Thicker Than Water

By Ato Williams

For many, in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, New York, armed robbery is a way of life. Tone, his younger brother Dee, and their close friend Trey trust each other with their lives as they take money from wherever and whomever they please.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Mar 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9780981708003

Book preview

CHAPTER

PROLOUGE

I heard the phone ringing. I knew I should answer, but I couldn’t move. It felt like I had a sack of bricks in my pocket and my head ached like someone had taken one out and hit me with it a few times. My girl, Njeri, lay between the phone and me. She didn’t move either. I vaguely remembered her screaming something at me earlier about never being home. My head was full of images from the night before: liquor, weed, and women, so it was hard to tell if the argument had taken place five minutes or five days ago. My eyelids were so heavy they felt like they were glued shut. I managed to pry an eye open and saw the clock on the nightstand beside the bed. It was 7:45am. It had been about a half an hour since Njeri and I had that one-sided argument. I was silly enough to try and sneak in the house like there was a chance she wouldn’t be waiting up for me.

The phone continued to ring. I rolled over and saw Njeri pretending to be asleep. She had that little wrinkle on her forehead that pops up whenever she’s annoyed, so I knew she was upset. Still, she was beautiful. I chuckled to myself at the thought of her so-called mean face. She could never look mean, no matter how hard she tried—and she really does try. Her high cheekbones, full lips and oval-shaped face give her a classic model-like beauty that nobody can deny. For the third time that week, I silently admitted that she deserved more quality time.

The phone was still ringing. I reached over Njeri and answered it, but didn’t say anything at first. I just listened. After a few seconds of silence, my little brother Derrick’s voice came over the line.

I know you ain’t sleeping, he said.

Dee, why are you calling here so early? I asked.

What the fuck do you mean why am I calling? Tone, stop playing games with me! It’s raining outside!

What? I couldn’t believe he woke me up to give me a weather report.

I said it’s raining! Wake the fuck up!

I was still half-asleep so it took a second for my brain to register what he was saying. It finally clicked, and I jumped up and ran to the window. Not only was it raining, it was pouring.

Where are you? I asked.

Church Avenue train station, he answered after taking a Deep breath.

What are you doing over there?

I was going to check this broad on Eighteenth Street, but it started raining so I called you.

Where’s your boy Jah at?

I called his house first. His mother said he never came home last night.

Fuck him, I said. Go to Trey’s house. I’ll call and tell him you’re on your way.

Dee didn’t bother responding; he just hung up. I dialed Trey’s number, and he surprised me by picking up on the first ring.

What‘s up? He answered, sounding wide-awake.

You up already? I asked.

Yeah son, me and Tiffany been beefing ever since I got home. Now she’s getting ready for work and she ain’t trying to let me get no sleep.

You ain’t alone son, Njeri is tight too, I chuckled. You see the rain?

Yeah, I was getting ready to call you. Shit popping or what?

Hell yeah shit popping! I announced. Dee is on his way over there to pick you up. We need a fourth man though.

What happened to Jah? Trey inquired.

Who knows? See if you can get one of them dudes off the block. All they gotta do is drive the car. When Dee gets there, y’all hurry the fuck up and get over here. I thought about it for a second then added, Don’t ring the bell, you might wake Njeri up. I’ll meet y’all downstairs."

I’m already up! She yelled.

I was so busy talking on the phone that she had sat up without me noticing.

And tell your man Trey you ain’t going nowhere this morning! She added.

I cupped my hand over my mouth and the receiver and whispered, Downstairs, hurry up.

Njeri watched me hang up and then rolled her eyes as I sat on the bed beside her and kissed her on the neck.

I’m not playing, Anthony, she said, pushing me off her. Today is my day off and you promised to stay home.

I threw my arms around her and held her close. Listen baby, I’m coming right back. You know we’ve been waiting for a rainy day for a while now.

So what! Why you always got to go? Why can’t they do it by themselves?

I frowned. You know I have to keep an eye on my little brother.

She got up and looked at me over her shoulder as she walked towards the bathroom. Don’t be surprised if I’m gone when you get back.

Where the hell are you going?

Out! She snapped.

I pushed past her and blocked the entrance to the bathroom. Don’t play with me, Ma! If I come home and you’re gone, then don’t bother coming back! I’ll send your shit to your mother’s house. You stay beefing, but you spend more money around here than I do. If I start staying home your little shopping sprees would be dead!

She sucked her teeth and flopped down on the bed. I was bullshitting about kicking her out, but she didn’t know it. We’d been together for what seemed like forever and I couldn’t imagine living without her. I just had to make a point. Her eyes told me she got the message so I moved out the doorway and let her into the bathroom. I listened to her get in the shower and gave her a few minutes to calm down before joining her. My tongue was in her mouth before she could soap up her washrag. The next thing she knew we were making love under the flowing water and she had completely forgotten she was ever upset.

I know you’re probably wondering why there‘s so much excitement over the rain. Let me explain. Although we prefer the title armed robbers, me, my brother, and my friend Trey are what they call stick up kids. Some people confuse us with thieves, but there’s a difference. Thieves sneak around in the dark and steal stuff. Where’s the honor in that? We stand up and take what we want, which gives the victim an opportunity to fight for what’s theirs if they want to. Nobody respects a thief. It’s a coward’s profession.

Anyway, some Dominicans owned a small grocery store on Myrtle Avenue in Downtown Brooklyn. The grocery business couldn’t have been that good because our Dominican friends were selling marijuana on the side. Yes, marijuana—weed—trees. Whatever you want to call it; they were moving plenty of it. The rule usually is: wherever there’s weed being sold, there’s money to be taken.

We watched the store for about a month and decided it would be a pretty easy hit. There was only one problem. It was located on an extremely busy street. On top of that, the front window was so big that people in the shops across the street could see directly inside. We agreed that we needed a rainy day to pull it off. A steady fall of rain would clear the streets and distort the view from across the street. Ever since we made that decision, the rain seemed like it would never come. Now it was finally here, and I wasn’t letting anything get in my way.

I left Njeri in the shower after giving her what she wanted and then got dressed needing a shower more than I did before I got in with her. Trey, Dee, and Trey’s man Ty were waiting for me downstairs in the car. I jumped in and they all started laughing.

What the fuck is so funny? I barked.

Trey leaned towards me and sniffed my clothes. He shook his head and asked, You just had to fuck her before you left, huh?

I smiled and told him, Shut up and drive.

They all laughed again as we pulled off.

Everything seemed perfect when we finally reached downtown. All the shops across the street were empty and the sidewalk was practically deserted, except for a few high school kids who didn’t look like they intended on going anywhere near a school that day. We lucked up and found a parking space right around the corner. We got out the car ready to go. I had a Tech-nine-millimeter assault rifle in a blue Nike duffel bag and my brother and Trey both had nine-millimeter handguns in the waistbands of their jeans. We told Ty to wait outside by the car and then headed towards the store. It may sound crazy but we didn’t have any type of plan. We’d robbed so many places together in the past that it became like second nature. We didn’t even consider the fact that we were still drunk and high from the night before, or how that could effect our judgment.

The inside of the store looked just as I’d remembered it. In fact, it was exactly the same. The weed was their best selling product so most of the stuff on the shelves was spoiled. I eyed a box of crackers and noticed the dusty fingerprint that I’d left during a visit a week earlier. I’d cracked a joke to my brother about the old stuff on the shelves and ran my finger across the box to emphasize my point. I realized my foolish error and used my shirtsleeve to remove the print. One of us came and checked on the spot at least once a week since we decided to rob it. That’s what I was doing when I left the print. As I said, things looked exactly the same. Until we noticed an important difference: the door leading behind the counter was closed. It had always been open before then, but for some strange reason things were different that morning. Still, I wasn’t going to let it discourage me. Trey was another story. He sucked his teeth and walked out the store. I gave Dee a confused look and we followed Trey outside. I didn’t say a word until we got back to the car.

What the fuck is wrong with you! I barked.

The door was closed, Trey answered.

So you walk out? They’re probably in there right now wondering what the hell is going on.

Derrick interrupted our little dispute. I know we not walking away from this one! He said.

Hell no, I replied. We been waiting for this one too long to just walk away.

Trey scratched his head and appeared to be in deep thought before saying, Okay. Dee, you hold down the front. Me and Tone are gonna make them open the door.

Everybody agreed and we went back in. The two guys behind the counter studied us with confused looks. It didn’t take long for them to figure out what was going on because Trey had quickly pulled out his gun and pointed it at them through the small opening in the bulletproof glass that they’d put up around the counter for protection.

Open the fucking door, Trey demanded.

No ingles, no ingles, The two guys replied.

Trey reached through the hole and grabbed one of them with his free hand while the other guy watched in amazement. Open the door or I’ll kill you, he demanded.

No ingles, no ingles, The guy kept saying.

It was obvious we were getting nowhere, so I reached into my bag and pulled out the Tech. The quiet guy suddenly sprang to life.

Machine gun! Machine gun, he yelled and ran to open the door.

Our instincts kicked in after we got behind the counter. I put the two guys down on the floor and used Duct-tape to cover their mouths and secure their arms and legs. When that was done, Trey started the search for drugs and money.

There’s a crowd forming out here, Dee yelled from up front.

What are you talking about? I asked.

People are lining up waiting to get in. Mostly high school kids. What do you want me to do?

I looked at Trey and shrugged my shoulders.

Trey smirked and said, Drag them in the back.

We pulled the two men out of sight and then Trey called up front to Dee and told him to let in a few people at a time. He had found a box of ten-dollar bags up under the counter and served the customers while I interrogated the two workers.

I kneeled in front of our two bound and gagged captives and politely asked where the money was. They both gave me stupid looks like they didn’t have any idea what I was talking about. I pulled an orange box cutter from my pocket and pushed the blade up. The guy who had opened the door started to tremble, so I approached the other one. That’s something I learned at an early age; fuck the tough guy up and the scared one will do whatever you ask. I asked one last time where the money was, but received no answer. So, I slowly pressed the blade into the center of the tough guy’s forehead and guided it around his eye and down the side of his face. The tape prevented him from screaming. He just moaned and shook violently as his blood dripped to the floor. I turned back to the other guy and nodded. Fear covered his face. It looked like his eyes were going to pop out of his head. He motioned towards a large box up on a shelf. I grabbed the box and smiled when I opened it and found several pounds of weed and a bag full of money stashed under some bags of coffee. I headed back to the counter and saw Trey telling someone to come back in twenty minutes because we were all out. I just laughed and told him I’d found what we came for.

Good, he replied. Cause I done sold all of this shit.

We filled a box with Newports and calling cards because we knew they would sell easily on the street. There would always be smokers, and the cards were the new big thing at the time. I snatched the keys off a hook and locked the front door on the way out. We stopped at the car and put everything, including the guns, in the trunk. Ty drove to my house while the rest of us headed for the train station.

Separating ourselves from the money and guns was a precaution we always took. That way, the police wouldn’t get the money if we happened to get caught. We never fooled ourselves. Each of us knew that getting caught was a possibility. We also knew that somewhere out there was one job that would pay enough to set us straight for life. Trust me when I say that the guns won’t go in the trunk if we find it. We’re not going down easy if it involves big money. We’ll put down anybody that tries to stand in our way. Cops and all. Besides, I made sure to take the trunk key off of the ring before giving them to Ty. I wasn’t really worried about him robbing us, ‘cause if he did, he knew he could never come back to the neighborhood. But just in case he was stupid, I wasn’t going to make it any easier for him by giving him the key.

We met up at my house an hour later to split everything up. Njeri blasted the television from the bedroom. I got her message and quickly got them out of the house. It was time to give my woman some much-needed attention.

CHAPTER ONE

Njeri and I go back a long way. Our parents have been very close friends since we were both toddlers. They spent a lot of time together, so Njeri and I became close at a young age. Close may be putting it lightly because they had us bathing together when we were barely old enough to walk.

I can still remember little things from our childhood. There was another little girl, whose name I can’t remember, who used to spend time with us. One time, the three of us were in Njeri’s bedroom with the door closed. We couldn’t have been any older than five or six. We were playing house. I was the only boy, so I was obviously the daddy. We used a wooden toy chest as our bed. Why, when there was a bed in the room, I don’t know. The way I remember it is that the other girl got on top of me, while Njeri watched from the other side of the room with wide eyes and a finger in her mouth. Njeri continues to insist that it was her on top, but that’s not how I remember it. Anyway, the toy chest couldn’t support our weight and it caved in. The wood made an extremely loud noise when it cracked, drawing the attention of our parents in the next room. We scrambled to our feet and they came running. I’m not exactly sure what we told them, but it must have been good because nobody got in trouble. That’s just one of the events I can remember. It makes me wonder; if we were experimenting with sex at such an early age, and we knew enough to lie to our parents about it, imagine what we may have done that I don’t remember.

I’m still not sure what happened between our parents, but Njeri and I lost contact between the ages of eight and eleven. One day my mother just stopped taking me to their house.

I started hanging around Trey when I was fifteen. We hustled together uptown in the projects. Neither one of us had ever lived in the projects, but we both had the typical I don’t give a fuck, I’m from Flatbush attitude. We spent two years going from small time workers to semi-large employers. I guess cats in the pj’s finally got tired of us and put some shit in the game. They set me up on the day after Mother’s Day in 1993. I got stabbed twice in the chest by a crackhead looking for a free hit. We were extremely popular among the girls in the projects by the time that happened. It turns out that a handful of girls went to school the next day and told their friends about the stabbing. One of those friends was Njeri. She asked her mother to find out if it was me. My mother confirmed it, and they tried to come see me in the hospital. Unfortunately, they couldn’t get in because I had too many visitors in my room that day.

I was unable to walk around on my own when I got out the hospital. As a result, I stayed with my grandmother for a little while. Njeri and I got reconnected over the phone. She attempted to come visit me there, but she’s from Uptown and couldn’t find the apartment building. I wasn’t too upset about her getting lost. I didn’t want her to see me all fucked up anyway.

It took me a few weeks to get myself back in tip-top shape. By then I was thirsty to see what she looked like. I hadn’t seen her since we were kids. She sounded as sweet as candy over the phone and I wanted a taste. We set up a date to meet at her place. Her little sister opened the door when I got to her house. I sat on the couch and waited, trying to figure out what I was going to do if she was ugly. I wasn’t fucking with no ugly bitch. I couldn’t believe my eyes when she finally came out of the room. She was sexy as hell.

I’ve always considered myself a good-looking motherfucka. I’m about six-feet four-inches tall, 215 pounds, with brown skin, a semi-muscular build, and big brown eyes that all the women seem to love. Even though I’m by no means a little dude, I’ve always liked little women. Njeri doesn’t fit that description. She’s a fucking amazon princess! Six-feet tall, golden brown complexion, thighs tight enough to crack a walnut, and an ass big enough to rest a drink on with 38 C cup tits! She had the nerve to have on heels that day, and she has this stink ass walk that makes you want to fuck her right where she stands.

We went to a park in her neighborhood to smoke a couple of blunts and reminisce about our childhood. Her memory was unbelievable. She remembered all types of stories about us that I didn’t. By the end of the night we were back at her house and she had those long ass legs wrapped around my back. The condom broke when I was about ten strokes into it, and that was the only one I had, so we didn’t get the chance to finish. It was probably for the best because her parents were asleep in the other room. That shit was getting good; we were bound to start making noise and wake them up. I left, but I was back at her house bright and early the next morning. Her parents were at work and her sister was at school. We must’ve used at least fifteen condoms that day, and we’ve been together ever since.

Njeri always got along with most of my friends. In fact, she gets along with all of them. All except Trey. He’s my closest friend besides her, which is the source of their ongoing beef. About six months into our relationship, Njeri and I had got an apartment together. We got into this big argument one morning about some shit that I can’t even remember. It must have seemed extremely important at the time, because she stormed out the house and disappeared for a few days. No one in her family would tell me where she was staying. They said they didn’t know where she was. I knew they were lying, and I also knew they never really liked me, so I cursed them all out before letting them know to never ask me for anything.

Trey spotted her on the third night at a house party around the way. I hadn’t told him about our fight, but he knew something was wrong because she was out of place in a party in Flatbush. Especially since I wasn’t there. Njeri didn’t really know anybody in my neighborhood back then, but there she was in the corner grinding with some kid. Trey couldn’t believe his eyes. He tried to convince her to go with him to my house, but she responded with yelling and screaming. The guy she was dancing with stuck his chest out and beefed about Njeri being with him. Trey politely showed the guy his gun, slapped Njeri in the face, and then dragged her to his car and brought her to my house. She expected me to be mad because he’d hit her. I listened to him explain the situation and was surprised that was all he had done. I thanked him for bringing her home and told him I’d see him later. She screamed and cursed at me all night for letting Trey hit her, and she never forgave Trey. I always thought it was funny because there’s no telling what would have happened if I’d have caught her like that.

The way I met Trey and Ty is kind of funny. I went to high school in Manhattan, and there were only a few guys from Brooklyn in the school. We stayed in some shit with the guys from Harlem. Even though we were a small group, we never backed down. Surprisingly, we came out on top more often than not, and that gained us a level of popularity that attracted the best looking girls in the school.

One of my boys was messing with this pretty chic named Sarah that Ty wanted to fuck with. I had seen Ty in school, and around the way a couple of times, but had never talked to him. He insisted on making it known that he had a serious interest in Sarah. They had the same first period class and he made it his business to sit next to her every morning. He spent the whole class pushing up on her. She told him that she had a man who wouldn’t appreciate the things he was saying to her. Ty told her that he knew who her man was and that he thought her man was pussy. He said she needed a real man like himself.

Needless to say, we decided to get at son as soon as she told us what he said. The day we went looking for him, he was nowhere to be found. We asked a few people, but nobody had seen him all morning. Somehow he got word that we were looking for him, and left school early.

There was a talent show at school the next day. My boys and I were supposed to perform in it. Ty was in the audience with his man Trey. They were waiting for the right time to pop off on us. Even though there were only two of them, they were confident that they could win. That’s the Flatbush attitude I was talking about.

During intermission, some chic that went to the school came backstage and accused one of my boys of stealing her hat. We were trying to figure out what really happened when her boyfriend, some dude that didn’t even go to the school, tried to grab the hat on some thug shit. As if on cue, we all proceeded to whip his ass. Security ran over and attempted to get the guy out the building. During all the commotion, Trey and Ty had headed backstage to handle their business. I’m not really sure what happened next, but somehow they got involved in our fight. The funny shit about it is that instead of fighting against us, they ended up helping us whip homeboy’s ass.

We all ended up getting kicked out of school for that stunt. Once it was all over, I discovered that Trey lived right around the corner from me, and Ty was only a few blocks away. Trey and I have been tight ever since. I don’t know why we clicked like we did. Ty and I have never really been close, but me and Trey started doing everything together after that incident. The whole neighborhood knows that we would die for each other if need be. In fact, Trey is the reason my little brother and I are so close. He’s also the reason I can drink more liquor than three average motherfuckas. Two things I am very grateful for.

My little brother, Derrick, came up in a rougher situation than most kids did. When he was ten years old, and I was fifteen, he did something the whole neighborhood will never forget. We never saw much of our father before then. My mother was his third wife, and he didn’t stop there. He had an unknown amount of ex-wives and kids across the country, so he stayed on the move. Pops was an attractive man. Tall, dark, and handsome, plus he had a lot of game with him. He was basically the type of man that always attracted the prettiest women in the room. His only flaw was his drinking problem. Actually the drinking wouldn’t have been so bad if he didn’t turn into Mike Tyson when he got drunk.

One night pops showed up at the house at about 7:30 in the evening. My mother opened the door and he stumbled inside. He could barely stand on his own; he used the wall to prop himself up. Then, in slurred words, he demanded that my mother let him sleep in the house for a few days. Of course she said no, and pops started roughing her up. Derrick was in the bedroom with my little sister, Alasia, who was only five at the time. My mother screamed for help and somehow Alasia slipped away from Dee, ran into the living room, and tried to hug my mother. Pops actually slapped my baby sister to the ground. He even laughed about it and then stumbled out the apartment after ensuring my mother that he would be back.

I wasn’t there but I’ve heard the story a million times. The way it goes is that my father got halfway down the block before Dee came downstairs behind him. Derrick walked up on him and tugged on his jacket. When pops turned around, Dee punched him in the balls. Pops bent over in pain for a minute, while Dee stood patiently waiting. After a while, pops stood straight up and slapped Dee like he was grown ass man. Derrick stumbled, but never fell. He reached under his shirt, pulled out a 38 revolver, and gave all six to our daddy.

My prints were later found on the gun. I had to admit to it being mine in order to avoid my mother being charged with the possession. They sentenced me to six months jail time and five years probation. Derrick had to stay in the custody of the state until he turned eighteen. One of the terms of my probation was that I could have no contact with Dee until he was an adult. No letters, no phone calls, no nothing. The judge said Dee was better off without me in his life, since it was my gun, and I was obviously a bad influence on him. Because of that, I never got the chance to know my brother as a man. I only knew the boy that went away to jail.

Derrick ended up doing an extra year for stabbing some little motherfucka while he was in the juvenile facility. By the time he got out I had already moved out of my mother’s house and in with Njeri. But I was there for him when he got home. I took him out shopping and got this freak bitch to give him some pussy. He told me how his boys kept him up on what was going on in the street. Someone had told him I was the man on the stick up tip. He wanted to get down with the team. He was right about me being the man, but he was dead wrong if he thought I was letting him get involved. I tried to explain to him that even though we’re brothers, I didn’t know him. I didn’t know how he would react in life-threatening situations, and that could get a lot of people killed. Besides, I told him, Mommy would kill me if I got you in any more trouble. And anyway, you just don’t come home after nine years and start sticking shit up! Relax yourself, get you a girl and lay up. We didn’t speak for a month after that conversation.

I was at my mother‘s house one day and she