Ty swallowed hard, then nodded. GC slapped him to the ground, and the rest started hitting and kicking him. After thirty seconds, with blood flowing into his eyes, he started fighting back and got in a few good licks himself. They pushed him around for five minutes, and though he was bleeding badly, he’d drawn blood on a couple of them too.
“Okay, you all right, little homie,” GC said. “You fight back. Won’t be beatin’ on you anymore. Unless we bored and need a tune up for the Bloods.” GC put his arm around him. “You pretty low right now, what wid yo’ mama and all. But you want to show us you down? Wanna make a rep? That be good. You long way from OG. You just a baby gangster, a tiny. But you in now, you been jumped in. You a homie, a 60. It’s ‘Do or die, Crip or cry.’ But you want to be OG, you gotta build your rep. You gotta go head up on slobs. And you gotta do it with this set so when they speak yo’ name it’s like speakin’ the Rollin’ 60s Crips. You gotta promote the set, recruit for it, buy and sell for it, live for it, be willin’ to die for it. But you gotsta prove yourself, man. You down fo’ dat, honor student?”
“Yeah,” Ty said, filled with pride and terror.
“You strapped, little homie? You carryin’?” When Ty shook his head, GC said to Shadow, “Get me a gauge, road dog.” Shadow, in charge of munitions, pulled out from a military-green canvas bag a sawed-off shotgun, a twelve gauge missing most of its eighteen-inch legal minimum.
“This yo’ first time, cuz?” GC showed him how to handle the weapon. “Sawed-off’s easy to carry and sprays fast so you don’t have to be too accurate. It’s got double-aught buckshot. Only problem is, if you has to shoot more than fifteen feet, it’s a spray and you not gonna get a funeral out of it. But you can still do some damage, man. Understand?” GC spoke with the calm reassurance of a tennis pro instructing a child in the proper forehand grip.
Tyrone felt the shotgun, awkward in his hands. He’d never held a gauge before, much less fired one. He’d never shot any gun. He looked at GC.
“You got the gauge now. Make you a man. Go spray some Bloods, little homie.” GC held his hands up in the air like he was holding his own gauge. “‘Booyah! You dead.’ You wit’ me?”
“Righteous, man. I wit’ you.” The words sounded much more confident than the cracking voice that spoke them.
GC looked out at the group. “All right, cuzzins, we been clockin’ dese Bloods three days since they waste our little homie. We know right where they is tonight. They celebratin’ our tiny’s funeral. And we gonna pay ’em a visit, get some get back. For our homeboy. For the 60s.”
Skin slapping and numerous exclamations of “down” and “righteous” and “def” filled the air. Ty felt the anticipation.
“Remember,” GC said, “it’s all about droppin’ bodies. It’s all about Blood funerals. They been woofin’, the slobs. They dis you, they call you Crabs or Smuzz or Ricket. You gonna take that?”
“No way, man.”
“This our mission tonight, homies. You show ’em. Watch the sentries now. You get Pretty Boy, that big black cat, you ring up points! You see that nigga, you shoot him, hear me? You don’t see him, you shoot him anyway. You don’t get them, they get you. Got it?”
It felt like NBA players breaking from the huddle and heading out on the court. Ty felt the intoxicating surge of power, the sense of being part of the Rollin’ 60s dominion. Instead of being a victim, waiting for life to beat up on him, he could seize control.
They took five cars, all loaded up and lights off. Ty trembled as he found himself sitting right next to Shadow. He could smell the nuclear waste, the pungent grease in the defense minister’s cornrowed hair. Shadow was R6C to the core, tough as they come. They cruised up to a house on Loc’d Out Piru Gangster turf, where the Bloods were hangin’ and slangin’, a dozen on the outside and at least as many inside. GC was first to jump out of a car. With quick aim, he shot out two street-lamps with his gauge. Booyah! Shadowy forms ran in confusion in the front yard. Glass fragments rained all over GC, and it seemed to exhilarate him. One gangster let loose with what sounded like a cannon. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! Ty heard someone yell “Sixties!” but wasn’t sure if it was friend or foe.
The big bass of a .45 sounded off. Ty heard a Booyah. Another shotgun. The enemy flew off like starlings charged in the park, one screeching “Rollers!” Ty stood up close behind a Crip car, leaning over, terrified. One Blood turned and shot toward the car. The Crip next to Ty shot his nine-millimeter Beretta and the Blood dropped to the ground.
By now the Crips were all spread out, and only Ty and the banger with the Beretta—he didn’t even know his name—were by the car. The other boy shot again, but his gun jammed. He saw Ty holding the shotgun and yelled, “Shoot it, fool!” He looked like he was about to grab it from him, so Ty turned it toward the house and blindly pulled the trigger. Booyah! It exploded, a surge of power going through him, seducing and terrifying him at the same time. The buckshot fired toward two Bloods, both with their backs turned. One hit the ground, the other kept running but pulled up limp.
“Move in,” the nameless 60 told Ty, who panicked, trying to stick the sawed-off shotgun into his pants like he’d seen GC do once. Ty burned his skin and cut himself with its jagged metal edges.
While the other boy ran ahead, Ty stopped where the boy lay face down, totally still. He turned his head and in the dim light recognized him. He was a year older than Ty, but they’d gone to the same middle school. His name was Donnie. They’d had a math class together. Donnie had given Ty some chocolate chip cookies one day.
Ty spread his hand on Donnie’s back and felt the blood. He ran back to the car and got in the backseat and shrunk down low. He wiped the blood off his hands onto his jeans and started crying. Sweat, blood, and tears soaked his shirt.
After a few minutes the car suddenly filled up again. In the panic no one noticed Ty had run from the scene. All the Crip cars seemed to take off at once. Tires screeched as Ty’s car pulled out. Ty saw Shadow still standing by a telephone pole, with his nine-millimeter gun pointed at the house.
After a few moments, the Bloods, thinking all the Crips were gone, began moving around outside the house. Two Bloods got up and brushed themselves off, just in time to be targeted cold by Shadow. He shot three times and knocked them both down. Then he ran up close. Ty watched in horror as Shadow put the gun close to one head and fired. Boom! Then he pointed at the other. Click! Click! Click! Shadow ran full speed toward the getaway car, which had stopped and backed up toward him.
One of the Crips in the car laughed hilariously. “That Shadow, he down. He get mo’ points after the hit than in it! Those Bloods, they always fall fo’ screechin’ tires. You leave one soldier and he do de cleanup!”
Shadow jumped into the car, and the excited comrade slapped his hand. “Shadow, you one sprung nigger.”
When they got back to their turf, less than two miles away, the set retreated into an old abandoned church building to celebrate and tell war stories, which got grander as time went on and lids broke out and bottles were passed. Ty snuck out and went around a corner. He threw up. Some of the boys laughed at him.
“You hurled, honor student, but at least you didn’t bail!” It was GC. “You down, boy. You halfway down, at least! Heard you got you some get back on a couple slobs.” He slapped Ty on the shoulder.
“Cuz be with us—he blasted slobs tonight, hey?” GC looked at Mookie. “Now move yo’ black rear end and open up some tall ones. Let’s drink some forties!”
The forty-ounce bottles of Olde English beer gave the feel of pirates drinking their ale after seizing a ship on the high seas. GC let Ty drink out of his forty. Ty loved the weight of the bottle in his hand. He loved being a part of something important, something bigger than himself. Being with these guys had been scary, but now it was feelin’ better, feelin’ real good.
“How’s the brew, little homie?” GC asked.
“Great, man. Righteous.” He lied. It tasted awful.
“Beats
Night Train. Gangsta juice,” GC laughed. He was so cool.
After the crowd dispersed, GC took Ty aside.
“Bend the corner here, cuz. GC gonna talk wid you.” GC looked at Ty like a veteran pitcher might a promising rookie. He seemed almost tender. “You dropped bodies tonight, tiny. That puts you in all the way. Bangin’ ain’t no part-time thang. It yo’ life now, hear me? I ’member seein’ yo’ family at the church—Ebenezer? Well, it’s like that pastor used to say, everybody has a callin’. This yo’ callin’. Nothin’ matters like bein’ a Crip. Love yo’ set; hate yo’ enemy. Hear me now?”
“Yeaaah.”
“Homeboys is yo’ family. We yo’ daddy and yo’ brothers. Crip women yo’ mama and sisters, and they more than that too. They give you some fine action, you see. You get ’em big, that be okay. Show you a man. Bring ’em a lid or jewelry once in awhile, you keep ’em happy. Daddy Welfare take care of de rest.” GC laughed. “They ig you or dis you, jus’ find another one. Know what I’m sayin’?”
Ty nodded, though for the most part he didn’t know at all. But his education had begun.
“Now on, you go out, you go out g-down, hear me? Here some decent locs.” He handed him his dark glasses. Ty couldn’t believe it. He had his own shades, from K-Mart, but these were from Gangster Cool himself. He’d won his approval.
“Don’t want you lookin’ like some fool Blood or somethin’.” GC reached down into a bag. “Got sumpin’ else for you. Yo’ own strap.” He handed him a big black nine-millimeter handgun, a Taurus PT 92AF.
“A nine?” Ty’s eyes got big, admiring the cheap knockoff of a military sidearm Beretta 92F, as if it were a work of art.
“Whatchu think, I give you one of those .22 pea shooters?” He laughed. “Man, I took a deuce-deuce round once and thought it be a mosquito bite!” He slapped hands with his little homie.
GC showed him the fifteen-round magazine. “It’s a virgin, not a hot one, not like mine,” GC said, meaning no murders had been committed with it yet. GC kissed his own gun, a nine-millimeter Glock, identical to the ones used by many police officers. Some said he’d gotten it from a cop he killed. GC never challenged them on it. “You a cop-killer, you got juice.” It made for a good rep. He treated his gun a lot better than his girlfriend. He had an extended magazine good for eighteen rounds without reloading.
“Now, little homey, you got to keep yo’ piece loaded all the way. Bloods, they got one mo’ round than you and you be sorry, you be dead. They don’t know you now, but they will soon. And you can’t just be slippin’ down these streets. Got to have yo’ eyes open. You hear me?”
“Yeeaah. Eyes open.”
“Pretty soon you feel naked without yo’ piece. The gat’s part of the dress code. You ain’t strapped and it be like one of them downtown boys in his monkey suit, like your uncle, goin’ around without a credit card. Don’t leave home widout it.” GC thought this was extremely funny, and the pot made it funnier. He handed another lid to Ty, who laughed too, though the weed was making him sick.
“Now, yo’ mama—sorry, I forgot they killed her, those dirty…Spics.” He was obviously used to blaming Bloods for everything, so “Spics” didn’t come out naturally. “Yo’ uncle and auntie, now they ain’t gonna understand why you need a piece. They jus’ civilians. So hide it good. You got it?”
“Got it.”
Ty went to GC’s house to get cleaned up and spend the night. He’d told his aunt Geneva he was spending the night with his friend Troy Knopf, one of his few friends his mother had approved of. Geneva had called Troy’s mother to make sure it was all right. At the last minute Ty told Troy he couldn’t come. He hoped his aunt hadn’t checked up on him again. He especially hoped his uncle wouldn’t suspect anything.
Ty slept in GC’s room on an extra mattress in the corner. It was almost three o’clock before he and GC stopped talking, nearly four before he fell asleep. Images flashed through his mind as he slept, feeding his dreams. Flashes of light, tumultuous sounds, and grotesque body shapes fought for dominion over his mind. Some of the haunting images came from earlier in the evening, some from another world. He lay there trembling. Now he watched the beautiful gruesome way the buckshot tore through the enemy’s clothes and into his flesh, like piranha ripping into their prey. He saw a terrified look on the face of the Blood, unarmed, just fifteen. Donnie from math class, who gave him cookies. His tossing and turning became moaning and writhing.
He saw Shadow dropping those two boys and moving in to finish them off. The horror of it drew him out of sleep. He lay there wondering if he knew them. Maybe one was an honor student. Maybe his mama had one of those bumper stickers too.
He felt a lump in his throat. He lay there feeling proud, exhilarated, alive, terrified, guilty, and ashamed.
Tyrone fell back asleep, exhausted. He dreamed the sounds of magazines being rammed home, shotguns pumped, tires screeching, surreal blasts of gunfire. He saw twisted, lifeless bodies, a crippled boy trying to run or crawl away. He saw the blasts piercing the house. He saw his mother and sister riddled with bullets. He screamed.
“Mama, no, Mama, I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
GC came to Ty’s side, not knowing what to say, remembering years ago when he used to have bad dreams too.
“It be okay, little homie,” GC said to him. “Everything be okay.”
Surrounded by people of every color and nationality and language, Dani squinted as she joined them in gazing at the four living creatures in the midst of the burning fire of Elyon’s holiness. The creatures looked somewhat like men, but very different, with four wings. They stood upright, legs straight, but their feet were calf-like and looked like polished bronze. They each had four faces on four sides of their heads, faces which Dani did not dare to look upon.
Whirling disks bisected each other at right angles. The wheels within wheels made her think of Elyon’s omnipresence; the eyes she saw everywhere, of his omniscience. In concert with millions around her, both men and angels, she fell on her knees and trembled at a terrifying holiness beyond comprehension.
“Behold, the cherubim who surround the throne of God.” The voice was Torel’s, but it sounded muffled and feeble, in stark contrast to the clear confident voice with which he normally spoke. She turned to see his face pressed against the ground.
She finally looked up at the four faces of the cherubim. Man, facing forward, he who had dominion over animals, king of the earth. Lion, king of wild beasts. Ox, king of domesticated animals. Eagle, king of the sky. They all spoke of Elyon—King of all the universe, he who exercised dominion over all.
Their human-like hands reached upward and outward, as they chanted “Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty.”
Dani recognized this as the sound she’d heard from a distance from the moment she entered heaven, just as she’d once heard Niagara Falls from far away. But now she was at the base of the waterfall, a waterfall of holiness that made Niagara seem like drips from a kitchen faucet.
The cherubim were connected in a square and could travel straight in any direction at immense speed, able at a moment to change direction without turning. On the one hand it seemed to defy natural laws, yet on the other it seemed to be the ultimate expression of mathematical and geometrical precision. Dani remembered having once thought of mathematics as a distinctly secular subject, without spiritual dimension. Now it seemed the opposite, that mathematics was in its essence spiritual not secular.
In a universe handmade by Elyon, she thought, under his dominion, there’s no such thing as secular, nothing that lacked a spiritual dimension.
Dani shook, bordering on dread. Her visceral instinct was to run from the terrifying holiness as from a tidal wave. But her mind reminded her emotions that this was the essence of the same Carpenter she loved, the Bridegroom himself. And if she would be forever swept away by this galactic tidal wave, then so be it. She lost all thought of self, including self-preservation, and let the tidal wave engulf her.
S
he felt for a moment vulnerable to the anger of the Almighty. But she was suddenly immersed in the reality that his holy anger against her sin was taken out on the Carpenter, and because she had accepted that provision, God had no anger left for her. Elyon’s anger was there, all right, anger stored up for a day of judgment. But she would survive that day, for she was no longer an object of his wrath.
It struck her now as amazing that the Carpenter could talk and laugh and tease and relate so easily, even casually, to her. For that which the cherubim surrounded was the essence of Elyon, who was the Carpenter himself.
After time immeasurable had passed, Dani and Torel rose, and in concert with the congregation of millions, they slowly backed away from the cherubim, then dispersed to the corners of an ever-expanding universe, one that seemed bigger after each encounter with the Lord of the cosmos.
“The cherubim are so powerful and so…beautiful,” Dani said, voice still trembling.
“Yet their power and beauty,” Torel said, “is but a faint reflection of the infinite power and beauty of Elyon. His is a beauty so great that to those with corrupt eyes it is a more hideous ugliness than the mind can imagine.”
“Hideous? Ugliness?” Dani said.
“Did you not feel the terror?”
“Yes, but—”
“Then you felt only a hint of what the inhabitants of hell feel about heaven, what the ungodly feel about God. The terror they feel is unmitigated by solace and reassurance. They feel the burning fire of his holiness without his hand-piercing love.”
“How horrible,” Dani said.
“Yes. And how unnecessary. For everything essential for their redemption has been done. The price has been paid. The blood has been shed. Only their stubbornness keeps them away. To the cleansed, beauty is beautiful. To the unclean, it is ugly beyond imagination.”