Читать книгу The Roar of an Uncaged Lion - Frederick Howard Jr. - Страница 11

I can remember clearly the moment I wanted to be a gangster: it was during a celebration for a young man from Oakdale who was gunned down. This young man was remembered with a celebration every year since his death. This was the first time I had ever seen anything like it. All the kids, young men and women gathered together in a spot where this man’s name had been spray-painted on the wall. They turned the music on in their cars and opened the doors so the sound would carry throughout the block. The older men barbecued and passed around big bottles of Hennessey and cans of beer, as everyone told stories of the young man’s life. For a corrupt kid who always felt as if he had something to prove, that scene excited me. As I took in the scene, I thought to myself, This is how I can live forever. Not soon after the party, Demetri, Conrad, and I started to hang on the upper part of the block. Once we started to hang outside, we met other boys and girls who were on the block but not part of the block.

We banded together and formed our own gang, which we called the Nine-Deep. It consisted of a bunch of ragtag youths who had none or very limited parental guidance. We called ourselves Nine Deep mainly because there were nine of us who started the gang—Conrad, Demetri, Chucky-B, the twins, my best friend Linin, David, Larry, and me the leader—though we added a kid we called Jala a few months later. I became the leader because there was no one around who could beat me. The Nine as we called ourselves wasn’t from Oakdale: we just lived on the block. We spent most our days going from one gym to another playing hoops. However, we did beat up any kid we found wearing a hat that repped his hood.

I remember during the summer of 1991, the Nine was ten deep and we were headed to the Nowally-Valley gym in the upper part of the Mission district in San Francisco. As we walked, Conrad and David —the two youngest of the bunch—came to me, pointed out a boy my age, and said he had tried to beat them up at their school. My anger flared and before I knew it, we were surrounding the young man.

He asked, “What’s up?”

As I pointed to David and Conrad, I asked, “A, you know them?”

Smiling as if he was cool with them, he said, “Yeah.”

I asked, “You tried to beat on them?”

He said, “They jumped my little brother.”

I called both David and Conrad to me and barked at them, “Hit him!”

Both were scared because he was twice their size and four years older than them, but I was there and I wanted them to know he was flesh and that he could be hurt. At this time my corruption was spilling over onto the members of the Nine, and they were soaking it up like grass soaks up water during a hot summer day. As I turned to the boys, both looked as if I had told them to jump off the Golden Gate Bridge or something. So I looked straight at David and said, “Hit him.” David gave a halfhearted swing and connected, but I wasn’t satisfied so I barked, “Hit him again, and this time really hit him!” Once again David’s hit was as if he were hitting a child, so I swung and dropped him to his back. Then I looked at the boys and said, “That’s how you hit someone.” This lesson of corruption the boys would remember and live by, carrying their corruption to a height not even my feeble mind could have imagined. We were a tight bunch, but at age nineteen I felt there was nothing on Oakdale for me. With the same conviction I had when I left my mom’s house, I just walked away and never went back to my auntie’s house. Now I was really on the streets with nothing but my intellect and heart; but nevertheless I was in the game, and that was more than enough for me to make it.

My first task was to find a come up, so I found AJ and asked, “Can I get a come up?”

He responded with “No!”

I asked, “Why not? I don’t have a place to stay or food to eat. I need it.”

See, in the game all the older men are trying to find a way out and all the young men are trying to get in. AJ knew what I didn’t: he had seen the good, the bad, and the ugly about the streets and didn’t want to start me on my way to hell.

He pulled me to the side and said, “Go home!”

But I said, “If you don’t want to help that’s cool, but I’m not going home!”

I walked off mad, because I could not see into the distant future that AJ dreaded I would encounter. I got my come up money by snatching a purse. Never gave any thought if the woman was a mother whose money was for her rent or food for her kids. I had completely lost my conscience and my feelings were nonexistent, but it would get worse.

In the Tenderloin I made a name for myself; my corrupt morals were now manifesting themselves in my interactions with others, and the people were now recognizing me. In an environment where everyone has heart, mine shined. One day a friend and I were hanging in front of a store with three very pretty young ladies. Three men from Sunnydale (a section of San Francisco) named J.T., Kofi, and Joe parked their car, and also stood in front of the store. J.T., the oldest and leader of the men, said to one of the girls, “Can I get your number?”

She responded, “I got a man.”

I saw that the girl wasn’t interested in him, so as they roughhoused to get the girls’ attention, I slid in and got the phone number. As we talked, J.T. came up behind me and hit me on the back of the head. Not knowing what was happening I stumbled into the store, but when I turned around and saw that it was him who hit me, my rage grew. I grabbed a bottle on the counter but before I could throw it, J.T. said, “Throw it, but how you gon get out” so now it became a test of heart. I slammed the bottle back on the counter and said, “I’m gon walk out!”

I then walked straight for him and as I passed him, once more he hit me in the back of the head . Not knowing if they had gun or not, I ran around the corner and picked up my friend and went to go get my gun. It was a short four blocks to the hotel where the gun was stashed, but it felt more like ten miles. After picking up the gun we rushed backed to the store, and when we arrived they were still there. When I turned the corner and saw them, murder was on my mind. But before I could get close enough to shoot him, they turned around and saw me. As J.T. pointed towards the gun he asked, “What you gon do with that?” I barked back, “Nothing! You a man I’m a man—we gon fight! The gun is to make sure that no one jumps in.”

J.T. was what we called penitentiary built, at thirty-six years old standing 5’11” and weighing 210 lbs. He had been in the streets since a boy. I on the other hand was 5’9” 175 lbs. just coming out of boyhood, but like the young lion that challenges the old leader, I stood ready to attack. I let off the first five blows; these were usually my knockout punches, but as they landed he neither fell nor moved. The blows instantly caused blood to flow from his nose and mouth, but he just shook it off. Then he looked me right in my eyes and said, “I’m gon hurt you!” At that point all the madness I felt left me, and my safety was all I thought about. I didn’t run or back down, but I did make sure when I hit him I did it fast and got away even faster. I didn’t knock him out or down, but everyone there saw when it came to fighting I could handle myself. So my rep grew and before my twentieth birthday I had two workers, a woman who brought in ten thousand every other week, and a rep. My woman was my best friend: she kept me sane in a world built on insanity, she allowed me to love. Her name was Tunisia Mannings.

Tunisia was a bright young lady from the suburbs of Oakland, California. She was uncorrupted by the environment around us. Tunisia was a chubby dark-skinned young lady who was about eighteen years old, she was very pretty and self-willed. I watched Tunisia from afar and liked the way she handled herself. Nisi’s stepdad was like Jason of the Friday the Thirteenth movies; to the Tenderloin, his name was Tim. Tim was 5’10” and weighed 200 lbs. He wore his hair long and uncombed. He had a scar in the middle of his forehead, which when he smoked weed made him look like a red-eyed demon. He robbed, beat, and shot anyone who challenged him, so he was someone nobody messed with. No one could talk to Nisi unless he approved and he approved no one. One day while Tim was gone, Nisi got jacked by the police (stopped and searched) and had to eat a fifty-rock of dope. She was scared and none of her people were around, so I stepped up and took her with me.

We ended up in a Taco Bell on Market Street and after I calmed her nerves, we talked. In the space of about six hours we opened up our hearts to each other, telling of things that neither one of us had ever told anyone. When we walked into that Taco Bell we were strangers, but when we left we were connected by our souls. When Tim found us he told her, “Go get in the car,” and as she ran off, he just turned my way and frowned. But two weeks later we were together again and this time it was for good. Nisi and I hustled together every night for forty-five days. We slept in the same bed but never touched each other.

One day she asked me, “Fred, my grandparents used to tell me about something they called a courtship—is that what we are doing?”

I said, “No, we’re just taking our time.” The truth was I was cautious—because of Tim.

On the forty-sixth day, Nisi said, “Fred, we doing it tonight!”

I said, “What!”

She responded, “You heard me!”

So that night we got the E&J brandy and had planned to get the weed, but forgot. When we remembered we didn’t have the weed, I said, “Baby, I’ll be right back. Get ready.” I went to jail that night and didn’t see her again for three months. Jail did me good, because I now knew I could do it. Also while locked up I got physically bigger, which helped me in the streets.

At twenty-two I was a terror, standing 5’9” and tipping the scales at a whopping 185 lbs. I felt unstoppable. I returned to Oakdale with money, respect, and a rep. The young men welcomed me back. The name Freddy-Gz was given to me by a girl, and it stuck. In my opinion this name aided in my downfall, because it became known throughout the city. At that time I no longer sold drugs, but I started to rob drug dealers and dice games—which in itself is crazy, but the seeds of corruption were now in full bloom. But in the garden of my life, among the thorns, thistles, and weeds of my character were the most beautiful flowers. These flowers were the women that I surrounded myself with, which during that time were numerous.

The most influential flower in my life during that time was Dawn. Dawn was a beautiful, loving, compassionate, and generous slender white girl from my past. During my high school years she was one of Hen’s girls, but I always liked her.

One day I got a call from Hen’s mother.

“Hello, Fred, it’s Alana. Henry is in jail and I was wondering if you will go with Dawn to see him and put money on his books?”

I said, “Yeah, just give her my number and tell her to call me.”

My first thoughts were of Hen, because what his mother didn’t know was I already knew where he was. I was with him when he got caught—I just got away. When I met up with Dawn I didn’t expect to hook up with her, but as I looked into her innocent face I succumbed to my lust.

It took some time to win Dawn over but I was up for the challenge, and in the summer of ‘96 we consummated our relationship. For me it was nothing special just sex, but for her it became so much more. After Dawn and I had sex I forgot all about her, until she called me four weeks later. I was at one of my other female friends’ house asleep, and when my phone rang the lady answered it. I was awakened to the sound of her saying, “Fred, it’s a woman on the phone saying she’s pregnant and it’s yours.”

I rolled over and said, “Give me my phone,” I placed the phone to my face and said, “Hello.”

It was Dawn, I listened as she shouted at me, “Fred, I’m pregnant!”

I calmly responded back,” Who’s the father?”

Dawn got real quiet and then said, “Fred, it’s yours.”

I said, “Stop playing with me!” I then hung up the phone, threw it on the chair, and tried to go back to sleep.

But the young lady I was with at the time wouldn’t let me. She said, “Until you go see if that’s your baby, I’m not messing with you.” I got up and left, but all day I was haunted by the thought that it may be true—I didn’t use protection that night. Early the next morning I was on my way to Dawn’s house. Dawn and I started a relationship and I moved in with her. My extracurricular activities didn’t change: I continued doing drugs and sleeping with every woman I could manipulate into bed. Dawn was sensitive and very loving, but her loyalty and devotion was wasted on me. I wasn’t into love, nor did I feel for others. My only concern at that time was only to benefit myself, so to me Dawn was a tool to be used. Dawn tried her best to keep her family together for the first few months, but by her eighth month she was telling me the only reason she was still with me was because of the emotions that came with the pregnancy. I took that to mean once the baby came, she would be gone. We patiently waited for her to go into labor for our own reasons. Both of us wanted me to be there at the birth of our child, but our hopes would be dashed by my stupidity. Five months into Dawn’s pregnancy, another woman I was having sex with told me I was the father of her unborn child. Her name was Debra, and although she wasn’t my main chick at the time, she would become my wife in the near future.

For the entire time during both of these pregnancies, my habits and my actions were unchanged. When one accepts the corruption, he or she accepts all that comes with it and in my case that meant doing drugs. There had always been drugs around me, but I had never partaken of them. Watching how the drugs took control of my parents and the misery it caused me and Tia made me hate them, but by this time all those memories were gone and I chose to taste the forbidden fruit of cocaine. I was snorting cocaine, smoking weed, drinking alcohol, robbing drug dealers and dice games every night. Cocaine made me feel as if I were invincible. It gave me that edge that propelled me to even more daring crimes.

During 1996 I started to hang out and commit robberies with an older man from Oakdale named Jonathan. Jonathan was a stocky dark-skinned black man who stood about 5’5” and who never had a problem putting in work. He loved the fact that he had a youngster who never minded holding the pistol and was willing to rob anyone at the drop of a hat. We spent money all day and went to the strip clubs at night. By 2:30 AM we would be looking to make our money back out of the pockets of the drug dealers of Tenderloin. One night after we left the strip club drunk and headed for the Tenderloin, we came upon two police officers sitting in their car. Being the arrogant and disrespectful child that I was, I pulled up on the side of them and asked sarcastically, “A yawl gon be in that parking space for long?”

The cop driving gave me a stern face and said, “Get the hell out of here.”

Driving off we laughed as I said, “Fuck um.” Little did I know I would be at the mercy of those same cops just a few minutes later. We drove around the block and spotted some young men and women hanging out by a car. We immediately parked, loaded the gun, and got out. As we walked up on the crowd I spotted a girl I knew, so I said, “What’s up, pretty girl?”

She smiled and said, “Nothing; what’s up wit you? You wit me tonight?”

I said, “A come walk with me.” As we walked I asked, “Pretty girl, how well do you know those other guys?”

She said, “I really don’t know them, they just stopped us so we could smoke with them.”

I then asked, “Have they been making sales?

She responded with, “Hell, yeah, they ain’t stop. It’s juking out here” (meaning that money was coming through fast).

Before we could pull out the gun, the cops showed up and told everyone to get against the wall. John motioned to me to run because I had the gun, but I stayed. As the police started to frisk me I turned and let off two blows that drop the cop to the ground, and then I ran off. As I jumped a fence that led to a park, the cop opened fire. It was only by the grace of God that I didn’t get hit that night—due to the fact that before the shots rang out, I accidently fell on my face as the bullets flew over my head. Since I was drunk and had been smoking weed and cigars, I had no wind and could not run another step. I hid the gun and ran to the back of the park and fell out. I was caught that night and although I was guilty they could not find the gun, so I was only charged with assault on a peace officer and evading capture. Two months later I was released on bail. Even though I had escaped with my life, my corruption would constantly keep me in situations that would endanger it.