No questions asked
I knew it would be a bad day when the call came from The Bronx.
Look, I’m not against making an extra buck or two, but crossing people’s turf is bad enough without dancing through a whole borough.
How this dude got my number up where he was wasn’t my business.
My motto is: no questions asked.
I needed a new jacket and business in Brooklyn was slow, so I figured: why not?
Then there was the thing about having a reputation.
You didn’t put out advertisements like mine and then refuse a job.
Word gets out, and people stop trusting you.
The next thing you know there’s some kid slipping onto your turf stealing your action.
On the subway, some puff-gang part time rap group tired to give me some fluff, slick fools with big mouths making like they owned the tracks when every gang worth their salt knew the subways were sacred.
They took one look at me and figure they were going to score my shoes or my shirt, and I went and pulled a Glock on them, blowing them away before any one of them could fathom what went on.
None of them figured n my handing a piece, let alone using it.
And theirs were the only faces shocked when I pulled the trigger.
It was “all out that’s getting out “ when the train got to the next station.
And of course, some big brother transit dick gets it in his head to play here like he was any good at anything more than beating up on graffiti kids or chasing down turnstile hoppers.
The dude shouted for me to stop as I followed the crowd out into Manhattan. He even drew his gun like he thought he could use it, rapping into his radio.
That scared me more because I knew real cops would hear that broadcast and come swarming down on me like a pack of rates.
Sure I blew that fools away, then got out onto the street as fast as I could before the shit hit the fan.
Borough hopping?
That was the problem.
And I wasn’t going to do it again, bad rep rap or not.
I went west, crossing over to the Broadway line where it was safe to go underground again.
I played sheep the rest of the way uptown.
Let the punks have their glory as long as I stayed out of the pen.
I saw no more rail gains or transit pigs, just more sheep shipping back from overpaid jobs on Wall Street.
Easy pickings, I figured.
But I left them alone.
I had enough to be peeved about when I got to where I was going and the lead-head son of a bitch told me he changed his mind.
Changed his mind!
Sure, he said he would pay me my money anyway, but I was no mood to hear that shit and I told him as much.
“But it’s my sister, man,” he told me , pleading with me not to go through with the hit.
He said he was pissed at her for something and lost his head.
Too bad, I told him, and made him lose more than his head when I shot him in the face.
Then, on principle, I went and hit his sister, too.
I didn’t want any loose ends for the cops to pick up on.
I shed my beeper and my cell phone the moment I got back to home turf, just to be safe.
Okay, so maybe it didn’t look right me hitting both of them like that.
But I was peeved and hell it would have looked a lot worse if I let those two turkeys get away with it.
I told you.
I’ve got a reputation to keep and I would have looked like a fool to go all the way up there to have some idiot change his mind.
But next time something happens like this, I’m gonna ask some questions.