I walked to the driver’s side window and demanded his wallet, at which time he smiled with a baneful sneer, drew a pistol, and fired one round into my chest.
BOOM!
The sound reverberated again and again, echoing away in my unconscious mind.
My own screaming woke me from my fitful sleep. Sitting up in the hospital bed, I struggled for clarity. Was it just a dream? I felt my chest for blood, a hole, anything that could prove or, for that matter, disprove my fearful thought of being shot again. I bad been dreaming—having a nightmare would be more accurate. But my dreams, or those I could recollect, have always been punctuated with gunfire. Gunfire directed at me, coming from me, or in my general vicinity. And never have I shrunk from the presence of such lethal violence.
Being chased by Randy’s huge donut is quite another matter, one to which I could not attach any sort of logic whatsoever. That scared me. For years that damn donut chased me around in my dreams. I was so deathly afraid of those donut dreams that once I had started banging I often contemplated destroying the huge plastic replica on Normandie and Century. Even today I loathe the sight of it. My screams alerted the on-duty nurse, not to mention scaring the daylights out of my roommate, who was also a gunshot victim. In minutes I was being attended by a nice-looking Chicano nurse who, as it turned out, had seen such postshooting behavior many times. She explained that it was quite normal and expected. My main concern at first was to make sure I had just been dreaming, and then my pride stepped in and I inquired about the tone and sound of my screaming. “Was I really screaming or was I just shouting? Was it loud, or what?”
Against my worst fears of damaged masculinity, or what I perceived to be such, she confirmed that yes, it was a scream and it was very loud. Perhaps she felt she had been too literal for my young ego, as I’m certain she saw me slump into a mournfully sagging posture. She fell heavily into a spiel about my nightmares being “normal,” “natural,” and “a result of the terrifying experience I had been through.” All that was fine and sounded good, but could she please go down to South Central and explain that to my homies? Or, better yet, my enemies, who would just love to hear of me having nightmares. This line of thinking caused me for the first time to question my roommate’s origins and set affiliation. For if he belonged to the wrong set this could be very harmful to my reputation and perhaps make it all the more difficult to continue my ascent through the ranks. Monster Kody having nightmares? Unthinkable.
Shortly after the nurse’s departure and before the morphine she’d administered took me under, I questioned my roommate. He was a hapless civilian, fresh out of the backwoods of a small town in Georgia, whose people lived in a highly active part of Los Angeles. He had been sprayed with buckshot from a passing vehicle. The possibility that he was a civilian had never crossed my mind, perhaps because I always tried not to shoot civilians, unless of course the bangers outnumbered them in a gathering. Should we get some flack for that later on, we could always claim “association.” We were hard-driven for results, for confirmed body counts of combatants. From what my roommate said, he was simply standing in the front yard when a passing car unloaded some buckshot into him. After he told me of this and his immediate plans to depart for “back home,” he repeated over and over in a strong southern drawl, “Damnedest thang… damnedest thang.”
He was totally taken aback by L.A.’s madness. But to me it all seemed quite normal. “Normal” like the nurse had explained my nightmares were normal. It was “natural” for me to retaliate against anybody as a “result of the terrifying experience I had been through,” just like the nurse had explained. Of course I twisted her explanation of my psychosis into a perverted alibi for my continued behavior. I rationalized my actions continually, and with each successive level of consciousness I reached, my rationalization became less convincing to me. Questions were often left to hang in the balance because my conscience simply refused to process them due to such illogical reasoning. So I’d avoided questioning myself about my ongoing radical behavior. I’d deadened my conscience with PCP, alcohol, and friends, who themselves had done likewise. I dozed off under the soothing waves of the morphine, wondering how it must be to live a civilian life.
I just couldn’t imagine living the life of a “hook,” those seemingly spineless nerds who were always victims of someone’s ridicule or physical violence, who never responded to an affront of any type. I had, while in primary school, been victimized by cats during their ascent to “king of the school.” My milk money was taken. My lips were busted two or three times. Not because I decided to defend my dime or my honor, but because my assailant simply whacked me. Early on I saw and felt both sides of the game being played where I lived. It was during my time in elementary school that I chose to never be a victim again, if I could help it. There was no gray area, no middle ground. You banged or held strong association with the gang, or else you were a victim, period. To stress this when we made appearances at high schools, we’d often jump on hooks and take their money, leather jackets, hats, and such.
What’s contradictory here, and is one of the irrational questions I battled with in my later years, is why are hooks victims of our physical wrath but unfair game in our lethal violence? The answer seems to be that hooks seldom, if ever, shoot back. Other bangers—whom I’m convinced, like me, have been victimized at some point in their lives and refused to let it continue—respond with the same violence they receive, if not something more lethal. Because of this, they must be smashed. Hooks are easy pickings for most anyone. But bangers know that there is no glory in killing a hook. In fact, it’s frowned upon in most areas. To me, however, to be unconnected meant to be a victim. And I couldn’t imagine that.
The next time I surfaced from my morphine-induced drift, I was in tremendous pain. Everywhere and all at once pain pounced on me with mind-wracking weight. My stomach, which had been surgically cut open to remove some shredded intestines, was now closed with sutures and staples. Since the surgery was so recent the cut skin had not yet started to heal, and in between the staples the openings looked pus-filled. The sutures were so tight that I could barely move without feeling tied down. My stomach resembled railroad tracks that in some areas had been blown apart by saboteurs. The sight of this alone caused lumps in my throat. To the left and slightly below my navel was where the bullet had entered. There was just a hole there, uncovered and open. I could see pink inside. My pain in this area came from under my navel and around the staples. The tube in my nose, which ran down into my stomach, was attached to a pumplike machine next to my bed. Looking at it caused pain. It was extracting green slime from my stomach and storing it in a clear jar. The nurse called it poison. I couldn’t comprehend that and just assumed I had been hit with poison bullets. The catheter in my maleness ran from under the covers over the side of the bed and into what, I don’t know. I never looked. This was also very painful. My left hand had been broken by the impact of the second shot and was in a cast. It, too, throbbed with pain.
I had taken three hits in the left leg, two side by side in the meatiest part of my front thigh, and one up a bit higher near my hip, almost on my butt. Like my stomach wound these, too, had been left open and exposed. I had also been hit in the upper back. I assumed this hole was also left open. From every hole, or its surrounding area, I had pain.
Looking from my stomach to the catheter to the open wounds and then to the pumping machine, I just couldn’t put it all together. My thoughts ran at lightning speed in an attempt to answer some of the questions now being submitted for clarification. I was seriously dehydrated. My lips were cracked and dry. I reached out for the nurse’s aid button hanging next to my bed, but my stomach pain was too intense, and I fell back in a heap. Frustration rose up like an evil serpent from a murky river, snatched me, and drew me under. It was then that I began to realize the impact of my being wounded and all the mental strain that I had actually been under.
I lay prone for what seemed like a day or two, trying to piece together what had taken place in my life over the past five years. Damn, had it actually been five years? Yes, five years had elapsed since my joining up with the set. Although it seemed like a long time, it had gone very quickly. At the same time, the seriousness of my chosen path had made me age with double rapidity. At sixteen I felt twenty-four. Life meant very little to me. I felt that my purpose on earth was to bang. My mind-set was narrowed by the conditions and circumstances prevailing around me. Certainly I had little respect for life when practically all my life I had seen people assaulted, maimed, and blown away at very young ages, and no one seemed to care. I recognized early that where I lived, we grew and died in dog years. Actually, some dogs outlived us. Where I lived, stepping on someone’s shoe was a capital offense punishable by death. This was not just in a few isolated instances, or as a result of one or two hotheads, but a recognized given for the crime of disrespect. Regardless of the condition of the shoes, the underlying factor that usually got you killed was the principle. The principle is respect, a linchpin critical to relations between all people, but magnified by thirty in the ghettos and slums across America.
I had no idea of peace and tranquility. From my earliest recollections there has been struggle, strife, and the ubiquity of violence. This ranged from the economic destitution of my family to the domestic violence between my parents, from the raging gang wars to the omnipresent occupational police force in hot pursuit. Peace to me was a fleeting illusion only to be seen on TV programs like “The Brady Bunch.” I’ve never been at peace, and nothing has ever been stable. Everything in my life has been subject to drastic change or subtle movement, without so much as a hint or forewarning. I’ve always felt like a temporary guest everywhere I’ve been, all of my life, and, truly, I’ve never been comfortable. Motion has been my closest companion, from room to room, house to house, street to street, neighborhood to neighborhood, school to school, jail to jail, cell to cell—from one man-made hell to another. So I didn’t care one way or another about living or dying—and I cared less than that about killing someone.
The set was my clearest vision of stability. Although changes took place in the hood, the hood itself never changed. To ensure that it didn’t, we vowed to kill all who set out to eliminate it. This obsession has been evidenced by our carriage in warfare. The ultimate stability, however, was death—the final rest, the only lasting peace. Though never verbally stated, death was looked upon as a sort of reward, a badge of honor, especially if one died in some heroic capacity for the hood. The supreme sacrifice was to “take a bullet for a homie.” The set functioned as a religion. Nothing held a light to the power of the set. If you died on the trigger you surely were smiled upon by the Crip God. On my homie Lucky’s tombstone it simply says: “My baby Brother taking a rest.” He was fourteen when he was murdered, but he had lived so hard through so much that he needed a rest. We all learned quite early through experience that it was sometimes better to rest in peace than to continue to live in war.
In Vietnam when a soldier was wounded badly enough he was sent home. Home was a place where there was peace. No real danger of the ’Cong existed stateside. The war was ten thousand miles away. In contrast, our war is where we live. Where do we go when we’ve been wounded bad, or when our minds have been reduced to mincemeat by years, not months, of constant combat? If Vietnam vets suffer from post-traumatic stress syndrome, then I contend that gang members who are combat soldiers are subject to the same mind-bend as are veterans of foreign wars.
For us there is no retreat to a place ten thousand miles away, where one can receive psychiatric attention with full benefits from the Veterans Administration. No, our problems are left to compound, and our traumatic stress thickens, as does our abnormal behavior caused by the original malady gone unchecked. Is there any wonder our condition continues to worsen?
Talking with any gang member one will quickly pick up on the high praise and respect given when, in the course of conversation, a dead homie is mentioned. Usually before or right after the name of the deceased is spoken, “rest in peace” will be communicated in a very respectful tone.
Being wounded, on the other hand, can be taken two ways. In some cases, cats who’ve been wounded simply drop out of sight and use their injuries as an excuse to say “enough,” which, of course, still leaves the set in the position of having to respond to the attack. All strikes against the set have to be answered in a timely and appropriate manner; otherwise the set’s prestige wanes and eventually it collapses under the weight of the ridicule and military hegemony. But sometimes the wounded party utilizes their affliction to reaffirm their commitment to the ’hood. In so doing, they automatically climb another notch up the ladder toward that desired status of O.G.
Li’l Crazy De, for instance, has been shot thirteen separate times and is still committed to the ’hood. In the tenth unsuccessful attempt on his life he lost his left eye and a piece of his scalp. He is loved by few, hated by many, but respected by all. His legend is like that of the notorious gangster Legs Diamond, who had been shot repeatedly and survived. My wounding, however, fell deep within this second category, though there really was no need to reaffirm my commitment, for it went without saying that I’d be back. But the Sixties were certain that I had died. In fact, their premature celebration is what drew the set’s attention to them as the possible shooters. We were at war with so many sets that it was hard to pin my shooting on any one ’hood, so the homies responded by hitting every ’hood we didn’t get along with and a few that we did, just to be sure. The violence level rose dramatically in the days following my shooting—so much, in fact, that two officers from CRASH had come to the hospital with pleas for me to somehow stop it. When I’d gestured helplessly with my palms turned up they’d resorted to threats of conspiracy and accessory charges. I couldn’t possibly help them.
When I finally reached my call button, I was surprised to find that I was being attended by an Afrikan nurse. She hurried about the room, checking on my general state, and then informed me that I was to be moved to yet another room, on the ninth floor. She was very talkative and witty, perhaps in her mid-to late thirties, and buxom. I pegged her as a stalwart Christian who was a third-generation immigrant from the National Territory (that is, the rest of the United States). She was very dark and very shiny and her name was Eloise. When she spoke she lit up the room with a radiant smile generated by sparkling white teeth.
“Now what happened to you?” she asked, hands planted on both sides of her shapely hips.
“I’m in pain,” I responded. “Can you give me a shot?”
“Fo’ what, so you can turn into a junkie?” she shot back.
“No, so I can stop hurtin.”
“Baby, you been gettin’ twenty-eight grams of morphine every four hours for three days now. I think it’s time you slowed down.”
“What? Three days! What is the date today?”
“Today is,” she said, looking at the watch on her fat wrist, “January third, nineteen eighty-one.”
I had no sense of time and just couldn’t believe that three days had elapsed since I had been shot.
“Now, what happened to you?” she asked again.
“I was shot.”
“Shit, boy, I can see that. But what happened?” She asked in a voice of genuine concern, so I felt compelled to tell her.
“Gangbangin’. I was shot by other gang members.” This sounded awkward to me, trying to explain it to her.
“And who shot you?”
Damn, I thought, was she some kind of detective or what, asking me all those questions.
“Don’t know, maybe some Sixties, but I really don’t know.”
“And where you from, the Eighties?” she asked, but somehow she already knew.
“Yep, how you know?” Now I was getting very uncomfortable.
“I know ’bout that war y’all got going on over there. My son is involved in that shit,” she said with disgust.
“Who is your son and where is he from?”
“Now don’t you worry about that.”
“Is he from my set, one of my homies?” I asked anxiously.
“I ain’t got nothin’ to say ’bout it no mo’. It’s a damn shame how y’all do each other over some concrete no one owns.”
Oh shit, I thought, here comes one of those sermons about how we are fighting for nothing and that we are all black people. Save it, lady. But she didn’t say anything else, so I asked her why I was being moved. Because it was requested by the authorities, she said. I didn’t give it a second thought, but I did ask if she’d still be my nurse, to which she replied she would.
“Now can I please have my shot?” I asked pleadingly.
“Yes, yes, chile, you can have yo’ dope,” she answered, and mumbled something unintelligible under her breath as she strode out of the room.
My roommate was gone, but I never asked after him. For what? He was a civilian. I got my shot and started drifting again. When I came to I had been moved to another room, a single-occupant room. The pain was not as intense, but I was even more dehydrated. Apparently another day had passed.
“Good morning, Mr. Scott.” An American, Dr. Blakewell, spoke to me over an aluminum clipboard as he jotted down some notes.
“Wha’s up?” I said through parched lips. “When can I go home?”
“Well,” he spoke in measured tones, “we have to keep you here a bit longer so as to monitor your development. You’ve had a difficult operation, but you seem to be faring well. Perhaps you’ll be ready for discharge in a couple of weeks.”
He lifted up my hospital gown and felt around my stomach.
“How’s the medication?”
“Awright, I guess.”
“Well, we are going to stop giving you shots and give you codeine fours. These will work just as well,” he said, humming now as he continued to write more notes.
“Yeah, well check this out, Doc, can I get one last shot of what you been givin’ me?”
“No, Mr. Scott, I don’t think it’s necessary. Your pain should not be that intense now.”
“How you gonna tell me’bout pain, muthafucka?” I blew up and surprised the shit out of Dr. Blakewell. “I’m in pain now,” I continued, “all over, man, so what you talkin’ ’bout?”
“Yes, of course there is pain, Mr. Scott, simply due to the severity of the wounds and the extent of your operation. However, we must not allow you to become dependent on the pain medicine. Do you understand?”
I simply said, “Aw, man, save that shit.”
Dr. Blakewell left my room red as a beet.
When my nurse, Eloise, came to work that afternoon I was glad to see her. We had begun to develop a healthy rapport and her wit, in the face of my condition, was appreciated. Not long after she came in and we joked a bit about me shouting at Dr. Blakewell—which she got a tremendous kick out of—she brought me a telephone and informed me that I had a caller who asked for me by my full name. Perhaps it was Li’l Monster or China. I knew it wouldn’t be Tamu, because she had left the year before and gone to Texas.
I elevated myself up with the remote that controlled my bed and prepared to have a good talk. Gathering the phone from Eloise I held it to my chest, insinuating that I wanted privacy, and waited for her to leave the room. If this was anyone from the ’hood our conversation would definitely be about combat and, in this light, I could trust no one, especially a civilian. Once she left I cleared my throat and spoke into the receiver.
“Hello.”
Silence.
“Hello.”
And then, “You ain’t dead yet, tramp?!”
Stunned, I said nothing. After a few seconds of thought fueled my anger I exploded into the phone.
“Naw, punk muthafucka, yo’ homies got scared and couldn’t finish the job. Bitch-made Sissies!”
I got no response to this.
“Hello? Hello?”
The caller had hung up. Mad, nervous, and irritated, I sat there and fumed. The nerve of them muthafuckas, I thought, calling to verify my status. My head was spinning. When Eloise came in I snapped at her. She demanded an apology, for she is that type of strong sister, so I gave her one. After all, she was not the cause of my anger, and even if her son was in the enemy camp, she had not told him who I was. I explained to her that I needed to make a call and could she please excuse me. She readily complied and exited the room.
Still, I couldn’t come to grips with the chutzpah of my foes. Clearly they had wanted to quash the debate once and for all. Was I dead or not? The rumors ran hot and cold. Of course, this was also a scare tactic, one that was truly wasted on me. I phoned Li’l Monster, let the phone ring sixteen times, but got no answer. I knew my mother and older brother, Kerwin, would be at work. I hung up, a bit frustrated, and called Li’l Crazy De. When I reached him, he explained the latest developments.
Upon hearing of my shooting, the others had aborted the surplus mission. Li’l Hunchy, who was with me and had run when the shooting started, was questioned at length about the circumstances surrounding the ambush. No one had any idea that he had run out on me. He told everyone that the shooters had specifically wanted me. Li’l Monster, taking the call to colors, went in search of a crew of elite shooters, troops steeled in the ways of urban guerrilla warfare. That night they did nothing but plan. Several units were organized in the hours following my shooting, but just six individuals were selected by Li’l Monster to roll with him: Li’l G.C., Rattone, Al Capone, Li’l Capone, Slim, and Killer Rob. Others were organized to hit various targets, but this crew was specifically assigned to the Sixties. Search and destroy was the mission.
At dusk on January I, 1981, a van was commandeered by one of the selected soldiers to be used in the execution of the upcoming mission. Earlier in the day Li’l Monster had acquired two shotguns from an older supporter who had been informed of the shooting and wanted to give assistance in the way of arms. His offer was acknowledged and the weapons were secured: a double-barrel over and under, a 12 gauge, and a 20-gauge pump that shot six times. Because the mission was search and destroy, the weapons were not sawed off. Also in stock were an 8 millimeter Mauser that had ten rounds and looked like a Daniel Boone gun, a six-inch .357 magnum, an eight-inch 44 magnum, and a .38 Long. The driver was to be unarmed. Gathering at their respective launch sites, the crew began to fall out when darkness came. The order of the night was “body count.”
According to Li’l Crazy De, wasn’t no one on the streets but police and fools, the police not giving a fuck and the fools doomed by their own ignorance. How many fell that first night? And from what sets did they come? No one knew the actual count, except the recipient set and the parents who had to bury their children. And that’s what we all were, children. Children gone wild in a concrete jungle of poverty and rage. Armed and dangerous, prowling the concrete jungle in search of ourselves, we were children who had grown up quickly in a city that cared too little about its young. Males, females, dogs, and cats were all targets. Curfew was declared in enemy sets: dusk to dawn. Anyone caught out after dark and before dawn would be shot. The Tet had begun.
The first night was pretty much catch and clobber. The second night was a bit more complicated, as word traveled fast around the colony. The third night, I’m told, was harder still, as troops literally had to go house to house in search of “suspects.” It was in this climate that the officers from CRASH had come to see me. But prior to talking with Li’l De I had had no idea of the scope of the retribution and, for sure, I had not conspired with anyone to make it happen. Could I stop it? Perhaps, but why? “Fuck ’em” was pretty much my attitude then. And why was CRASH concerned about stopping the violence? They had been helping us kill ourselves, so why were they so interested? It is my contention that they simply wanted to go on record as having tried to stop the killings. Shit, if they wanted to stop the killings, they would have begun by outlawing the choke hold!
After being briefed by Li’l De about the Tet, I informed him that Li’l Hunchy had run out on me. He asked what I wanted to have happen to Li’l Hunchy. I said simply that he should not be allowed to run out on anyone else. That made the set look awfully bad. Li’l De gave me his word that he’d handle it. Putting the phone in its cradle I lay back and smiled inwardly, feeling extremely proud of the set. The mighty Eight Trays…
By my fifth day in the hospital, I had grown quite accustomed to the comings and goings of the orderlies. I had learned, for instance, that the Chicano woman who had attended me first was the mother of the candy striper who now cleaned my room and who was a gang member from Eighteenth Street. She and I chatted twice. But still I had no visitors, and I had not talked with Li’l Monster. On the afternoon of January 4, as I lay back in my bed thinking, I noticed three people standing in my doorway. At first glance, I took them to be ordinary people who were just passing through looking, as I used to, into anyone’s hospital room. But these people looked familiar—in no friendly way. Their look was menacing, and I’ll be damned if it didn’t hit me like a ton of bricks. It’s them! The same three who had ambushed me! The mustache, the beard, and the clean-shaven one stood erect and alert at my door. No doubt it was also them who had called my room. What to do? With an I.V. in my right arm, a catheter in my penis, a tube in my nose, stitches in my stomach, a cast on my left hand, dehydrated and weak, I knew I didn’t have a chance.
As slowly and as inconspicuously as possible I reached for my nurse’s call button, hoping that Eloise was on duty. My assailants seemed indecisive and fidgety, looking around and, I guess, waiting for the proper moment to make their move. I figured they’d probably stab or suffocate me so as not to make much noise. I pressed my call button several times, hoping to irritate someone, anyone, and have them rush to my room. This, I thought, would persuade my assailants to leave. All the while I was acting as if I was heavily sedated, so much so that I couldn’t tell that I was being sized up. Damn, any other nurse would have responded by now. Just my damn luck. I began to despair and settle for the final rest. Of course, I told myself, I was going to resist. I would swing as much as I could with the cast, kick with my right leg, and bite, if I could. But I was sure I’d lose, and I resigned myself to that end. Just then, as in a Hollywood movie, where the star never gets killed, in rushed Eloise, past the three and to my bedside.
“What’s wrong, baby?” she asked, concerned that something was bothering me medically.
“Listen,” I began in a low voice, “see those three people at the—”
“I can’t hear you,” she said.
“Shhh, listen, listen,” I said, trying to control my voice. “See those three dudes at the door? Don’t look, don’t look!”
“What about ’em, baby?”
“They come to kill me!”
“Oh, there you go dramatizing, you need to—”
“Look,” I said, grabbing Eloise by the collar and yanking her down face-to-face with me, “they come to kill me, now goddammit, do something!” I was speaking low through clenched teeth. For sure she now saw, perhaps for the first time, my thousand-yard stare.
Her eyes grew wide when it registered that I was for real. Even when I let go of her collar she remained in my face.
“Go, now, and handle that,” I told her and, as if hypnotized, she slowly rose to an erect position and strode back toward the door. I watched her through half-closed eyes, hoping they wouldn’t kill both of us. She stopped in their presence and traded words with them. They were out of my earshot. I saw Eloise gesture toward the hallway to the left, turn, and do the same thing toward the right. I had no idea what she was doing. Whatever it was, it worked, and my assailants moved into the hallway and eventually out of my sight. She, too, left my sight, but only for an instant. When I saw her round the corner again and come into the room she had the telephone with her and was moving rather quickly.
“What did you tell ’em?” I asked excitedly.
Thrusting the phone at me she said, “Don’t worry ’bout that, you better call your people, ’cause they comin’ back.”
Not knowing how much time I had before they’d be back, I hastily dialed Li’l Monster’s number. It rung once, twice, three times and… damn, I’d dialed the wrong number. On my second attempt I hit pay dirt.
“Bro, what’s up?” I said quickly into the receiver.
“What’s up?!” Bro shot back and stammered on, “Man, we been tearin’ shit—”
“No, wait, listen. They up here!”
“Who?”
“The Sixties, man. The Sixties!”
“We on our way!”
The connection was broken. I rang for Eloise and she came right away. I explained to her the seriousness of my foes and that it was probably the same three who had originally shot me. I also turned down her offer to get the police. No, we’d handle this ourselves. She looked skeptical, but gave me her word that she wouldn’t call the police. The longest twenty minutes of my life were spent waiting for Li’l Bro and reinforcements.
Finally, I saw Li’l Bro bend the corner, followed by Li’l Spike, Joker, Li’l Crazy De, Stone, China, Bam, and Spooney, the latter three being homegirls. They surrounded my bed so that nothing else was visible but them; then weapons began to materialize from under their heavy clothing. They had mostly hand weapons, a few buck knives, and Li’l Spike had a sawed-off single-shot. Li’l Monster had been out of camp for about nine months and was working in earnest toward his required second level. He displayed all the traits of promise. From under his shirt he produced a .25 automatic, and China came out with a box of bullets.
“This is for you, Bro,” he said, handing me the strap and box of bullets.
“Righteous.” I went on to explain the situation and gave a description of all three. Li’l Spike and Joker went in search of them, while the others stayed to talk. Bro said that he had come to see me while I was in ICU, but I had no recollection of him ever being there. He said he could not stand to see me in such a state. We looked at each other for a long moment, and I could see that he was hurt and wanted to communicate his emotions, but neither of us knew how to do it. So we settled for the unspoken medium of love, each hoping the other would somehow catch the vibes of sincerity.
Crazy De had been in an altercation with some Sixties in the Hall, China told me. No homies had been captured or shot since the Tet had begun, and the set was enjoying tremendous coverage by the media. Li’l Spike and Joker returned with Eloise hot on their heels.
“No sign of them fools,” Li’l Spike said with frustration. “Besides,” he said, pointing his thumb at Eloise, “we got sweated by homelady here.”
“You damn right you got sweated. But tell him what you was doin’. Go on, tell him,” she said loudly.
Neither Joker nor Li’l Spike said a thing, so I asked them what was up.
Joker spoke up first. “Aw, cuz, she bent the corner and caught a muthafucka strikin’ up the ’hood.”
“Gangwritin’, in my hospital. Uhh-uhh, not here you don’t.”
“You don’t own this goddamn hospital, woman, who the—”
“Stall her out, Bam, she down wit’ us,” I said sharply to the homegirl, who was widely known for her belligerence.
“But she—”
“Stall her out,” I repeated, forcefully.
“Kody, visitin’ time is ’bout over anyway.” Eloise was now shooting daggers at Bam, who was returning her stares point for point.
“Awright, but let us get three mo’ minutes, huh?”
“Yeah, yeah, but no mo’ writin’, y’all hear?” she said, looking from one hard face to another.
No one replied. She finally gave a small sigh and left the room. I began to instruct the crew about my plans once I was released. All seemed quite happy to know that I was recovering well, Li’l Bro and China especially. Not to say that there was any less affection from the others, but China and Li’l Monster knew me more intimately, so our link was stronger.
Soon thereafter the crew began to leave. The set sign was thrown in a salute by each homie, and China gave me a kiss on the cheek, promising she’d be back the following day. Bro milled around and waited for the last homie to file out. After a minute he looked at me, then dropped his head. When he raised it again we both had tears in our eyes. I had been touched—wounded—and although it was never verbally communicated, I was Li’l Bro’s hero, the closest thing he had to total invincibility. Everything I did, he did. And now, with my being wounded, he knew that there was someone out there that was stronger, more determined than me. The vast weight of this fell heavy on his shoulders and it became incumbent upon him to destroy that person and “save the world”—our set. At fourteen, that’s a heavy load.
“It’s gonna be all right, it’s gonna be all right,” is all I could say.
To which Bro replied, “Yeah, ’cause I’m gonna make it right. Watch.”
We hugged briefly, as much as my stitches would allow, and then Bro left without looking back. It was times like this that I hated my life. Perhaps this was due to my not knowing answers to certain questions or being able to present my emotions on an intelligible level. Being ignorant is, to me, the equivalent of being dead.
I checked my strap to make sure it was loaded and put it under my pillow. If they came back now it would not be in their interest. Against my better judgment, I dozed off.
Time flew by, and daily I became stronger. China was coming to visit every day and even brought a radio, although only after I had sworn on the set—which was much more religious than swearing to God—not to destroy it like the last one. I got no more calls or unexpected visits, and on January 14th I was discharged. This was the only time my mother came to the hospital, which didn’t bother me too much then. We had grown very far apart, so I’d never expected her to come, anyway. But she had to come on my discharge day because I was still sixteen and she had to sign the release form. Our mutual greetings were lukewarm. We talked little on the way out of the hospital. I was rolled out in a wheelchair pushed by Mom. Over my knees was a blanket, and underneath it the weapon, my hand fully on the grip.
In the car we both made small talk. The days were past where Mom sought to talk me out of bangin’, but still she was firmly set against it. Little did I know that Mom was under as much strain as I was. This is universally true of every mother who has a child in a gang. But usually communication has long been broken with that parent, who the child looks upon as a familiar intruder trying once again to offset stability. In this light, anything proposed by the parent—whether positive or not—is rejected. The intruding parent becomes enemylike in thought, and is to be avoided. Nothing is to alter the set’s existence. For a youth with no other hope in a system that excludes them, the gang becomes their corporation, college, religion, and life. It is in this reality that gang members go to the extreme with tattoos. I now have “Eight Trays” written across my neck and “Crips” on my chest. Ever see George Bush with “Republican” on his chest or “Capitalist” on his neck?
The moment I got home the phone began ringing off the hook.
“Yes, I’m all right.”
“No, I didn’t get my dick blown off.”
“No, I wasn’t shot in the head.”
The calls went on like this all day. When night fell, I hit the streets on Li’l Monster’s bike. Li’l Tray Ball rode with me and carried the weapon. We weaved our way through the ’hood, stopping here and there to explain blurry details to concerned citizens of the ’hood and a few parents who were looked upon as “friendlies.” When we had circumvented a good portion of the ’hood, we doubled back toward the north. It had gotten chilly, and because of my stay in the hospital I was unaccustomed to being out in such weather. My open wounds made my trek in such weather all the more dangerous. When we reached the house, Mom was standing out on the front lawn accompanied by a host of homegirls. Kesha, Judy Brown, China, Bam, Prena, and Big Lynn were all there. Before I came to a halt I knew something wasn’t right. Everyone looked grief-stricken. Mom began in on me right away.
“Kody, where you been?”
“Just ridin’ in the ’hood, what’s up?” I asked in a nonchalant tone.
“You are not supposed to be out in such weather with those open wounds. You know what the doctor told you.” Her voice was almost a whimper.
“Aw, Mom, I was just ridin’ around. Anyway, I got my jacket on,” I retorted.
“But honey, you could catch pneumonia out here. Please come in the house.”
“Awright, but just let me kick it a minute out here,” I said defiantly, not about to be talked down by Mom in front of the homies.
“No,” Mom said with new force. “Come in here now.”
“Mom, you trippin’, I’ll be in there in a minute.”
“Monster,” Kesha spoke up, “you should just go on in the house.”
“Wait, wait, hold it, hold it,” I responded with both hands up, one palm showing and a cast on the other.
“Naw, Monster, you hold it. Yo’ mama only tryin’ to tell you what’s right.” This was Big Lynn.
Knowing her prowess I eased closer toward Li’l Tray Ball, who was armed. If she made an attempt at physically persuading me into the house I was going to bust a cap in her ass.
“Check this out, I’m only right here in the yard. I’m comin’ in in a minute, okay?” Now I was looking for some support from the homegirls. I got none. Mom had apparently wooed them before I rode up.
“Kody, please come in the house.” Mom was so overwhelming that even Li’l Tray Ball was now urging me to comply.
“Homie, you should go on in the pad.”
I laid down the bike and stalked off toward the house, arguing about Mom being of another generation and not over-standing me. This, of course, was a genuine cop-out. For it was I who had lost touch with reality. I had encapsulated my block of reality into a tamper-proof world that made every other point of view absurd. This was especially so if I felt the other point of view was threatening to my livelihood.
Once in the house I went to my room, shut the door, and sat on the bed. Li’l Monster was out campaigning, so I began sorting through our “oldie” collection. Actually, the records belonged to Li’l Monster, who was, and still is, an ardent oldie fan. I dug out something fitting and placed it on the turntable. “I’m Still Here” by the Larks came screaming over the stereo, and I fell back on my bed and let the lyrics seep in. The refrain, “I’m still here,” kept lifting me up. It held a special meaning to me after being shot six times. “I’m still here.” I undressed and dozed off with the refrain still resounding in my ear, though the record had long been off.
I got up the following morning and pulled on some fresh Ben Davis jeans, a sweatshirt, and croaker sacks—shoes made from burlap. I gathered up Mom’s car keys to go to the store for some cereal. When I began rolling out of the driveway I found I was blocked by an unmarked police car. Two American detectives got out and approached the driver’s side of the car, so I got out. One of them asked if I was Kody Scott. I replied that I was. The other then produced a piece of paper from the inner pocket of his suit coat. He explained that they had apprehended the guy who shot me. When I asked who that was, he said Pretty Boy. I knew who Pretty Boy was. He and I used to be friends, until the start of the conflict. He, like Crazy De and me, was fiercely loyal to his ’hood and had on many occasions shot or shot at our homies. This was widely known. In fact, after his involvement in Twinky’s death, he was elevated to Threat Level Two and put on our Most Wanted list. I knew he hadn’t shot me, but to try and explain this to these two would be futile. The paper the officer handed me was a subpoena to appear in court as a witness to Pretty Boy’s shooting me. I took the paper and threw it into the car and they left.
I made my way to the store and back without further incident. When I returned, I found my mother and my niece, Tamara, in the front garden cleaning out weeds. I spoke to them briefly and then went into the house to enjoy a big bowl of cereal, as I was quite hungry. My mom’s house is a moderate three-bedroom mid-sixties dwelling with two huge picture windows on either side of the front door. When the drapes are open one can see clear into the house. We had a nice front lawn and a huge rubber tree out in the yard that gave us great shade in the summer and camouflaged military launches at night. Right in front of the porch was a beautiful garden that Mom took great pride in keeping up. It was in this garden that she and Tamara now worked as Li’l Monster and I sat staring out of the picture window eating raisin bran. As I lifted a spoonful of cereal to my mouth a car drove past at a slow observer’s pace. I stopped in midmotion and let the face of the staring occupant sink in. Enemy Sixty!
“Sixties!” I shouted to Li’l Bro, who had already recognized them and was heading down the hallway toward our room and the cache of weapons now stored there. Once we had seized two weapons—both long-barrel shotguns—we made it back to the front room just in time to see the vehicle turn up into a driveway and begin to come back our way. Perhaps their intent was to shoot into the house, shoot Mom, or simply undertake a reconnaissance mission. Whatever it was, we had no intention of letting them leave this block. As they began approaching us, going westbound—the driver closest to the house—we burst through the door and leapt over Mom and Tamara and ran at top speed toward the car, weapons leveled. When Mom recognized what was happening she shouted for Tamara to go in the backyard. Before the driver could mount a response we were within killing distance of them.
Leveling the barrel to the driver’s head, I shouted, “This is Eighty-third Street, muthafucka!” and pulled the trigger.
The gun was on safety.
If there is a God, He was between me and that driver because the driver, for sure, was dead that morning. Ducking down into the seat and swerving sharply to the right, he punched the accelerator, jumped the curb, and ran down Mrs. Bucks’s fence.
Mom said nothing as we retreated past her and back into the house. We ate the rest of our cereal with guns in one hand, spoons in the other. It was this particular incident that rang the bells in Mom’s head that said, “Hey, this thing is serious.” No sooner had we finished our cereal, not ten minutes after the incident, than a black-and-white patrol car came to a halt in front of our house. Bending down so as not to be seen by the police, we darted down the hallway to stash the straps. We both discarded our clothes and donned bathrobes to shake a description, in case someone had seen us in action earlier. We then heard talking up front.
“Is Kody Scott your son?” one of the policemen asked my mom.
“Yes, Kody is my son, why?”
“Well, ma’am, we have a warrant for his arrest for murder and six counts of attempted murder.”
“Oh,” Mom began with a slight chuckle, “you must be mistaken. Kody was just released from the hospital two days ago. He could not have possibly killed anyone.”
“Well, we have several eye witnesses who say it was in fact Monst—I mean Kody who they saw.” His voice sounded no-nonsense.
“Well,” Mom said, trying another angle, “can you call the station to make sure it’s Kody you want?”
“Ma’am, we are sure who we want. Now is Kody here?”
“Yes, he’s here. Kody!” Mom called out after me.
After hearing as much as I needed to I began to get dressed. Me and Li’l Bro hugged and said our good-byes. I stepped forward and allowed the police—henceforth soldier-cops—to take me in.
At the station I got the details. Some Brims had said that while they were shooting dice in their park, Harvard Park, I had stepped out of the shadows with, of all things, a double-barrel and blasted them. This was supposed to have happened the same night that I was released from the hospital.
Once again I found myself in solitary confinement at Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall. But this time I was in bad physical condition from the shooting and the operation. I also had the cast on my arm with the ’hood struck up all over it, along with the names of some homies. After my standard week in the box I was transferred to unit C-D. In Los Padrinos the housing units are designated by alphabet. I had pretty much been in them all. When I got to C-D I met up with Queek from Eight Tray Hoover. He and I were the only Crips in the entire unit. All of the New Afrikans were Bloods, and the Chicanos and the Americans were strongly supporting them.
There were approximately twenty-five people in the day-room. At least thirteen were New Afrikans and the rest Chicano or American. There were twenty plastic chairs on metal frames welded together in rows of five. These were situated in front of an old black-and-white television. Queek and I sat there, primarily because to sit any other place would be foolish. We also wanted to stipulate the distinction between us and them, Crips and Bloods. Most of the Bloods were Pirus from Compton. Every so often, as if on cue, one of the Pirus would leap to his feet and shout, “All the ’Rus in the house say ho!” at which time everyone—except Queek and me—would jump to their feet fanatically shouting “Hoooo!” This went on throughout the night at hour intervals, but no one approached Queek or me personally.
The next day while Queek and I sat on our bench—our meager territory—and talked, we drew some pretty mean stares from the chair section. Once, in the course of conversation, I said “cuz” to Queek and the whole dayroom fell abruptly silent. Even the characters on television seemed to pause and look over at us. No one moved, no one said a thing. And then, as if he were an ambassador to the U.N., Bayboo from Miller Gangster Bloods cleared his throat and started walking over toward us. He was a viciously ugly person with a huge jug head, which was covered with small braids in no fixed pattern. His complexion was dark, but not that shiny smooth darkness like Marcus Garvey or Cicely Tyson. It was a flat darkness, broken in spots by chicken-pox marks that had become infected from scratching. His eyes held no light, no humor, no remorse. His eyes each had black rings around them and they were sunk deeply into their sockets. His lips and nose were uncut Afrikan from the continent. I would guess he weighed 170 pounds then, quite muscular with a broad chest. He stopped in front of me.
“What did you say?” he asked, looking down on me with total ugliness.
I looked at Queek for some sign of mutual liability, but my stare went unacknowledged. I stood up so he would not have the advantage of a downswing.
“I said cuz to my homeboy,” I replied. Murmurs from the chair section began to grow louder.
“You must not know where you at, Blood. This is our unit and we don’t allow no punk-ass crabs over here. I should knock you out, boy.”
Far from being a fool, I took a step backward out of his firing range.
“And what you think I’m gonna be doin’ while you knock-in’ me out?” I shot back, hoping I hadn’t made him too mad, because for sure I was in no physical shape to fight anybody, especially him.
“Wha…” he started, and made a quick step in my direction. I took one step back and a brother whom I hadn’t even noticed came between us, but facing Bayboo.
“Man, stall dude out. You see he all fucked up, cast and shit,” the brother said to Bayboo.
“Fuck that fool, he don’t know where he at or somethin’.”
“I know where I’m at,” I managed to say.
The staff was becoming suspicious, as the dayroom had grown too quiet. Shit, everything was fine as long as there were Pirus shouts every hour, I guess. But the quiet was out of order.
“You,” a Chicano staff member said, pointing at me. “Come on in here.” He gestured at his office. When I went in and sat down he asked what the problem was. I told him that there was no problem, but he wasn’t buying it.
“Oh, I see, you a Crip. And,” he continued, turning his head to read the graffiti on my cast, “you are from ETG, Eight Tray Gangster, huh?”
“Yeah, that’s where I’m from.”
“Well then, that explains it. You are starting confusion in my unit,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Man, I ain’t startin’ nothin’ in yo’ unit,” I tried to explain.
At this, he opened a desk drawer and brought out a red marker.
“Paint your cast, ’cause the gang graffiti is a problem,” he said, pushing the marker toward me.
“I ain’t coloring my cast dead”—a disrespectful term for red. “You must be crazy.”
“Oh, well, we’ll see about that.”
He reached for the phone, dialed, and talked with someone. Five minutes later a New Afrikan man came in.
“What’s happening?” he said.
The Chicano cat explained as best he could, which wasn’t too good. When he had finished, the brother simply asked, “You a Crip?”
“Yep.”
“Are you a real Crip?” “Yep.”
“Here, then, paint your cast blue,” he said, handing me a blue marker.
Perhaps this was a ploy and he thought I wouldn’t do it because of my situation. Well, I did. I broke open that marker and painted my cast Crip blue. The brother just stared. The Chicano was visibly upset. I went back out into the dayroom and had no further problems that night.
The next morning I went to court and got arraigned on murder and attempted murder charges. Because of the serious nature of the crime, I was being tried as an adult. This meant I would face the same time as any adult would for the case. Sixty years to life was the maximum penalty. Also because of their decision to try me as an adult, I had to stay in East Lake Juvenile Hall, also known as Central. Los Padrinos did not house juveniles who were being tried as adults. This was cool with me because Crazy De and other homies were at Central. I’ve always preferred it over L.P. anyway.
I was put in unit E-F. Central, like L.P., designates their units by alphabet. E-F and G-H were where all the hard-core bangers were housed. In E-F we had staff from South Central who treated us like family. There was Brother Blackburn, who let Crazy De use his radio so we could go into the unit library and jam. He also let us go into the unit office and lift weights. There was Brother Doc, who gave us phone calls all the time. He let us stay back from school and just kick it. He also tried to flirt with our mothers during visiting hours. There was Stewart, Heron, and Cryer, but our favorite cat was Brother Gains. He was a strong brother with a genuine concern for people of color. He was the source of all power in unit E-F.
De and I were on the same side, E side. Central was packed with future Ghetto Stars from both sides of the color bar and varying divisions therein. It was also packed with soon-to-be-dead gang members. Many who were there in 1981 have since been gunned down in street battles. Others were sent to prison and killed there. Few, very few, have lived since then in any prolonged state of peace.
Who became Ghetto Stars? There was Devil from Shot Gun Crips, Fish from Outlaw Twenty Bloods, Fat Rat from Five Deuce Hoover, Roscoe—a Samoan—from Park Village Compton Crips, Taco from Grape Street Watts, Mace from Eleven Deuce Hoover, and Kan from Black P. Stone Bloods. Each is of the highest level of banger. Even if any of them do not subscribe to banging today, their mark is firmly planted in their respective ’hoods.
Sundays in juvenile hall were perhaps the most exciting day of the week. Not only was it visiting day, but it was church day. No religious strings whatsoever were attached to church. On the contrary, church was a place to see the girl prisoners, and to see all your homies who were in different units. Chicanos and Americans went to the Catholic service, and New Afrikans went to the Protestant service. This was to be my first church service and, seemingly, everyone knew I had been shot, though all sorts of rumors had muddied the waters about my well-being. I readied myself for my first appearance the night before by “pressing” my county khaki pants with soap and laying them under my mattress. I had procured a fresh baby-blue sweatshirt that had a Central juvenile hall emblem on the front. I carefully cut the left sleeve off at the elbow to fit my cast. This, too, I slid under the mattress for pressing. My hair had been freshly cornrowed, and I had some new bubble-gum tennis shoes. The next morning I got dressed with all the enthusiasm of a student on the first day of school.
Unit E-F was the last to arrive at church that morning. With all the other units already seated and situated so the staff could halfway keep an eye on them, we came through the door. Juvenile hall policy dictates that all unit movement be conducted in columns of two and in silence. De and I headed up our unit. When we came through the chapel doors all heads turned to catch our entry. Standing in the doorway briefly, De and I scanned the pews like lords looking upon their subjects.
“There he go, that’s Monster Kody in the cast,” said a faceless voice.
“Damn, cuz got a blue cast,” said another.
After being told by the staff where to sit, we moved in and took our seats. De pointed out friend and foe. Because we weren’t allowed to talk or communicate to each other, our hatred and happiness were transmitted by stares and quick hand gestures. Only when the preacher began the service did the whispers cease.
I was the talk of the hall. Later in the week I met Sam from Shot Gun—the Shot Guns had recently killed a Rollin’ Sixty—who was going with a female from the Sixties named Goldie. I had never met her. He said he had heard about me being shot from her. He then went to his room and brought back a letter for me to read. It was from Goldie. It was really a paltry little letter that ended with, “Oh, yeah, my homies killed that tramp Monster Kody last night.” My heart skipped a beat when I read that. It was one thing to hear someone say it. Words spoken could be shaken off with a laugh or some other move that didn’t make the effect of what’s said last too long. They were just words in the air. But seeing it written was another thing. Unlike threat legends of getting killed spray painted on walls, this was written in the past tense, as in already happened. It was a bit eerie. I quickly folded up the letter and gave it back to Sam. I didn’t comment on what she wrote, but I did store her name for future reference.
When I woke the next morning I was in terrible pain. My stomach was in knots. No sooner had I gained consciousness than I started vomiting. I tried to eat, but I could not keep any food down. This went on most of the day. De said that I should go to the nurse, but I declined. The next morning I was vomiting blood and the whites of my eyes had turned yellow. That evening I turned myself in to the nurse who, in turn, alerted the doctor. One look at me and he called for an ambulance. I was rushed back to the U.S.C Medical Center—also known as General Hospital—and operated on immediately. When I woke up the next day I was in the same old pain of three weeks ago, the same tubes running here and there, the same machine next to my bed. My stomach once again looked like twisted and torn railroad tracks. The only difference now was that I was chained to the bed by my ankle. Two days went past and I got a visit from my mom. We talked a bit, but when I showed her my stomach, she left.
Two weeks later I was transported back to Central. When I got there the place was in an uproar. Staff members were running here and there, obviously stressing. I quickly learned that a friend of mine had escaped. Q-Tip from Geer Gang had broken out. I was happy for him. This was Valentine’s Day, 1981.
I was placed in the infirmary until my stitches were removed. On that day, February 21, I walked around the corner from the infirmary to the connecting unit R and R—Receiving and Release—to exchange the hospital gown I had been wearing for facility clothing. Coming in were Li’l Monster, Rattone, and Killer Rob. All three looked haggard and distraught.
“What’s up,” I asked Li’l Bro with a light hug.
“Aw, man, we think Li’l Capone snitched about the murders,” he said in a very tired voice. They were still dressed in street clothes. Bro had on one of my Pendletons.
“Y’all in here for murder?” I asked, looking from one to the next.
“Yep,” Rattone replied.
“I think he told ’bout some shit you did, too,” Killer Rob said, “’cause the police was askin’ me ’bout some bodies left in the Sixties.” Killer was speaking as if he were simply saying “Yo, man, your shoe is untied.” Murders were that commonplace.
“Yeah, well, dude don’t know shit ’bout me ’cause I wouldn’t steal a hat wit fool,” I spoke up, trying to put a good face on this dreary news.
“Scott,” a staff member called out, so both Li’l Monster and I went to the desk. He was referring to Bro, so that he could be dressed in, but since we were both Scott and we both needed to be dressed in, he let us go together. Stepping into the next room, we rapped about family, Mom, and our neighbors.
When I took off my gown Bro said, “Damn, they fucked you up,” and broke into tears. Through sobs and sniffs he said that he had never seen me that skinny.
“We’ll get ’em,” I said.
“That’s right,” Bro replied.
We talked some more and then I was sent to my unit. Because Bro, Killer, and Rattone had murders, they had to go to solitary for a week. When their seven days were up only Rattone and Li’l Monster remained. Killer had been transferred to the county jail because he’d turned eighteen while in solitary. Also captured were Li’l G.C., Al Capone, and Li’l Capone. Slim had gotten away.
Bro was put in unit M-N, across the field. Mom came the following week to see us both. The week after that I tore my cast off in the shower and began lifting weights.
When I went to court for a preliminary hearing, I was transferred to the county jail to be housed in the notorious juvenile tank. To this day, I still don’t know why I was sent to the county jail. I hadn’t even gotten into a fight yet. But this was par for the course for my entire life. It only served to irritate me further by allowing me no stability. I was a bit uncertain about L.A. County after hearing so much over the wire, especially because of my weakened physical condition. Fighting now would be quite a task.
It took an entire evening for me to be processed into L.A. County. I arrived in 3100, the juvenile tank, after midnight. Now, I’m told, the juvenile tank is located in the old hall of the Justice Building, but in 1981 it was still in the new jail.
All the lights were out when I came on the tier, and there was no noise, no sound. With an almost terrifying clang, my cage was opened and I was told by the deputy to step in. Once locked behind the steel bars, I surveyed my surroundings. There were two tiers consisting of Able row and Charlie row. Each tier had twenty-six cages on it. Each cage was single occupancy, very small, very dirty, and very cold. There was a toilet and sink in each cage, as well as a light that the soldier-cop controlled. There was a rickety desk that hung halfway off the wall with no stool. I didn’t remember seeing anyone awake or moving in any of the seven cages I passed to get to mine. I was number eight. This was a ploy, but I knew nothing of it then.
“Blood, where you from?” a voice shouted from the back of the lower tier—Able row. Its sharpness startled me momentarily, but my instincts overrode any delay in responding.
“North Side Eight Tray Gangster Crip.”
“Aw, Blood,” said another voice from the opposite direction. “We got one.”
And then, as if from the adjacent cage to my right, number nine:
“We gon’ kill yo’ muthafuckin’ ass in the mo’nin’, crab.”
“Fuck you slob-ass muthafuckas, this is ET muthafuckin’ G, fool.”
“We’ll see ’bout that in the mo’nin’. Let the gates be the bell.”
Another fine mess I had gotten myself into. Shit. I had no idea of how I’d get out of this one. Amazingly, I never once thought of rankin’ out, pleading, or otherwise backing down. Even in the face of insurmountable odds I would rather die fighting than live as a coward. I made my bed and lay there staring at the roaches gathering on the desk top. I dozed off, but I don’t know when.
I was awakened by the heavy sound of moving metal, cages being opened and closed. I quickly got up and put on my tennys and stood ready. Able row was being let out first. Looking down over the tier I saw a crowd gathering along the wall. Most faces were staring up into mine, though no teeth were being shown. No happiness lived here.
I didn’t know any face down in the crowd and none, I guess, knew me. No one said anything to me, nor did I say a word to them. They began to file out to what I guessed to be the chow hall. Charlie row was next. “Let the gates be the bell” was fresh in my mind. My neighbor to the right had said that last night. So it was best, I thought, to tie into him immediately.
“Charlie row watch your gates, gates opening,” the soldier-cop called down the tier.
With some effort the cage door began to slide open. When there was enough room to squeeze out I made it through and was on the tier in what I reasonably thought to be Blood ’hood. But when my neighbor in cage nine came out it was a familiar face: Bennose from 107 Hoover. Ben recognized me and broke into a wide grin. But still I was tense. Next I saw Levi from 107 Hoover, then Popa and Perry—who I didn’t know, but had seen on the news—from Harlem Crip. Taco from Grape was there, too. It had all been a test to register my commitment level when in dire straits. I passed with flying colors.
They had already known that I was coming, perhaps long before I did. The grapevine could be very efficient at times, and at other times it failed miserably. I found out quickly that above and beyond unit E-F and G-H in Central juvenile hall, this was where they housed the “worst of the worst.” I fell in step and was right at home. Both Able row and Charlie row were Crips. There were Chicanos housed there, as well. No Americans could survive on Able or Charlie row, nor could any Blood. Later I fixed it where Sixties were excluded, too. Bloods, Americans—there were very few—and victims lived on Baker and Denver rows, or P.C., Protective Custody.
The “slob game,” as it came to be known—played on me to test my courage—was also used to uncover and weed out real Bloods. Because every American put into the tank was severely beaten or in some cases raped, the entire populace of American soldier-cops despised the juveniles of Able and Charlie rows with a vengeance. Often we’d get beat for the most trivial things. And, of course, there was inter-rivalry.
When I got there, Cyco Mike from Main Street Crips was supposedly in charge. He was a tyrant, taking food and other things from people, especially those on Able row, without so much as a word in return. He was a big, dark-complexioned cat with long hair. He, like the rest of us, had a murder charge. From day one he sensed my potential to threaten his tyrannical rule. It wasn’t leadership he was providing. He had gotten his position not by popular support but by brute strength. On his team he had Green Eyes from Venice Sho-line Crips, Eric from Nine-Deuce Hoover, his homies Killer Rob and Cisco from Main Street, and Handbone, who was also from Venice Sho-line. They were all on Able row. The other Crips on Able row were simply cannon fodder. The rumble between Cyco Mike and me was inevitable. All the while I kept lifting weights and training for that day.
“When two totalitarian powers make war on each other, the anger and hatred that arise can be appeased only by the death of one or the other. More than this, such killing is profoundly satisfying. Anger and hatred are ’fulfilled’ in destruction insofar as such emotions know satiety. The more lives the soldier succeeds in accounting for, the prouder he is likely to feel. To his people he is a genuine hero and to himself, as well. For him, war is in no sense a game or a dirty mess. It is a mission, a holy cause, his chance to prove himself and gain a supreme purpose in living. His hatred of the enemy makes this soldier feel supremely real, and in combat his hatred finds its only appropriate appeasement.”
J. Glenn Gray
The juvenile tank has got to be the most blatant exercise the state has ever devised for corrupting, institutionalizing, and creating recidivism in youths. At the behest of a judge or on the recommendation of the probation officer or district attorney, these youths can be whisked from a structured program monitored by a civilian staff—who attempt to counsel the captured youths by developing a healthy, human rapport with them and their parents—and dropped into a prisonlike setting with not so much as an inkling of counseling or adult support or the benefit of any meaningful, structured program to aid them in correcting whatever problems they may have. Removing them from a program designed for immature, unsophisticated youths and hurling them into a highly competitive, one hundred percent criminal population and setting—where the only adults are the very same police deputies responsible for their initial capture—is clearly a way to breed a criminal generation.
Probation officers and deputy district attorneys ultimately decide who will be tried as an adult. This decision is based on what the P.O. and D.A. call “maturity of the circumstances surrounding the crime.” This, of course, is euphemistic and, when examined from my side of the bars, means “If you’re New Afrikan or Chicano and have a murder charge, regardless of the circumstances, you are mature enough to be treated as an adult.”
It went without saying that most any American youth captured for murder would never be tried as an adult. His crime was surely not “mature enough” to warrant such harsh treatment, even if the hard evidence surrounding the case clearly illustrated that. For example: a shotgun shell had been secured to a rat trap by a U-nail and deliberately left in Mrs. Goldberg’s mailbox. When she opened the box to retrieve her morning mail a wire was tripped, letting loose the swing arm of the trap, which in turn hit the primer of the low-base, high-charge .12 gauge shell, killing Mrs. Goldberg instantly. Or, while dropping hits of acid at a social gathering, a group of friends uncovered an intruder from another planet who had somehow broken their circle and was surreptitiously plotting to execute the town fathers or, more important, the connection. So, based on a Ouija board identification of the intruder, he is sacrificed and eaten. Sophisticated? Mature? Premeditated? Of course not. “This,” the P.O. and D.A. will explain to the judge, “was a simple case of a good child destructively influenced by the violence of television.” Or, deeper still, “a victim of the drug plague, simply needing a psychiatric evaluation. But,” the D.A. would continue, “to try this young person—our very future—as an adult would be tantamount to treason!”
But the juvenile tank is filled to capacity with New Afrikan and Chicano youth, who more often than not have been charged in an alleged crime against one of their own. A New Afrikan youth in jail, charged for murdering another New Afrikan in most any form—sophisticated or not, and usually it’s not—will be tried as an adult and given the stiffest sentence possible, which, without fail, will be life.
I found myself behind bars for the first time at age sixteen. Not a door, not a window, but bars. Since then I have had an indelible scar on my mind stamped “criminal.” All my years of watching TV told me that righteous criminals went to jail behind bars. Wasn’t Al Capone put behind bars? The Onion Field killers, Charles Manson, and Sirhan Sirhan? So by environment alone I came to look upon myself as a stone-cold criminal and nothing else. Not then overstanding the political machinations involved with me being housed in such a place, I simply assumed that my reputation had preceded me and a more secure setting was needed to hold me.
Without a doubt, I was engaged in criminality. But my activity gravitated around a survival instinct: kill or be killed. Conditions dictated that I evolve or perish. I was engaged in a war with an equal opponent. I did not start this cycle, nor did I conspire to create conditions so that this type of self-murder would take place. My participation came as second nature. To be in a gang in South Central when I joined—and it is still the case today—is the equivalent of growing up in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, and going to college: everyone does it. Those who don’t aren’t part of the fraternity. And as with everything from a union to a tennis club, it’s better to be in than out.
So it goes that the American youths tried as adults—an insignificant number, not enough for a percentage—stayed in juvenile hall. The few that trickled into our wardom had simply been thrown away by the system. Because of our youth and political immaturity we would vent our anger, frustration, and hatred of the system—whatever that was—on them. It was totally beyond our overstanding that they were just like us: castaways condemned to an existence outside of the system. Potential allies were torn to shreds like bloody meat in a shark tank. Not one walked out, and few live today unscarred.
We stayed locked in our paltry little cages most of the day. For an hour a day we’d all be let out into the dayroom—a huge room, unobserved save for a small portion that was manned by a lookout. We watched them attempt to watch us. The demarcation was set: us and them—that is, the soldier-cops. Unlike the staff in the hall, who posed little or no threat, the deputies were outright racist dogs who always wanted a confrontation with us. We thought that as we were juveniles, they could not beat us. How naive the young mind can be. Levi was the first to be beaten. I can’t recall the circumstances surrounding the altercation, but it was awfully messy. They beat him bad. Blood was everywhere. The more they beat him the more frantic they became, every one of them Americans, with the exception of one Negro. It blew my mind to hear the American deputies calling Levi “dirty nigger” and “nappy-headed motherfucker” while the Negro deputy held him for his cohorts. Even Levi looked to the Negro for some sort of explanation to this contradiction. None was given. That was heavy to me. Little did I know that the load would get heavier.
It was in Los Angeles County Jail that I learned that Americans have a thing for attacking our private parts during a scuffle. Every incident I’ve been involved in or witnessed, the private parts of the beatee would be viciously attacked without missing a beat, as if some personal grudge existed between them and our dicks. Later on I learned that it did. We nursed Levi back to health and began to avoid direct confrontations with the deputies. We’d fuck them in other ways.
Charlie row had coalesced the strong into a united front and violently purged the weak. Able row, which was now Cyco Mike’s territory, was also being formed into a front; however, he worked through force and violence. Most of those with him felt physically intimidated by his size and prowess. Our unity on Charlie row came as a result of a common enemy: Cyco Mike. He had little idea that we were plotting his overthrow. We were taken to the roof thrice weekly and allowed to lift weights. Both tiers went together, so we on Charlie row feigned affection for Mike in his presence and continued to prepare for his destruction in private.
Mike had, at one time or another in the course of his climb to the top, talked bad to, beat up on, or taken something from almost everyone there. What’s striking here is that when our generation picked up the gun, we began to use our hands less and less, so more than a few gunfighters amongst us had no ability to down Mike physically. Most folks talked behind Mike’s back. When we said anything about him it was in questioning his strong and weak points, who would really go down with him on Able row, and who were just hostages.
I myself was only beginning to gain my weight back. I trained with the weights like a mad Russian. The second operation had really set me back, and since I was only out of the hospital three days before being captured, I hadn’t had the proper nutrients to supplement my diet to stimulate growth. I had to suffice with jail food—ugh! Nothing was less healthful.
The Los Angeles County juvenile tank was not all humdrum, tension, and war. We had some good times as a captured family, making light of our dismal situation. Next to 3100—the module we were housed in—was 3300. On Able and Charlie rows of module 3300 there were queens and a few studs. On Baker and Denver rows were snitches classified as K-9s. The queens used to shine our shoes, braid our hair, and, if one wished, do a few other things. We had never seen queens and were awestruck by them, just as much as they were with being so close to throbbing, young, naive juveniles. One afternoon, Chicken Swoop from Long Beach Insane persuaded a queen named Silky to come over to our tier gate. Once Silky had come close enough to our gate, High Tower and Wino from Grape Street Watts grabbed him and wrestled him to the ground. They subdued him and hustled him down the tier to an open cell. After having their way with Silky, who had long ago ceased to resist, they let him go. With the excitement seemingly over for the day, we all fell into a somber sleep. But late in the night we were awakened by Chicken Swoop’s loud screaming.
“Ahh! Ahhh!”
“What’s wrong, cuz?”
“Ahh! Ahhh!”
“Who is that?” a disgruntled voice asked.
“Cuz, that’s Swoop. Somethin’ wrong wit’ him,” someone answered.
“I wish he’d shut the fuck up,” said yet another voice, through the cold and darkness.
“What’s wrong, Swoop?” asked Green Eyes from Venice Sho-Line.
“Cuz,” Swoop began, “my dick is green.”
“Yo’ what?”
“My dick, muthafucka, my dick!”
And just then from down on the other end of the tier came another scream.
“Ahhh!”
“Who is that?” someone asked.
“Aw, shit!” High Tower stammered. “My dick green, too!”
The whole tank was awake now and out came the comedians. No one got any more sleep that night. We stayed up and clowned all night and into the next afternoon, right up until the medical crew came and hauled Swoop, High Tower, and Wino out of there. Later that afternoon a lieutenant came and gave us a sex talk about men who have somehow been twisted into thinking they are women and that we were all queers. He ended his sermon by calling us the sickest youngsters he had met in a while.
Light moments such as this tended to ease some of the stress that we were under. Once eight or nine of us were in a cell just telling war stories and joking around when someone claimed he could ejaculate faster than anyone else in the cell. Well, this was cause for a showdown. Within seconds everyone had their dick in their hand and was pumpin’ away. The self-proclaimed champ did not blow off first and was clowned as just wanting to see our dicks. We threatened to urinate on him.
Our rule was simple: the sets that were there first and remained firm were “in,” This meant that any set that came in that any of the “in” sets didn’t get along with, no set got along with. They had to go—violently. This was even true of the Chicano sets.
When I was shipped to County, Li’l Monster was still in the Hall. Shyster was basically running the Rollin’ Sixties in Central, and I thought he might try to do something to my li’l brother to get some points. Li’l Monster was in there for killing Shyster’s homies, and Shyster was there for killing one of our homies. Since Shyster was being tried as an adult, he faced the very real possibility of coming to the juvenile tank. So I wrote him a letter saying basically that should one finger be laid on Li’l Monster in my absence it would be brought to bear on him when he arrived at County. I told him of our structure there and for authenticity I had everyone sign it. Li’l Monster went unmolested his entire stay.
In early March one of Popa and Perry’s homies from Harlem Thirties was killed by some Brims at Manuel Arts High School. True to tradition, the alleged killers were tried as adults and rushed to the juvenile tank. They went directly to Baker and Denver rows P.C. We plotted and planned on a way to get over to their cell and kill them. In April our chance came. Ironically, Popa, Perry, Insane, myself, and both the Brims were taken to court together. We knew that as juveniles we’d all be put in the same court holding cell and then, as planned, we’d beat the two Bloods to death. The juveniles who were being tried as adults but kept in the Hall were also to be housed in this same holding cell awaiting court.
Our shackles were removed, and we filed into the cell on the basement floor of the Criminal Courts building in downtown Los Angeles. The county jail juveniles always arrived approximately thirty minutes before those from the Hall, so even though we were all in the small cell, we didn’t pounce on the two Bloods, who by now knew we were getting ready to jump. We wanted to wait until the others arrived, so no one would be coming by for at least two more hours. When the door opened for the others from the Hall to enter, I was removing the braids from my hair. If the t Bloods were going to make a dash for it, now was the time. We expected them to, but not a quip was heard from either. This meant one of two things: the Bloods were not afraid of us, as we had anticipated and surely had always believed, or they were naive enough to think that we were not going to smash them. I was relieved that they had not gone to the soldier-cops. I guess I felt a bit of respect for them, as well, because to stay in a ten-by-twenty-foot cell with four members of the opposition who had been charged with killing took a certain amount of courage. I also felt sorry for them. The ignorant bastards had no idea of how we planned to mistreat them.
Two juveniles from Central entered the tank. Both were New Afrikans and both were Rollin’ Sixties. I didn’t know either by face, nor did they recognize me. Popa eased over to me and whispered that the light-complexioned one was T-Bone. The other one he just knew as one of their homies. T-Bone’s name carried a little weight in his ’hood. A second-level member who had shot a few people, he had recently been shot five times by the Black P. Stone Bloods. He had a slight build, short hair, and a fixed frown. When his eyes swept the cell they telegraphed contempt. He wore a black hair net down over his forehead like a sweater cap. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a half-smoked cigarette, fumbled in his other pocket, and retrieved a match. He struck the match on the concrete floor, lit his cigarette, and sat back coolly on the bench. His homie stood across from him near the entrance. Because I didn’t know who he was, I worried little about him. I walked over to T-Bone, who was concentrating on his hard-core stare, and stood before him. I had completely forgotten about the Bloods.
“Where you from?” I asked, already knowing but wanting to hear him say it.
“Rollin’ Sixties,” he responded proudly.
“Get up, homeboy. We gotta get ’em up.”
“Fo’ what?” he asked, visibly disturbed.
“ ’Cause I’m Monster Kody from Gangsta.”
“Wait, man, hold it. We ain’t even gotta trip that.”
“Naw, I don’t wanna hear that shit, fool. Yo’ punk-ass homies blasted me up, killed my homeboys Twinky, Roach, and Tit Tit. Now you wanna talk that ’hold it’ shit? Get yo’ bitch ass up!
I stepped back so he could get up, but still he wouldn’t move. The half cigarette was now a butt, and he was nervously sucking on it through clenched fingertips. I walked back up to him and put my left foot up on the bench next to him. He would not look me in the eyes.
“Who killed my homeboy Twinky?” I asked, figuring to pump this lame muthafucka for all the information I could before I downed him.
“I don’t know.”
“Oh yeah?” I began. “Who killed my homeboy Roach?”
“I don’t know,” he responded, looking straight ahead. I think he began to ease a bit under questioning, believing this would be my only intrusion.
“Who shot me?”
“Look, I ain’t supposed to tell you who shot yo’ homeboys,” he said, as if he were reminding me of some set rules of warfare agreed upon by both countries in Geneva. This taking of the Fifth would perhaps have been admissible in some American court of law, but in our circle it was not acceptable.
“Muthafucka,” I exploded, “I’ll tell you who shot yo’ homeboys!”
“Who killed Zinc?” he asked.
“I killed Zinc!”
“Who killed Popa T.?”
“I killed Popa T.!”
“Who killed Baby O.?”
“Me, muthafucka, me!”
I went on to name a few others I had pushed off this planet, all the while trying to incite him to violence.
“Now,” I said calmly, “who killed Twinky?”
“I don’t know.”
Out of control now, I grabbed him by the collar.
“Sissy, I’ll slap yo’ goddamn head off.”
“If you do I’ll still be from the big Six-O,” he said.
I reared back as far as I could and slapped the hell out of him hard across the face. His hair net flew off from the blow. With little choice he stood up swinging, but he was just a gunfighter and had little skill with his hands. I beat him pretty bad. One of my uppercut blows landed directly in his eye, knocking his head back. He stumbled to a corner holding his eye and pleading for me to stop. I did only because he ceased to resist. All the while his homeboy said nothing, so I stepped over to him.
“What’s yo’ name?” I asked.
“Shakey,” he replied. A fitting name, I remember thinking.
“How long you been from the Sixties?”
“ ’Bout nine months.”
“What you in here fo,’ shootin’ one of my homies?”
“Naw, fo’ shootin’ some Brims.”
In a flash one of the Bloods jumped up and said, “I’m a Brim,” and rushed the Sixty with blinding quickness. For a moment I stood indecisive. After all, the Sixties were Crips. Shouldn’t I help him get the Blood—which was our original intent? But the Sixties had showed little regard for my ’hood, my homies, or me. Why should I help him? “Fuck them Sixties,” I decided, and sat back to watch the fight. Though both were my enemies, the Sixties were my worst enemies.
The rumbling was too loud against the door so the soldier-cops came in and seized both Shakey and the Blood. At this time the other Blood spoke up and made his exit to safety with his comrade. T-Bone stayed, and I pumped him for all the information I could.
That day in court my trial date was set. T-Bone was remanded to the custody of the sheriff’s department, which meant he was coming to the juvenile tank. When he arrived the next day he had miraculously stopped banging. He was put on Able row. His eye was so discolored and bloodshot that he was given the new name of Tangle-Eye. After that, whenever any drama of significance took place with our ’hoods on the street, I beat Tangle-Eye for it. When Li’l Crazy De was shot—for the third time—I hurt Tangle-Eye bad. To offset my wanton abuse of him, Cyco Mike got Tangle-Eye claiming he was with Main Street, and because we had no beef with Main Street, he was able to enjoy a bit of immunity.
In the course of our slob game late one night we found the real Bloods. I was feeling at a loss for someone to beat up. One of the Bloods was Bingo from Bounty Hunter and the other was Weeble Wooble from Mad Swan. Both were from the east side of Los Angeles and neither had killed any of my homies, though we had suspected the Swans of desecrating our homie Cocaine’s body while it lay in wake near their ’hood. We’d arrived late to find that Cocaine had been stabbed repeatedly in the face with a screwdriver and that multiple red flags had been thrown into the casket. But their part in this was mere speculation.
The most eager to put hands on the two Bloods were the Grape Streets, whose worst enemy was the Bounty Hunters, and the East Coasts, whose worst enemy was the Mad Swans. Those poor Bloods. Up until the following day we had them believing that we were all Bloods. We’d lead into a topic about so-and-so having been shot, and they’d finish the story off. When our rumors proved false, they’d correct it for the record: “Uh-uhn, Blood, that was my homie so-and-so who kilt that crab.” This went on through the night. We even signed off with “Blood love” before going to sleep.
The next day was Doomsday. We fell into the dayroom that evening feeling ecstatic, excitement in the air. Right up until we began tying blue flags around our knuckles, the Bloods thought they were among their own. No one said anything, everyone just prepared. The Grape Streets moved on Bingo first. The sight was inexplicable: within seconds he was unidentifiable. This was a standard beat-down. The other, however, is worth detailing.
Weeble Wobble was a stocky little guy with a full beard. Monk, from East Coast, said his name had a little weight to it on the east side. He, like the rest of us, had a murder. He had little beady eyes that darted around nervously, and the left side of his mouth quivered. I doubted it was because he was scared, though, because he didn’t seem to be. He answered all our questions in an even voice.
Monk had a bit more tact than the Grape Streets, who just pounced on Bingo. Monk questioned Weeble Wooble at length about people, places, and events that had transpired over the years between their ’hoods. Weeble Wobble, as if knowing his fate and wanting to confess his sins, spilled his guts. But he did so admirably, proudly conveying the missions he had been on and who had fallen by his hand. Just as I admired Monk’s professionalism in handling this prisoner of war, I had to acknowledge the sincerity of the prisoner. Not once did he falter during his debriefing, not once did he stutter.
When Monk was satisfied that he had bled him of all that he needed, he called for Dirt to bring a cup. Everyone looked baffled. It was enough to be civil in questioning the prisoner, but to now offer him a drink was a bit out of our range of diplomacy. Nevertheless, we all waited to see what Monk had up his sleeve. Monk had done some irrational shit in his day and was not beyond pulling a twist. When he got the cup from Dirt (Dirt’s brother’s name was Mud; they were both there for killing Jessie James from Blood Stone Villain) it was empty, which didn’t seem to bother Monk too much. He simply pulled out his dick and filled the cup. And then, as if it were beer, he nonchalantly handed it to Weeble Wobble who, to our surprise, took it. Well goddamn, I thought, this shit was going too smoothly, almost as if rehearsed.
“Drink it,” Monk ordered. Only now did his voice show strains of anger, betraying the cool look on his face.
“Wait a minute, Monk, I—”
“Drink it!” Monk exploded with fury, completely out of control now.
Without further protest Weeble Wobble drank the acrid liquid, spilling droplets on his beard as he tipped the cup. Once he had finished and put the cup down Monk tore into him with a vengeance. Everyone wanted to rat-pack him, but Monk insisted on it being head up. Weeble Wobble tried to dance about and put up a little resistance, but he had been so demoralized by the debriefing and the urine drinking that his response was simply no match for the swiftness and physical skill of Monk. Every punch Monk threw was with pinpoint accuracy, splitting Weeble Wobble’s lip with a left jab, then doubling back with an overhand right, opening a gushing wound above his right eye. Body blows rained in rapid-fire succession from his navel to his neck. When he fell to the ground, Monk proceeded to stomp and kick him all over—except, with any real intent, in the groin area—until his eyes rolled back in his head and he flopped around on the floor like a fish.
Bingo had long ceased any movement. Feeling somehow left out, I called Tangle-Eye over and slapped him up. Not to be outdone by Monk, I called for a cup. But I couldn’t urinate, so I handed it to Taco, who quickly filled it up. No one said a word as I handed the urine-filled cup to Tangle-Eye.
“Drink it,” I told him, “or come to the back and prepare for battle.”
Tangle-Eye was looking around for Cyco Mike, who had gone to see a visitor. He then looked to Green Eyes for a reprieve.
“Hey, Green, you know I ain’t no Sixty no mo’. You gonna let cuz do me like this?”
“Monster,” Green Eyes began, “you know cuz claimin’ Main Street now—”
“This muthafucka ain’t from no Main Street! You know it and I know it.”
And then, looking at Tangle-Eye, I held up both fists and repeated, “Now drink it, punk, or get these dogs put on yo’ ass.”
“You know you gonna have to answer to Mike when he get back,” Green Eyes said.
“Drink it!” I said loudly, ignoring Green. And then as an afterthought I said, “Mike don’t pump no fear here,” slapping myself over the heart. “Just’cause he got y’all scared ’round here don’t mean I’m gon’ be scared, too.”
The dayroom was deathly quiet. The line had been crossed, my plan prematurely hatched.
“Muthafucka, what did I tell you?”
At that, Tangle-Eye tipped the cup and swallowed the urine. I slapped him anyway for being such a coward.
When the soldier-cops came to the dayroom door to let Cyco Mike back in, they saw Bingo and Weeble Wobble lying in pools of blood and called a 415—a distress call. Within minutes the dayroom was swarming with vile soldier-cops slinging threats and profanities around at random. We each were made to strip for examination by a sergeant, who looked for scratches, blood, welts, or abrasions that would suggest we had somehow been involved in the beat-down. Monk was the only one taken to the hole.
After the examination we were locked back into our cages. I heard Green Eyes sending Cyco Mike a briefing on what had happened with Tangle-Eye. But Mike said nothing to me.
Later that night I heard Cyco Mike order Li’l Fella from Five Tray to give up his breakfast in the morning. Li’l Fella, a small cat who weighed at least fifty pounds less than Cyco Mike, gave no response to this. It became apparent to me what was taking place. Cyco Mike knew he could not give Tangle-Eye full immunity under Main Street’s jurisprudence for two reasons: Tangle-Eye had not joined willfully and with the required passage of the universal litmus test, and he had smut on him from not putting up a struggle for his props. This type of coverage only served to make Main Street look soft, as if anyone could join. Cyco Mike knew that I knew all of this. He also knew that he could not bring my latest act of aggression on Tangle-Eye to me without making himself look stupid. So he was using an indirect route to draw me out. All Trays—Four Trays, Five Trays, Seven Trays, and Eight Trays—are natural allies, just as the Neighborhoods are. So by publicly taking Li’l Fella’s breakfast he was actually sending a message to me.
I weighed the consequences of what I was about to do. How many troops did he have down there? There was Green Eyes, Cisco, Warlock, Killer Rob, Handbone, and Chicken Swoop—who was recently back from the clinic. He could also count Tangle-Eye on his side. I had Moman, Oldman, Taco, Poopay, High-Tower, Dirt, Mud, Bennose, Levi, Popa, and Perry. It’s not quantity but quality that counts in such situations. We had a crew of quality soldiers who, quite frankly, up until my arrival, had lacked the proper leadership. To say I alone filled that vacuum would negate the role of all the others in forging our united front. We all, at different times, functioned in the seat of leadership. But I was the primary driver. Though I was nowhere near the physical condition I wanted and needed to be in, I had to respond to Mike. He knew what he was doing and I knew—that was enough. But before I could respond to him directly, I had to try to rile up some resistance in Li’l Fella. Although he had little chance against Mike, he could at least stand his ground.
“Hey, Li’l Fella, what you do, give cuz yo’ breakfast or what?”
“Naw, homie, but fuck that breakfast.”
“Yeah, but Trays don’t do it like that,” I told him. “If you ain’t gonna eat it, throw it away.”
Before Li’l Fella responded Mike spoke up.
“Monster, what tier you on?”
“Charlie row.”
“Well, keep yo’ ass up there. Don’t worry ’bout what go on down here.”
“I could give less than a fat rat’s ass ’bout Able row. My concern is with my li’l homie,” I said matter-of-factly.
“Yeah, well he live down here.”
“You too big to be bullying on cuz anyhow.”
“Who the fuck you think you is anyway?” Mike asked accusingly. “Coming here, thinking you that muthafucka somethin’. You too new here to be woofin’ that shit, Monster.”
“Nigga, fuck you!”
“FUCK YOU!” Mike shot back.
“So what’s up then?”
“In the a.m., muthafucka, let the gates be the bell.”
And that was it.
The silence weighed a hundred tons. It seemed that I could hardly move or breathe under it. I wanted to make small talk with Ben, but decided against it in fear of my voice cracking, showing strain, stress, and, honestly, fear. Fear not necessarily of Cyco Mike, but of possibly losing the fight. What then? Was I supposed to live with it? That just wasn’t my style.
I remember before I went to camp in ’79 my older brother, Kerwin, used to put hands on me. He’d feel quite content with bopping me around for any small infraction. But he didn’t realize the radical transformations I was going through while in jail, where ass whippings just weren’t tolerated by anyone. So when I was released and had committed my first infraction—something like failing to clean the bathroom—he went to pounce on me, and I quickly drew my strap and explained to him that those days were over. If he had any further notions of putting hands on me, he’d have to tangle with my gun. He nodded his comprehension and walked out of the room in somewhat of a trance. He hasn’t touched me since.
Unfortunately, I didn’t have a strap now. I did, however, have my fighting skill. I lay there and went over some moves I could pull, trying to plan, which was ridiculous. How can one plan a fistfight? It’s not like the combatants have the same choreographer. And it was clear this wasn’t going to be a clean fight. This would be a stomp-down, drag-out brawl for the duration of wind, punches, and stamina. It had come to this, though prematurely, but in a way I was glad it was finally going to be on and over. Something had to break the tension. The situation had come to a head, and a new round of relations were about to be set in motion. I fell asleep with my mind full of these thoughts.
The following day, nothing happened. The next day, I observed Cyco Mike in the dayroom having war counsel with his troops. I saw Green Eyes wrap Mike’s hand in blue flags and help him take down his jumpsuit, so I had Taco tie my hands up with flags and I took my jumpsuit down, too. Taco and I remained seated on the table in front of the old black-and-white television. Both sets of troops were fanned out about the day-room eyeing each other skeptically. The tension was very, very thick. Cyco Mike and Green Eyes began to walk toward Taco and me, so we stood up. Mike spoke first.
“Woof that shit now that you was woofin’ the other night.”
“I ain’t no tape recorder. You heard what I said.”
We both were in strike-first positions, almost toe to toe.
“Fuck that, fool, we gotta get down,” Mike declared, and went to step out of his shoes.
“I thought you knew,” I said, and didn’t let him get to the other shoe. Like lightning I was on him, hitting everywhere at once. My speed, fueled by great bursts of adrenaline, was surprising—even to me. When I stopped swinging he was down on all fours.
“Aw, you gonna try to hit me when I’m takin’ my shoes off, huh?”
“Fuck you, punk, get yo’ bitch ass up,” I said vehemently.
When he stood up again he rushed at me, but not with swinging blows. Instead, he tried to wrestle me down. Each time he went to grab me I banked a blow across his face or head. I was backing up, sticking and moving, sidestepping and hooking. He was furious! Finally, when I had danced myself into exhaustion, he grabbed me in a suffocating bear hug. Using his strength and weight as leverage he succeeded in toppling me backward, falling on top of me. Once on the ground he tried to hit me a few times in the torso, but he left his face completely exposed and I took liberty with his mug. Taco moved to us quickly, as instructed, and pushed Mike off me. In a moment I was back up on my feet, dancing and shouting.
“C’mon, muthafucka, c’mon!”
Mike just stood there and then, to everyone’s surprise, extended his hand in a peacemaking gesture. He said that we were both Crips and had no business fighting. Thinking it was a ploy, I backed away sayin’ “Fuck that shit.”
When I went back amongst my troops I saw pride, love, and admiration in their faces. The spell was broken. I felt like a world champion, a liberator, but didn’t allow myself to get big-headed or pompous. Li’l Fella came over to me and without looking me in the eyes said thanks. Li’l Fella, like so many other noncrucial observers, thought that this was simply a result of the breakfast issue. Few knew that since my arrival this battle had been inevitable. Even I couldn’t articulate it then. But I did know that the growing tension had precipitated a brawl because Cyco Mike was wrong in so many instances and hadn’t the popular support to continue in his capacity as leader.
And so it went that I assumed responsibility for the juvenile tank. I didn’t simply demote Mike, but let him carry some responsibility—not nearly what he had been used to wielding, but enough so as not to break his spirit. I had Handbone beaten and stomped for being a general coward. I reduced Tangle-Eye to a basket case and enjoyed the sight. And it was during my reign that I fixed it so that Sixties were outlawed from Able and Charlie rows. I allowed individual freedom and no one was misused arbitrarily.
The Darwinian theory of survival of the fittest continued to rule our existence. No one got a free ride. Our dayroom time was mostly spent going chest: Charlie row against Able row, everybody bombing everyone else with torso shots. We did this to enhance our physical skills, because so many had lost this ability, as the gun had replaced hand-to-hand combat. But here the strong survived and the weak were phased out. Within three months we were a quality contingency of sheer terror.
Lounging in my cage one morning, reading—or trying to read—I was disturbed by Fat Rat from One-Eighteen East Coast. He said that he had just seen and overheard two detectives down front talking about coming to search my cell. Fat Rat was known for his clowning and could hardly be taken seriously half the time, so I told him to fuck off and went back to struggling with my comic book. Not ten minutes later my gate opened and I was ordered to step out. When I stepped out on the tier, sure enough, two plainclothes detectives accompanied by a sergeant were walking briskly down the tier toward me.
“Kody Scott?” the blond detective asked.
“Yeah, wha’s up?”
“We have a search warrant for your cell,” he said, as the sergeant cuffed me to the tier rail.
“Fo’ what?” I asked in utter disbelief.
“For murder, Mr. Scott, or should I say Monster Kody?”
“Man, y’all trippin’. I’m in here fo’ murder already.”
“Oh yes, we know that, but it seems that one of your homeboys has turned over on you for yet another murder.”
“Yeah, right,” I said, but now I knew that this was what Killer Rob had been talking about when I’d seen him in the Hall.
“So what y’all lookin’ fo’, guns? Oh yeah, I see, right here on this paper, a .32, a shotgun, a—”
“No, we’re only looking for correspondence that you have possibly entered into with some of your homeboys.”
They searched my cell for all of an hour. When they came out they had at least ten letters. While the sergeant uncuffed me, I told the detectives that I hoped they’d found what they were looking for, to which they replied that they had. As they were leaving, one turned back and said with a smile, “But we are going to wait until you are eighteen so we can gas your black ass.”
“Fuck you!” I called after them, but they went out laughing.
In June I started trial for the murder and six attempted murders. The district attorney said that if I pleaded guilty he would be lenient and only give me twenty-five years. “Oh, is that all?” I asked sarcastically.
The Brims turned out en masse. One after the other they testified that I had blasted them in the park. When my attorney asked them what I was wearing, they all described my attire differently. All said that I had gripped the shotgun with both hands. When asked if I was wearing gloves, each said no, that both hands were bare. My attorney then produced medical files that clearly showed that I had been released from the hospital that very night and, most important, had a white cast on my left hand extending up to my elbow.
The jury deliberated less than an hour and came back with a verdict of not guilty on all charges.
It was June 22, 1981, and all that I had on my mind—before sex, drinking, and smoking pot or PCP—was to blast some Brims. Really blast them. Before the sun rose the next morning, they would feel me strong.