photo by Alex Lear

CRY, CRY, CRY

PART THREE: ALL I COULD DO WAS CRY

GO HERE FOR PART ONE: I WON’T CRY

GO HERE FOR PART TWO: A MAN AIN’T SUPPOSE TO CRY 

Even though her mouth was empty, Rita savored the crunchy flavor of animal cookies, old time animal cookies made with real vanilla. Her son laid out in a casket and here she was thinking about snacks. But that was because animal cookies were Sammy’s favorite.

            When he was small, Rita would gallop the shapes up Sammy’s little round stomach moving the crisply baked dough in bounding leaps. Usually the miniature animals ended up between Sammy’s laughing lips.

            His fat cheeks dimpled with a grin, Sammy would squirm in Rita’s lap, turn and clap his small hands in glee as he chomped down on the golden tan figures. Sometimes he’d cry out in mock pain when a bear would take a really hard jump and end up bounding over Sammy’s head into Rita’s mouth. Animal crackers and funerals.

            Now little Gloria, twenty-three and a half months old, sat in Rita’s lap. Tyronne sat silently next to her. Gloria squirmed briefly. Without really hearing a word he said, Rita patiently endured Pastor White droning on and on. Out of the corner of her eye, Rita stole a glance at Sammy’s corpse laying in the coffin. Taking in that awful stillness, Rita’s instinct took over: she protectively hugged Gloria, bowed her dark face into the well oiled coiffure of her daughter’s carefully cornrowed hair and planted a silent kiss deep between the black, thick, kinky rows of hair on the top of Gloria’s head.

            Rita was beginning to doubt life was worth living, worth sacrificing and saving… for what, for to have children who get shot down. What sense did it make to be a mother and outlive your children?

            Two deacons moved forward and flanked the coffin. Like passing through a room where the television was on but no one was watching and the sound off, Rita was aware the men were there to lower the coffin lid but she really paid no attention to the dark suited sentinels. Rita had long ago said good-bye and there was no need to drag this out. The elder of the church appointed guardians efficiently closed the blue velvet trimmed coffin lid. Someone two rows to the rear of Rita uttered a soft but audible “Oh, my Lord.” The lamentation cut clearly through the reverent silence that had settled on the small congregation. This was the end of the wake but only the beginning of a very long and sleepless night.

            Friends and acquaintances shuffled slowly, very slowly, out of the sanctuary into the small vestibule where people lined up to script their condolences in one of Sammy’s school notebooks that had been set out on a podium. There was a pencil sitting in the middle of the book. A few people had signed in ball-point pen, but most signatures (some were written in large block letters, others in an indecipherable cursive script) were scripted with the pencil’s soft lead and seemed to fade immediately upon writing.

            Rita looked up. “No, that couldn’t be,” she thought to herself. That couldn’t be Paul “Snowflake” Moore darkening the sanctity of her sorrow. Rita instantly shifted the sleeping weight of Gloria from her shoulder. Wordlessly Rita handed Gloria to Tyronne. Tyronne had already seen Snowflake and knew a confrontation was in the making. In one seamless motion, as soon as Tyronne received Gloria into his large hands, he spun on his heels and handed Gloria to the first older woman he saw. By the time Tyronne turned back to Rita, Rita was already in Snowflake’s face.

            “Get out of here!” Rita hissed between tightly clenched teeth. “You the…”

            “I just come to pay my respects. I ain’t come to cause no trouble.”

            “You don’t respect nobody.”

            By now the packed anteroom crackled with dread. The woman who had taken Gloria scurried back into the sanctuary, just a few months ago she had witnessed a fight break out at a funeral. Tyronne rushed behind Rita who was oblivious to her back up towering above her. With the arrogance of power, Snowflake stoically stood his ground and impassively peered at Rita and Tyronne. Suddenly the tension increased.

            “Get out,” Rita screamed and pushed Snowflake hard in his chest. Snowflake glowered. She was fortunate that this was a wake, that Sammy was her son and might even be related to him, fortunate that a lot of people were standing there watching, but most all, fortunate that none of Snowflake’s usual retinue was surrounding him because then Snowflake would have been bound, at the very least, to slap her down. As it was, Snowflake’s hand instinctively went to his .38 derringer snug but ready  in the waist-pocket of his vest.

            The confrontation escalated so fast the onlookers barely had time to breath in and out, in fact, a few of the younger men were holding their breath. Surely Snowflake wasn’t going to accept being pushed around without doing something in retaliation. Tyronne quickly stepped between the antagonists.

            “She’s upset, you understand. Please, leave her be. We appreciate your concern but it would be better, man, if you would leave.” Tyronne stared unflinchingly into the depths of Snowflake’s emotionless eyes. Snowflake stared back and pulled an empty hand out of his vest pocket.

            Everybody, except Tyronne, Snowflake and Rita, prematurely relaxed and let out a relieved breath.

            “I said get out!” Rita screamed a second time. The deacon who had closed the coffin lid ran to the phone to dial 911. Half the people who had been standing around now quickly moved out, some exiting the front door, others retreating back into the sanctuary. Rita reached around Tyronne in another attempt to shove Snowflake toward the door.

            The rest happened so quickly only Tyronne and Snowflake saw it all. Tyronne took a swift half-step to his right to cut off Rita charging around him. He leaned backward briefly, pushing against Rita with his shoulders.

            Snowflake’s left hand leapt with lizard rapidity to knock away Rita’s outstretched right arm and in the process was detained by Tyronne’s right hand that gripped with a viselike strength and was surprisingly unyielding. An onlooker moaned, “Oh, Lordy, no!”

            “Get out!” Rita’s vehement command overpowered the onlooker’s exclamation.

            Snowflake’s right hand had already come up with his gun at the ready. Tyronne stepped in so close to Snowflake, if Snowflake pulled the trigger there’s no telling what direction the slug would travel: upward into the ceiling, upward into Tyronne’s chest, or upward into Snowflake’s jaw.

            “He got a gun,” some young male voice blurted at the same time Rita was reaching to get around Tyronne so she could sink her nails into Snowflake’s smoothly groomed face. Snowflake pushed his right forearm against Tyronne’s chest attempting to back Tyronne up and simultaneously free his left arm, which Tyronne held secure at the wrist. Not unlike is often the case in impromptu street fights, the peacemaker in the middle was the person in the most danger.

            “Young man, please. Has there not been enough shooting and death,” the pastor said in a calm but insistent voice as he rushed through trying to get to where Rita, Tyronne and Snowflake were locked in an emotional tug of war.

            Rita spit at Snowflake. She missed his face but a glob stuck to the top of Snowflake’s left shoulder. Some older lady fainted but no one paid her any mind because she was too far away from the focal point of the fight. The minister smothered Rita in his protective arms.

            “Can’t you see this woman is grieving over her son.”

            When Reverend White grabbed Rita, Tyronne bear hugged Snowflake and spoke slowly and carefully into Snowflake’s ear. “I’m begging you man. Please don’t shoot my wife. She’s so upset she ain’t got no idea what she’s doing. You can understand her only son is dead and she thinks you had something to do with it. You got the gun. If you got to shoot somebody, shoot me. But please don’t shoot my wife.”

            Snowflake’s gun was pinned between the two men.

            “Will everyone please either leave out the front door or join me in the sanctuary where we will pray for sister Rita.” Reverend White physically picked up Rita in his embrace and carried her out of immediate danger. Supporting her with firm grips under her arms, two ushers grabbed the woman who had briefly fainted and spirited her out into the welcomed chill of the night air.

            The whole scene had been acted out so quickly, it seemed like a blur of simultaneous motion. Within ninety-five seconds, Snowflake and Tyronne were alone in the forlorn vestibule.

            “Thank you,” Tyronne said as he stepped back half a step, reached into his lapel pocket, pulled out the white handkerchief and gently dabbed Rita’s spittle off of Snowflake’s cashmere jacket. “Thank you.”

            It sounded so, so insane, but that was all Tyronne could think to say to the man standing in the receiving area of the church and holding a loaded gun gleaming beneath the chandelier lights. From inside the sanctuary the 23rd Psalm seeped through the swinging doors. Reverend White lead and the assembled congregation responded with a tremulous sincerity. “…Yeh, though I walk through…”

***

            “Yeah, what up?”

            Rita almost dropped the phone. It was Snowflake. She quietly hung up. So, it was just like she thought. Snowflake was behind it all.

            Here it was two weeks after the funeral and only now had Rita finally been able to summon the strength to clean out Sammy’s closet.

            When Rita pulled the closet door open, Sammy’s scent assaulted her. She buckled at the knees and had to grab the door sill with one hand and push hard against the door knob with the other hand just to keep from falling. It was like Sammy was hiding in the closet and came charging out when she opened it.

            Rita started to close the closet door. She couldn’t stand anymore. Her intruding into Sammy’s life had already gotten him killed. Rita blanked out momentarily.

            When she recovered consciousness, Rita was kneeling on one knee inside the closet door. This was as close to a breakdown as she had allowed herself to come.

            What was really fueling Rita’s weakness at this moment was the indescribable mantle of guilt which refused to lift. She had taken the money out of Sammy’s backpack because she wanted to talk him into stopping. He did. His death stopped everything. And the money, well, four thousand dollars barely paid for the funeral.

            Rita heard some sound behind her, turned to look over her shoulder and saw Tyronne standing in the doorway, his brow deeply furrowed in pain.

            “I’m all right. I was just going to clean out his closet and…” How do you explain to a man that a mother knows how her child smells, that you could identify his clothes blindfolded, that opening this closet door was like finding the secret place your child’s death had not yet visited, the place where the child was still overpoweringly present? How does a mother tell a stepfather that the smell of dirty clothes piled on a closet floor knocked you to your knees?

            “If you want me to help, I’ll be in the front room,” Tyronne said quietly. Then, after waiting a few moments and hearing no response to his offer, Tyronne turned and left the room even more quietly than he had entered.

            Tyronne was trying so hard to be helpful, and patient, and considerate. But, Rita knew, the details and the ultimate impact of all of this was way beyond Tyronne’s understanding. So much of this reality was based on events Rita would never reveal to Tyronne, such as the fact that Sammy’s father was Silas Moore, Snowflake’s oldest brother, and that Rita and Snowflake knew each other in ways hard to explain outside of the situation within which the particulars arose.

            “Stand up baby, show this boy what a woman look like.”

            “Silas, I don’t have any cloth… Silas, I’m naked.”

            “I know you naked. This my little brother. He ain’t nothing but ten years old and he ain’t never even seen no pussy.”

            “I done seen it before.”

            “Yeah, when?”

            “Joanne showed me her thing.”

            “Who you talking bout?”

            “Joanne, dat live cross the hall.”

            And Silas had laughed at Paul. “Bo-Bo, that ain’t no pussy. Bet she ain’t even got no hair on it good yet. How old that girl is?”

            “She eight and it’s still pussy, it just girl pussy.”

            “Yeah, well I’m talking about real pussy. I’m talking about a woman’s pussy. Rita stand up and show this boy what a woman’s pussy look like.”

            “Sil, I don’t want to.”

            “Do it for me, baby.”

            “She ain’t got to show me nuthin’, I done seen pussy befo’.”

            “Rita, I said stand up.”

            As Rita remembers standing up, she turns around to see if Tyronne is still standing there looking at her, but Tyronne is gone. Rita lowers herself into a sitting position in the closet doorway and another wave of memories flood over her.

            When she was seventeen the fact that twenty-two year old Silas “Silky Sil” Moore considered her a woman filled Rita with pride. Sil was the biggest player in the courtyard. He always had money—had a big car and could have any woman he wanted, and he wanted Rita.

            “Why you like me?”

            “Look here Rita, let me give you some good advice. When you hit a streak a good luck, don’t question why. Just ride it long as it last, and when the luck leave you, get up off it and be thankful you got what you did.”

            “You saying you gon leave me?”

            “Naw, baby, I’m saying life is like the weather, it’s always changing. Sooner or later, everything gon change.”

            “I ain’t gon never stop loving you.”

            “Now nah, girl, you can’t say that. Don’t be judging tomorrow by what’s happening today. Suppose, I take to liking another girl? Would you still love me?”

            “As long as it was liking and not loving, what I care. My love for you ain’t got nothing to do with you liking or not liking somebody else.”

            “You don’t sound like no seventeen year old. That’s one of the reasons I likes you.”

            “Yeah, and what’s another reason?”

            “Come here, I can show you better than I can tell you.”          

            Rita could see her silly little seventeen year old self trying to act so womanish, and really doing nothing but being a stone fool for a man who was just using her.

            No matter how hard she tried, Rita could never forget that day. Sil pulled her close and kissed her. As her tongue flickered into his mouth, he sucked it hard almost to the point of hurting her and then released her.

            Sil unbuckled his pants and let them drop at his feet. He slid his shorts down and sat on the side of his bed. “You want a mouthful of this,” he said while guiding her hand to his erect penis?

            Rita knelt quickly and started to give him head—she knew he like the way she did it. She practiced doing it, sucking on a banana sometimes for five minutes straight without stopping, strengthening her jaw muscles and other times she would chew five sticks of gum at a time, over and over, and over and over, and over, building up her stamina.

            Some of the girls said they didn’t like it but they had to do it to keep a man, but Rita liked it. She liked feeling him in her mouth and liked the soft, slightly salty taste of his sperm. Like most of the girls she grew up around, Rita knew there were only two ways out for most women, one was to hitch your wagon to a man on the move and the other was to luck up and get a good job if somebody put in a good word for you, or somebody who was related to you got you on somewhere. There generally wasn’t no other way out and usually finding a good job, when all you had was, at best, a public high school diploma, was harder than finding a good man. At least, every young girl had a body and most of them could attract a man for a good six to seven years after they made eighteen. There wasn’t nothing they taught you in high school that lasted that long.

            “Wait a minute baby. Go close the door, this is something for just me and you.”

            When Rita turned away from Sil’s dick and made her first move toward the door, she saw little Paul standing there wide-eyed. She never said a word to him and just closed the door in his face.

            How could she tell Tyronne about all of that?

            By the time Rita had discovered she was pregnant, she and Sil had already broken up. Her turn was over and it was time for another high school cutie to hang on Sil. By the time Samuel was born, Sil was in prison. Rita didn’t even bother trying to contact him. You ride it til it’s through and when it’s over you let it go.

            Rita snapped completely back to the present and began pulling clothes, boxes and whatnot out of the closet, setting them on the floor beside her in three distinct piles. One pile was clothes she would give away. One pile was stuff she would throw away, sneakers, two old pair of underwear, stuff like that, and a third pile—well, not really a pile, just a couple of things—a third stack was memorabilia she would keep. Sammy’s drawing notebooks mainly and a neat stack of comic books he liked to read. Rita didn’t know why she felt it important to keep the short stack of comic books but somehow these things reminded her of Sammy more than even his picture on the bedroom dresser.

            Rita lovingly looked through Sammy’s notebooks. He had two that were full and one only partially complete. The partially complete one had the best drawings and also had a phone number written on the inside cover.

            She had noticed the number immediately, because, unlike everything else in the notebook, the number was written in ink and underlined.

            Maybe this number held the key to who killed Sammy? Rita believed it was Snowflake but she had no proof.

***

            “Girl, he like you. Look how he looking at you.”

            “LaToya, I got a baby already. Less he ready to be a daddy and a lover, I don’t even want to hear nothing.”

            “Girl, he kinda cute. I wish he would look at me like that.”

            “Yeah. Whatever.”

            “What you mean, ‘whatever.’ That man got a job. He a security guard.”

            “Yeah, and since he got a job, he probably got a woman.”

            Rita and LaToya went up to the window together to cash their Shoney’s pay checks. LaToya kept eyeing Tyronne. He was kind of build too. LaToya cashed her check first and stepped away while Rita cashed hers.

            When they got outside, LaToya burst out laughing.

            “Girl, what’s so funny?”

            “You gon see.”

            “No, tell me now. What up?”

            “You gon see, when he call you.”

            “When who call me?”

            “Tyronne.”

            “Tyronne who? What you talking about?”

            “I’m talking about that security guard in the bank who had them juicy lips.”

            “Call me…what you talking about? He don’t even know me.”

            “Well he got your number.”

            “How he got my number?”

            “Cause while you was cashing your check, I told him that you liked-ded him but you was shy and that you told me to give him your number.”

            “No, you didn’t.”

            “586-8540. Rita Deslonde.”

            “Oh, you wrong for that,” Rita said and chased LaToya a quarter of the way down the block.

            Holding Tyronne’s revolver in her hand, Rita had to smile as she thought back to how they had gotten together. He had called. He had asked for a date, and Rita decided he was all right when he didn’t hesitate about taking her and her eleven year old son, Samuel, to the Audubon Zoo for their first date.

            What she liked most about Tyronne is he wasn’t afraid to talk to her about his life—how he felt about his experiences, and not only what his dreams were but also what his fears were.

            “So, Tyronne, I can’t believe you don’t have a girlfriend already.”

            “Believe it or not, it’s true.”

            “How come?”

            “I guess cause a lot of girls think I’m kind of square or something.”

            “Well, after what all I done seen, square seems kind of nice to me.”

            “We’ll see.”

            Rita smiled thinking about just how square Tyronne actually was. He wasn’t much of a lover. He would roll on top of her and be through almost as soon as they got started. But that was ok, she could teach him how to take his time.

            She also had to teach him how to get high. He said he never like smoking “that stuff” all that much. With him around, a nickel bag lasted a long time. They might smoke once a week or so. Gradually, Rita just gave it up, unless they were under a lot of stress.

            The only thing they ever fought about was keeping a gun in the house. Rita knew keeping a gun went hand in hand with being a security guard but she just didn’t like the idea of a gun in the house with children who were always snooping into everything. Finally, Tyronne hit on the idea of keeping the gun in a lock box. She had a key and Tyronne had a key. Rita could live with that.

            Rita slid Tyronne’s gun into her purse, closed the box, covered it back up with clothing and slid the second dresser drawer fully close. Then Rita turned around in the dim bedroom. It would soon be dusk. She had no words to tell Tyronne about Sammy, about Sammy’s father—well she had told Tyronne that Sammy was the result of a brief fling when she was seventeen years old and that she had never told the man that he was Sammy’s father. That was true. However, Rita hadn’t told Tyronne that Silas Moore was Sammy’s father or that Silas was in prison. Nor, of course, had she told Tyronne that Snowflake was Silas’ baby brother and that Snowflake and Rita knew each other. New Orleans was such a small town, all the poor people knew each other, or knew somebody who knew some…

            Her past wasn’t pretty and there was no way she wanted to share the foolishness of her youth with Tyronne. He wouldn’t be able to deal with it. It would haunt him. He was a good man but… well, it would hurt him too much to hear the details of her life. Plus, he had no way of understanding some things. Rita remembered a conversation about a news show on Channel 4.

            “Well, Goddamn, look at that. That girl can’t be no more than sixteen or seventeen and she caught up in a drug ring.”

            “Tee, when it’s all around you…”

            “It was all around me when I grew up. But I mean she’s a girl.”

            “Well the drug dealer is probably her man.”

            “You mean her pimp.”

            “Well sometimes it ain’t about being no prostitute or nothing. Those girls just be starved for affection and those guys give them dresses and jewelry and stuff and they think they’re in love.”

            “Yeah, and after they get pre…”

            “You mean like I got pregnant with Sammy?”

            The question hung in the air for a long time.

            After about a minute of silence, Tyronne spoke up, “So, I guess you’re telling me, you’re like that girl.”

            “No, I’m telling you I understand what that girl is going through and I don’t think you do. I think you see the condition she’s in only from the outside and me, I feel the condition she’s in on the inside.”

            “I guess I’m thinking of how we used to mess over them young girls in Vietnam and it’s hard for me to imagine them growing up and coming out ok after all that stuff…”

            “Well, if you live, you grow up. You got no choice about that. As for it being ok, who’s to say what’s ok?”

            After another long pause, Tyronne looked at Rita. “Baby there’s a whole lot I don’t know, but I know you’re ok and I love you.”

            Tyronne’s love was disarming and sometimes uncomfortable. He was so honest about his own shortcomings and so accepting of hers. Rita used to wish she could start her life over with Tyronne, wish she had met him when she was fourteen instead of meeting Roger, wish she had gone with him in high school instead of Sherman and Bekay, wish she had waited for Tyronne to father Sammy. But what was the use of wishing. Life was what it was, not what you wished it to be. She should just count her blessings and feel lucky she and Tyronne did eventually hook up.

            The whole time they were discussing the girl on Channel 4, Rita had been standing next to the chair where Tyronne liked to sit while watching television. She bent and kissed him lovingly. “I love you back, Tee, with everything I got. I love you too.”

            Everything I got, Rita thought to herself. The rub was there were things she no longer had because they had been taken from her. Rita wished she had those missing things so she could love Tyronne with everything just like he loved her. But that was only a wish, the reality was both more complex and much more repulsive.

            Clearly Tyronne had never been molested as a child, so, he still had some innocence in his loving. Rita had no innocence left. To Rita, the fierce reality of her childhood was unsparing and unforgiving. Rita was certain if Tyronne knew all the sad and sordid things that had happened to Rita and all the silly and stupid things that she had done to herself, no matter how much he loved her, he probably would leave her. Everything in Rita’s life told her, no matter what they said or how much they loved you, men didn’t tolerate their women making too many mistakes and indiscretions, especially if sex was involved. Tyronne was a man and, deep down, probably was no different.

            Plus Tyronne was nice and good-hearted, the very kind of man who always has a hard time dealing with people who fuck up over and over again. Tyronne got upset if she threw a coke cup out the car window, Rita could imagine what would happen if he knew about some of the other things she had thrown out the windows of her life.

            Tyronne believed that most people were basically good and a few  people were evil minded. Rita knew that everybody could go either way, it just depended on the circumstances and what they felt their chances were of getting what they wanted versus getting caught.

            Rita paused briefly in the doorway and hoped everything would be all right for Tyronne. He deserved good things. He was a good man.

            Even though Tyronne had killed as a soldier, Rita could tell, from the way Tee talked about his Nam experiences, Tyronne could never kill anyone in cold blood nor would he be able to understand being a cold-bloodied killer, and that’s why right now she couldn’t share with Tyronne that she had decided she was going to kill Snowflake.

            She wasn’t going to talk about it and she wasn’t going to think about it. She wasn’t even going to cook up no scheme about how she was going to do it. She was just going to do it.

            Some things are best never said, Rita thought to herself as she passed through the front room. It’s bad enough we act on some of the evil thoughts and fucked up desires we have, we don’t have to talk about them; or, at least, that’s how Rita rationalized walking out the door past Tyronne without telling him anything other than, “Tee, I got to get some air. Walk around some. I’ll be back.”

            Tyronne looked at her. He ached to comfort her but knew her well enough to know there were areas of her life she refused to allow him to touch. All he could do was wait, helplessly wait, until she was ready to open to him. “Rita, be careful.”

            “I’m just going for a little walk.” If Rita stopped to say anymore to Tyronne she might not do it. She had to do it now, while the smell of Sammy was still in her nose and the fuck-ups of the past were lingering in her consciousness.

            Twelve blocks later, Rita stood in the gloaming looking at Snowflake’s house across the street. Lights were on. A jeep was in the driveway and a fancy car out front. She knew he was home. He had answered the phone. Then again, maybe he left right after she called. Maybe somebody else was up in there.

            Should she go knock on the door? Should she just stand and wait? Was it safe just to stand on the sidewalk waiting? Maybe he was checking her out right now.

            Sheltered by the darkening dusk, Rita simply waited for something to happen. A light shower began. Rita had had the presence of mind to bring an umbrella and raised it above her head. She stood in the rain for twenty-eight minutes, her eyes fastened to Snowflake’s house. Then she saw the door open. He was standing on the porch locking the door.

            Rita quickly dashed across the street, holding the umbrella in her left hand and reaching into her dangling purse to pull out the revolver with her right hand. She had no plan. She was just going to flat out and out kill him.

            They almost bumped into each other as Snowflake ran toward his BMW. Snowflake had seen the woman running across the street in the rain but had paid her no mine until she was right on top of him.

            “Paul Moore this is for Samuel Deslonde.” Bam. The first shot caught him square in the chest. He had no time to react. The force of the bullet hurled him over the hood of his car. Bam. Bam. Rita stood over Snowflake and shot him twice more. Once in his right side and the other into the back of his right shoulder. He slid off the car, a bleeding heap of inert flesh in the street.

            The rain was steady falling. Rita froze momentarily. Not sure what to do now. She looked around. A few people near the corner were standing under a sweetshop store awning and looking at her. She put the warm pistol back into her purse and swiftly walked away. No one said anything to her as she passed.

            Rita took the long way home and did not stop until she was standing, wet and distraught but dry-eyed, in their living room. When she came in Tyronne rose slowly. He had Gloria in his arms, she was sleeping. He gently set her down in the chair and silently rushed over to Rita.

            He quickly surveyed her from head to toe, wiped her damp hair back from her face and gathered her up in a huge embrace.

            “Tee, I…”

            “Shhhh, shhhhh. Don’t say nothing, baby. Whatever it is we’ll deal with it. I don’t care. We’ll deal with it.”

            “I shot Snowflake.”

            There were so many questions he wanted to ask her. Had anyone seen her? Did anyone follow her? Had it been on the street or in a bar or where? She probably had used his gun, which meant he could probably take the rap if it came down to that. Say he did it. Gloria needed a mama more than a daddy. Besides, probably wasn’t nothing going to happen. The cops never spent too much time looking for who shot a known drug dealer. No matter what happened, they would deal with it.

            Tyronne just hugged her tighter. “I don’t care. All I care about is you back here with me. Whatever happens, we’ll deal with it. Together.”

            Rita buried her face into Tyronne’s shoulder and did something she had not done since she was fifteen and had a train pulled on her at a party—what was worse than the physical pain was how worthless the gang rape made her feel: she cried. She cried and she cried. And she cried.

            It felt good. She cried for twelve long minutes, tears rolling out of her eyes big as Cuff. When Rita finished, Tyronne was still holding her and still whispering into her ear, “no matter what happens, we gon deal with it. We gon deal with it.”

            What started out as tears of pain, were now tears of gratitude. Nobody had ever loved her like this before. Nobody. In the face of such unconditional love, all Rita could do was cry.

THE END

—kalamu ya salaam