Hate the Player and the Game

chapter 4

Chapter 4

Cruze

I sat there at the dinning table in the kitchen cutting the white, hard stuff with a pocket knife. Cocaine was my first lesson. Calli made Raheem spend the whole week with me on how to cook it up and create money. Calli told me that cocaine was good merchandise and if I fucked it up then he would fuck me up. Meaning that he would beat my ass. Calli sure did know how to intimidate me. I always told myself that I wasn't scared of nothing, but when it came down to Calli, it was something about him that put the fear of God in me. He acted like my teacher, my influence, but most of all he acted like a father. I've haven't had that in the past seven years so of course I was going to do what he told me, but Calli did have some dark sides. This nigga was crazy and so was Raheem, but Calli couldn't control his anger at some point of times and he did some pretty messed up shit. I've only been here a week and I feel like I want to go back to Brooklyn, but there was nothing for me there. I wanted to go back because I watched Calli beat the living shit out of a young boy for getting robbed when he was making some moves. Calli lost almost five hundred dollars off of a little dope boy about sixteen years old and he went on a rampage. To me, five hundred dollars was petty, but to Calli it was still money. To make a long story short, that boy left with a broken nose and a few of his teeth knocked out. I had to realize that one mistake, one mistake that I ever made in this business will lead me to my death bed and Calli would probably be the one to put me there. So I sat there, cutting the dope up and measuring. I concentrated so hard that I concentrated on concentrating. I was all alone and Raheem said that he wasn't going to help me anymore because I should already have the hang of it. When I was finished I bagged up the merchandise in small baggies about the size of my finger tips, and long plastic tubes. I was now finished. I put all the cocaine and the balance in a small safe box with a combination lock on it and locked it up. I put it under the sink behind cleaning utensils and bottles of chemicals as I was instructed. I then go down to the basement where Calli and Uncle Ronnie were socializing. Calli looks at me and smiles. "Cruze......nice of you to join us youngin". He says. I nodd my head and go over and sit next to Uncle Ronnie on the couch. "I have something to tell you".

"What is it"? I ask.

"Well uhh me and your Uncle decided that your going to be going to school soon okay".

"WHAT"! I yell. I stood up furiously. I didn't know what came over me to yell at Calli the way I did, but I couldn't believe what he was telling me.

"I ain't studder".He says.

"But.....but".I couldn't find the words. Calli pointed his long finger at me.

"Young Blood....you better calm yo ass down.......I don't want to hurt you".

"But I thought I was done with school. I thought that as long as I was living here then I didn't have to go. Plus I'm expelled from my old school remember? I have forty days not to start a knew school and it's February. The school year is almost over".

"Do you think we care". Uncle Ronnie says. "You still will have another three months to go back".

"But my old school is back in Brooklyn......so yall gonna send me back now"? I asks.

"No.....no. Your getting the wrong idea here". Calli says. "Your going to Central Queens high school. Your fifteen so your what? A sophomore"?

"Yeah". I say.

"Okay well since you think you know it all, I bet you can't even tell me how many kids are willing to buy a little weed".

"You mean if I get bad grades you won't care"?

"What does your damn grades have to do with my damn money. Of course I don't. Handle that shit on your own......ask your uncle about all that. All I care about is the mullah and this knew idea we got here will probably make us allot of it.....I mean Central Queens has a football and basketball team. You probably couldn't even think of the money that we could make by selling the players steroids". Calli laughed.