Free Christmas in the Hood by Nikki Turner Page A

said playfully. “Do Grandma even know you out here pumping?”
    Andrew stared at the ground.
    “Do she?” Chico asked forcefully.
    “Nah.”
    “A’ight, then take y’all asses upstairs.”
    “Look, Chico, you know Grandma’s very sick,” Gigi blurtedout. “When the cops raided the crib, they took the money she had saved for the surgery.”
    “Damn. Why didn’t she tell me?” Chico replied, rubbing his chin.
    “You know how she is.”
    “How much the operation cost again?”
    “Twenty-five thousand.”
    Chico’s mouth seemed wired shut for a moment or two. “When she need it?”
    “Before January fourth.”
    “I’ll see what I can do,” Chico assured her before turning to Andrew. “I don’t wanna see you on this corner. Stick to that stoop of yours like a fly on shit.”
    “Whatever,” Andrew snapped, as if he wasn’t frightened by Chico’s ruthless reputation.
    “Never take my kindness for weakness. You family, and I’d never cause you no real harm,” Chico said, anger flashing in his eyes. “But I’ll slap fire out yo’ ass if you disrespect me again.”
    Andrew had the good sense to look nervous. “My bad,” he said, before walking off with Gigi.

Chapter Five
    T he week leading up to Christmas, Gigi worked harder than she had ever worked before. Although she knew Andrew was doing the best he could, she realized he was fine selling to thedope fiends on their block while she was determined to sell to a higher clientele.
    Through sheer determination she had already managed to stack eighteen thousand dollars, thanks to the stockbrokers, which left them only seven grand shy of their goal.
    With only three days left until Christmas Day, Gigi and Grandma lay sleeping one night when they were awakened by a gunshot in the apartment.
    Not knowing what was happening in the living room, Gigi knew her cousin was in trouble because he was asleep on the couch when she last saw him. She dashed into Andrew’s room, searching for the gun her cousin kept hidden there.
    Gigi heard the intruder bump into the wall as he ran past Andrew’s room toward the front door. The intruder yelled “Fuck, fuck!” as he struggled with the locks. Just as she found the gun under the mattress, she heard the apartment door slam into the wall as the man made his escape. She turned in time to see Andrew fly by. Clutching the .45 tightly, she quickly followed, ready to bust her gun if necessary.
    The intruder hit the stairwell like a bat out of hell, almost tripping as he descended the staircase, two steps at a time. Andrew busted through the stairwell door just as the intruder reached the half landing. Raising a .380, Andrew let off two rounds that just missed their mark. The man barely dodged death as he dipped around the partition separating the lower staircase from the upper one.
    Dashing out the building the intruder almost knocked over a fiend and leaped into a black sedan idling at the curb. The car squealed off before the intruder could shut the door.
    Flying onto the stoop, Andrew took aim at the car disappearing down the street and unloaded the rest of the clip.
    Hearing the wail of police sirens in the distance, Gigi knew it was just a matter of time before the cops pulled up. She grabbed Andrew by the shoulder.
    “Let’s go,” she yelled, running back inside the building. “We gotta get rid of the drugs before the cops get here.”
    As they reached the second-floor hallway, Grandma was standing halfway in the apartment doorway and halfway in the hall.
    “Andrew, you bleeding!” she cried out when she spotted her grandson’s bloody head. Bloodstains soiled the right half of his shirt.
    “I’m okay, Grandma,” Andrew assured her as Gigi spun around to look. “He just grazed me.”
    “Thank God,” Grandma said, rubbing the rosary beads hanging around her neck.
    Caught up in the moment, Gigi hadn’t realized her cousin had been hurt. “You sure you okay?” she asked.
    “Yes,” Andrew replied,