Array 50 Cent - Baby Brother

“Damn, that’s an amazing story,” Butter said.

“Yeah, man. That’s how the shit went down. I got her pregnant. We kept in touch while I was in prison and she moved to Charlotte, N.C., so that’s why I relocated here.”

“Why did you relocate here?”

Seven inhaled the blunt. “Damn, nigga, you a news reporter? Motherfucker, why so many questions—you the FBI or something?”

“Naw, just making sure you ain’t FBI,” Butter replied.

“I mean I got three sisters and three brothers in New York, but I ain’t really fucking with them like that. I mean, the whole time I was down only one of my sisters came to visit me so I ain’t really have no reason to go back to New York and I ain’t going back to Virginia cuz all my niggas locked up.”

“Damn. You came all the way down here not knowing anybody.”

“I wasn’t afraid. The only thing I was worried about was that bitch tripping, and she tripped and put me out. But it’s okay, I got my own room in the boardinghouse and I got some pussy, so I’m good.”

“Nigga, you must not be used to having money.”

“Now that’s where you’re wrong at. I made a lot of money. Ran with a fucking crew—and most of them niggas that I ran with are either dead or in jail.”

Butter rolled another blunt, lit it and inhaled, then blew another smoke ring before coughing loudly.

“What the fuck were y’all doing?”

“Coke, heroin, e-pills… all types shit.”

“I can’t believe that shit, man, cuz it just seems like you are so content with being an average motherfucker.”

“Nigga, you average,” Seven said.

“But I ain’t never got no real money, nigga. I bet y’all seen millions.”

Seven thought back. A few years ago he was driving Porsches, BMWs and shit with expensive rims. Ever since he’d been released from prison a year ago, it had only been a bus pass. He really wanted money too, but he didn’t know anybody who would give him drugs. He was in Charlotte. Nobody knew him. This was both good and bad. It was good because he didn’t have a reputation to keep, but it was bad because he couldn’t get anybody in Charlotte to supply him.

Butter passed Seven the gun. “Got this motherfucker for two rocks, nigga, it was brand-new in the box.”

“What you mean you got it for two rocks, you ain’t no hustler.”

“I know but I have drugs because I’m the type of motherfucker that takes shit from the dope boyz, you know, if they making money I’m making money because they have to give me money or else I’ll rob they punk ass. I actually took the dope from a nigga, gave it to another motherfucker for the gun and when I got the gun I robbed the nigga that sold me the gun and got my rocks back…that’s how ya boy Butter gets down.”

Seven laughed but he really didn’t think that was funny. He’d been around niggas like Butter before and knew he could only trust him as far as he could see him.

“So—do you want to help me with this lick?”

“So, who is this cat, Caesar? And does he have money?”

“He has a Colombian plug, and word in the street is he gets those bricks for thirteen five. He just bought this stripper bitch a Benz for her birthday.”

“How can we get at him?” Seven wanted to know. He remembered the days when he was dealing in Richmond, Virginia. He knew that the streets talk, especially in the South; news spread like wildfire. Things that were just ordinary conversation could be made into major news. He also knew that whoever Caesar was, it wasn’t going to be easy to get to him.

“One thing you have to always remember is that most of these major drug dealers are cowards. You don’t have to worry about them. It’s the niggas around them that you have to worry about; the enforcer-type niggas. Those are the hungry mufuckas that will do something to you,” Butter pointed out.

“Exactly. I know this. I mean I ain’t never stuck nobody up, but I know the fuckin’ streets. I know legendary stickup kids in New York. I’m talking about kidnap-your-mom type niggas, son.”

Butter chuckled to himself. He never understood why New Yorkers called everybody “son.” A motherfucker could be seventy years old and still be called son.

“I know what ya mean. But—back to the business. You with me or not?”

Seven thought for a moment and took a puff of the blunt. He knew that if what Butter said was true, he would be doing a lot better than he had been doing. Hell. He lived in a boardinghouse with twelve other sweaty men and one crackhead woman. He wanted out of that place more than he did prison. He envisioned taking kilos of coke from the drug dealer with the Colombian connection. “Yeah. I’m down, son.”

Butter tossed him a pair of gloves and a ski mask and a sawed-off pump shotgun. “Let’s get that money the fast way the ski mask way.”

“The ski mask way…Hell yeah,” Seven said. He and Butter high-fived.

The subdivision was called Peaceful Oaks. A quiet neighborhood in the southeastern part of Charlotte. It was predominantely white, which meant they had to be very cautious. White people called the police at the slightest bit of suspicion. Two black men rolling through suburbia after midnight was not a good look. Butter and Seven rolled through the neighborhood looking out for Good Samaritans—people that wanted to be on the news saying that they tipped the police.

Caesar’s street was Peaceful Way Drive. Butter went one street over, to Peaceful Pine Drive, and parked the car in the driveway of an abandoned house. He and Seven hopped over the privacy fence in the backyard into Caesar’s backyard and looked around, but didn’t see anybody. Then Seven saw the sign that read ADT in front of the door.

“He has an alarm. Man. What do we do about that?”

“He has a baby, too.”

Seven looked confused. “What the fuck does that have to do with anything?”

“Don’t worry about this shit. I’ve done it before. I got this player.”

Seven put on the mask and the gloves. He thought about prison; the sick old men there, the perverts, the liars and the snitches. He didn’t want to go back to that place. They went around front. Nobody noticed them and the street was dark.

“On the count of three, I’m going to kick in the door. I want you to go in one room and I go in the other, just in case there is somebody else in the house.”

“Nigga, you’ve done this shit before for real?” Seven said.

Butter’s face hardened. “This ain’t no fuckin’ game to me, man. I need to eat.”

“Okay. Let’s do it.”

Butter kicked the door in and ran into the first bedroom.

Seven ran into the second bedroom and found a man and a woman on the floor, naked. He pointed the gun at the man. “Okay, I need you to get the fuck up and your bitch to stay on the floor with her hands on her head.”

The man was shaking and it looked as if tears were in his eyes. Damn, what a bitch-assed nigga, Seven thought.

“Nobody is going to get hurt as long as you do what the fuck I say.”

Butter walked into the room with a little boy wearing Elmo pajamas.

“Look what I have.”

The little boy began to cry.

The alarm went off. Caesar said, “The police will be here soon. You don’t want to go to jail, do you?”

Seven said sarcastically, “Yeah. That what we came here for…to get caught and go to jail.” He slapped Caesar with the barrel of the gun.

“Don’t you say a motherfuckin’ thing.”

He walked Caesar into the hallway to the alarm keypad.

“Disarm the alarm,” Seven ordered.

Caesar punched in the code.

The telephone rang. Butter picked it up without answering it. The caller ID said ADP.

“The fuckin’ alarm company.”