I got fucked up that night, I'm not even gonna lie. It was my first and only time getting high on my own supply. On anyone's supply. That was just never my thing. Between daddy and Aunt Jazz, I just...couldn't. I couldn't deal with that shit outside of business, and everyone on the block knew that. Rico loved that. It meant that he never had to watch me with his product. He didn't have to watch Jazz, either, to tell you the truth. She may have been looking for stray rocks in the carpet, but she wasn't stupid enough to try to lift anything from Uncle Rico.

Nobody was.

Drugs and alcohol were never my thing, but fuck it. Tonight...I shook my head and took the last brick of weed that I still needed to sell for the week. I only pulled out a dime for myself, though, because money was still money. Then I grabbed a bottle of Remmey's moonshine that Uncle Rico had stashed and headed out to the train tracks. I hadn't been out there since my last time going with Sammy. When I got up to the top, I rolled that shit up like a pro, kicked my legs out over the side of the tracks, sat back, and relaxed.

It was like a fifty foot drop if a train ever did decide to come that way, but according to Sammy, one would never come so I didn't even think twice about getting blitzed up there. 

I still believed her. 

Everything that she ever told me. 

I still believed.

"Sammy..." I said like she was sitting right next to me. "Shit's really fucked up now. What the hell am I supposed to do with Aunt Jazz?" I looked over to my right, like she was really sitting there, and then I looked back over my city, toking and blowing smoke out like I had been smoking my whole life.

I guess some things you really can learn by watching.

"Really fucked up," I repeated again quietly, and I swear I felt her pat my hand as I took another swig of that damn fire water Remmey used to push before Uncle Rico needed him to put more focus on the family business, and less focus on his side hustle. I looked down at the bottle and realized that might have been the last one left from Remmey's bootlegging days. I would have to deal with Rico later if it was. I shrugged and took another giant gulp.

Fuck it.

I was about a fourth of the way through the moonshine and about halfway through the dime when I heard footsteps clanging up the ladder and then slowly approaching me. I didn't even look to see who it was. I didn't give a shit.

"Hey." Her voice was gentle and familiar.

The sun had almost completely set and I had to blink twice to make sure that I was really seeing who I was seeing. It had been a while. She was even more beautiful than I remembered. Her ass had gotten fatter, too.

"Hey." I blinked a third time at Tiana, letting my eyes wander over her shirt, slowly across her mini skirt and down her legs, briefly wishing that I had been climbing up that ladder behind her to get a real good look. I took every single new curve in, and then I went back to the weed.

"What's this?" she asked sitting down beside me, and took an extra-long swig out of the bottle before I could answer. She started coughing and gasping as soon as it hit that spot. "Remmey," she choked out and put the bottle down.

I smiled and nodded. She, Charity and Sammy must have been sneaking tastes with the rest of the kids back in the day for her to recognize it that fast.

"Shit's real," she said in a raspy voice and reached for the blunt that I was handing her. She eyed me, because she knew I didn't smoke or drink, but she also didn't say anything about it. She never did. Tiana never spoke on most of the things that she saw going on around her. "So..." she inhaled deeply and blew out a smoke ring. I was impressed and wondered how long she had been smoking. The last time I saw her, she didn't do any of that either...as far as I knew. "What's up?"

I chuckled, and then laughed a little harder at the fact that this was Tiana that I was smoking with, and took another puff...maybe two...when she handed it to me, then passed it back to her. "Nuthin'."

"I heard about your aunt," she said, like it was an everyday thing. And really it was. People got cracked out all the time on our block. Mostly because of me and my crew.

Fucked up, but true.

I nodded.

She sucked in an impressively deep breath and then blew the smoke out slowly.

"Fucked up." She spoke my internal thoughts out loud. "I really liked her."

I nodded again. "Me too." I shook my head at the roach she was handing me, and took another gulp of Remmey's oil.

Tiana sucked on the butt of the blunt one more time and then threw it over the side of the tracks.

"So..." she turned and looked deep into my eyes. "What's up?"

I was so fucked up by then, I couldn't even do anything but kiss her. She tasted just like I always thought she would. Cherry lip gloss. Tiana kissed me back, and you know how that goes.

Next thing you know, I was inside of her like is this really happening? But it felt so good I didn't care if it was real or a dream. I just went with it. She came after a few minutes. Again I was like what...the hell...is this!? And again, I just kept going. Clearly this wasn't her first time, but it was mine. And I wasn't even close to finished. I had to get all that crazy shit out of my head, and this was actually...helping. I fucked the girl that I had been in love with since before I even knew what love was, every way that she would let me and then when she finally came for the third time, I fucked her some more.

When I was finally done, we were both soaked and she was sprawled out across the railroad tracks with her legs wide open, grinning up at me and saying "Shit..." I immediately wanted to get back inside of her, but I couldn't. You know how that goes, too. So I just smiled at her, suddenly shy for no reason, and looked away. "I didn't know you been fuckin' Kenney!" She said it like if I had been, she would have been the first to know. Which was probably true. She and Charity knew everything about everyone on our block.

I shook my head and stole a glance at her. "I haven't."

"First time?" She looked surprised and sat up beside me.

"Yup..." I looked back out over the city, already refocused on how to fix my family.

She nodded, like she knew that I had already moved on, and reached for the moonshine. "Pretty good." She nodded again and gulped down some more of Remmey's fire water. "Pretty good." She also looked thoughtfully out over the city, and then it was like realization suddenly hit her. She jolted, like a lightning bolt went through her, and then she stared over at me like what the hell did we just do?

I grinned and looked away, then looked back over at her and chuckled at the fact that she used to watch me when Charity couldn't. Then I chuckled again, picturing mama's face if she ever walked in on that shit. Tiana looked into my eyes and laughed uncomfortably, probably thinking the same thing. Even though we were damn near the same age, it was still...a little weird.

This whole night was weird.

Tiana took another swig of the moonshine and handed it back to me.

"So...what's up?" she asked again, like the rest of that hadn't just happened.

She was picking the conversation up exactly where we left off.

I hollowed out another one of Rico's Black & Milds and started filling it with our 100% guaranteed top of the line marijuana. It was pretty good, I had to admit. I felt like I was floating like a yogi. I had never meditated, but Rico went through phases where he was all into that shit. Mostly when he was trying to"tap into his dreams." 

I looked back at Tiana's beautiful face and shrugged.

"Nuthin'."

Same answer as before.

I licked the blunt to seal it, and then put it to my lips to light it.

She took it from me when I handed it to her, and inhaled deeply. Then she passed it back. "You alright?"

I nodded. "Yeah."

"You sure?"

She knew I wasn't.

I looked over at her and grinned, flashing her my dimples. "Yeah." She blushed and looked away.

"Alright then." She stood up and stretched, then looked at me for a few minutes longer. She could tell that something had happened, but knew me well enough to know that if I didn't feel like talking about it, I wasn't going to.

After a while, she headed back the way she came.

I watched her leave, and then shook my head and toked thoughtfully. Either I was smoking like a chimney or this thing was burning too fast. I would check the rest of the weed when I got home. Rico was on top because our product was the best. It was my job and Jazz's to make sure that it stayed that way. Thinking about Jazz, I shook my head and let the smoke sink all the way down to the bottom of my lungs before blowing it out real slow, just like Tiana did.

Then I looked back over to my right and said, "...really fucked up now..."

Sammy just nodded her head slowly, and then sat there with me until I fell asleep.