Four Feet Tall and Rising Page 4

  Mama Myrt’s project, the Nickerson Gardens housing complex at 1590 East 114th Street in the Watts neighborhood, was now officially my home. Nickerson was and still is the largest public housing development west of the Mississippi, but it isn’t anything like the projects most people have in mind when they think about low-income housing. Most people imagine tall brick buildings with barred windows, like they have in New York. But Nickerson stretched over fifty-five acres and had over one thousand units in 150 or so two-story stucco buildings, designed to look like townhouses with flat roofs and wide overhangs. The townhouses were situated in long rows, instead of towers, to create the impression of a smaller neighborhood. The apartments had large windows and open floor plans. They were supposed to seem light and cheery.

  There was a community center in the middle of the complex, with curved streets radiating out from the center. That meant you could only see small sections of the project from any one point. Which meant you couldn’t always see danger coming. The project had its own gym and its own baseball and football fields, just like a prison. And just like prison, the Nickerson project apartments weren’t open to just anyone. It wasn’t easy to get in, but once you were in, you couldn’t get out.

  Nickerson was supposed to be a place where low-income families could have a decent standard of living. By the time I got there in the ’80s, the place functioned as a self-contained black ghetto. It was ground zero for the Watts riots and the birthplace of the Bounty Hunter Bloods.

  The Bounty Hunters had been around since the ’70s, when two guys, Gary Barker and Bobby Jack, started it up. The gang got so big, it broke into smaller gangs like the Lot Boys, Block Boys, Bell Haven, Ace Line, Deuce Line, Tray Line, Four Line, and Five Line. Our main rivals were the Grape Street Watts Crips in the Jordan Downs Housing Projects. We were pretty much at war with the Crips then, even though they had the upper hand since they controlled the largest black gang territory in Watts.

  Not everyone in the Bailey family was a Blood. There were some members working legit jobs, who had nothing to do with the gangs. There were some family members who were drug dealers, out there on their own with no gang affiliation at all. People assume that to be with a gang you had to sell drugs, but that wasn’t the case. Just ’cause someone was a gangbanger, it didn’t mean they were doing illegal stuff. There were gangbangers who had nothing to do with drugs. They had regular jobs. Guys worked for the city or the Parks Department. One of the guys worked for Starline Tours, driving tourists around to see celebrity houses.

  Being a Blood was a social affiliation. There was a parking lot where everyone would meet at six o’clock, after work, to hang out, have a beer, and just shoot the shit. Then they’d go home to their girlfriend or wife or baby mama or whatever. That’s how it was in our project. Some communities, you couldn’t sell shit if you weren’t in a gang. In the Mexican neighborhoods, you had to be a gangbanger to deal. But that wasn’t the politics of my ’hood. Not at that time.

  I was never officially “initiated” by the Bloods. It’s not like in the movies where the Cosa Nostra or Mafia makes some guy kill another guy. There were some gangs that required you to get the shit kicked out of you before you were even allowed to hang around them, but mostly, kids became Bloods by association, just ’cause they grew up in Nickerson. I became a Blood ’cause I was a Bailey. I was well respected ’cause I ran with guys that were important—O.G.’s, older guys who were original gangsters. ’cause I was accepted by the O.G.’s, the younger guys looked up to me and left me alone.

  In my gang, there was no one person in complete control. There was a troop of people that functioned like a commission. They’d determine where guys were allowed to sell or clear up any difference between people. Some of them I knew, some I didn’t. But in general, the ghetto gangs weren’t that organized. The more dirt you did, the higher your street cred and the higher you moved up the ladder. And of course, if you’d been to jail, you’d paid your dues, so you got respect.

  Most of the time, the O.G.’s left me behind when they went to do their dirt. “Shorty, you stay here.” I don’t know why they didn’t involve me more. Maybe I was too noticeable or they were just protective of me. Either way, they kept me out of trouble as much as they could. There were moments, though, when trouble just happened. We’d be at a party and somebody would step on somebody else’s foot and three seconds later, four or five people would be shot. I never got into a car with the intention to do a drive-by, but once you were in a car, stuff happened. I learned to protect myself. I carried guns. I used them for self-defense. But I couldn’t get behind senseless robbing and killing.

  There were divisions within the Bloods. I had to be very careful of where I walked. Two blocks this way, you could get killed; three blocks the other way, killed; one block the other way, killed. On the north side, you ended up in other Blood or Crip territories. The Bounty Hunter Bloods were the most territorial. No one could step in that area if they weren’t one of them. On the east side, the worst place you could walk was into Grape Street territory. On the south side, you couldn’t walk into Carver Park, and if you headed west, you had to deal with the Avalon Crips.

  It was on the borders, Imperial Highway or Compton or Central and 110th Street, that you had a chance of being shot. A trip to the liquor store was risky. One night, we went to get burgers on Compton at 110th. We were standing outside when these guys did a drive-by. The three people standing around me were shot and Mikey, standing right beside me, was killed. My height saved me. I was low enough to the ground not to get hit. Going to a funeral was a monthly, if not a weekly, event.

  With that said, it was always safer to be inside Nickerson than on the outskirts of it. Inside, no idiot could do a drive-by. But by eleventh grade, the Thornton family and the Hawkins family were in the middle of a huge war over drugs and money and there was shooting in the streets constantly. Neighbors stayed inside their apartments more, watching from their windows as people chased other people with rifles and guns. I saw lots of people get shot. A body would lay in the street for nine or ten hours before the police would ever show up. They had to wait until they could gather six or seven patrol cars to come in as a force. It wasn’t safe for a single police car to roll through.

  It didn’t take long to become numb to so much violence. That year was like watching a violent movie. I felt so distanced from what was going on, like an observer and not a flesh-and-blood person, right there in the moment. But losing Mikey was hard. It was a grim reminder that having close friends was a bad idea. Caring about people just caused pain.

  Like loving Nonnie. Mom and Dad had put Nonnie in a nursing home and it was killing me to know she was stuck in that place. Yes, her body was deteriorating and she wasn’t doing well, but I was fucking pissed that they’d left her to die, alone. I yelled at Mom, “She’s your mother. You’ve got rooms! Put her in the house with you!” but Dad had made up his mind. Nonnie would rot away by herself. She was my favorite person. She didn’t deserve to live like that. His actions strengthened my resolve to stay away forever. They also made it clear: if I was gonna invest in loving someone or something, it had better be a dog.

  That’s when I adopted my first pit bull. I named him Coco. Yes, the same name as Mom’s Doberman. Mom’s Coco was with them in Texas. I wanted my own dog in Los Angeles. Coco, the pit bull, was chocolate brown, too, but a male, about six months old when I got him. I took a lot of crap for naming a boy dog Coco, but I didn’t care. Coco was my right-hand man. Me and Coco were the shit going through the neighborhood. We were inseparable.

  The first time I saw a dogfight was in the projects. I couldn’t understand why they’d train their dogs to be mean, to be evil. I saw guys put gunpowder in their food. It did something to them and messed with their mind. They’d let them go at it and just rip each other apart until the weakest dog died. It happened on the sidewalks, in the streets. There were so many dogfights, I lost track. No one called the police. Dogfighting was just part of the cul
ture. It wasn’t hidden away. It wasn’t taboo. It was out in the streets, where money changed hands.

  Though they fought other breeds of dogs, the majority of the dogs used were pit bulls. They were matched against other pits of similar size and weight and conditioning. Most dog handlers thought it was “unfair” to fight a sick dog against a strong dog, although I thought it was unfair to fight them at all.

  Two handlers or owners would bring their dogs into the ring or the pit or whatever area they were using. Some guy would act as a referee. If a dog was hard to handle, or bit his handler, they’d just kill it. The dogs were trained to be loyal and subservient to their owners, but to be dog-aggressive, to kill other animals. It was kill or be killed, so I didn’t blame the dogs. They were just doing the job they’d been taught.

  The owners would wait on opposite sides of the pit until the referee said, “Release your dogs.” Then the fight started. The dogs would be pulled off each other during the match, returned to their “corners,” and then released again. Just like human boxing. Fights lasted anywhere from a few minutes to over two hours. I refused to stay and watch. I couldn’t stand to see those dogs with broken legs, or disemboweled, or faces half ripped off, struggling to survive … I couldn’t stand the cruelty. It made me sick.

  During the fight, dogs had to cross over what was called a “scratch line” before a certain amount of time passed, or else be disqualified. If a dog didn’t wanna fight, wouldn’t cross that scratch line, he was considered a coward and he was killed. There was no need to keep him around. He wasn’t a pet. He was a product. Dogs that survived or won a match were “rewarded” by having to fight again and again. If they were successful every time, they’d become stud dogs. They were money-making machines.

  Everything in the projects was about money. Everyone was hustling to make an extra dollar. To survive. If you weren’t selling drugs or fistfighting or both, you were a gambler. You were playing dominos or spades or rolling dice. Pit fighting was just another way to make money, but I wouldn’t even think of fighting Coco. He was my best friend and you don’t fight your best friend. I preferred cuddling with Coco in my bed at night.

  I was still enrolled in high school … well, high schools. After leaving Marshall High in Texas, I went to Locke High for one semester before I got kicked out for being an ass. I got mad at one of my teachers and took a baseball bat to his car, bashed in one of his windows. My anger was out of control by then. I was shipped to Cleveland High and got busted there, so they shipped me to David Starr Jordan High in the most dangerous neighborhood for me: rival gang territory. Getting on that bus to David Starr Jordan, me and my boys, we had to stick together and practically run after the last bell rang. Getting from the front doors of the school to the L.A. Metro bus stop was a danger zone. Crips would pelt us with rocks or throw M-80s at us. Making it onto the bus was no guarantee of safety. One time, they got ahold of a fire hose from the gym, plugged it into a fire hydrant, ran onto the bus, and hosed everyone down. This wasn’t a school bus. Regular people were on there, just trying to live their lives. Every day, I felt like a sitting duck. It was the most dangerous two miles I traveled in my life.

  There was a teacher at David Starr Jordan who tried to make a difference. He taught economics and actually put faith in me. He was an older, baldheaded black guy. He sat me down and said, “You’re smarter than you appear to be with your devious ways.” He made me wanna learn more. He actually cared about his students. He was really involved not just in my school life, but also in my personal life, in everything I was doing. ’Cause of that econ teacher, I got on the Dean’s List for my first semester ever. Before that, I’d never been asked to use my talents. I had only ever gotten D’s and maybe C’s. He showed me I was capable of a lot more. Then someone took a shot at me and tried to kill me, so I had to leave David Starr Jordan High for good. I ended up, my senior year, at Fremont High. I dropped out, three credits short of graduation. Biology was never my thing.

  As a dropout, I had a lot more free time on my hands. I had transferred from my Carl’s Jr. job in Texas to a location in Los Angeles, but got fired for being late for my shifts. I wasn’t interested in showing up on time. I was more interested in hanging with my roll dog, Jeremy Lucas. I called him Jerry. He was a couple of years younger than me, a friend from the projects. We were busy getting drunk, smoking weed, and getting laid. It was easy for me to get girls. Easier for me than for Jerry. There were a lot of girls who just wanted to see what it was like to sleep with a midget. I benefited from their curiosity. Once you go small … you never go tall.

  I wasn’t a committed boyfriend to any of them, not even my fiancée, Liz Evans. Liz was older than me by nine years. She was twenty-seven. I liked them older. I made it a policy to never date girls my own age or my own height. When I was sixteen, I’d hooked up with a woman who was thirty-two. In the projects, you had people of every different age hanging around each other. It didn’t take much to meet them.

  We’d go out to nightclubs. It was easier then to get into clubs and drink. It’s harder now. I used to go to the liquor store; they never questioned me. They thought I was older. We would go to World on Wheels or Skateland USA or someone would set up their own block party and charge ten bucks. All the places were dangerous. We had to stop going to World on Wheels ’cause the Crips took it over. It had originally been a roller rink, but they’d renovated it and turned it into a dance club.

  I didn’t meet Liz at the clubs. She was related to the Evans family, but they weren’t major players in the projects. I just knew her from around the way. We started talking and hanging out and I fell in love a little. Marriage, in the projects, wasn’t taken as seriously as it should have been. Guys married and divorced all the time, so it seemed like the thing to do. She wasn’t pressuring me. I was the one who decided that this was what I wanted. I was stubborn and I wouldn’t take no for an answer. I was a big asshole and I got my way. I told Liz we were getting married. She said yes.

  We went to the St. Vincent Jewelry Mart in downtown L.A. to get the ring. That’s where we used to buy all our jewelry at the time. Gold nugget rings and gold rope chains around our necks. That was the style. I had more expensive jewelry on me than I put on her finger. My little ass could be cheap, a remnant of growing up with Dad. I bought her a band, not a diamond, and I got a matching gold band, too. We may have had the wedding bands, but we never made it to the ceremony.

  The engagement lasted about four months. Liz didn’t know I was sleeping around, so she kept planning the big day. We got real close to walking down the aisle before I decided marriage wasn’t for me. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision to marry, and it was a spur-of-the-moment decision to call it off. It got a bit ugly. Liz heard about the other girls after we broke up. I started making sure to look both ways before crossing any street. Liz had threatened to run me over if she ever caught me in a crosswalk. Some people get pretty mad when you hurt their feelings.

  Once I was disengaged and fired, I didn’t have much to do. I’d get up, take Coco for a walk, watch TV, and play video games in my room. Then I’d walk over to Grandma Bailey’s house or one of the other aunts’ and uncles’ places. I’d hang out with my buddies on 115th and wait for something to happen. Then something did. A man I’ll call Uncle D. pulled up in his 280Z.

  Uncle D. was literally an uncle. He was the brother of Mama Myrt, and made his money dealing crack. One night, Uncle D. rolled up and stuck his head out the window, asking, “Shorty, you wanna go for a ride?” What else did I have to do? Nothing. So I got in. We crossed the border into Tijuana into this scary-ass area. I hadn’t spent any time in Mexico, so it seemed rough ’cause it was foreign to me. Uncle D. went into a raggedy-looking building, came back out, and put something in the back of the trunk. Then we drove back, through Los Angeles and all the way north to Atascadero. Uncle D. lived there with his wife. He had a whole setup in Atascadero where they made crack, divided it, weighed it, and packaged it for sale.

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bsp; The first time I got into his car, I had no idea what I was agreeing to. I knew what Uncle D. did for his business, but I was just along for the ride. It didn’t cross my mind that we might get busted. I didn’t think about the bigger picture. I didn’t think about what I was doing, or how I was getting involved. By then it was too late, I was in. People who live in the projects know what I mean. When you are surrounded by this shit all the time, it becomes part of your life. Seeing people get stabbed, killed, get the shit beat out of them, watching a carjack—you become a product of the environment. Everything you are and you do is part of what is going on around you. Only a small percentage of the people who live there make a success out of their lives. Everyone else is fucked.

  From the outside, it’s easy to blame people, to believe they had chances. But you’re telling some kid to go work at the pool in the park and make $50 a day when he can make $500 a day selling dope. What’s his option? We’re a country of greed. That’s what we are taught, to want more and more and more. It’s not an excuse, but you have to be some super-strong kid to be in that environment and not end up like everyone else. You just don’t see any other way around you. I didn’t move to the projects so I could hold money for a drug dealer, and carry a pistol. I wanted to get away from my father and my family and be happy around the friends and people I liked. The more I hung around the gangbangers and the drug dealers, and the more I saw, the less illegal it seemed to me. I didn’t even realize I was into dirt until I was in up to my neck.

  Uncle D. brought me in ’cause he caught his own cousin stealing from him. He said, “Shorty, can you count this money again?” I counted it and told him what I came up with. He said, “No, that’s impossible. That means there’s $6,000 missing.” I said, “I counted it three times. I know how much is missing.” He said, “You counted that three times? That fast?” He sat down and counted it with me, which took twice as long as when I counted it myself three times. He goes, “You nailed it right on. How’d you do that so quick?” I had no answer for him. I was just good with numbers. That’s when he offered me the job. There was no application process. This was no Carl’s Jr.