G made me sit up at the bar all night long, and even though I knew Moonie had been ordered to watch me and dip on every conversation I had, I didn’t really care. I figured I’d already taken one ass-whipping, so hell, I could take two. I would tell Moonie I was going to the bathroom, then sneak off and go run my mouth with the women who cleaned the rooms in the back, even helping them wipe down the bathrooms and change the sheets in between hoes.
But Moonie was not to be fucked with. He was totally loyal to G, and if you wanted somebody killed he was definitely down for the job. He was slick as hell, too. I couldn’t figure out if he had a woman or any kids, or how he kept his eyes on all things at all times, but he had it down pat. Only the best soldiers made it on Moonie’s front line squad, and from the highest lieutenant to the lowest lookout standing on the corner or sitting on a project bench, nobody crossed Moonie and nobody got next to G.
The spring semester of school was just about over and even though I had managed to pass all my classes I was feeling low-down. Jimmy kept hollering about working at the Spot instead of going to college, G told me I couldn’t enroll in a single summer course unless I had the money to pay for it myself, and to top it all off I was barred from chilling with or even speaking to Dicey. That shit made me feel rebellious like a mother, so once or twice I’d sent messages to her through Cooter, but G had already gotten to her and Cooter came stuttering back and told me Dicey said she wasn’t allowed to talk to me no more.
I was so stressed and bored that for weeks all I did was masturbate. In the shower, in the backseat of Pacho’s whip, and once or twice I put my life on the line and did it laying in bed right next to G. I went through all my sex toys until they didn’t excite me no more. I walked around all day with the Ben Wa balls up in me and practiced clenching my pussy muscles until it was too tight for a tampon.
I couldn’t take the sameness of it all. Day in and day out, the same old thing. New York was hot as hell in the summertime but I didn’t get to enjoy any of it. I wanted to be in Central Park, or hanging out with Rita in Brooklyn, or just walking the streets of Harlem like I used to when I was a kid. Instead I was either cooped up in the apartment during the day or cooped up at the Spot all night. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that a hottie like me was heading straight for trouble, and when I crashed into it headfirst, the only person G had to blame was himself.
I’d been humping those stools for so long that I’d learned how the whole bar operation was run. Liquor was an expensive commodity in the Spot, coming in right behind the drugs and the hoes. By watching Moonie and Cooter I figured out the names of all the mixed drinks and how they was supposed to be shaken or stirred. I dipped on how the finances went down, too. G didn’t run no nickel-and-dime game. Playas put their cash on the line as soon as they walked through the door. A grand to step on the carpet, and another grand that went toward your drinks, lap dances, drugs, and any trim you might just want to buy with the room chips you could purchase at any time. If your balance dipped too low Moonie sent some huge thug like Ace or that fat greasy niggah Pluto over to escort you to the cashier in the back room where they’d lighten you up by another grand.
I couldn’t stand Pluto’s fat ass. Out of all the dealers who worked for G, from the young heads on the streets to the bouncers and security workers who Moonie kept in deep check, Pluto was the only one who stayed up in my shit all the time. Every time I turned around he was either licking his nasty tongue out at me or saying something under his breath. Pluto wanted to fuck me, plain and simple, and if he thought he could do it and get away with it, he’d snatch my ass in a back room and do me all night long.
I didn’t say anything to G about Pluto. I was gonna wait until just the right time to tell on his fat funky ass. The only person who knew about Pluto coming on to me was Cooter, and that’s because he busted Pluto getting drunk and talking loud shit to me at the bar one night.
“H-h-hey, my man,” Cooter had stuttered. “J-j-juicy is a l-l-l-lady. Be cool w-w-with that sh-sh-shit.”
Cooter made sure Pluto saw him glance up the bar at Moonie, and then stood there until fatso took the hint and moseyed his wide ass on. We both knew Cooter hadn’t scared Pluto off. It was that look he’d shot toward Moonie, and the threat of him getting involved that had done it for Pluto.
When he left, Cooter had winked at me and I smiled. I liked Cooter because he was so nice. Simple, but nice. He was real skinny and had some fucked-up skin, and sometimes he stuttered so bad it was hard to understand him, but he was totally down with Moonie, who trusted him to the max, so instead of trying him and playing him like a duck, most niggahs ordered their drinks and left him alone.
Tonight, the staff had been preparing for Ladies Night just like they did every Saturday when Moonie came out of G’s office and told everybody there was gonna be a change in the plan. G was more of a fanatic than Spike Lee when it came to the New York Knicks, and tonight, Moonie said he was closing down the Spot to host a private party for one of the players’ birthdays.
All the strippers and hoes were hyped. Basketball players and other professional athletes always seemed to drop the biggest bank. Maybe it was a manhood thing. Harlem wasn’t the place for no sherms, and since most athletes usually weren’t truly street hard or deep in the game, they spread their cheddar real thick like they had something to prove.
So Knicks, schmicks cause I wasn’t starstruck no more. By now I was used to seeing big names roll up in the Spot. All the rappers and recording artists who profiled in the hottest videos, the big-name actors who starred in the black movies, the pimps and playas who held down Brooklyn and the Bronx, they all rolled heavy in the Spot. I could see why the hoes were happy, but this was non-news for me. Didn’t make me no difference who came through the doors. I was still gonna be bored and uptight because nobody was coming to see me.
Needless to say, I was looking luscious that evening as I always did. Sometimes I thought it was such a big waste of energy for me to be getting all primped and perfumed and dressed in all those fine clothes just to sit up on a bar stool or walk laps around a warehouse-sized club all night. I was getting tired of the routine big time. All that cigarette smoke stinking up my hair, my dogs howling in those high-heeled shoes, and I won’t even go there about all the fucking I saw going on but couldn’t partake in. The sauna, the Jacuzzi, the steam room… sperm was flowing by the gallon in the Spot, but not a drop of it in my direction.
I was sitting at the bar when my trouble walked in. I’d seen him a billion times on television, but never before in person. He played on a team that rivaled the Knicks, but he was cool like that so they made him down in New York. Something about him jumped out at me, but I couldn’t figure out what it was. It wasn’t just that he was fine. I could tell that from the TV, and besides, plenty of fine men swung by the G-Spot. And he wasn’t all that tall for a basketball player neither; definitely under six feet, and even though he was damn near the best in the league everybody knew his ass had a problem with showing up for team practices. Maybe it was those cornrows he was rocking, or the way he walked up in the joint like his name was G and he owned it. I don’t know. All I could say was the brother put his almond-shaped eyes on mine and smiled, and I got so wet I was ready to jump down and mop up the bar stool.
He was wearing a white sweatshirt and on the front it read PHILLY. The back read FUCK NEW YORK. Moonie scoped it before old boy got up to the stage, and just by tilting his chin sent a message to three thick-necked bouncers to check him where he stood. He was laughing as he pulled the shirt over his head, and underneath it he had on a white wife-beater with muscles bulging everywhere.