Through the Storm

by Vanessa Miller

  Valerie didn’t hesitate. “Tonight,” she told him.

  With a self-assured smile on his face, Isaac nodded his head and replied, “That’s what I thought.”

  Lydia asked Keith, “What about you? When are we going to take the next step?”

  Keith shook his head. “Oh no, I’m not in this mess. The last woman I lived with was my Mama and I didn’t like the way she kept house. It’s going to take me a long time to get over that.”

  The group laughed, but Isaac knew the truth. Keith didn’t want to live with just any woman. He wanted to live with his wife. The boy should have never become a hustler as far as Isaac was concerned. He should have been a professor or a minister; some occupation where people followed the rules and lived honorable lives.

  “Don’t listen to him,” Isaac slurred. “My boy don’t believe in shacking up. He believes in marriage and picket fences; three kids and two car garages.”

  “Shut up, Isaac,” Keith said while squirming in his seat.

  Valerie told Keith, “There’s nothing wrong with wanting all that. I think it’s beautiful.” She hit Isaac in the arm and said, “I just happen to be with a man who doesn’t care about love and commitment.”

  Isaac rubbed his arm. “Didn’t I just commit to you? How many other women do you think I’ve moved into my house?”

  Valerie didn’t answer.

  “None, that’s how many,” Isaac answered for her.

  “I’m sorry,” Valerie said sarcastically. “I didn’t realize how blessed I was.”

  “What are you talking that blessed stuff for? That sounds like church and I’m too drunk to hear about church stuff,” Isaac told her.

  “Well, you’re going to hear about church stuff around me, Isaac Walker. I grew up in the church and I’m not about to forget that just to please you,” Valerie told him.

  She was feisty. Isaac liked that. He thought they would do nicely together until something better came along anyway. “Let’s go home,” Isaac said.

  “All right, but I’m driving. You and Keith are too drunk to get behind the wheel of a car that I’m in,” Valerie told them. Isaac handed over the keys and got in on the passenger side. Keith and Lydia got in the back and Valerie drove them to Keith’s place.

  When Keith and Lydia got out, Isaac told Valerie, “You drive good. What kind of car do you want me to buy you?”

  “Are you serious?” Valerie asked.

  Isaac leaned his head against the window, and with a drunken goofy expression on his face that he had mistaken for cool, he asked, “Do I look like I’m joking?”

  Valerie laughed. “You don’t want me to tell you what you look like right now. But I’ll take a red BMW.”

  “Done!” Isaac shouted. “We’ll pick it up tomorrow.” And they did, right before Isaac and Keith’s meeting with the rest of the top street hustlers. So Isaac drove Valerie’s BMW to the meeting and she drove his Navigator to her apartment and loaded it with her clothes.

  At their meeting, however, things did not go as smoothly for Isaac, as moving a woman into his house and buying her a car to put a smile on her face did. No one smiled as Isaac and Keith glanced around the table. Spoony was at the head, Brown was on his right. To Spoony’s left was Stevie Johnson, a carrier turned top-dog once Marko’s organization had been destroyed. Two other cats were at the table. On Brown’s left was another old school hustler named Shinny Watson and next to Stevie was Pete Jones, a guy who came up along side Isaac. He just wasn’t closing as many deals as Isaac of late, but whose fault was that?

  “Isaac, your take has doubled in the last year, and some of the brothers here think that you are trying to take over.” Spoony told him.

  “Have I ever taken anything from you, Spoony?” Isaac asked. Spoony didn’t answer so Isaac asked another question. “And don’t I still bring all my business to you? So why haven’t you already told these cats to lay off?”

  Brown said, “Look here, Sonny-”

  Isaac turned his cold black eyes on Brown and said, “You ain’t my daddy, and I’m not your son. I’m a man, and if I speak to you respectfully, I expect the same in return. Understand?”

  Brown stood up and exploded. “Boy, I will slit your throat. How’s that for respect?”

  Spoony touched Brown’s arm and said, “Brown, man, we came here to discuss this like reasonable men. Sit down, please.”

  Brown flopped back into his seat as he told Spoony, “You just better tell your boy to check his self, before I do it for him.”

  Stevie put his elbows on the table and tried his hand at intimidation. “Isaac, people are concerned.”

  Brown added, “And we are all a little worried about your family’s safety. People are getting uptight, thinking that you and Keith are earning money that should have been theirs. Anything could happen.”

  Isaac wanted to laugh in Brown’s face. The only family he had left was his usually-wrong daddy and he would gladly give up the address to Usually-Wrong’s house if they wanted to do him a favor and kill that maggot. Thank God and good riddance was how Isaac saw it.

  But Keith was another matter. He stood up and told them, “If you think I’m going to sit here and listen to you threaten my family, you’ve got another thought coming. Bring it on,” Keith said as he strutted to the door and waited on Isaac to join him.

  Isaac slowly rose out of his chair, understanding he had now entered a game of winner take all – loser eat six feet of dirt. He nodded at Spoony and said, “I’ll see you around.”

  Spoony nodded back with a look on his face that said, “I sure hope so.”

  Over the next three months, Isaac and Keith’s cars were bombed. Their homes were riddled with bullets, so they started moving from hotel to hotel. Their runners were gunned down in the street. Isaac and Keith went to war and hit them harder than they were hit. By the end of that three month period, Stevie, Shinny and Pete were no longer of this world. The only two that were at that round table meeting left alive besides Isaac and Keith were Spoony and Brown. Spoony had arranged a meeting with Isaac and Brown and had them both agree to end the war. Isaac willingly agreed to stay on his side of town and leave Brown to his side. And with that, it was over. But, just when Isaac and Keith thought they could breathe easy again, two things happened.

  Leonard came home when Isaac was at Clara’s bringing some money to help with the bills. He’d stolen her bill money that month and the month before and they were getting ready to be evicted. Leonard walked over to Isaac as he sat at the kitchen table playing with his godson and said, “I miss you, man. How you just gon’ drop me like this when we supposed to be boys.”

  Isaac handed the baby back to Clara and told Leonard, “There’s no place in my organization for crack-heads.”

  Leonard started jumping around the kitchen like a man without hope, flailing his long arms and kicking in the air. He turned back to Isaac and pulled at his worn and tattered clothes and asked, “Do you think I want to be like this?”

  “We warned you more times than I can count about sampling the product. Is it my fault that you wouldn’t listen?”

  Leonard walked over to Isaac and got on his knees. “Help me, man. Don’t you see me? Look at me, Isaac. I need help!”

  Isaac was saddened by the man that knelt before him. Leonard’s cheeks were sunken and he had the ashened look that crack-heads get. His boy had sunken low and Isaac sat on the sidelines while it happened. “I’ll tell you what,” Isaac began. “If you agree to go to rehab, then I’ll have your back all the way.”

  Leonard stood up and stepped away from Isaac. “Aw man, them rehabs don’t work. Why you want to make me waste time like that when I could be back on the block helping you?”

  “If you’re serious about getting clean, it’ll work. Take it or leave it.”

  Leonard tried to reason with Isaac, but Isaac,grabbed his keys and walked out of the house with one last parting remark to Leonard. “Have Clara call me when you check into rehab. I’ll send you some ro
ses.”

  Isaac received a call from Joey, one of his runners. Joey told him that Keith needed to get over to his mother’s apartment asap. Isaac got Keith on the phone and told him, “Man, you need to get over to your mom’s place. Something has happened.”

  “I told you I don’t want to be bothered by her drama anymore.” Keith said.

  “You need to get over there, Keith. One of my runners just called and told me that the ambulance and police are at her place.”

  When they hung up, Isaac sped towards Ms. Doretha’s apartment on the lower South Side. He pulled up at the same time Keith did. He watched as Keith jumped out of his car and ran up to one of the police officers. Then Keith turned and watched the paramedics bringing the bed out of the apartment with a body bag on top of it. He ran over to them. The police officer followed, trying to hold him back.

  “Get off me, man. That’s my Mama,” Keith yelled as he trod forward.

  The paramedics set the ambulatory bed down and stood in front of it, waving Keith away. “You don’t want to see her now, sir,” One of them told him.

  Isaac ran over to Keith and tried to pull him away also. But Keith jerked away. “I have a right to know if that is my mother.” Keith pointed at the body bag.

  “She’s been cut up, man. Don’t do this to yourself,” the other police officer said.

  Keith grabbed the bag and quickly unzipped it before he could be stopped by anyone. A thin arm fell out, but Keith wasn’t looking at the arm. He was looking into the slashed and bloody face of Doretha Williams. He put his arms around her and became covered in blood because her chest was cut up as well. Keith didn’t notice how bloody he was becoming. He just wanted to hold his mother one last time. “I’m sorry. You hear me?” he asked her. “I’m sorry.”

  Isaac pulled Keith off of his mother so the paramedics could close the bag back up. Keith tried to fall back on the body, but Isaac grabbed him. Tears were streaming down Keith’s face as Isaac hugged him. Isaac’s own mother had been carried out by the paramedics covered in blood. So as they hugged, Isaac and Keith became forever bonded in blood.

  “Come on, man. Let me take you home,” Isaac said.

  “No. I can’t leave her like this, Isaac. She needs me, man.”

  “You’ve got to get out of here. Let these people do their job.” Isaac tried to pull Keith away again, and this time Keith allowed him. He took Keith over to his car and opened the passenger side door for him. “Get in, Keith. I’ll have Valerie come pick up your car.”

  Keith sat in the car numbly as Isaac drove. He then clenched his fist and smashed it against the dashboard. “Brown did this. I know it in my gut.”

  Isaac didn’t say anything, but he had been thinking over the probability of Brown having something to do with Keith’s mother’s death. Ms. Doretha had been prostituting to get her drugs. Anyone could have done this as far as Isaac was concerned.

  “We should have killed him right along with the rest of them.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you what,” Isaac said. “Let’s check into it, and if Brown had something to do with this, then his family will finally get to cash in his insurance policy.

  ***

  As it turned out, the killer just about begged the police to come and get him. He’d left his fingerprints all over Doretha’s apartment and body and bragged to numerous friends about the murder. Michael Hopkins was arrested in a coffee shop that was owned by Brown. And it was no wonder that the murderer was arrested at Brown’s coffee shop, since he was one of Brown’s top soldiers.

  Keith and Isaac were watching the news while Valerie fixed steaks for them. The arrest was televised, so after watching Michael Hopkins get carted out of Brown’s coffee shop, Isaac and Keith looked at each other and nodded. That night they went out in search of Brown and whoever might try to get in their way. They found him at Fat Al’s juke joint. It was ten at night so there were only four people in the joint; Fat Al, Brown and two of Brown’s henchmen. Brown was sitting at a back table sucking on a barbecue rib bone. His men were at the bar. Isaac and Keith sat at Brown’s table and trained their guns on him from underneath the table.

  “Isaac told Brown, “You shouldn’t have done it.”

  Brown put his barbecue down and asked, “What are you talking about?”

  “We hadn’t tried to move in on your operation. We hadn’t bothered anything of yours, but the way you had Keith’s mother cut up.” Isaac shook his head and then finished with, “We can’t let that go.”

  Brown turned to Keith. “I didn’t do anything to your mother. Don’t act crazy and get yourself killed in here.”

  “Brave talk for a dead man,” Isaac said.

  Brown laughed in Isaac’s face. “Man, get out of here before you get hurt.”

  “We never forgot how you warned us about our family, Brown,” Keith said.

  “And now we’ve got a warning for you,” Isaac said, and then pulled the trigger and shot Brown in the gut.

  Brown began lifting out of his chair. “You can’t shoot me,” he said.

  But Isaac must not have understood him because he lifted his gun and shot him again; this time in the head. As Brown fell face forward on top of his barbecue, Keith shot two of Brown’s henchmen as they tried to pull out their guns.

  “What’s up, Fat Al,” Isaac asked as he pointed his gun at him.

  Fat Al raised his hands. “I’m not taking sides, Ike-man. I’ve got a family and I just want to get out of here and see them again.”

  “You remember your family when the police ask you about this. Okay?” Isaac said as he and Keith backed out the door.

  Chapter 26

  Present Day

  Cynda had gone back into the hospital late Saturday night after she passed out. Keith didn’t know what else to do but dial 911. By Sunday morning, Cynda had been pumped full of morphine and was feeling no pain. Iona sat next to her mother’s bed watching and praying. Keith and the boys were there as well. The hospital staff kept giving them that understanding mournful look that they give to family members who don’t have much time left with their loved one. Iona ignored them. Her mother and her father’s God was now her God and she believed He could do anything but fail. She leaned in close to Cynda and asked, “Do you want us to get your posters and put them on the walls of your hospital room?”

  Cynda shook her head. “I want to go home. I’ll wait on the rapture,” she said in a whisper.

  Iona knew her mother was a little loopy from all the pain medication being pumped into her body, but she was still of a mind to declare her faith in a God who could do the impossible. Iona admired this woman more than she ever had; and hoped to grow up to be just like her.

  Iona moved over to Keith and asked in a low voice, “Do you think we can get her out of here?”

  Keith continued looking down at his wife as he answered, “Not until her pain subsides.”

  Iona nodded, walked back on the other side of her mother’s bed, grabbed her Bible off the night table and sat down to read and pray.

  By Tuesday morning, Cynda was released from the hospital. On Thursday morning as Iona sat next to her mother’s bed making calls and getting ready for her father’s pretrial, Cynda said, “You should be with your father so you can give this case your full attention.”

  Iona very much wanted to be by her father’s side in his time of need. But this was also Cynda’s time of need. How could she choose? There was no way that she could abandon one for the other, so she split her time between the two people she loved most on this earth. Somehow she would make it work.

  “It’ll be fine, Mama. I’m going to go back in the morning for the pre-trial hearing. I’ll catch a flight right back here the same night and then I’ll continue to work on the case from here,” Iona told her mother.

  Cynda adjusted herself in bed as she told Iona, “I’d like to go to Dayton for the weekend.”

  Iona laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous, Mama. You need to stay here and regain your strength.”
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br />   “Since when do you tell me what I can and can’t do?”

  “Oh, you want to play it like that?” Iona put down her note pad and left the room. When she returned, Keith was with her. “Now tell him what you want to do.” Iona told Cynda.

  Cynda smiled at her husband and patted an empty spot on the bed. He sat next to her. She lifted his hand and began to lightly rub it back and forth. “Baby, I know you’re worried about Isaac and want to be there for him right now.”

  “My place is here with you. Isaac understands that,” Keith told her.

  “I want to go, Keith. I haven’t seen Nina in years. It’ll be nice,” Cynda said.

  “Talk some sense into her, Keith,” Iona said. “She’s in no condition to go anywhere.”

  Cynda became agitated. She thrashed back and forth on the bed. “What’s the difference if I die in Dayton or Chicago,” she angrily demanded. A look of horror set on Iona’s and Keith’s faces and Cynda softened her tone. “Look, I don’t plan to die today or even this year for that matter. I just want to go to Dayton so Iona can be with her father and you can be with your best friend; or really when you think about it, he’s more like your brother.” Cynda touched Keith’s hand again. “Remember what you told me? The two of you were bonded by blood. Remember that?”

  Keith nodded and then said, “Let me see if I can get a nurse to come with us.”

  “Who needs a nurse? I’ve got an angel talking to God on my behalf,” Cynda told them.

  “Be that as it may,” Keith said. “You’re not leaving Chicago without a licensed professional by your side.”

  “O ye of little faith,” Cynda quipped playfully.

  “O me of great love,” Keith corrected and left the room to contact the hospital.

  Iona sat back down next to her mother, shaking her head.

  “What?” Cynda asked.

  “You may be able to sweet talk Keith, but I’m still mad at you. I think you should stay here and rest,” Iona told her as she picked up her note pad and got back to work on her father’s case. She was determined not to let her mother’s inability to realize the gravity of her condition put her in a bad mood – or any worse of a mood than a woman who discovers that her mother is dying of cancer and her father is being indicted on a murder charge could be in.