Read The Corner III (No Way Out) for Free Online Page A

was over.
    *     *     *
    “Push, Push. Come on Chantel, I can see the crown,” the East Indian doctor said calmly as Noonie looked on nervously.
    “Ahhh,” Chantel shouted and then she became quiet.
    Seconds later there was the sweet sound of a new life, cries from a baby. The umbilical cord was cut and the nurses took the baby and began cleaning him off as the doctor took care of Chantel.
    Anthony and Tesha nervously sat in the waiting room. They had arrived at the hospital about thirty minutes after receiving the call from Noonie. They were both sleeping and when they received the call they both jumped into warm-up suits and were out the door.
    Tesha looked at her watch then asked, “Did you reach Lucky?”
    “For the third time, yes. Damn, and I thought I was the one who was nervous,” Anthony joked.
    “We’ve been here for over two hours. I need to go talk to somebody,” she said as she stood and began to walk out of the waiting room.
    Anthony stopped her. “Look here, baby. Just sit and wait. I know you’re nervous because she lost the first baby. Hell, everyone is, but everything’s going to—”
    “Tesha Smith?” a nurse said as she entered the waiting room.
    “Yes, yes, that’s me. Is everything okay?” she asked nervously.
    “Everything is fine. Mr. and Mrs. Rodriquez are waiting for you to come and see their baby boy,” the nurse said pleasantly.
    “Yes!” Anthony said as he pumped his fist as if Derrick Rose had hit a game winning shot.
    The nurse smiled then said, “Right this way.”
    *     *     *
    Jamel parked the Escalade in the east parking lot of the hospital. Dressed in slacks and a button-down, Lucky stepped out of the passenger’s side and had a big smile on his face. He was overjoyed that Noonie and Chantel were having a baby. He looked up at the stars and thought about how God is good. Chantel and Noonie had lost a child and here they were less than two years later having their first son.
    “Don’t forget the flowers,” Lucky told Jamel.
    Jamel, who drove for Lucky, reached inside the driver’s side door and retrieved the flowers from the bench seat.
    Jamel asked, “Lucky, you must’ve known they were gonna have the baby tonight. What you do, buy the flowers earlier today?”
    Lucky smiled at the youngster. He loved having Jamel, who was only twenty, around. He felt the young man had potential to do something with his life so he kept him close. “Son, I cut them out of my garden after I called for you to pick me up.”
    Lucky’s house was plush. Thirty-nine hundred square feet brick home in the suburbs. Huge, beautifully landscaped yard with a large in-ground pool in the back. And to top things off at the home was Miss Joplin, a southern lady in her fifties who did all the cooking and cleaning for Lucky. She made sure he was well taken care of. She also assumed the duties of making sure that he was doing what he was supposed to do as far as his health. After being diagnosed with cancer, he was forced to change his diet and lifestyle to help with the biggest fight of his life.
    Lucky took the flowers from Jamel then said, “Let’s go see the baby.”
    The room was full of smiling faces and people taking pictures of the baby as Chantel, who was propped up by many pillows, held her firstborn. Miss Joplin, who was like a mother to all the men in Slim and Lucky’s crew, had jumped in her minivan and headed to the hospital as soon as Lucky told her that Chantel was about to deliver. Miss Joplin was tall, heavy seat and dark-skinned. She loved working for Lucky because she had no family to speak of. When she was a teenager, she had left Mississippi to escape the racism and poverty for the promise of a faster and more promising life in Chicago. Young and naïve, she got caught up in the wrong crowd and soon her so-called boyfriend had her tricking and strung out on heroin for most of the seventies. She eventually got her life together and began working as a