Teri Woods - Angel's Revenge

“Fuck hope! It better not come to that because I promise you all, I won’t lose,” Angel replied, sitting back down, laying her head back and closing her eyes.

“Count the money.”

In the next days after Sal’s funeral, Rahman made it a point to spend more time at home with his family. He didn’t neglect his responsibilities on the streets, but he kept his word to Ayesha. His home was like another world. He cut the grass, went to his son’s Little League games, and cooked dinners with Ayesha. Despite the turmoil in the cities of New Jersey, home was his sanctuary, his shelter in the storm.

Rahman sat on the sofa in the living room, watching Ali and Aminah play while Anisa slept peacefully in his lap. He looked at his children and understood what it was all about. Everything he was trying to accomplish revolved around them.

Peace.

To be able to raise his children in a safe neighborhood and to send them to good schools was what it was all about. Creating a legacy that could be passed down through the bloodline of establishing an economically, socially, and morally sound community was what it was all about. Rahman didn’t want only for his children. He wanted for all ghetto children everywhere. Not everyone was fortunate enough to make it out of the ghetto. People became doctors, lawyers, stars, and politicians, but instead of staying in the community and using its resources, they took their talents and finances to the sanitized suburbs and left their old neighborhoods to wallow in the mire.

If it wasn’t for the imminent threat to his family, Rahman would have moved them back to Newark. But he was street enemy number one and the risk was too great.

He prayed he would see the day when Newark would be cleaned up and safe, a place where old people didn’t have to worry about being robbed or assaulted and where women didn’t have to exploit themselves to get by. His mission was to change things for the better, and he was willing to kill and die to make it happen.

“Abu, are you goin’ back to jail?” Ali asked as he looked up into his father’s face with the questioning eyes of a puppy.

Ali’s question took Rahman by surprise. But before he could respond, Aminah sucked her teeth and said, “You stupid boy. Abu ain’t leavin’, are you Abu?”

“Don’t call your brother stupid, Minah,” he gently scolded. Then he turned to his son, “What made you say that, Ali?”

Ali shrugged his shoulders, afraid that he had said the wrong thing.

“Ali, are you lying to me? You do know what made you ask.”

He hesitated for a second before replying. “Mommy. I heard her praying to Allah that you don’t go back to jail.”

Rahman didn’t know what to say or how to respond. Of course going back to prison had crossed his mind. Every time he grabbed his guns, he took his chances with the law. He had killed in spite of the cause he claimed, and in court it would be called one thing… murder. The judgment would be life without parole, or worse, the death penalty.

“Ali, do you know how much I love you and Mommy and your sisters?”

“A lot?” Ali smiled.

Rahman smiled back. “A whole lot. With all my heart. I’ll do anything to protect you. I’d die for you. And yes, I’d even go back to prison.”

“But I don’t want you to die, Abu! And I don’t want you to go to prison,” Ali begged. “Allah will protect us, right?”

How do you explain to a child that sometimes in life people have to die to be free, that sacrifices must be made, and sometimes that means giving up everything?

Rahman picked Ali up off the floor and put him on the couch beside him.

“I don’t want to die either, Ali, and I don’t want to go to prison, but… what if somebody tried to hurt us? What would you do?”

“Fight,” Ali barked, balling up his little fists.

“Even if you got hurt, too?” Rahman asked.

Ali nodded vigorously.

“I’ma fight, too, Abu,” Aminah added, swinging at an imaginary opponent, making Rahman chuckle.

“I know you would, baby girl. But sometimes when we fight, we don’t always win, do we? But does that mean we stop fightin’?”

“No,” Ali and Aminah said in unison.

“That’s right. We keep fightin’. You can never give up.” Rahman paused to consider the consequences of losing. “I have to keep fighting. You understand?”

They both nodded their little heads.

“But you won’t lose, will you Abu?” Ali asked, looking up to his superhero, the master of his universe.

Rahman smiled, but inside, he trembled.

“Insha Allah. I won’t.”

While Rahman savored his time at home, the summer blazed in the inner city for more than the obvious reasons. A sweltering heat wave had blanketed Jersey along with a heat wave of gunplay.

Bodies piled up on all sides, both Muslims and gangstas. From Newark to Atlantic City, niggas died or came up missing as the two opposing forces waged war for control of the streets. Bombs were planted and people were kidnapped in retribution. The Muslims fought for peace in the hood, and the gangstas fought for a piece of the hood. The police had their hands full but understood very little of the underlying causes. They could clearly see, however, the effects of the war being waged.

The Muslims were determined to stop the flow of drug money, so Angel decided to stop the flow of their money as well. They want to fuck with my paper, let’s see how they like it when I fuck with theirs.

Angel and her gang broke up vendors and pushed them off their street corners, making it just as hard to sell oils as it was to sell drugs.

Both sides took losses. It came down to who would break first. Angel was relentless and Rahman was resistant, both keeping it hot but avoiding the obvious target.

Each other.

“Ock, if you kill the head, the body will die,” Hanif tried to tell Rahman one Friday after Jum’ah prayer service. They were standing outside the masjid on Branford Place. “If anybody knows how to hit her, it’s you,” Hanif concluded.

Rahman had been thinking the same thing, but he knew it wouldn’t be easy. Angel had the same thoroughbred instincts he did. Too many Muslims had been hurt and killed, so the time had come to strike at the top. With Angel out of the way, Rahman knew he could squash the petty wannabe gangstas like roaches.

Yet Rahman couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable for thinking about murdering someone who had been so close to his heart. He looked at Hanif and asked him the question that had been heavy on his mind since the Timberland hit.

“Hanif, I know our cause is just. But do you think we’re serving it justly?”

“I remind you of the people in the boat, some on the top, some on the bottom. If the people on the top don’t stop the fools then everyone will drown.”

Rahman knew the story well.

“They are sinkin’ our society, Rah. How else can we stop them?”

“Set it up,” Rahman ordered without another thought. “But I gotta be the one to do it,” he added, knowing to send someone else would be cowardly.

Hanif had already figured as much.

Angel had one weakness, her love of shoes. She had always been a sneaker fanatic. Her favorite spot to shop was the Newport Center Mall in Jersey City. Rahman knew this and planned to use it against her. When people indulge their desires, their defenses are down.

It took several days of surveillance before he received the call.

“She’s here.”

He had been staying in Jersey City, a few blocks from the mall, waiting for his team to call.

Angel, Goldilocks, and Capo pulled up in Capo’s chrome 745. The mall was moderately crowded but the two gorgeous killers still managed to turn heads in their short shorts and multicolored tanks. Angel both hated and loved the attention. She hated it because she’d rather be who she really was, but she needed the attention. The clothes were the bait, or at least that’s how she wore them.