Maurice Broaddus - King Maker

No one needed to yell "gun!" The reports scattered the crowd and the people charged from every direction.

Rhianna found herself separated from her girl. The melee was like a riptide, pulling folks caught in the undertow of bodies away from the action. If Rhianna stopped moving, she might have been trampled.

His head lowered, hands raised above it as if he were shielding himself, Percy waded through the bodies. Without trying, he pushed people aside. Heedless of his own well-being, all he knew was that her bloodless face was etched in pain. Despite no foundation, no lip gloss, no nail polish, no blush, no eyeliner, she was as beautiful to him as ever. He was embarrassed to stare at her for too long.

He stood there, not touching her. Not crowding her in any way. But he remained between her and the danger. He took any blows purposeful or accidental without so much as a wince.

Two bodies were left in the wake of the gun shots. Alaina, one eye a pocket of darkness with much of the back of her head missing; her mother shot in the belly. The news would go on to speak of the violence, the irony of Alaina's mother giving birth to one child as she lost another.

The cops put a knee into Percy's back, dropping him to the ground. Rhianna screamed at them to let him go. Blows rained down on him. Bloodied, but without complaint, he laid on the ground.

"What's the problem here?" Detective Burke said.

"Just securing the scene."

"He's a suspect."

"He was threatening the girl."

"No he wasn't. He was looking out for me."

"That true, son?" Detective Burke asked.

"I'd never hurt Rhianna."

"Let him go." Detective Burke's eyes softened. "But we do need to get control of the situation and secure this scene."

"Yes ma'am."

"And get an ambo up here." Angry and controlled.

Another in a trail of bodies leading back to the Phoenix Apartments, it was like a poisoning of the souls emanating from there. A tension settled on the west side of town, an ugly, frenzied spirit of darkness threatening to smother them.

The police questioned everyone for hours. What facts they could piece together from the jumbled statements was anyone's guess. Folks recounted little past fists flying and barely remembered glimpses of faces here and there.

Lady G hadn't left King's side since the attack. Though he towered over her, a tremor of fear ran through him. Instinct fought against the connection he sensed with her. His gut told him to move along — run if need be — that she was trouble waiting to hurt him. Many times he'd encountered women like Lady G. Women who took one look at a darker brother and cast him aside like a lesion best scraped off. But maybe that was him being unnecessarily defensive. There was a familiarity to her, a piece of a puzzle he never knew was missing. Too much of that had been going on in his life lately, like a game was going on and everyone had a copy of the rulebook except him.

"Can we get out of here?" Lady G slipped her gloved hand into his, soft, gentle, and unassuming. Struck by the mystery of the affection, King didn't know what to do with it. It wasn't wholly unpleasant.

"Yeah, I only live a few blocks down."

Lady G hesitated. She read his tone see if there was the hint of proposition, or worse, the expectation of one. The invitation wasn't what made her uncomfortable. It seemed genuine and despite there being little about his day to justify her feeling safe, she nevertheless did. No, what made her uncomfortable was being seen. Most times, no one saw her. People may have had a sense about homeless folks, the same way one could be in a darkened room and know that they weren't alone. People knew when to walk around them or speed out of the way of a possible solicitation of a handout.

Like hunting deer, one didn't look for the deer themselves, but rather trained their eyes to detect movement or some evidence of presence. With homeless teens, one checked what didn't belong. Like wearing long sleeve shirts on an eighty degree evening. Why? Because it got cool under bridges even at night. Or duct-taped shoes. Or conspicuous backpacks, containing all of their earthly belongings. Nothing definitive, only clues to a greater story, once you know what to look for. If you bother looking at all.

But King saw her.

Lady G hiked her backpack onto her shoulder.

"We ready to go?" Rhianna strode over to them, cutting a dagger-filled glance at Lady G's hand in King's. Percy, bruised and bandaged, followed behind her.

"Nah, I think I'm all right," Lady G said.

Rhianna continued to study King, wondering — though not having to guess too hard — what this oldass dude (he was what? Probably twenty-eight or something) wanted with her girl. "Where the spot be at?"

"Round the way."

"So is it just y'all or is there room for a few more?"

"It's tight as it is."

"It's like that?"

"Yeah. I'll catch up with you," Lady G reassured her. "You be at the bank squat?"

"Uh-uhn. I don't want every motherfucker knowin'."

"I know a spot," Percy said.

"All right then." Rhianna relaxed.

"You sure?"

"You giving me a choice?" Rhianna asked. Lady G shook her head. "All right then."

Dismissed, Rhianna and Percy walked toward the bus stop. She turned around one last time to make sure her friend was OK only to spy Lady G leaning into King's casual embrace.

Big Momma sat on a plastic bench with her neighbor from across the way. Freshly coiffed gray hair, Big Momma's sculpted dignity was undercut by her ashy elbows. The slight heft to her gut actually matched her neighbor's. They didn't say anything, merely sat there. The night wind bit at them, unexpectedly cool for an August night. Lady G assumed a posture designed to keep her warm: arms pulled within her T-shirt. A security porch light lit the court of townhouses. They sat in white plastic lawn chairs. Bent over, King slowly rocked back and forth on the cooler that was his makeshift chair — letting Lady G have the last seat.

"Who was that one girl who came up here halfnaked?" King asked.

"Who? Alaina?" Lady G felt a pang of regret at belittling her dead nemesis.

"Nah. Some spot girl, strolling on up talking about how she just got through letting another woman eat her coochie."

"Around the kids?" the neighbor asked before taking another drag from her cigarette. That usually signaled a brewing shit storm if she built up a big enough head of steam. She had been married for six years to her high school sweetheart. After the birth of their daughter, their marriage had hit a rocky patch. He had simply had enough at playing grownup. The lure of whiling away his days running the streets proved easier than holding down a straight (read: boring) nine to five gig, but she had bills to pay. So she put his ass out. And took up smoking.

"Ain't no kids around here anymore," King said. "Folks have to grow up too quick."

"She had to have been high," Lady G said almost to herself, her mind still mulling over Alaina suddenly bugging out the way she did. "Tweaked out on something. She could be bad, but she don't wild out like that."

"She like that?" King asked.

"Just saying. I hear they've got new stuff coming in, got some folks acting up."

After his father, Luther, died, his moms, Anyay, went off the rails. He lost her in degrees, so no one noticed for a long time. She moved out her momma's house, declaring it time further to spread her wings. More to let the streets seep into her, to find a connection to Luther. Love was a cancer which crept into you unsuspecting, and by the time you realize you have it, it had metastasized into every part of you. And Anyay sought her own brand of chemo, breaking her mother's heart. She died not too long after.

Two kids later, from men fueling her chemotherapy, it was a short jump to living in their car. They maintained as best they could: school in the morning, cutting out early so that King could do lawn work and odd jobs to get enough money for hotel rooms at night. King thought that his mother would get her act together if she only had the little ones to worry about. A good woman still lived within the fiend she'd become, she just needed a push. The chance to gain her footing in life and she'd pull it together. He knew she would. So he left them.