“To the drive-in,” I said, but before I could stop the flow of words I knew I was wrong.
“No,” she snapped, “you know where you took me?
And, of course, she was right. Li’l G.C. and I had jacked a civilian for his car one night. A nice car, too, so I decided to take China out on a date in the stolen car. But then again, why waste a good G-ride? I’ll just pick up Stone and Spooney, I thought, and we’ll do a double date ride-by. Shit, why not? So China and I picked up Stone and Spooney, along with their gun—a huge double-barrel 12 gauge. We stopped at the ’hood store for drinks—Old English and Night Train, gangsta juice. As we made our way west toward the Sixties, a black-and-white patrol car got on our tail. Never one to comply with the law, I accelerated, and the chase was on. After ten blocks of high speed and a faulty turn, we crashed. Immediately I was out of the car and into the wind. I was the only one to get away. Stone, Spooney, and China went to juvenile hall.
“But—” I tried to say, but was cut off.
“But nothin’, ’cause before that you stood me up when we was s’posed to go to the Pomona Fair. ’Member that? You got some new type of gun or somethin’ and just left me behind. That was cold.”
She was right again. The homegirl Dee Dee, whose boyfriend was in the navy, had given me a flare gun that looked like an ordinary ink pen, but shot a single ball of fire that she said would burn right through somebody. Well, that sounded like my type of weapon. She had given it to me on her way to the fair, and what better place to test such a weapon than at a fair? So I went with her instead of China.
“Yeah, but—”
“Naw, baby, ’cause there’s no mo’—”
Then out of the night came a terror-stricken cry of “Sixties!!” followed by the rat-a-tat-tat of a rifle.
In an instant we both were belly down, looking at each other. She saw the anger in my eyes and said in a whisper, “Don’t go, let somebody else play hero, baby, don’t go.”
“I gotta go, I gotta go.”
“Fuck you!!” she screamed, but I was on my way. I heard her faint sobs as I mounted my bike and peddled off.
No one was hit, but the response would have been the same in any case. We mounted up and rode back with swiftness. After that, to beat the heat, I went to Compton to kick it with some homies from Santana Block.
A week later, word was out that the police were looking for me and Crazy De for robbery. Which robbery, I wondered? Shit, we had done so many robberies that I was at a loss to figure out which one we were wanted for. With the police out for us, I’d wake up early, get dressed, and be out of the house before 6:00 A.M., because that’s their usual raiding time. I’d gravitate around homies’ houses until their parents went to work, and then we’d kick it until the rest of the ’hood started stirring. Then I’d try to lose myself in the sameness of the community. I ran, ducked, and hid every time someone yelled “Rollers.” I became so engrossed in escaping capture that my military performance slumped a bit.
The most frightening thing about being hunted as a banger is that you never really know what it is they are hunting you for. The banger’s position is far from static, so one day you could be a robber and the next day you might be told to commit murder, only to be asked the following day to spray paint a wall. Controlled freedom— democratic centralism. The gang was all that.
De and I were both eventually captured and hauled off to jail. De was eighteen, so he went to the county jail. I was still sixteen, pushing seventeen, so I went to juvenile hall. At my first court appearance I was remanded to the custody of the sheriff’s department and sent back to the juvenile tank.
Upon arrival I quickly saw that things had changed. Bennose and Levi were gone. Both had been sent to Youth Authority. Taco was still there, and so were about fourteen other Grape Street Watts Crips, all tight allies of Eight Tray. The difference was that Tangle-Eye was parading around there like a stalwart member of the community, as if his drinking of urine and set jumping was all in some other life. Cyco Mike had somehow regained his position as lord of the fiefdom and all the other bangers were catering to him like a bunch of oppressed serfs. And to top it all off there was an N-hood living on Charlie row!
The N-hood was Lucky from One-Eleven. He had two homies downstairs on Able row. After greeting Taco and the others I immediately went about the task of procuring a weapon to stab Lucky with. I wanted to make a strong point that I was back and shit was gonna be dealt with swiftly and harshly. After I had secured some iron—a steel flat of metal sharpened to a double-edged point—I told Taco of my intent and my utter hatred for all N- hoods.
“You ain’t gotta stab cuz. If you say move, he’ll move. But really, cuz is awright,” Taco said.
“Fuck that,” I told Taco. “This will send out a message to the rest of them punks.”
The next morning I stepped to him and caught him asleep. I crept up, climbed on the stool and then the desk, raised my weapon like my fist was a hammer, and began my downward motion. His movement was swift and sharp. He rolled to one side of the bed and balled up. My downstroke pierced his blanket and mattress and finally stopped with a vibrating “pinggg!” on the steel bed frame.
“Monster Kody, wait!” Anyone who knows me calls me either Monster or Kody. Only enemies and strangers refer to me by my whole name.
“I’m gonna kill yo’ punk ass,” I said, making a mocking stab at him, enjoying the terror in his eyes. “You outta bounds, N-hood, this is Grape and Gangsta ’hood, fool.” I made another swing in his general direction.
“Cuz,” he pleaded, hands held high like I was telling him to stick ’em up, “I didn’t know. Taco said it was cool if I live up here. Ask him, Monster Kody, ask him.”
I stopped swinging but began breathing hard, looking around like a lunatic. I went into my madman routine.
“You got three minutes by Gangsta time to roll yo’ shit up, bitch! You here me?” I said, eyes bugged like a crack addict’s.
“Yeah, Monster Kody, I hear you.”
“MOVE THEN!!” I yelled, waking everybody up.
“What’s up?” somebody said from down the tier.
“EIGHT TRAY GANGSTAS!!” I yelled, and someone said, “Aw, shit, he’s at it again.”
Lucky moved down on Able row and I consolidated Charlie row, resuming control of the tank. I found out that Weeble Wobble had gone to the penitentiary after taking a twenty-five-to-life deal. In San Quentin, the United Blood Nation murdered him. Popa and Perry had received ninety-six and ninety-eight years, respectively, and were in Folsom state prison. Chicken Swoop had also been found guilty and sentenced to twenty-five years to life. Chico was given fifteen years to life, Moman was sentenced to twenty-five years to life, and Old Man was given fifteen years to life. A lot of new people were there, and a few of the old ones still remained.
De and I had been charged with a robbery that neither of us committed. The LAPD knew this, without a doubt. Apparently, a man had been robbed on Eighty-fourth and Western Avenue, his money and shoes taken, and he had picked De and me out of a mug book as the robbers. But we knew that it was a bogus charge. After putting out our feelers and finding out who had really robbed the man, we knew beyond a doubt that it was a setup. The actual robbers—two older homies—didn’t resemble us whatsoever. It was impossible for that man to have been robbed by the other two homies and then have turned around and picked De and I. But it just so happened that De and I were the two hardest working bangers in the culture, committing crime sprees alone and together—a neighborhood’s worst nightmare. So we surmised early on in the proceedings that all this was a game of get-us- off-the-street. Well, it worked. I received four years and De received five. Since I was a minor, I went to Youth Authority; De was sent to state prison.
While I was in the juvenile tank, my homeboy Eight Ball was murdered—blown up in a ride-by ambush. He died on IIIth Street and New Hampshire while riding Devil from 107 Hoover on the handlebars of a ten-speed. He had not been out of Youth Authority a month before being killed. Because of who he was with, and the neighborhood they were in when the ambush occurred, it was easy to ascertain where the shooters were from. No doubt they were Neighborhood Blocks—the Hoovers’ worst enemy. The next day I snuck into the dayroom and ambushed Crazy Eight from One-Eleven N-hood for Eight Ball’s death. I beat him bloody.
Not long after that I was transferred to Youth Authority, going first to the Southern Reception Center Clinic (SRCC) in Norwalk. The day after my arrival I was summoned to the officer of the day’s office. When I got there a big, dark New Afrikan man and a scrawny little American woman sat behind two huge desks, both cluttered with papers and books. The New Afrikan man eyed me suspiciously, while the American woman busied herself with
