Page 1 of B.D.E
Prologue
I wasfourteen when I had my first kill. It wasn’t planned; it was sloppy as hell … but it was necessary. After that night, something broke in me. And whatever was left behind never made it out of that alley.
My mother overdosed when I was nine. I found her slumped on the bathroom floor with a needle still in her arm. Her mouth was cracked open like she died mid-sentence, eyes wide open and her lips were blue. She didn’t give two fucks about me. She’d left me alone is this cruel world without as much as a farewell or kiss my ass. My father got locked up when I was five for armed robbery and murder. Nobody ever told me the full story, and it really didn’t matter. I didn’t know the nigga and never really care to either.
After that, I bounced through foster homes like a lost mutt. Most of them were shitty, with just a select few that were decent. I learned fast to keep my head low and my fists ready. I didn’t talk much and didn’t trust a soul. The last house I lived in had a man who wanted to use me as a punching bag just for breathing too loud. I broke his nose with a metal bat I found in the garage while he was drunk one night and ran before they could send meto juvie. I’d already heard stories about what happened in that place, so I be damn if I ended up there.
I’d been on the streets for two weeks by then, sleeping behind buildings, dumpster diving for food or stealing it out of the corner stores any time I caught the clerk looking the other way and the rest of the time I stayed to myself. I learned quick that being invisible was the safest way to live.
That night, I was walking near the back of the corner store, trying to figure out how to sneak in without being seen. It was cold as hell and the jacket I was wearing was raggedy and full of holes, but I’d found it in the dumpster, and it served its purpose for the most part. A tall, dark skin man stepped out from behind the dumpster. His beard was greasy looking, and he wore an oversized army jacket. The stench of piss hit me before he even spoke.
“Hey lil’ man,” he said with a smile missing half his teeth. “You hungry?” I stared at him, silently.
“Come on,” he said. “I got food back at my place and a warm bed too. In a cold night like this, you don’t gotta’ be out here freezing.”
My gut was screaming no, but my stomach was louder since I hadn’t eaten so much as a piece of bread in the last two days. My stomach was touching my fucking back and I wasn’t sure how much longer I could make it. I hadn’t heard anyone talk like they gave a fuck in months, So, even though I should’ve walked away, I followed him. We cut through an alley behind the row of boarded-up buildings. Everything in me was tense. The hair on my arms stood up, but I kept walking. He stopped near the back entrance of one of them and turned to me.
“It’s just right through here,” he said. I shrugged and kept walking. That’s when his hand shot up and grabbed my wrist.
“You know the deal. Ain’t’ shit in life free,” he muttered, tightening his grip.
I yanked back. “Let go!”
He shoved me against the brick wall, pressing his weight on me. His breath was sour as fuck, and his eyes were wild like he was high off something.
“Don’t nobody give a shit about you, boy… but I will. You just gotta’ be nice.”
He reached for his belt as my eyes scanned the area with panic until they landed on a broken bottle near my foot on the ground. I reached down fast and swung. The first hit tore across his cheek.
“AAARRGH! You little fucker, I’m gon’ teach you a lesson!” He said as he grabbed me, but I was far from done. I swung again; this time the neck of the bottle sank deep into his neck. Warm blood hit my face before he gurgled, then dropped soon after. I stood over him, breathing hard as my hands shook around the broken bottle. He twitched once, then went still.
I heard footsteps behind me and spun around thinking someone was coming to stop me, or finish what the man started, but it was someone else. An older, much taller guy, dressed in all black. He didn’t even flinch when he saw the body. He just looked at me like seeing a dead body on the ground didn’t surprise him.
“You do that?” he asked, nodding his head down at the body. I nodded slowly, dropping the broken bottle from my hand.
“Why?”
“He tried to take something from me,” I said, telling him the truth. He studied me for a second, then reached and pulled something from his coat pocket and tossed it to me and I caught it on reflex. It was a protein bar.
“You’ve got something in you,” he said. “It’s raw; untamed… but it’s there.” He turned to walk away then stopped. “You can keep surviving out here until the streets swallow you whole,young buck… or you can come with me and learn how to never be prey again.”
He didn’t mention his name. He didn’t even ask for mine, but for some reason, like it was instinct, I followed him. He walked up to an all-black Tahoe with window tint darker than midnight.
“Get in,” he said, opening the back door.
As soon as my butt hit the seat I let out a quiet sigh of relief. The car was warm, even the seat felt heated. I didn’t ask where we were going when he slid into the driver’s seat and pulled off and honestly, I didn’t even care. For some reason, I just felt safe. My body was still buzzing, running off fumes. The hunger I’d felt earlier had vanished, replaced with adrenaline and the image of that man’s face on repeat. After a while, I leaned back in the seat, letting the hum of the engine and the warmth of the ride settle my insides. I didn’t even realize I’d fallen asleep until he woke me up, nudging my shoulder.
“Come on,” he said. “We’re here.” I rubbed my eyes, trying to get my vision straight. Then I looked up and froze. This place looked like something straight outta’ of them entertainment magazines I use to jack from the corner store. It was at least three stories, had a tall iron gate and the driveway was wide enough to host a car show. Five whips were already lined up. There were lights glowing from the inside like it never ran out of power. The sight in front of me looked like a whole different world.
“This… this is your house?” I asked.
He didn’t respond, just walked up the steps like I was supposed to follow, so I did. He punched in a code and the front door unlocked with a soft click. The second I stepped inside, the smell of cigar smoke and money hit me. The air even felt heavy and rich. The floors were hardwood and so polished that I could see my reflection in them. The ceilings were tall and there werechandeliers hanging that I knew cost more than anything I’d ever touched.
We kept walking, his steps smooth like he owned the whole world. The hall stretched long and quiet until we passed a door and I caught the noise from the other side. It was a kid’s voice, laughing loud and some kind of shooting sound that I figured was from a video game. I paused mid-step, taking in the laugh and realizing that it was a sound that I hadn’t heard in a long time. I couldn’t even remember a time when I was happy enough to laugh. He looked over his shoulder, noticing my hesitation.
“That’s my son,” the man said. “Marcus, don’t worry about him though, you won’t be seeing much of him.”
I didn’t understand what he meant by that, but I shrugged it off, kept quiet and continued following him down the hall. For a second, I thought that maybe this was it. Maybe this was my fresh start, with decent people, a clean bed and a house that didn’t smell like piss and liquor. Maybe I’d get to be a regular kid for once. We reached another door at the end of the hallway. He opened the door to the room and gestured with his hand for me to go in. It was bare, only housing a bed and a dresser. There was a bathroom connected to it and a small walk-in closet. The walls were bare and white.
