side. My heart sunk and my eyes started to swell. Damn! I turned around, went back into the crib, laid on the bed, shed a few tears and fell asleep. I was told he was shot and did not even want to hear anything else. I felt as if I had failed his mother when she asked me to look after him and keep him safe but people have their own minds and teenagers are people too. He is still in my thought wearing his light brown colored Shearling coat, hat and gloves looking like a light skin Russian and that smile coming across the street after bagging the browning. I often think about his mother and how she felt. I thought about his baby sister and how she will never get to know how good of a guy her older brother was. I was angry and felt responsible for a very long time. Then I had to finally came to the realization one day that he was his own person but had I known he was leaving to hustle I would have beaten the crap out of him to stay home.
It really bothered me that his mom would allow him to go anywhere with anyone other than me. She always said she would not let him out of her sight except when he was with me. My best guess was at the time was that he lied to her and said he was leaving out to go somewhere with me. I have never talked anyone into selling dope, or doing harm to anyone. I've been a chill type dude since I was a kid except one time in Grenada. It was the day before we were leaving to come to America. There was this older kid at our school who use to bully us and slap us around sometimes. He would never bother us when we were together, he would catch us alone then start troubling us. Right before school let out I told Nigel I was going beat that boy's ass for all the times he bullied us. As soon as the bell rang I ran up on him and started swinging, then I looked at Nigel and said come get your licks in. We kicked his ass good. We ran home after leaving our book bags in the school yard. We felt good, smile giving each other high fives. We were ten years old, short and scrawny looking but my heart and my rage made me feel like I was Jean Claude Van Dam.
My Freshman year into college a fellow student named Richard Walton asked me to DJ for him at a basement party. I was shocked when I arrived at the house on Montgomery Street. It was the same house that Joseph lived in. I told my friend Linda Meyers about Joseph and how odd it was that I was djaying a Hibiscus Disco party at his former residence. Richard and I had the same major “Graphic Art and Advertising.” I began to suspect something quite odd was in play and my third eye and sense of awareness became heightened.
Submitted December 08, 2018 at 10:42PM by the_watcher33 https://ift.tt/2Gg07Gi
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