Thangs Crossing My Mind. The Case of the Stolen Truck, Part II.

click here for "The Case of the Stolen Truck, Part I"



So I’d gotten a tip.

My brother’s truck may be located down in “The Bottoms”.

Hen-Dog had given me instructions on how to get there and what street to turn on.

Simple enough.

Now my plan was simple: get up early in the morning, when all the prostitutes, crackheads, and thuggish-ruggish folks were still asleep, and go down have a look-see.

But you know me. I have a tendency to procrastinate.

Now the truck was stolen on a Wednesday, I believe.

I didn’t go to explore “The Bottoms” until that Saturday afternoon.

"But Ladylee, er'body's awake round that time, Ladylee!!!"

Yeah, I hear you. But shoot, I'd just went shopping and happen to be rolling hard near that area, trying to make it to my house.

I knew I was hood deep when I turned onto “G” street, the entrance into "The Bottoms" and there was a woman standing in the middle of a vacant on a cell phone giving someone a good cussin’ out. I mean she was straight going off on somebody HARD. My windows were down, and it sounded like she was going off on her man for cheating on her…

"N**** you better stop f***** that b**** or I'ma kill both ya'll, you bastard!!"

Oh My.

She was much better than a nice sign that said "Welcome to the Bottoms".

I decided to keep driving. I was going pretty slow, checking out some of the run-down houses, and I noticed that folks had fenced in backyards… Backyards with wooden fences that were at least 8 feet tall. I know one thing: if my brother’s truck was being chopped in one of those backyards, then no one would ever know.

Now, it did cross my mind to jump out of the car and look over some of these fences.

Yeah, it crossed my mind, from one side of my mind right on out the other. I am too scary for that.

But I decided to keep driving. I was going to stick to my basic plan: Look for the boy's truck, write down the house address and get the hell out of dodge. Wasn’t gonna be any of that confrontin’ people.

Just go scope out the place and dip, man!

I got to the back of the neighborhood and ran into a million afroed and dredlocked-up negroes wearing white t-shirts and baggy pants, all standing in the middle of the street, drinking, smoking, and laughing, and shooting basketball on a portable hoop and goal.

“Aww hell!” I exhaled.

I kept driving, hoping these dudes would just get out of the way. Now, if I had to mow the brothas down with my Mazda, it wouldn’t have bothered me one bit.

They eventually got out of the way of my car. They stared me down, obviously perturbed that I’d interrupted their basketball game and other activities.

It crossed my mind to pose a question…

“Yo playas, ya’ll seen a old red Silverado around here?”

But that was another one of those thoughts that simply crossed my mind. Again, I was much, much too scary for that.

I simply enjoyed the contact high from whatever wonderfully special herbs the brothas were smoking.

I kept driving. I remember looking back through my sideview and rearview mirrors at the brothas in their oversized white tees and saw some of them staring after me. Maybe I should have covered up my license plate? Oh well, too late for all that.

The entrance street to “The Bottoms” ran all the way through the small neighborhood, and was apparently the only real street in the neighborhood, as I soon realized that it curved all the way back around and led me back to the main street that I’d turned on. I turned back out onto the main road, and that very same chick was still standing off in the same vacant lot, cussing up a storm!

I didn’t see the truck. It crossed my mind to go back through again, but um… that would’ve been stupid. A bit more stupid then rolling down there by myself in the first place.

Oh well, I’d done my part.

Da’Kari came home the next week for Christmas break. He and Kay were sharing a rental car, and they both seem to be content with the arrangement. So, I decided to cut my little investigation short.

Well Christmas came around, and the family gathered at Grandma’s house for dinner. I remember standing around outside and joking with some of my cousins.

“Come here, Lee,” my Uncle Tweet beckoned.

“What’s up, Tweet?”

“A bunch of Chevy Truck parts came in last week.”

I was thoroughly confused. “What?”

“I said, a bunch of Chevy Truck parts, engines and transmission, stuff like that, came in at this house I know where they sell stolen parts.”

Now, Tweet is a lot like Snake, the Mayor of my hood: they are both, how should I say this… They are both a bit fond of partaking of and smoking certain substances.

Tweet continued talking to me about some little chop shop in that neighborhood, and he’d seen some parts, and thought I should go check it out.

“Lee, what you need to do is, get the VIN number from the truck, take it down to this shop and see if you can match that VIN number with the parts. That’s what you need to do. And if you see a match, go head on and call the police.”

Oh see, he was trippin’. I looked at him hard, and he appeared to be sober. I’d been talking to him all afternoon, and he wasn’t high. But I knew that he couldn’t be serious.

A crazy image crossed my mind: Me standing in some dope boy’s chop shop, with a slip of paper containing Kari’s truck VIN number, going from engine to engine, trying to match up the numbers, then upon finding a match, me pulling out my cell phone, and dialing 911…

followed by me getting straight up pistol whipped and shot…

“Nawl Tweet,” I said as calmly as possible, trying not to scream. “I think I will pass on that.”

“Well I’m just telling you. Them parts came in.”

“Yeah, Tweet.”

Later, when I was sitting at the dining room table, eating some of Grandma’s homemade sweet potato pie, another Uncle, my Uncle Dean, ran up on me.

“Lisa, Tweet told me about those parts that came in. You need to go check it out.”

What the hell was going on? Did they really want me to get shot or something?

Well my uncle Dean proceeded to give me this long, LONG drawn out lecture about how I needed to go check it all out, and how it was all a matter of principle.

“People should not steal, Lisa. It’s just wrong. It's a matter of principle.”

I just sat there and listened.

Wondered silently to myself if my uncles were really serious, or if they had both been smoking a little something, something. I turned around and looked at DaKari, who was sitting in the livingroom, watching a movie on my laptop… It was very obvious that he wasn’t sitting around distraught and upset about his missing truck. He'd been skinnin' and grinnin' all damn day. Shoot, all day long, he'd been in all the pictures I'd taken. Even Uncle Tweet was cheesing along with him in few pics.



I’d done my five minutes of detective work. That was all that they were going to get from me.

Well to make a long story short, the police found the stripped down truck, on a street near my Grandma’s hood.

So maybe my uncles were on to something. Far be if from me to find out.

The insurance company totaled the truck out, and Ma got the insurance money.

The boy went and bought a new car. He speaks fondly of his old truck, and he does miss it, but he seems to be happy about the new Grand Am he just purchased.

Hopefully this one won’t go missing…

If it does, hopefully it won’t cross my mind play the Wanna-be Investigator!!