Grace After Midnight_ A Memoir - Felicia Pearson [6]
Once I even saw Pop come face to face with a knucklehead trying to jack him up.
It was the end of the workday. I happened to look out a window and saw Pop walking down the street. That’s when a gangsta jumped up outta nowhere and stuck a gun in Pop’s back. Pop wheeled around and gave this boy such a heavy look—I mean fire was coming out Pop’s eyes—the thug backed down. The gangsta melted into a punk. Never saw nothing like that before. But that was Pops.
He was strong. He worked hard, earned his money, provided for his family. Him and Mama both did things right. They were the right models for a young girl growing up.
So why didn’t I grow up the way they wanted me to?
Why couldn’t I follow their lead?
Why did I wind up doing the things I did?
The streets were screaming at me—that’s for sure. But the streets were screaming at everyone. Some kids ignored those screams. I didn’t. I had to see what the screaming was all about.
EVERYTHING MOVES
OFF MONEY
If you studied the streets like me, the truth was up in your face: Money made it happen. Money made people jump, duck, hustle, and hide. Big money made you big. The lack of money made you little. Your money could be dirty or clean. Didn’t matter. Your money could be soaked in fresh blood. That didn’t matter either. What mattered was having it. What mattered was getting it. What mattered was keeping it.
To an eight- or nine-year-old child looking at life from the steps of East Oliver Street, it was crystal clear that everything moves off money.
Then when the boys from New York started opening up shop, it became even clearer. New money was taking over.
A shop is where a dealer sets up operation, gets him a couple of corner boys to organize the merchandise and look out for cops, plus a couple of runners who deal with the customers in the cars or the customers walking by.
If you’re a kid with half a brain, you scope out the scene in no time.
To me it was interesting.
Being outside Mama’s house was always more interesting than being inside.
Action was better than no action.
“You’re restless like a little boy,” one of Mama’s friends told me.
I was already thinking of myself as a boy—so I took it as a compliment.
The girls were inside with their sewing kits and baby dolls.
The boys were outside looking for trouble.
Trouble didn’t scare me none. I didn’t think twice about it. I figured I could take care of myself.
Rico thought so, too.
Rico was the first dealer who brought me into the game—even though he didn’t bring me very far.
Rico was an ultracool cat from New York, half black, half Puerto Rican. Short, handsome, super-smooth.
Loved me some Rico. Rico spotted me right off.
“You just sitting there playing like you don’t know what’s happening,” Rico told me.
I didn’t say a word.
“You talk?” he said.
“Sure.”
“What do you got to say?”
“Nothing.”
A car rolled by with 2 Live Crew screaming from the speakers, “We Want Some Pussy.”
“You know what that song’s about?” Rico asked.
I nodded.
“I bet you do.”
He came closer to me and said, “I got something for you to hold. You cool with that?”
I nodded again.
He handed me a packet. I knew what was inside.
“You put this in your pocket for a minute or two. I’ll be back later.”
He was testing me.
When he got back in an hour, I was sitting in the same place.
“Got that packet?” he asked.
I handed it to him without saying a word. He handed me three ten-dollar bills.
That was the start.
That was also when the cops wouldn’t think that a kid might be holding dope for a dealer. Back then you could get away with it.
Back then, before the New Yorkers like Rico came through, the dope scene was calmer. You’d see people get high, but Rico and his boys raised the stakes: The highs got higher ’cause the dope got stronger. Things got crazier.
The crackheads were really crazy. It was like watching cartoon characters on