George Pelecanos - Hell To Pay

Potter fired a Bic up in front of the Phillie in his hand and gave the cigar some draw. He held the draw in and passed the blunt over to Little.

Little hit the hydro and exhaled slowly. He blew a ring of gray smoke into the room. “So talk.”

Carlton Little knew what was about to come from Potter’s mouth. He expected it, and didn’t like it, but he would go along with it, because he knew Potter was right. Though Little fully expected to die on the street or in prison, it didn’t mean he was in any hurry. He wasn’t exactly afraid to die. He had convinced himself that he was not. But he did want to live as long as he could. His friend Charles White was fixin’ to cut his life short, one way or another. Charles had to go.

“We got a problem with Charles,” said Potter. “Boy gets picked up for somethin’, he is gonna roll on us. Or maybe his conscience is gonna send him to the po-lice before that. You know this, right?”

“I do.” Little sat up on the couch and rubbed at his face. “Shame, too. I mean, me and Coon, all of us, D, we go back.”

“I’ll take care of it, Dirty.”

“Wish you would.”

“You know, Charles is like that dog of his,” said Potter. “Good to hang around with, wags his tail when you be walkin’ into a room and shit. But like that dog, he’s a cur. And a cur needs to be put down.”

“When?” said Little.

“I was thinkin’, later tonight, after we watch this game, get our heads up some? We take Charles out for a ride.”

CHARLES White had been lying in bed, listening to a Roc-a-Fella compilation through the headphones of his Aiwa, when the cups on the phones started to hurt him some. His ears got sore when he kept the phones on too long, and he had been having them on his head most of the day. He took the headphones off and moved onto his side, staring out the window at the night out behind the house. Wasn’t nothin’ but dark and an alley back there. He looked at it a little while, then got off the bed and walked out to the bathroom in the hall.

White could hear them playing the first Wu-Tang, the one that mattered, down in the living room. It was that last track the Clan had, “Tearz,” before that spoken thing they did to close the set. This was the bomb, the kind of classic shit he wanted to record his own self when he got the chance. But of course, he knew deep down he would never get the chance.

White figured he better go downstairs and see what Dirty and Garfield was up to. See if they wanted him to run out for some burgers or malt or sumshit like that. But first he needed to get those dirt tracks off his face. He had been crying a little while ago, back in his room. Some of it had been over what they’d done to that kid, but most of it had been just cryin’ for himself.

He bent over the bathroom sink, washed his face, toweled off the water, and checked himself in the mirror. He must have lost weight or something, what with the way he’d been stressin’ since they’d killed that boy. His nose looked bigger than usual, his cheeks on either side of it nothin’ but some flabby skin hanging on to bone. But you couldn’t tell he’d been crying, now that he’d cleaned up. He looked all right.

White went along a hall, hearing their voices below and smelling the smoke of the cheeva they were hittin’ drifting up the stairs. It was strange for things to be so quiet in this house. He heard Dirty say, “So talk,” and then Garfield say, “We got a problem with Charles.”

White’s heart had kicked up and his fingers were shaking some as he went down the stairs halfway. There was a wall there that blocked a view from the living room, and carpet on the steps to muffle the sound of his descent.

He listened to their conversation. He heard his friend Carlton say “When?” and Garfield, quick and cold in his reply, answered, “Later tonight.” He said something else about watching the game and getting high, and then he said, “We take Charles out for a ride.”

You ain’t takin’ me a mother fuckin’ place, thought White as he backed himself slowly up the stairs.

CHARLES locked his bedroom door. They came up and asked why he’d locked himself in, he’d deal with it then.

He got into his Timbies and laced them tight. He found an old Adidas athletic bag, the size of a small duffel, in his closet. He stuffed it with underwear and a few pairs of jeans and some shirts, and one leather jacket, but he left most of the cold-weather stuff on the hangers because he had already decided that he was headed south. He had grabbed his toothbrush and shaving shit from the vanity over the sink on the way to his room, and he dropped it all in. There was still some room in the bag. He put his Aiwa in along with all the CDs, the newer joints, he could fit. He found some older stuff he still listened to, Amerikkka’s Most Wanted and Doggystyle , and jammed those in there, too.

White went to his bedroom mirror, where he had taped a photograph of his mother to the glass. In the original shot, some Jheri-curled sucker, all teeth and sweat, lookin’ like he walked off the Street Songs cover, had his arm around White’s mom. White had scissored the man off the picture so that now you could only see the hustler’s hand. His mother was smiling in the photo, had a low-cut dress on, red, you could see her titties half hangin’ out, but that was all right. At least she looked happy. Not like she looked when they’d cuffed her right at the apartment for robbery, the last of her offenses in a long line of them, and taken her off to that women’s prison in West Virginia. Last time White had seen her, ten years back, before he went to live with his grandmother. Granmoms had been okay to him, but she wasn’t his moms. He had no idea who his father was.

White carefully took the photograph down and slipped it into his wallet, along with eighteen hundred dollars in cash he found where he’d hidden it, under some T-shirts in the bottom of his dresser.

He opened the window by his bed and dropped the Adidas bag into the darkness. He heard it hit the alley and he closed the window tight.

White slipped himself into his bright orange Nautica pullover, swept the keys to his Toyota off his scarred dresser, and walked out of his room. He walked quickly, so he wouldn’t have much time to think on what he was about to do. Wasn’t like he could just drop himself out that bedroom window and ghost. He needed to talk to those two, act like everything was chilly. He needed to do this and be gone.

And now he was going down the stairs. And now he was down the stairs and into the living room, and he was twirling his car keys on his finger, wondering why he was doing that, tipping them off so soon that he was headed out the door.

“Where you off to, Coon?” said Little, lying on the couch. He said it casual, like he was still White’s friend. White could see in Carlton’s eyes that he was higher than a motherfucker, too.

“I’m hungry. You hungry, right?”

“I still got me a Mac.”

“I was gonna roll on up to the Wings n Things, man.” His voice shook some and he closed his eyes, then forced them open quick.

“Bring me some malt back,” said Potter.

“You got money?” said White.

He moved to the lounger where Potter sat.

Be hard, Charles. Give ’em somethin’ bold to remember you by. Let ’em know you all there.

White opened his hand in front of Potter’s face. Potter slapped the hand away. “Man, get that shit out my face! Bring me some Olde English back, hear? Two forties of that shits.”

“And some wings,” said Little.

Potter and Little laughed, and White laughed, too.

“Aiight, then,” said White. He headed for the door.