Hood Rat Read online

  “That’s right, baby,” he said, prodding her head further. “Do that for daddy.”

  Reese looked up at him and thought for the umpteenth time how full of shit he was. That was okay, though. When they got to the Dior store he would pay like he weighed for that blow job. Reese began by gently licking around the head of Teddy’s dick. Something tasted different, but she really didn’t have time to dwell on it before he was trying to force himself in her mouth. She ran her tongue up and down his shaft to get it good and slippery, then proceeded with the magic trick. Reese took all of Teddy into her throat, drawing a low moan from him.

  “I can’t take this shit,” he said, snatching her to her feet and damn near dragging her over to the couch. Teddy roughly slung her over the arm of the couch and started pulling at her pants.

  “Nigga, these is Seven jeans. You rip ’em, you bought ’em,” she warned.

  “Sorry,” he said, panting and continuing to pull at her jeans. Finally he got them down and admired Reese’s ass. Seeing her in jeans, you could tell that she had a little something, but when they came down you could appreciate the whole union. Fumbling with his short, fat penis, Teddy began trying to penetrate her from behind.

  “Damn, hold your horses!” she shouted, slapping his hands away from her hips. “You got a condom on?”

  “Come on, ma, don’t start tripping off that shit. You know how me and you do,” he said, continuing to force himself inside her vagina.

  Reese had always had a problem taking Teddy inside her. Though he didn’t have the longest dick in the world, it damn near had the girth of a miniature salami. She tried to tell him to take it slow, as she wasn’t wet yet, but he ignored her and kept pushing. Reese felt like she was getting rug burns on the inside as Teddy crammed himself inside her. Gripping her hips, he began pumping away, obviously not bothered by the dryness of her. The worst part about it was that by the time she had gotten wet and was ready to enjoy it, Teddy came.

  “No the fuck you didn’t?” Reese looked back at him disgusted.

  “My fault, ma.” He was still panting. “Yo pussy is so good that a nigga couldn’t hold it. I’ll make it up to you, though.” When he pulled his dick out of her, cum ran down her inner thigh and landed on the back of her jeans. Reese wasn’t sure if she was more pissed at the fact that he had cum prematurely or the fact that he had fucked up her jeans.

  * * *

  “I don’t believe you came on my jeans,” Reese said, using the overhead mirror on the passenger side to try and fix her hair.

  “Reese, I said I was sorry. Fuck you want me to do, buy you a new pair?” he asked sarcastically.

  “I’d appreciate that,” she said as if he had been serious. Teddy looked over at her like he wanted to say something, but his cell phone cut him off. He listened for a while, said okay, and hung up. Reese didn’t like the tone of his voice while he was on the phone and she liked the way he was looking at her afterward even less.

  “Baby, we’ve got a slight change in plans,” he said solemnly.

  “Oh boy, what is it now? Penny break a nail and need you to take her to the fucking emergency room?”

  “You know, one of these days I’m gonna bust you in your smart-ass mouth,” he warned her.

  “The moment you feel like losing that same hand you raise to me, be my guest,” she said defiantly. “Now, are we gonna sit in front of this fucking building all day or are you taking me to Madison Avenue?”

  “That might have to wait till later on.”

  “Teddy, I know you ain’t about to pull this bullshit on me. I waited for you all damn morning and now you’re telling me we ain’t going?”

  “Yo, it ain’t my fault,” he said, running his hands across the top of his fade. “Penny was supposed to go pick Sha up, but now she’s talking about something came up so I gotta do it.” Sha was Teddy’s eightyear-old son. Reese had met him on more than one occasion, but couldn’t honestly say she spent any great length of time around him.

  “Oh, is that all? Why don’t you just snatch him up and bring him along. It’d be nice for me and Sha to finally get to spend some time together.”

  “Nah, you know how Penny be tripping. If she found out I had our son around another bitch she’d kill me and you.”

  “So that’s all I am, another bitch?” she asked defensively.

  “You know what I mean, Reese. You’re my bitch.” He reached out to touch her face, but she moved back. “Tell you what,” he said, peeling off a fifty and a twenty from his bankroll and handing it to her, “use this money to jump in a cab from here and get your mind right. Get yaself a bottle and some smoke, and when I finish with Sha, I’ll hit you back and we can see about catching the store.”

  Hearing that he would be coming back to scoop her, Reese’s face softened a bit. “Teddy, you better not be playing with me.” She took the money and got out of the car. “If you have me waiting around and you don’t show up, it’s gonna be on and popping.”

  “Ma, I got you,” he said, smiling like the cat that ate the canary. Reese went to say something else, but ended up getting a mouthful of exhaust as he peeled off down Seventh.

  * * *

  “Pooh, get your ass out here and get the sneakers out of the middle of my living room! If I fall and break my neck, I’m gonna break your ass!”

  Rhonda was dressed in a pair of denim shorts that were trimmed along the back, showing off her ass cheeks. The tank top she wore drew attention to her double-D breasts, but did nothing to hide her slightly protruding belly. She was a short woman with a large ass and oversize breasts, but as small as she was, she had the mouth of a giant.

  Rhonda made her way through her cluttered living room, mock-sweeping up the cigarette butts and beer bottle tops from the night before. Rhonda wasn’t a dirty woman, but her house always looked like a whirlwind had swept through it. It was due in part to the card parties she often threw. Being that Rhonda was one of the few girls who had her own crib, the girls were always coming through partying. On weekends, Rhonda sold plates to everyone in the hood to have some extra cake to stack on top of what she was already getting from the government.

  Though Rhonda wasn’t the most book smart of her friends, she was a master hustler. She was getting checks from all branches of the aid system. The state gave her a little cash and food stamps for her three children, but the big payoff was Social Security. Rhonda had swallowed some of her own stool when she was born, so the doctors said there was a chance she might develop a learning disability. Though there was nothing wrong with her, her mother went to the state building and told them there was. Rhonda’s mother had been getting checks for her since she was four years old, and when Rhonda turned eighteen, they came in her name. The hustle was so sweet that she used her son’s ADD condition to get one for him, too.

  “Alisha.” Rhonda turned to her thirteen-year-old daughter. “Get off my goddamn phone and go iron P.J.’s clothes.”

  Alisha rolled her eyes. “Hold on,” she said into the phone and covered the receiver with her hand. “A’ight! I’ll do it when I get off the phone.”

  “Bitch, who you yelling at?” Rhonda tossed a shoe at the child. “Don’t make me whip your little pissy ass! You just do like I say.”

  Alisha hung up the phone, with a suck of her teeth. When she passed Rhonda, she mumbled, “I hate you.”

  “What the fuck you just say?” Rhonda grabbed Alisha by the shirt. “Say it again, so I can kick your little ass.” She shoved Alisha roughly toward the bedroom.

  Alisha wanted to cry, but she wouldn’t give her mother the satisfaction. All her mother ever did was yell and curse at them. All of the kids’ mothers yelled, but not like Rhonda. There were things that Alisha wanted to confide in her mother, as every little girl did, but they didn’t have that type of relationship. She longed for the day when she was old enough to move out. When Alisha got to the back of the apartment, she slammed the door roughly.

  “Don’t be slamming no doors in here!”
she called after Alisha. “I gotta pay for that, and I got your little funky ass for free.” Rhonda’s tirade was interrupted by her phone ringing. She looked at the caller ID, but couldn’t tell who it was because the batteries were dead. “Hello!” she answered in her best hood rat tone.

  “Bitch, you can’t answer the phone no better than that?” the caller replied.

  “Don’t play with me, Billy. What’s up?”

  Billy was one of Rhonda’s closest friends. Though she was younger than Rhonda, they had lived in the same projects a few years back before Billy’s mother had gotten them out. She hadn’t known Billy as long as Yoshi had, but over the years they had developed quite a friendship.

  “Nothing, ’bout to go to Kingdome and see what’s going on,” Billy said.

  “Shit, I ain’t been there all summer,” Rhonda recalled. “I need to go with you. Who else is going?”

  “Me, Reese, and Jean.”

  “Jean? Billy, what’s really good with you and that bitch?”

  “Don’t be funny, Rhonda. You know me and Jean used to play for Brandeis together.”

  “Umm-hmm. Tell me anything,” Rhonda said suspiciously. “Let me find out you eat at the Y.”

  Billy sucked her teeth. “You know what, y’all better stop playing with me. You and Reese kill me with them slick-ass dyke comments.”

  Billy’s sexuality was a sore spot for her. Growing up, she had always been a tomboy. She didn’t play with dolls or do other things that little girls would. Billy felt more comfortable playing sports. Before her father was killed, he had taught her to play basketball. From the time Billy was five until right before she entered junior high school, he would take her to the park every day to work on her game. By the time Billy was twelve, she could give any of the older boys on the court a run for their money.

  Her friends always clowned her about being so boyish, but she was quick to defend her femininity. She had had several boyfriends through the years, but always felt like there was a void being left unfilled. Being around like-minded girls in the sports circuit all her life, it was only natural that her curiosity was peaked. Billy didn’t consider herself gay because she didn’t have a girlfriend, nor did she consider herself bi because she only got involved with guys. Oh, she had experimented a few times, but had yet to find the bitch to turn her out properly.

  “Well, maybe if you wasn’t so hard, people wouldn’t think it,” Rhonda continued.

  “Rhonda, just because I don’t run around with my tits and gut out like you doesn’t mean I’m not sexy.”

  “Please,” Rhonda said, “I got three muthafuck’n kids. This gut is a badge of honor. Besides, niggaz love to suck these titties.” She groped her breasts, as if Billy could see her through the phone.

  “Speaking of your big-ass titties, I seen Paul the other day,” Billy taunted.

  “Fuck him!” Rhonda snapped. “I ain’t stunting his square ass.”

  Billy sucked her teeth. “Yeah, right. You be on that nigga like a fly on shit.”

  “You can’t be serious. All Paul can do for me is take care of P.J. and make sure my pockets is right.”

  “You ain’t got no shame,” Billy said.

  “Shame, my ass! My son has his last name, and that means I’m tied to that muthafucka for the next fourteen years. Membership has its privileges,” Rhonda said smugly.

  “Now ain’t that some larcenous shit,” Billy remarked. “Rhonda, just because you and Paul have a baby together doesn’t mean he owes you. His job is to take care of his seed.”

  Rhonda moved the phone away from her ear and stared at it for a minute before she resumed their conversation. “Willamina, you’ve been my girl for a long time, but you must’ve fell and bumped that peanut-ass head of yours. I was on that table for twenty-six hours pushing that big-head little muthafucka out my ass. The least Paul can do is make sure I look just as good as P.J. does. You lay, you pay. Those are the rules, sweetie.”

  “Whatever. So you going or not?” Billy changed the subject.

  “Gimme like an hour. I gotta throw something off and get rid of these bad-ass kids,” Rhonda said.

  “Why don’t you bring them with you? The kids could play in the park, or watch the game. The fresh air would do them good. Besides, I haven’t seen my girl Alisha in a while anyway. How is she?”

  Rhonda huffed. “That little bitch is trying to make me kill her. I told her little ass to iron P.J.’s clothes and she acted like she was feeling some kind of way. Slamming doors and shit!”

  Billy snickered. “Stop playing.”

  “I’m dead-ass. She don’t know, I’ll lay her to rest, early!”

  “You need to stop talking about them kids like that.”

  “I brought the bitches here, so I can take ’em out. You just make sure y’all come get me.”

  “Just have yo trick ass ready when we get there!” Billy shot back, but it was too late because Rhonda had already transferred her to the dial tone.

  2

  Paul Dutton was the middle child of three boys. His mother worked as hard as she could to raise them after their father decided that a piece of sixteen-year-old trim was worth more than the wife he had uprooted from humble roots in Ohio, and the children they had bore. When the girl’s parents found out their relationship, they didn’t hesitate to sic the law on him. He was currently in the eighth year of a ten-year sentence.

  For all of their mother’s efforts, and the multiple jobs she worked, her children still managed to be swayed by the call. Paul’s oldest brother, Boo, managed to make jail his home. He had been in and out of different correctional facilities since he was thirteen. He was on the last leg of a three to nine, and looking to come home by the following summer.

  His baby brother Jahlil, or Jah, as he had taken to calling himself, was a loose screw. All of the Dutton boys had a touch of the devil in them, but Jah was just evil. He had taken to running with a pack of young kids from the Polo Grounds. They were behind several murders and strong-arm robberies. The old heads gave them a wide berth, and in return they let them be. Anyone who didn’t fall under the umbrella was food.

  Paul wasn’t a career criminal like Boo, or a sociopath killer like Jah, but he was no angel. Paul’s game was the con, and his weapons of choice were words. He had learned it from a dope fiend named Bub who used to hang on his block. He started out hitting up cee-low games and switching the dice. This held him down as a youth, but when he became a teenager, his need for dough increased. He saw the things that hustling friends had and wanted to keep in step, but he didn’t have the stomach for the risk that came with it. He would rob with words, as opposed to iron. Paul talked his way in and out of various department stores and other businesses using smoke and mirrors to fleece them of their goods.

  The boost game was sweet, but Paul’s greed pushed him to bigger and better scores. He got in good with this bitch who worked for the post office as a casual and kicked his hustle game up. Shorty would snatch credit cards and mail order checkbooks, bringing them to Paul to get off. Now instead of coming off with a few stolen pieces, he could simply walk in and purchase what he needed. He had even set up online accounts via the ’Net, making his job that much easier. Everyone in the hood was checking for Paul to cop the newest and flyest shit at half price.

  This went well, until the girl he was dealing with got greedy and tried to get over. She had come up on a Visa charge card, but her dumb ass didn’t know the difference between a debit and a credit card. All that week she had been shopping and eating at expensive restaurants. One she had particularly taken a liking to was an Italian joint called Bella’s. She was becoming a regular there, always ordering expensive wine and meals she couldn’t pronounce. On her fifth day of fun, the curtain finally fell. It didn’t take long for the account holder to notice that someone had been making sizable dents in her account. The feds noticed multiple charges to Bella’s on the account and were waiting in hopes that the thief would show. Sure enough, her trick ass showed up.<
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  The police took her down without much effort. Paul couldn’t be sure when it happened, but he had been told she started talking before they even got downtown. She fed them a bullshit story about how Paul was the mastermind, and he forced her to help him. With her bogus story, the deck looked stacked against Paul. His saving grace was that they only found merchandise at his house, no sales receipts. He was handed eighteen months and five years’ probation for his part in the capers. This brought his hustling days to a slow crawl.

  Paul sat in the middle of his studio apartment, wearing only a pair of jeans and a stocking cap. His chocolate-colored body was splattered with paint from the dripping brush that he held in his hand. On the easel in front of him was a five-by-five-foot canvas, assaulted with colors. The image wasn’t complete, but you could make out angles and white clouds. These kinds of portraits were Paul’s favorite to paint. Though he wasn’t a religious man, he found a certain joy in the images.

  In school, Paul was one of the most talented artists in the city. He was blessed with an artistic eye without having ever taken a lesson. He was offered scholarships to several schools, but none ever panned out. He let his need for cash overpower his common sense, and chose the streets over education. Years later, he found himself a starving artist, hustling here and there to make it and trying to take care of his son.

  A knock at the door stopped him midstroke. A mixture of blue paint and egg whites dripped from the tip of the brush and made splatter patterns on the wood floor. He wondered who it could be since he hadn’t expected anyone to come by. He inched toward the door, careful not to step on the loose floorboard. Looking through the peephole, Paul sucked his teeth. He wiped his hands on his pants and opened the door for his childhood friend, Larry Love.