This is for all the people who have witnessed the violence of gangs and have been harmed by them. This is especially for Bishop who last his cousin to a gang war, and his uncle (his cousin's dad) to a gang war on the day of her funereal. Please comment.
Untraditional Gangster
When you’re a gangster people expect certain things from you. Rule breaker –gangster. Dropout –gangster. Cheater –gangster. Inmate –gangster. But even though we’re rule breakers even we have our unspoken boundaries. Stick up for your homies, stick up for your gang, and if they ask you’d better help them.
I’m a gangster. An L.A. Crypt. Untraditional. I’m still in school and I get good grades. I have no record at the station; I’ve never been to Juvie. I don’t cheat and I try not to break the rules.
But when you’re a gangster sometimes you have no other choice.
Red is for Blood
I was walking down the street, my homies all around me. Christian was pissed and he had asked a select group of people to come with to blow off some steam. All of us were real good at keeping our mouths shut. We all knew someone was going to die. No one said a word.
“Look,” someone whispered. In front of us there was a girl with long blonde hair walking slowly towards my house. Everyone saw the red flag in her back pocket. I recognized her.
“No!” I whispered, “No! This can’t be happening! Christian don’t!” I got louder with every syllable I spoke but I was too late. Christian’s hand was in the air and the shots echoed through the neighborhood. Rachel, the girl, my best friend, dropped to the ground, red staining her white shirt.
I ran to her, my face soaked with tears and sweat. I knew I was too late but I couldn’t stop hoping. I rolled her over and pressed my hand to the wound trying to stop the bleeding. She was shot twice just above the heart and blood kept gushing out, pushed by her adrenaline filled heart.
“Stop. Stop bleeding Rae! I swear st-stop bleeding!” I was yelling and I turned to Christian his arm still raised, gun in hand, pointing at me. “You stupid! Why did you shoot her? What did she ever do to you?” I couldn’t stop shouting. I heard police sirens in the distance. I pulled my flag out of my pocket and Rachel’s too and used them as bandages. Christian and the rest of the gang just stood there, watching as I raced to stop the bleeding. I turned back to them both flags raised, dripping blood.
“Do you see? Red is for Blood! But we all bleed the same Blood or Crip.” I took out my pocketknife, slit my wrist and let my blood mix with Rachel’s. Right then in that simple action I knew how stupid the gang feud was.
“If you ever come back I’ll kill you.” Christian dropped the gun and ran.
When the ambulance pulled up I looked at my cut wrist and at the blood-soaked flags. Rachel was dead but you couldn’t tell which was red and which was blue.
Bullet Holes
Three months later I lived in an apartment on the other side of town. I wore two flags around my arms stained almost beyond recognition. One red, one blue. Every night I dreamed of Rachel and how I couldn’t save her. I remembered her at the hospital her condition worsening with every breath she took. Once, near the end, she had enough energy to talk.
“Stay alive. Keep fighting. So that no one else dies because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“I will Rae. I promise.” And then she died. Her grip loosened on my hand and her heart monitor flat-lined.
I woke screaming once. I threw on a jacket and walked out into the mid-September night. Rachel had died late June. The seasons change and time keeps on flowing even though it seemed it had stopped for me. I decided –no Rachel decided for me –I would stay in the city even with Christian out to get me. I was a gangster. the toughest kind there was. I’d stay and fight for Rachel because the bullet holes in her chest were put there by a boy steered wrong, because of the blood-stained flags on my arms, tattered to where you couldn’t tell what color they once were, because we all bleed the same.
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