a hand shaking violently with an overdose of adrenalin and a blood pressure that must have been in the one eighties. A bullet smashed through the driver’s side window and whistled past my nose. Scratch stood in the doorway aiming that big shiny .45 at my head. He looked normal again and he looked pissed. I ducked down and finally managed to fit the key into the ignition. More bullets whistled by over head as I started the engine and raced away from the withered crack-house with the raging white demon slumped in the doorway, his chest stained crimson, firing carelessly into the night.
««—»»
A deluge of gunfire thundered down upon the tank-like ’72 Impala as it rocked and swerved up G-town Avenue at heart-stopping speeds. It kicked up trash and garbage as it barreled through the somber deserted streets pursued by the gold-encrusted red Beemer. The entire time I couldn’t help but to doubt my sanity.
But then darker questions, more terrifying questions invaded my head making me want to cry out in terror.
I tried to shut those thoughts out. What I thought I saw couldn’t have been real. It couldn’t have.
A cascade of glass rained down upon my head as bullets ripped through the Impala like a stinging swarm of angry bees. I ducked, closed my eyes, and moaned like a bitch. I was scared to death, confused, and lost without that cocky, ignorant, madness that usually protected me from fear and doubt. It had been a long time since I had run from anything outside myself and I didn’t like it. It was funny, just hours ago I would have never doubted that I could take Scratch out with ease, yet here I was fleeing for my life as he chased my black ass all over creation. Under normal circumstances I would have just turned and capped this punk. But these were not normal circumstances. There was no way I could have missed Scratch at that range, even in the dark, yet there he was ten seconds off my ass. And then there was that bizarre transformation. It might have just been the shadows. It was pretty dark down there.
Still, running from a battle just wasn’t my thing. I hated the idea of catching a bullet in my back when there was at least the opportunity to die like a man and maybe take him out with me, but I couldn’t risk getting the child killed too.
The tired, old car gasped and wheezed and seemed to cry out in pain—leaking fluids and spraying steam and noxious blue smoke from burning oil. The tires screeched in protest as I forced it into turns that would have taxed vehicles half its years. I was a terrible driver and for the umpteenth time it occurred to me how senseless it would be to avoid Scratch only to kill us both by crashing into a pole.
Burning rubber mixed with the smell of sulfur and oil, the sound of shattering glass, the whine of bullets, and the screams of tortured metal. Yet, the baby lay passively in the passenger seat as if he didn’t have a care in the world. He was staring at me soothingly. A loving, trusting smile played across his face. Even amid the roaring chaos my heart began to lighten. If he lived he’d make one hell of a pimp or a con-man someday. He was playing me like Nintendo. His soft vulnerable-looking, brown skin and carelessly nappy hair alone made me want to protect him or die trying. Looking at him gave me the courage to keep my mind from shutting down and giving in to the desire to curl up on the front seat and just wait for the fatal bullet that would void my brain from my skull onto the dashboard. If any nigga on earth deserved such a fate it was damn sure me. I wondered if this little baby would forgive sins as profound as mine? If he truly knew what I was— a killer without a conscience being pursued to the death by another.
I decided to try to buy us some time by emptying a few rounds into Scratch’s BMW to see if I could slow his ass down. My blood was jackhammering through my veins so hard and fast I could feel it pounding in my ears. My mind felt like it was wading through thick mud and fog. Everything I did seemed a few seconds off. Aiming was a joke. I would’ve been lucky to hit the car at all let alone to hit Scratch.
I held the nine-millimeter Beretta in my lap trying to cock it with my right hand while steering with my left as the accelerator slowly crept toward ninety and traffic grew denser.
That thought chilled me to the bone. Certainly Scratch didn’t owe his entire success to me. He was well on his way to becoming a serious ghetto star before I even met him. But I had helped. I had helped a lot.
Maybe I was supposed to pay for my sins by getting my cap peeled in a moving car and dying with the Baby Christ in my arms
“Oww! Shit!”
A bullet ripped through my ear and seared a small furrow alognisde my head, inches from my temple. That familiar berserker rage, which had served me in so many street fights, descended on me like a black cloud blotting out fear and reason.
“Oh, you have got ta die now. I don’t give a fuck what you are. You’ve got to die.”
I switched the gun to my left hand and swung it over my right shoulder, aiming with help from my rearview mirror. I could see Scratch’s face through my shattered rear windshield. I slowed down to let the BMW get closer as I pointed my gun right into the face of the devil. White flame leapt into his eyes and his pasty face split wide with a gold-toothed grin. Calmly he raised the big shiny Colt .45 and pointed it at me. At this range he couldn’t miss and he was aiming much better than I was. The back of my head and center of my forehead started to itch and I knew that the bullet would enter and exit there if I allowed him to pull that trigger. I squeezed the trigger frantically and the obnoxious red Beemer swerved into a parked car, going up on two wheels and nearly flipping end over end. When it came to rest I could have sworn I saw something scamper out of the car on four long gnarled legs…something with wings and claws and eyes that burned like stars. It staggered and collapsed in the street and I turned my attention back to the road just as I ran a red light and barreled through the intersection of Germantown and Chelten Avenues.
Twin headlights bore down on me as I hit the accelerator, leaving the wreckage of Scratch’s vehicle behind. I barely managed to maintain control of the car which was now doing over 90 miles per hour when my rear bumper was demolished by an old Chevy Nova heading down Chelten Ave. My bumper dragged on the asphalt shooting up sparks as I continued up the street with my foot firmly planted on the gas. I kept the speedometer at 90 until I hit Tulpehocken Street, then I slowed it down to 35. Now that I had escaped Scratch I couldn’t risk getting jacked by the police for speeding and having them discover a smoking gun in my car. In jail I would be a sitting duck and the child would be left unprotected. I made a right onto McCallum street and flew across Washington Lane. I came to a rest in front of Huey’s house, scooped the child up in my arms and leapt from the car leaving it still running. There were so many bullets in the seats and dashboard that it seemed almost impossible that none of them had hit us.
The Impala belched out its last noxious breath and died as I staggered toward Huey’s front porch. The infant was still eerily calm. I crept up the crumbling concrete steps on legs that wobbled and shook from exhaustion as the adrenaline rush died off and I started to crash. I was staring into the child’s eyes again as if awaiting revelation. None came.
