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Jones laughed out loud. It sounded more like a dog barking, but it was a laugh. "Let me tell you a little story," he said. "A few months after we'd started this new group, Chuck and I dropped some acid and went for a drive. He was driving. Next thing I knew we were passing the Coliseum and the USC campus, and we were suddenly in the heart of darkness." He paused, presumably for dramatic effect. "We were smack dab in the middle of Watts. I asked him what the fuck he was doing; we were going to get ourselves killed. Them niggers don't like whiteys coming onto their turf. But Chuck just smiled and kept driving. It was early evening, before daylight saving time, so it was dusk. We turned onto a street that was pretty industrial, and deserted ... until we saw this teen-ager throwing a basketball against the side of a building. There wasn't a hoop or anything, but the stupid fuck would pretend like he was going in for a layup and throw the ball up against the wall."
"So Chuck pulls the car into the lot where the kid is, and the kid turns to face us, holding his free hand over his eyes to block the glare of our headlights. He had this funny, puzzled look on his face. Chuck says, 'Watch this,' and reaches under his seat and pulls out a gun. Before I can say shit, he gets out of the car and walks toward the kid. I could see the little nigger's eyes go big, just like in them old-time movies where everybody overacted. There was a big-ass white guy coolly walking toward him with a gun in his hand. The kid dropped his basketball, and it rolled away. He raised both hands in the air. I guess he thought we were robbing him. But without saying a word, Chuck shot the fucker in the face. I don't know what kind of gun it was. It was too dark for me to tell, but whatever it was totally blew the kid's face apart. He went down like a sack of cement."
Jones smiled again and then shook his head, apparently enjoying the memory.
"The gunshot seemed like the loudest thing I'd ever heard. It reverberated off the cement buildings, and I heard it echo. I gotta admit: I was pretty scared. I was also stoned on acid, so I was getting pretty fucking paranoid at this point. But Chuck walked back to the car, slow as could be, and got in. He calmly put the gun back under his seat. Then he turned to me. There was a wild look in his eyes, but he was grinning ear to ear. 'Well, that was fun,' he said. Then we drove away."
