Thursday morning…

The gate buzzed. It was loud. Sharp. Final. The kind of sound he had gotten used to and wouldn’t forget, even if he tried.

Dream stepped through the gate, squinting into the daylight like it was foreign. Seven years of the same gray walls, same fluorescent flicker. Out here, the sky was too wide. The air smelled too clean. The colors were too bright. Everything felt strange.

They had given him back his old clothes, as if they expected him to just slide back into the world like nothing happened. Jeans that sagged a little now, a tee with a faded True Religion logo, boots with dust from a different life. A man could grow old in seven years. Harden. Dream sure as hell had.

There was no welcome committee. No fanfare. Just the sound of gravel underneath his Timbs and the distant hum of traffic. The city didn’t welcome Dream home. But he didn’t need it to, all he knew was that it had better make space for what was coming.

Looking up, he saw the only person who had held him down during his bid. His baby brother leaning against a black Acura like something out of a film by Hype Williams. He was bigger now, with a more arrogant swag about him than Dream remembered from before. But he had the same eyes. The same scar above his brow from that fight in ’09.

“Damn,” Lyfe said, pushing off the car with a half-grin. “Didn’t think they’d let you out lookin’ like that.”

Dream didn’t laugh or smile. He just nodded once. His facewas solemn.

“You ready?” His brother asked.

Dream looked out at the stretch of highway behind them. Freedom. But also, everything he had left behind. The streets. The dirt. The blood that was still on his name. And the name of the bitch who had killed his father etched in his memory like a brand.

“I been ready.”

He opened the passenger door and slid in. The car smelled like fresh leather and expensive cologne. As they pulled off, he didn’t look back at the prison. He didn’t need to. That part of him was dead. The part that came out? That part was coming for everything.

The ride was smooth, Lyfe’s Ack gliding through the highway like it knew where it was going. Effortless. Fast. Blacked out windows like midnight, with its engine growling low as if it knew the weight it carried.

Dream sat quiet in the passenger seat, shoulders broad, eyes vacant. These past years had shown him a lot. About the people he thought he knew and a world he’d never understood and still didn’t. If there was one thing he had learned on the inside, it was the value of time. And time had taught him that it wasn’t something to be wasted.

Lyfe was driving, one hand on the wheel, the other resting near his lap. A pistol sat tucked in the center console. That wasn’t new. That’s how it had always been. The brothers had been taught from young. Always stay ready, so you don’t have to get ready.

“You hungry?” Lyfe asked, breaking the silence.

Dream shook his head once. “Nah.”

Lyfe nodded like he expected that. He knew his big brother, and he knew him well. Lyfe himself was no joke. But Dream? Dream was about that life, for real. He played no games. Lyfe also knew that his brother wanted war, but what he didn’t know was whether they were ready for that yet. They needed a plan first.

For a while, the brothers just rode. The city had changed in some places, stayed the same in others. Blocks still claimed by corners; murals faded by time. The same skeleton underneath, even if the skin looked different.

“The hood been talking about you,” Lyfe said, eyes on the road. “Some happy and ready to welcome you back. Others sucking dick. Talking shit.”

“Let ’em talk,” Dream said. “That’s what niggas do best.”

Lyfe smirked a little. “You right about that.”

They passed a corner they used to post up on. Dream’s eyes followed it. Ghosts lived there now. His father’s voice, his laugh, the weight of that old Ruger he passed down like it was sacred.

“This shit got heavier after you left,” Lyfe said. “I’ve been keeping it going, but…”

Dream cut his eyes toward him. “You did what you had to. I don’t need a play-by-play.”

Silence settled again. Not disrespectful, just understood.

“She still out here, too,” Lyfe said after a beat. “I heard she’s staying out in Long Island now. Big ass house and shit. Bitch is living. Comfortable.”

Dream didn’t flinch. Just stared straight ahead.

“She won’t be comfortable for much longer,” he replied.

Lyfe glanced over. “You sure you ready to get back in?”

Dream turned his head slow, meeting his brother’s eyes with something steel cold.

“I never left.”

Lyfe didn’t say another word. Just pressed a little harder on the gas, the car growled louder as they crossed back into familiar territory.

Dream took note of his surroundings. Harlem was not the same. All he saw were a bunch of new faces that he did not recognize. Corners that used to be hot now looked dead. Old buildings were gone. Gentrified. Made to look “safe”. But Deamknew better. Streets don’t change, he thought. It just learns how to hide its teeth.

He hadn’t changed much either. In fact, he was worse.

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