Let Me Hear a Rhyme

Jasmine is enjoying dancing in the club, and moves toward dancing on Quadir, when a fight breaks out. Someone has a gun, and a bunch of people get pushed out of the club, including Quadir and Jasmine, who take a taxi back to Brooklyn. They stand outside the bodega to wait for Jarrell, who they hope will meet them there if he’s okay. Quadir attempts to comfort Jasmine, who swats his hand away, and he apologizes. He says they can’t be a couple because she’s Steph’s sister. Jasmine mentally notes that he doesn’t mention Ronnie. Jarrell appears in a cab, and Jasmine tells the boys to either give her the money they made off Steph’s CDs or keep their end of the deal and help her learn who killed him. Otherwise, she says she’ll tell Pierce and her mom the truth.

Jasmine’s mom says they’re moving to Westchester, north of the city, soon. Jasmine worries that if she doesn’t learn who killed Steph before they move, nobody ever will.

Monday morning after the club, Jarrell keeps track of how much money they’ve made in the back of one of Steph’s notebooks of rhymes. A New York Police Department business card for Detective Paul Vasquez falls out of the notebook. Jarrell questions whether Steph was a police informant. Mack appears, offering to give Jarrell a ride to school, because he also has something to discuss with him. Jarrell drops his twin brothers at their nearby school then gets in Mack’s car.

Mack asks what Jarrell’s been up to. Jarrell says he’s not selling drugs. Mack says he knows that—if Jarrell was selling drugs, Mack would have already had him killed. Jarrell asks if Mack knows who murdered Steph. He says he doesn’t, and if he finds out, he’ll kill them. Jarrell isn’t sure he believes Mack. Recently, Mack has been encouraging Jarrell to attend college, and he brings it up again now, offering to help pay for it and to give him a job after he graduates. Jarrell says he’s not sure about college. He gets out of the car and heads to school.

Ronnie gives Jarrell a box of Quadir’s stuff, which she no longer wants. Jarrell looks confused, so she explains they broke up. Jarrell’s hurt Quadir didn’t tell him. He asks why Ronnie can’t give Quadir the box herself. She says he’s not at school today, because he’s visiting Bishop instead, and plans to use the money they’re making to pay his Bishop tuition and college tuition. Jarrell is even more hurt that Quadir kept these secrets from him as well.

At Bishop, Quadir goes to classes with a basketball player, then attends practice. Afterward, Jasmine meets Quadir at his request and says Pierce wants Fast Pace and the Architect to collaborate on a song. Jasmine thinks it’s probably time to tell Pierce the truth. Jasmine asks Quadir how Bishop was, and if Ronnie will be switching schools with him. He says it was nice but he’s not dating Ronnie anymore. As they continue to walk, Jasmine leads Quadir somewhere. He keeps asking where they’re going when they arrive at the place where Steph was killed, behind a building.

Steph’s body was found behind the building, and he’d been shot from a close distance, suggesting the person who killed him could clearly see who he was and didn’t shoot him by accident. Jasmine thinks it was probably someone who knew Steph, not a stranger. Kaven’s studio, which was probably where Steph was recording, is nearby. Jasmine thinks Steph probably owed money to whichever drug dealer he was working for, and that person saw him leaving Kaven’s, then killed him. She thinks the culprit is the guy with acne and braids from Coney Island. Quadir says Steph didn’t sell drugs. Jasmine says he probably sold drugs to help their mom out after their dad died. Jasmine wants to see Kaven’s security camera footage to check if they can see Steph leaving the studio, and/or see the murderer.

Quadir reveals that the vials of crack cocaine in Steph’s room were actually Quadir’s, not Steph’s. Quadir was supposed to sell it, but Steph found it and took it so Quadir wouldn’t keep going down that path. Jasmine is furious that Quadir allowed her to believe her brother was selling crack even though she was horrified by this idea. He claims he planned on telling her eventually. Jasmine asks if anyone else knew Steph had the crack. Quadir says no. He won’t tell Jasmine where he got the crack. Jasmine is disappointed in Quadir, but more importantly, she’s devastated because if her brother wasn’t killed over drug money, she thinks it was actually her fault he was murdered.

The boys hang out at a different park rather than their usual courtyard. Quadir wanted to come here for some reason that the other two don’t understand. Steph and Jarrell feel uncomfortable in the new park, where people are having a family reunion. Quadir wants to join a basketball game, when Steph notices that another boy nods subtly at Quadir. Steph opens Quadir’s backpack and finds the drugs. He’s furious, and Quadir says his family needs money. Steph makes enough of a scene so that the stranger he was looking for silently cancels the drug deal because it would be too risky. Steph then takes Quadir’s backpack and tells him to go home.

Quadir runs into Jarrell, who has new, expensive shoes. Quadir says they’re not supposed to spend the money from Steph’s CDs yet. Jarrell asks Quadir how Bishop was, implying that Quadir is being hypocritical because he was considering using the money to pay his tuition. Quadir points out that he hasn’t actually done this yet. Jarrell says he also saw Jasmine pass by, crying, and that Quadir has been keeping too many secrets from him. Jarrell thinks they can still make a song with Steph and Fast Pace together, using a new recording from Fast Pace and an old recording of Steph. Quadir thinks it’s time to tell the truth. Jarrell accuses Quadir of quitting as soon as he has enough money for school, but Jarrell wants to keep going. Quadir says Jasmine wouldn’t allow it. Jarrell says Quadir claims to do this for Steph but he’s really just “creeping” on Jasmine, which Steph wouldn’t want. Jarrell is mad that Quadir isn’t being honest with him.

Quadir goes home and talks to his mom, who also says Quadir tells a lot of “white lies.” She thinks he’s trying to protect people by lying, but he should try telling the truth instead, because the truth will yield results, without the collateral damage and confusion that lies tend to cause.

Jasmine comes home late one night, and Steph asks where she’s been. She says she was at a concert. He knows she’s lying so she confesses she was with the Guerillas. She likes the Guerillas because of their commitment to Black power and how they make her feel like she belongs. Steph says this is a telltale sign of gangs—to make the person feel like nobody else besides the gang accepts or understands them. He says that this is also what their father said about gang groups like the Guerillas. Jasmine says their father is dead now, but if she joins the gang, at least she won’t be left alone. She’s already started the initiation process and they won’t let her just quit. She’s supposed to fight another girl as a test. Steph says he’ll fix the situation and tells Jasmine to steer clear of the Guerillas for now.

It’s Black Friday. Quadir apologizes for withholding the truth from Jasmine. He tells her that he got the drugs he was selling from Mack and that he did it because his mom needed money, and Ronnie expected a lot financially. Jasmine points out that crack cocaine ravages communities. Quadir says he had his own family’s well-being to worry about. Jasmine asks if Jarrell knows about his attempt to sell, but Quadir says Steph was the only one who knew. Steph took Quadir’s stash of drugs so he couldn’t sell them, but Ronnie gave Quadir the money to pay off his debt. Nobody knew Steph took the drugs from Quadir, so the murder couldn’t have been about the drugs.

Jasmine says she’s worried it’s her fault: She was joining the Guerillas, but Steph intervened so she wouldn’t have to continue. She’s afraid the Guerillas are behind Steph’s death. Quadir says killing Black people goes against the Guerillas’ ideology, so they probably didn’t kill Steph. Quadir says it’s not Jasmine’s fault, that he still isn’t sure whose fault it is, and that he promises they’ll find out. They kiss.

Jarrell hangs out in the library during study hall even though he normally hangs out in the halls with Quadir. Quadir is meeting with counselors about possibly transferring to Bishop. Jarrell overhears two other kids discussing how much they love the Architect’s music and how nobody knows his identity yet. The kids are convinced by Steph’s lyrics about how keeping quiet about murders is actually bad. The kids debate if he’s like Superman or Spider-Man; Jarrell jumps in to say he’s Batman because Batman is just a regular, local person doing amazing things to save the city.

Later, Quadir and Jarrell meet up to apologize for arguing with each other. Quadir admits that he didn’t think they’d succeed with Steph’s music, and that he wants to be a writer. Jarrell shares that he wants to join the music industry one day and be like Pierce.

Quadir and Jarrell go meet Fast Pace and Pierce, who is once again mad that the Architect isn’t with them. Fast Pace says he heard the Architect is a police informant and is responsible for many arrests. Fast Pace doesn’t want to do the song with the Architect anymore and Jarrell contests the claim that Steph was a snitch. Fast Pace advises Pierce not to sign the Architect because this would cause problems with other hip-hop artists on the label. He then threatens to quit the label if Pierce does sign the Architect. However, he also heard the Architect is dead, but if he’s not, this will be a problem for Fast Pace.

In order to settle the issue, Pierce announces there will be a rap battle between the Architect and Fast Pace that night at the Tunnel. If Fast Pace wins, Pierce won’t sign the Architect. If the Architect wins, Pierce keeps both rappers on the label and Fast Pace won’t cause any problems. Fast Pace agrees to this challenge. Pierce tells everyone to leave so he can attend his next meeting.

On the way out, Fast Pace privately asks Jarrell and Quadir how long they plan on continuing their game. Fast Pace plays them the original recording of one of Steph’s songs, and they don’t know how he got it. Jarrell rushes at Fast Pace as if to fight him. Fast Pace hits him and knocks him down, and says that if Steph is still alive, he should beware. Fast Pace leaves.

The boys debate how Fast Pace knows details about Steph. They agree to call the police officer from Steph’s business card as a starting point, to find out if he was really an informant and any other useful information the officer might know. When Quadir asks why Jarrell tried to fight Fast Pace, Jarrell reveals that he did it to steal the tape from Fast Pace, so they’ll listen to it later.