T H E STO R E FICTION
Jo ann e S k e r re t t
ou are here to make bank. That’s what he said. We gotta make bank. So you pull your braids back into a ponytail, pull your hoodie over your head, and try to get your mind right. “They got cameras everywhere these days.” He didn’t need to tell you that; you are ready for this. You are here because you, too, believe that some ice on a chain, new J’s, new drip, might set things right in your world in some magical way, might even give you a glimpse of the person you were a year ago. You hop off the bus after him and wonder how Georgetown and Congress Heights can exist in the same city, on the same day, at the same time. In your neighborhood, the streets are quiet, empty, gaping with fear; good people have no business lingering outside. But here, rich people are moving in a slow, carefree, Saturday kind of way, wandering in and out of stores, drinking coffee, staring into restaurant menus with very serious looks on their faces. “There’s one right there, on that building.” You point at the camera above The Sandwich Shoppe where dozens of people are lined up outside, as if a sandwich could be that great. “Keep your head down.” He adjusts his cap. “The camera’s real good these days.” You already know that from your foster mother’s posts on the neighborhood watch Twitter. She’s been calling the councilman three days now to replace the cameras by the bus stop after the Kings shot it out. She still calls the cops when the Kings start shooting in the alley and laughing, like it’s BB guns they’re playing with, like it’s not real life. They wake her up every night; she complains to the cops. “I pay my taxes, dammit! I deserve a good night’s sleep!” You sometimes wonder how you’ve come to know all these things in just one year, like how a 9mm bursts through the night in staccato pops and how a Draco AK47 obliterates all silence, leaving a thunderous echo in your
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