Marlon James - A Brief History of Seven Killings

And Papa-Lo come out raging like a madman saying who give Josey Wales and Weeper permission to chuck badness on Rema, who the fuck give it to him and he says a man bigger than you and Papa-Lo looked like he was going to hit Josey Wales but then he see we, he see me and he see the guns and I don’t know what he think but it must be something heavy because he walk away. But not before he said to anybody, everybody and nobody that one day we all goin’ run out of people to kill. Josey Wales hiss and go off to fuck him woman or play with him pickney. The woman I was living with look at me as if she never see me before. She right. She never see nothing like me before.

Nineteen seventy-six come and bring an election with it. The man who bring guns to the ghetto made it clear that there is no way that socialist government should win again. They will bring down hellfire and damnation first. They send us to shoot up two of the Eight Lanes at first but then they send us to do more. At the Coronation Market we walk up to a seller woman and a woman who dress stoosh, as if she come from uptown, and shoot them both. The next day we go to Crossroads, right where downtown rub up against uptown, and break into a Chinese shop and shoot it up. The next day we stop a bus passing through West Kingston on the way to St. Catherine. We stop to rob and scare the people but a woman police shout out Stop, like she is Starsky or Hutch. She couldn’t get her gun out in time so we drag her off the bus and the bus drive off. In the wild bush to the side of the road we shoot her six time while cars pass. Her body do the bullet dance when we shoot her, but is what Josey Wales do before that make me swallow back down me own vomit. Papa-Lo would never allow that. Josey wave him gun in front of us promising judgment if we tell.

The woman I live with look at how I change but I don’t care about anything as long as I get a smoke. And soon Weeper make it known that what stand between me and one big whiff of smoke was them pussyholes that need to get dead. I need to get rewarded, something anything to stop the downpression. That is what happen now, either you’re smoking or you’re dreaming about smoking and you grieve like somebody dead and not coming back.

News spread in Jamaica that crime is out of control, the country is going to the dogs, not even uptown is safe and PNP is losing control of the country. Is two weeks before the election, and Papa-Lo send us to every house to remind people how to vote. One of the boys say he don’t take orders from Papa-Lo. Josey Wales might hiss and grumble and say something with double meaning but Josey Wales never forget that Papa-Lo became Papa by being the toughest and most brutal man in the ghetto. Papa-Lo walk right up to the little boy and ask him age. Seventeen, he said. Look like age eighteen lock off, Papa-Lo say and shoot him in the foot. The boy scream and hop and scream again. People getting testy ’round here, he shout. People forgetting who is top ranking ’round here! You! You forget? he say and point him gun at another one of the boys. The boy jump and tremble out no-no-no Papa-Lo you is the don, the don of the dons, and Papa-Lo laugh as the boy start to piss up himself. Lick it up, Papa-Lo say, and the boy look stupid for a second until Papa-Lo fire his gun and say either you clean up the piss or we clean up you blood, and the boy, seeing that Papa-Lo not joking, crouch down and start to lap up his pee-pee like a cat gone crazy.

And so we go into the street and knock on the open door and kick down the locked one and one person, old and almost mad, say he not voting for anybody, so we drag him out of him house and take out all him clothes and burn them and then we strip him naked and burn those clothes too and kick him two time and say he better know how him going vote or we start burning things in the house, and the woman I live with ask if they coming for her too since JLP and PNP is both shit and I say that we might and she didn’t say a word to me again. But when the white man come and when the man who bring guns to the ghetto come, they talk to Josey Wales, not Papa-Lo. Papa not even in the ghetto that much anymore. Spending too much time with the Singer.

Night. December supposed to be cool by now. The Singer in him house. Living and singing and playing. All Jamaica and in the ghetto talking about how he decide to do the Smile Jamaica Peace Concert even though it’s PNP propaganda and night and day that the Echo Squad, bad man on PNP payroll, guarding him house. No police except for one car that stop early in the night. Nobody getting in and few people coming out. I watch car pass by and I watch room light go on and off and on again. I watch the stubby manager go and come and the white man with brown hair. He say one time that him life don’t mean nothing if he couldn’t help plenty people, and he help plenty people but he keep giving people what they need and young people don’t need nothing, they just want everything. We sing other songs, songs from youth who can’t afford to make song so we ride the real rock rhythm and skank because only women dance. And we sing song that we make up in our sleep that if you ride like lightning you going crash like thunder. And the Singer think Johnny was, but Johnny is, Johnny change and Johnny coming to get him. Before this night I see him smoking weed with Papa-Lo, and then give envelope to man who run with Shotta Sherrif and even people bigger than me wondering what the r’asscloth this Natty Dread up to. This Singer think because he come from where we come from that he understand how we live. But he don’t understand nothing. Everybody think the way him think when they leave and come back. That everything was exactly how they leave it. But we different. We harder than him and we don’t care. He flee before you turn into something like we.

And we? We be top-ranking bad man. Heckle mother come out one day when we controlling the street corner and playing domino saying ’bout how she can smell all sort of nastiness in him room so he slap her in the face and say don’t disrespect the bad man when him out’a street. The woman I live with ask if is so I goin’ treat her too but I say nothing. I don’t want to beat no woman. I just want some free C. That is all I want. That is all I need. Two day ago I walk past some woman house and see Weeper walk out naked to the standpipe ’round the back. He pull the condom off him buddy, fling it away and bathe himself. Everybody know that condom and birth control was white man scheme to kill off black people, but he don’t care. I watch him take off him glasses and scrub everywhere with rag and soap as if the standpipe and the tree build for him alone even though it wasn’t even his regular woman house. I didn’t want to fuck him, none of that nasty batty boy business, I just wanted to go inside him like a duppy and move when he move and buck when he buck and wind when he wind and feel myself pull out little by little by little and ram back in hard then soft, fast then slow. Then I wanted to be the woman. I just need to fucking breathe.

Tonight I watching the Singer house alone, but other times I watch with company. The short man with the big mouth that manage him, he thought we was just another set of boys coming looking for either money, weed or a chance to cut a big tune, but he look at we different. And we go back to the ghetto and the white man who seem to know him tell us about every room in him house. That everybody have their price, even the people right under him, and at the right time they will take a nice little break, no a nice long break, a good funky disco nap like funky Kingston I gotcha! That there is only one way in and one way out. That he take a break usually at around nine, nine-fifteen, and go to the kitchen, alone, since the children not there and everybody else still in the studio or about to leave. That the steps leading up to the kitchen give a clear view but we should just shower the place to make sure. That two should drive, two go inside and four case the grounds. We don’t know what he mean, so Josey Wales say he mean take the guns around out of the case, which sound stupid. The American go red again and the man who bring guns to the ghetto says he means surround the place. They show us picture. The Singer in the kitchen, him and the white man who manage the label, him in the studio with eyes bursting out of him head from good weed, him and the new guitarist straight from America, him fucking one girl, him fucking her sister, him leaning against the stove like even the Singer now tired of the Singer. All of Jamaica waiting for the Smile Jamaica Concert. Even some people in the ghetto going because Papa-Lo say we should go for Bob, even though it’s PNP propaganda. All I could think of was one more night and I would stop being hungry. One more night and I was going to take the S off Superman chest and the B off Batman belly.