Drillmington: What We Could Do

Breakfast consisted of a kale bowl for Julisia and TSL snacked on an acai bowl. Both of them scrolled on their phones. With her open hand, she stretched towards TSL. She put her palm in his. A smirk came over her face. He snickered.

“Today’s a full day. I’ve got three more interviews.”

“Great.”

“You goddamn right it’s great. I’ll get more exposure for the .orgs especially.”

“Your gun club. That was a good interview.”

“Yes. I thank you for working diligently once again,” TSL acknowledged.

“That’s why I have that Spyra outside and we still have the Goulding. When we get to the house, we will be prepared for spaces to keep even more vehicles.”

“That’s if we keep the money flowing.”

“Jesus, Top. We’re not going to have to worry about that.”

“You say that but we’re going to be on the side of a highway if people discover that we’re snitches. The rap money will dry up and the celebrity will fade for the commercials to be shot. We can try to continue to inform, but it will lack the same zeal and zest. We have to tighten up.”

“If we just take our time—”

“And what?” He fired back.

“And know that what we have going on is something more important. You’re smart enough to take on both roles. Look, we’ve been doing this a long time. The cellphone mistake was immediately remedied with our next concert. We made $80,000. We took on the trafficking and drug gang. Now, of course we don’t care too much about the drugs but they were a starting force. That was $150,000. What we have to find out is…to rap or snitch or both.”

TSL rubbed his hands together. It was a rhythmic, methodic motion. He became pensive. Thought lines appeared on his brow. He thought about all that Julisia had to say. Then—

“Let’s just snitch. It’s more money right now. Sure, I could make an album or a mixtape and get streams. But I think the snitch route will be more profitable. It will be fraught with danger but that never stopped us before all this.”

Julisia sighed. Worry lines appeared on her brow, too. “Your whole career, everything you built up and what would be part of your legacy, you’re doing that, now. Maybe it will be a good thing to just come out and say you're a snitch.”

“No, woman! Hell, no! If I do that, there’ll be no coming back from that. I would rather retire than to be forced into permanent retirement.”

“But you wouldn’t. We continue to snitch and you can rap, too. We can make this an entire enterprise like we’ve been doing but make it even bigger. The vision is there. We just have to ensure that what we see materializes.”

TSL looked around the kitchen. He looked at the gleaming steel and marble that marked the space. The soft glow of the light made him slightly squint as he looked into it, red and blue stars replacing his eyesight for the moment. He observed the island at which they sat and remembered the $17,000 a month that it took to keep up the place.

“Do you see what we could do?” Julisia queried. “I know your passion is rapping and that you don’t need it at the same time. If snitching is your way of getting the bag, then we’re always going to keep going. We’re always going to keep fighting despite what anyone says. A rat, a fink, a stoolie, a snitch, we’ll always be. Once we realize that all we have is our ideas and our ability to become stronger together, we’ll know that there is no limit.”