Yns

2012

“I’m not from Delaware,” Verbena Gossimer announced. She had blonde hair and charcoal skin with natural green eyes.

“But you live here,” Meena Carlsbad responded. She looked short at five feet two inches but made up for it with her curves and chunky cheeks in her face.

“I’m from Philly,” Verbena replied.

“Okay…alright,” Meena rolled her eyes.

“What’s the move?” Verbena asked.

“We’re about to get touched with forty bricks,” Meena pointed out.

“In one drop?”

“In one drop,” Meena sounded clear and glum at the same time. She was glum because they had been promised sixty bricks but some of the package got damaged in transit and had to be tossed overboard.

“We’re going to ensure that this weight gets moved with the same precision as we do our dance routines,” Verbena backed up and snapped her fingers like a gypsy at a sold out show. A smile slashed across her face as she moved her hips and dipped.

Meena looked at the phone ringing. The ringtone blasted “Nobody” by Keith Sweat. Her boyfriend appeared on the iPhone screen. Gent Bovers had light features and three-hundred-sixty degree waves.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“Y’all do the things.”

“Not yet.”

“Alright.”

“What’s happening tonight, though? I heard they had a bump over on East Side.”

“Yeah….”

“I’ll go back to this work though.”

“Alright. One.”

She ended the call.

“When you gonna get a man?” Meena asked with more curiosity than contempt.

“Excuse me?” Verbena drawled.

“You heard what I said.”

“I mess with Yarborough Simms. He’s on the golf team. He’s going to be bigger than Tiger.”

“Okay,” Meena. She switched up the conversation completely. “I heard they have monsters that will snatch your work if your game isn’t tight,” Meena observed.

“I don’t deny it. I’ve seen it happen. Big orange and green ones. They terrorize any of us hustlers. They don’t do it for a righteous cause, only to disrupt business. It’s out of sheer wrath,” Verbena attested.

“That drop’s supposed to get here. We’re going to look into being next level after this. No longer runners, we’re going to be part of the upper echelon,” Meena beamed with enthusiasm.

An all-black 750 BMW with green BBS rims rolled up. It looked all blacked-out and shimmered under the street lamps that just came on around the block. The trunk opened automatically. Meena and Verbena crossed the street. They looked at the packages and frowned. Meena rolled up to the driver’s seat and banged on the window.

“Hey! Hey! We’re supposed to get more than this!” The trunk closed automatically but Verbena almost lost her arm fetching at least two bricks.

The Beamer sped off into the twilight like a shot of adrenaline through the system. Verbena knocked back on her behind. The street didn’t yield and she almost broke her coccyx. She remained fine, however. Her hands broke her fall.

“Two bricks?! Two?! We can just let the monsters take these. That’s all we can do with this,” Meena stated, helping Verbena to her feet.

“No, it’s not. We can make it stretch. She pulled up a photo of a box of Arm and Hammer baking soda.

“Now, I know you're tripping,” Meena retorted.

“No. We can make the work stretch, buy smaller baggies and make sure whoever is copping is going to become a customer who can deal with diminishing returns.”

“I know that’s right with the vocabulary from business school,” Meena observed.

“You’re the nurse. You know how to patch things up so in case the smokers test us, we can always have medical aid and never have to report to the emergency room. You still have those supplies?”

“Yes, they were giving them away,” Meena explained.

“Alright, now….we can take this inside and….” They heard rustling in the trees. They saw the green mass of arbor twisting and churning but little breeze had shown up. “Let’s get in here. They never go into homes. Just outside.” The two women rushed into the house and headed straight to the kitchen. They unwrapped the packages and turned up their faces. It was as if they had just smelled an elephant’s elimination.

“Goddamn!” Meena brought her arm up to her nose.

“This is all molded!” Verbena screeched.

Upon closer inspection, Meena saw some flakiness meaning what good parts had remained kept its high quality. “It’s alright, it’s alright. I mean we’re going to have to stretch even more but that’s what it’s going to take,” she spoke.

“Jesus that smell. Get some of that air freshener from the bathroom, please,” Verbena suggested. After Meena retrieved the spray, she cast the fine mist in the kitchen. As the droplets caught the odor in the air and on surfaces, Verbena grabbed surgical masks and gloves and small baggies.

“You still want to cook?” Verbena asked, a tension like a tight rope walker crossing an expanse crept into her voice.

“I do,” Meena answered with her chin slightly canted upward.

The gold pots, the spoon, the water, the ice trays, the rubber bands and the Pyrex cookware all added to the portrait of the two women whipping up work. After about fifteen minutes, the operation ran smoothly. Though they had been forced to chop off pieces of the brick due to spoilage, they kept laboring over this task, now instead of the $30,000 they would have reaped, they would earn about $12,000. Meena turned the fan on over the stove to let it ventilate. The two of them sat at the chairs in their house they rented.

The place looked regular from the outside but featured magnificent carpeting, Vermeer and Jacob Lawrence portraits, and sculptures by Rodin. The space didn’t look home or cozy but arty and uncluttered. The two of them responded to their surroundings by just taking a break and looking at their accomplishments. As the fan whirred they both vaped.

“Yes, well we’ve got a problem,” Verbena mentioned. Her voice was as sober as a neurosurgeon.

“I know. We’re supposed to give twenty percent to Calgary,” Verbena reminded her partner. Calgary ruled as the Lord of the West Side. He’d been in the game for fourteen years and amassed close to two million dollars in the street.

“We can stretch it, I told you,” Meena described. “ Look…get up and take that one that just floated to the top, no! That one. Yes. put it on the paper towel and I’ll show you how to break this down. It's an excellent product. We just have to make it last. We should net maybe eight or nine thousand between us.” Meena used a Gemstar razor blade to slice the sections into small bits.

“Where did those monsters come from anyway?”

“Who knows. They’ve got scaly skin and bulbous heads and are jacked. They’re fast, too. If I see one, I’m turning them into mincemeat with Tina Turner here.” She showed her Desert Eagle pistol on her waist and tapped it twice.

“You’re going to need a rocket launcher with them, though. A flame thrower equipped with napalm wouldn’t help, either,” Verbena mentioned.

The women looked at each other for a long time and then returned to work.

As the white knots floated to the surface, they became enticed at the look of the ice.

y whiteness. The smell never overwhelmed as the fan kept spinning. Then it stopped.

“We don’t have time for that. We’ll fix it later,” Verbena addressed Meena.

“Roger.”

“It’s getting dark out and we’re going to have to cross over to South Bridge in order to sell again.”

“Not on East Side?” Verbena asked.

“No, the party is over there and the cops will be on the prowl,” Meena explained.

“Okay, so let’s bag up all the work and hit the streets,” Verbena suggested.

“Wait! Before we go,” Meena rushed out of the room and grabbed her Uzi.

“Janet Jackson doesn’t play either,” she winked.

“Alright, let’s get it!”

They piled into Meena’s 2007 burgundy Lexus with the gold trimming.

Aaliyah’s “One in a Million” came through the AUX cable to Verbena’s phone. She abided. “Text the boys,” Meena commanded. Within a few moments, like flowers sprouting up through the concrete, about eight or nine YNs came out of the apartment complexes and houses, ready to generate funds.

As they passed over the boulevards, they felt a rush of excitement that came with the game. Then the two of them looked about their surroundings and looked at the dour conditions and lowness of the area. Some spots seemed bright, however. South Bridge looked like a skull with missing teeth but the remaining ones sparkled in the light.

Meen and Verbena hopped out of the Japanese luxury car. They posted up and signaled for their couriers to come and cop the product. They stuffed the baggies in their waists and covered their shirts in the evening heat of the late spring day. Then, they scattered like a bag of peanuts across the kitchen floor. Their gusto, their drive proved to be even more infectious than the both of them had anticipated.

“The role of the businesswoman is to always know her product. I think we have something here that’s going to definitely garner us huge rewards. That’s going to be our main source in trying to create something that’s meaningful,” Meena reflected. A courier came up to her with three hundred and eighty dollars. He turned around quickly, eager to make her even more money.

“You see, this is a week’s pay at most retailer stores and fast food restaurants. Did you see how much I made in that little bit of time for that bit of effort?”

Verbena looked at her and giggled. “I know, right? We could be slaving away at some big box. No, my eyes are set on becoming an entrepreneur in the pure sense. I want to not just own my own business, but have controlling interest over it. I want the billions.”

“I’ll be a nurse, but I’ll have something on the side. I may not make billions, but then again, I don’t want to make them. I want to practice medicine with the idea of helping myself. Everyone always says they ‘want to help others’ as a nurse. It’s not only phony, it's false. I selfishly want to aid. I don’t see it as a duty to bow and scrape bed pans. I want to be a nurse that can handle any situation and use my smarts to apply to whatever may happen to me.” More couriers with cash overflowing from their pockets run up to them as they posted on the car. They looked around and heard the muffled sound of music pumping down the block.

“Ooh, it’s that party, “Meena deduced. “We should get a few more dollars and then go over there and see what’s up.”

Bovers called Meena’s phone. “I’m here. Where are you?”

“We’re still doing our thing.”

“Alright. We’ll see you later, then,” Bovers mentioned.

The call ended.

“We’re going to do this the way of the––” Verbena started but the terror on her face looked like a shattered mirror or a crumpled up piece of paper or a car’s front end after a collision. Tears came to her eyes. She looked up and saw a giant with big green eyes and orange skin snatch up Meena. The monster snapped her in half and swallowed her like a wet lemon pepper flat.

Verbena reached for her waist. She withdrew her Desert Eagle and shot the monster in between the eyes. It lost its eagerness after that and fell flat to the street. After the gun shot, the people at the party ran out and the couriers started running off with the money. Verbena, tears streaking her face, jumped into the Lexus and started towards the Delaware Memorial Bridges. She made plans to get back to Philadelphia with just a few dollars to her name and the loss of her friend. She felt the sting.