Damn, I remember thinking, I only got three bullets, and I didn’t know where in the cylinder they were! The click stopped everything—and then everybody seemed to move at once. Eric ran toward the chili stand, my brother rushed to me. Before I could aim and fire, my brother and I were wrestling over the gun.

“Give me the gun, I’ll shoot him!” my brother exclaimed.

“No, let me shoot him!” I shouted back.

In our battle for control, the gun was now pointing at my mother’s chest.

CLICK.

My mother jumped, and momentarily I was paralyzed with fright. In this instant I let go of the gun and my brother turned and fired into the chili stand.

BOOM! The .44 sounded like a cannon.

CLICK: another empty chamber.

Eric had by now retrieved his shotgun and was on his way out after us. Seeing him coming, both my brother and I turned and ran. We had barely rounded the corner when the report from the shotgun echoed behind us. He chased us through several yards, firing and tearing up people’s property. He fired a total of eight times, but we escaped unscathed—except for our pride. My mother, sister, and little brother also escaped unharmed, though in great fear for us, for they knew not our fate.

After meeting back at home, my mother wanted to send us all out to my uncle’s house in West Covina. We protested and stayed. The next morning, however, while I’m standing at the bus stop waiting to go to school, Eric pulls up and mad dogs me. “What you lookin’ at, punk?” he shouts from the car.

“You muthafucka!” I respond, though scared because he may have a gun and I couldn’t get mine out the house, since after yesterday’s episode Moms was searching me. There were three young ladies standing there, as well, so my pride and integrity were also involved, not to mention my reputation. I had to stand my ground.

Eric leapt from the car, circled from the front, walked up, and hit me in the mouth—bam! I faltered and became indecisive. But in an instant I knew I needed an equalizer, because he lifted his shirt to reveal the butt of a pistol in his waistband. I turned and bolted. Running at top speed with tears streaming down my face, I made my way back home, went right in, got my gun, and trotted back to the bus stop. I was hoping the bus hadn’t come, so that the three girls who saw me get hit could watch me kill him.

Art’s chili dog stand has been on Florence and Normandie since the forties, and it was still in its original decor—open and primarily wood, with big windows facing onto Florence Avenue. The bus stop was across Florence on Normandie. Turning the corner on Seventy-first at a steady trot, I was relieved to find the three girls still there, almost as if waiting for me. Passing them, I heard one say to another, “That boy is crazy!”

I was taking no chances this time; with six rounds ready I stood in the street in front of Art’s on Florence Avenue. Commuter traffic was moderate, so I waited for the light to turn red. Once I saw that I could safely break back across Florence and then to a backyard, I opened fire on Art’s. BOOM! BOOM! Loud baritone echoes cracked the morning stillness, as chunks of wood and shards of glass flew off of Art’s with magical quickness. Cordite filled my nostrils and revenge filled my heart. BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM! Six shots I emptied into the tiny dwelling, hoping to have killed Eric, who had just opened up for business.

No such luck. I was captured the next day and given sixty days in juvenile hall, but actually only served nineteen due to overcrowding. Once out, my reputation was stronger than ever. Even Eric gave me my props, though grudgingly.

The very next week after my release for the shooting, De, myself, and two members of the Rollin’ Sixties Crips (later the Sixties and my set—the Eight Trays—would become mortal enemies) were on our way to Rosecrans Skating Rink, which was where everybody who was somebody in the gang world went to further promote their name and set. Walking up Manchester Avenue westbound, we passed Pearl’s Gym and Best Yet hair salon. Still within the established boundaries of my set, we came to a halt at the corner of Manchester and Gramercy Place, waiting for the light to change so we could trek on to Van Ness, where our bus was to depart. We heard two reports from what sounded like a .38. The sound came from the direction of Duke’s hamburger stand, which stood on the southeast corner of Gramercy Place off of Manchester Avenue. Duke’s had recently become contested territory, as the Inglewood Family Bloods had begun to frequent it regularly in hopes of establishing it as theirs. (Gangs tend to function as “states” in regard to taking or colonizing territory.)

We looked toward the sound and we saw Fly and Tracc breaking out of Duke’s, running right at us across the street. Tracc had what appeared to be a big, long-barrel .38 revolver in his left hand. Without stopping, Trace exclaimed, “Y’all bail, we just busted on some Families!” They kept running, right on past us.

We hadn’t done nothing, so we kept on our way. Not a minute later, a white Camaro screeched out of Duke’s parking lot. “There they go!” we heard an almost hysterical voice yell from the car. A second car, a huge orange Chrysler, came out of the parking lot, bearing down on the bumper of the Camaro—which was now heading directly for us. We scattered.

De and I darted into an adjacent alley behind Best Yet, and I don’t know where Stone and Snoopy went. The chase was on. Hopping a fence in the alley, De and I hid ourselves in the dense shrubbery behind Pearl’s Gym. The Camaro and the Chrysler roared up and down the alley several times as we lay in wait. The thoughts that ran through my head were hopes that the Blood who had been shot would die.

It’s significant that there were no Crip-on-Crip wars raging in these times. The worst enemies were Crip and Blood sets. Today, of course, Crips are the number-one killer of Crips. In fact, Crips have killed more Crips in the last twelve years than the Bloods have killed in the entire twenty-two-year conflict. And, too, sets in the Crip and Blood communities have increased twenty-fold—so that there is literally a gang on every street. Also, there are the huge conglomerate sets spanning hundreds of city blocks at a time, extending themselves into other cities and counties. It’s not at all unusual for one of these huge conglomerate sets to be policed by five separate divisions of both the LAPD and the sheriff’s department. (The East Coast Crips are one such set, spanning from First Street in downtown Los Angeles to 225th Street in Harbor City.)

After an hour or so we emerged from hiding and walked east in search of Snoopy and Stone.

“Man, them fools was mad!”

“Huh?” De spoke up. “If they would have caught us, Kody, we’d have been through.” De was very serious when I finally looked at him. “Why you didn’t bring the gat”—gat is a generic term for gun—“anyway?”

“’Cause of the metal detector at Rosecrans. Ever since the Families blew the door off they been really tight on security. Besides, all homies be there anyway.”

We found Snoopy and Stone standing on Western Avenue and Manchester. Well aware that the Families were now out in mass looking for revenge, we devised a new strategy for getting to the skating rink. Just then the orange Chrysler hit the corner of Eighty-fifth Street, packed with occupants from the Red side. We had two choices: run into the street and try to make it across Western and further into the interior of our ’hood and possible safety, or run into the surplus store behind us and hope they wouldn’t follow in view of such a big civilian crowd. We quickly chose the second option.

De broke first, with myself, Snoopy and Stone heavy on his heels. Looking back, I immediately realized that we had made a terrible decision, for the Bloods were bailing out of the huge Chrysler like beans from a bag and chasing us straight up into the store! I remember taking one last look back after I had jumped the turnstile, and I knew then that we were trapped.

The surplus kept a huge green trash can by the door that was full of axe handles of heavy oak; each Blood grabbed one as he entered. Alarmed and not knowing if this was a gang raid on his store, the manager locked the door once the last Blood had come in. I knew we’d be beaten to death.

Snoopy and Stone went one way and De and I went another. I followed De up some stairs that led to an attic supply room and further entrapment. Four Bloods followed us up, swearing to kill us for shooting their homeboy. One guy was shouting about the victim being his brother. Damn, how in the hell had we gotten into this?

Running up into the small attic area, I thought seriously about death for the first time in my life, and for the slightest second I wanted to turn and tell the Bloods, “Hey, all right, I quit. I’m only thirteen, can’t we talk?” Diplomacy was as foreign as Chinese to us all, but it’s a trip that when under pressure, clear thoughts seem to abound.

Stopping and crouching, temporarily having lost my tail among the rows and aisles of stocked clothing, I heard De trying to explain that it wasn’t us, that they had made a mistake. “Hold it, man, it wasn’t us,” I heard De say in a cracking tone of sincerity and terror.

“You a muthafuckin’ lie, we saw you Blood!”

Crack! “Ahh!” Crack! “All right, man, all—” Crack! “Ahh!”

Terrified, I crouched lower and closed my eyes, hoping they wouldn’t kill De, who was now on the ground and silent. But the beating continued. I felt completely helpless.

“Here go another one!” Crack! “Ahh!” Across the top of my head the heavy axe handle came down. Swoosh! A miss, and in an instant I was on my feet. Crack! “Ahh!” One to the back, as I tried to get past another in the semidarkness.

“Wait, wait!”

“Fuck that wait shit, fool, you didn’t wait when you shot Mike!” Crack! “Ohh.” Crack! “Ahh…” Blackness.

When I came to I was on my stomach, handcuffed. Next to me was De. Both of us were bloody and swollen. Craning my neck to the left, I saw Snoopy and Stone. They, too, looked whipped and soiled.

“Which one of you did the shootin’?” a police officer asked from somewhere behind me.

“Him, the one in the blue overalls and sweat jacket.”

That was me! “What?” I managed to say through fog and loose teeth. “Who, me?”

“Yeah, you, you little crab-ass punk!” (Crab is a disrespectful term used by Bloods against Crips—defacing the enemy.)

For the first time, I noticed her—a girl. Looking up, I brought her into focus. Never seen her in my life.

“You a lie, bitch—” I blurted out and was abruptly cut short by a police boot on the back of my neck.

“Shut up, asshole. Are you sure this is the shooter, ma’am?”

“Yes, yes I’m sure, officer. He was trying to talk to me and then found out who I was with and just pulled a gun and started shooting. I just—”

“Bitch, you lying, I don’t know you, I was—Uuugh!” I was kicked in the side by the police officer who had already smashed my face to the ground.

“One more word, dipshit, and you’ll get another ass whipping.”

I felt it best to remain silent. I was transported to the Seventy-seventh Street Division and booked for attempted murder.

Now I was hoping he wouldn’t die. I was the only one arrested. At the station, I was asked a series of questions, of which I answered none. I was taken to Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall to await court. I was no doubt facing a camp term now, worse than juvenile hall, for the attempted murder, which I hadn’t even had anything to do with. The strict code of the street held me, though, and I said not a word to anyone about who had really shot the Blood.

The Hall (juvenile hall) was another territory to conquer, just like South Central, but all the sets were now face-to-face, bunched together in units of fifty. I met Crips who I had heard about and others whose names I had seen spray-painted on walls. I fought against Bloods whose sets I had never heard of and, of course, against those who were our worst enemies.

I went to trial three months later. The gang turnout was surprising. Along with my family, at least fifteen of my home-boys came. All were in full gear (gear is gang clothes, colors and hats—actually uniforms). On the other side, the Bloods also came in force, in full gear. Tension ran thick through the courtroom as stares of hate were passed back and forth.

I was told after the first day that a shoving and shouting match had taken place in the hallway outside the courtroom. My homeboys had to serve as bodyguards for my family. On my next court date, I was released into the custody of my mother, pending trial proceedings. During my next scheduled court date, three gangs filled the court—the Crips, the Bloods, and the LAPD CRASH unit (Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums).

The atmosphere was tight with rage that ran just below the surface, and this is where I began to grasp the meaning of “low-intensity warfare.” I couldn’t believe how personally the Bloods were taking this. After all, their homie was shot “legally,” that is, within the unspoken but generally known guidelines of gang warfare. He was fired on in a free-fire zone. In fact, this area, as I explained above, was contested. We had gotten numerous reports of Blood sightings. He just happened to be the first caught.

And now here they were, taking the war off the streets and into the courtroom, where neither of us had the experience to win. Blood after Blood testified to my shooting of their home-boy—all lying, of course. The final witness was the victim himself. He was thin and wearing cornrowed braids; his would be the testimony to seal my fate. After the prosecution asked him to convey the events of that day and time, he was asked if he saw the person who had shot him in the courtroom. Silence. And then…

“No, he ain’t the one who shot me.”

“What?” The D.A. couldn’t believe his ears.

Murmurs filled the courtroom as his homies whispered their disbelief at his honesty. Snickers and taunts came from our side. I sat still and just looked at Mike, who stared back without a semblance of hate, but with a sort of remorse for having put me through this.

The judge’s gavel struck wood. “Case dismissed.”

I stood, still looking at Mike, who was dismounting the witness stand.

“Tell Trace,” Mike whispered as he passed me, “that I’ll see him at another time.”

I said nothing, turned, and fell into step with my crew.

That night I led an initiation party into Family ’hood and dropped two bodies. No one was captured.

My relationship with my mother soured continuously as I was drawn deeper and deeper into the streets and further away from home and school. My sixth-grade graduation was my first and last. Actually, it was the last time I ever seriously attended school—for academic purposes. My homeboys became my family—the older ones were father figures. Each time I shot someone, each time I put another gun on the set, each time I successfully recruited a combat soldier, I was congratulated by my older homeboys. (Every gang member is responsible for bringing guns into the gang. We used to break into neighbors’ homes and steal their weapons. Now, with the influx of narcotics and overseas connections, guns are bought by the crate.) When I went home I was cursed for not emptying the trash. Trash? Didn’t Mom know who I was? Apparently not.