by Kiki Swinson
Thank God, I had already had on a pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt. After I slipped on my sneakers and grabbed my keys and purse, I was out the door and in my car in five minutes flat. The way that I sped off in my car drew the attention of Mr. Thomas, another one of my neighbors. I knew he could tell that I was in a foul mood because normally when he waved his hand in greeting, I’d stop my car and chat with him about his grandkids and about the latest news concerning the war in Iraq. This time, I blew my horn and kept it moving. In the middle of my drive, I called Seth’s cellular phone again, and just as I expected, he didn’t answer. I hung up and called his mother’s home number, and I got no answer there. My intuition told me that someone was there, and that was enough incentive for me to keep driving in that direction.
My intuition was right. As soon as I turned onto their street and drove within three hundred yards of the house, I could see his car and his mother’s car parked outside. I parked at the curb in front of the house. As I began to walk up the sidewalk, I noticed someone peeking through the living room mini-blinds. I knew it couldn’t be anybody but his mother because she did it every time she heard a car door close. That was just how nosey her ass was. You would have thought that after she saw me walking up to her door, she would have the courtesy to open it and welcome me in, but she didn’t. I figured she ran and told Seth I was outside and he told her not to answer the door. It was something he would do, being the coward he was. I wasn’t going to let them play me out like that, so I knocked on the door with a lot of force because I intended on getting my point across today, if that was the last thing I did.
Finally, after the fifth knock, Mrs. Richardson’s tired ass opened up her door. “Hi, Maxine, how are you?” she said and greeted me with the fakest smile her phony ass could muster up.
“I’m not too good. Where’s your son?” I asked, cutting to the chase.
She stood directly in front of the doorway. “He’s in the shower right now.”
“OK, I’ll wait for him.” I took a couple of steps toward her so she could let me in, but this lady didn’t budge. “Are you going to let me in?”
“Well, he said he didn’t want to see you.”
I was infuriated. “Mrs. Richardson, I don’t care what he said. I want to see Seth right now.”
“Maxine, I really don’t want to meddle in y’all’s business, but Seth told me not to let you in this house.”
“Whose house is this, his or yours?” I snapped. “You better stop letting him run over you like you’re his child.”
“Now Maxine, I don’t think you should carry that tone with me.”
“Mrs. Richardson, I’m sorry for yelling, but I’m a little frustrated. Now, all I want to do is come into your house and talk to your son for a few minutes so we can work a few things out.”
“I understand what you’re saying, but I still can’t let you in.”
“Mrs. Richardson,” I roared, “do you know that by being Seth’s probation officer, I can come into your residence, while he resides here, as often as I choose to?”
Dumbfounded, she said, “No, I didn’t know that.”
“Well, I can. Now, will you please step aside so I can come in?”
Out of nowhere, Seth came from behind his mother and told her to excuse him. “I got it, Mama. You can go back in the kitchen now.”
“You sure?” she asked.
“Yes, we can handle it from here,” I interjected, giving her an evil look. When she disappeared around the corner, I ripped into Seth’s ass. “Why the fuck you always got to hide behind your damn mother? You never sit down and have a discussion with me without running out on it, and I am tired of it.”
“Don’t you think I’m tired of you trying to run my motherfucking life? It’s bad enough I got to have you all down my back about sticking to the rules of my probation, but to have you trying to tell me what to do like you’re the man and I’m the woman is a bit much, and I ain’t gon’ put up with it anymore. If you wanna violate me for that, then go ahead.”
“First of all, I’ve never treated you like you were the woman and I was the man, so you can cut that out. All I’ve been doing is trying to look out for your best interest so you can be successful in your life. I mean, what kind of woman would I be if I just let you continue to work at dead-end jobs, where there are no benefits and no room for growth?”
“But it ain’t about you; it’s about me,” Seth explained. “I want to get back on my feet on my own so when I look back at my achievements, I can really feel good about myself.”
“I understand all of that, but look at how you’re doing it,” I replied, trying to give him a mental picture. Of course, he couldn’t see it. After ten more minutes of a long debate, he got more frustrated than ever and said, “Look, I am tired of standing here and going on and on about this. I done already got my feet wet yesterday and came out with over two grand in my pocket, so I’m definitely going back. If you want to violate me for that, then stop selling me wolf tickets and go ahead and do it.”
Seeing how seriously fed up he was, I realized that my tactics weren’t working. I knew that if I didn’t back off and let him finish doing what I had agreed to let him do, he would eventually defy my authority and shit would get really ugly. After mulling over the pros and cons of this situation, I came to a conclusion. “All right, you win,” I finally said.
“But it’s not about who wins or loses. I just want to do what I need to do and that’s it. End of story.”
“OK, and you will,” I commented in a soft tone, hoping it would defuse all the tension between us.
Before Seth could respond, his cellular phone started ringing. He pulled it out of his front pants pocket and looked at the CallerID screen. “I’ll call you later, because I gotta take this,” he told me and tried to close the front door in my face.
“Wait a minute. Who is that?” I snapped.
“It’s my peoples. Now, I gotta go,” he snapped back and closed the door.
Mortified at how he had just treated me, I stood there in complete shock. My first thought was to kick the front door down, but I elected not to do it. His mother would love to call the police on me and charge me with breaking and entering. That wouldn’t be pretty at all. It would also be just my luck that my boss would find out about it. That would definitely be a scandal and a half, so to avoid all of that, I counted to ten and walked away.
When I got into my car, I took one last look at their house and then pulled off. Before I could get far enough down the block my mind started going into overdrive. I wanted to know who these people were that Seth was working for. I want so badly to at least get a name and find out what they looked like. I would never be able to get any information from Seth, so I guessed the best thing for me to do was to do some investigative work on my own. There was no better time to start than right now. I immediately turned into the next block and pulled my car over, because I knew it was only going to be a matter of time before he left the house to meet the caller, and I wanted to be there when that happened.
Meanwhile, as I sat there and waited, I got a phone call from my girlfriend, Heather. She had been in my life forever, and it seemed she knew me like the back of her hand. People said she looked like Gabrielle Union, but just a little taller. Because of her height, I had always tried to encourage her to pursue a career in modeling, but she chose to be a psychiatrist instead. She’s worked as a licensed psychiatrist for six years and felt like she knew everything about people and their behavioral changes. No one could tell her anything. Not even a man, which was why she was still single and had no children to go with that fully loaded BMW truck she drove and newly renovated, three-bedroom home she lived in.
“Hello,” I said, trying desperately not to let on that I was upset.
“Haven’t heard from you in a couple of days. What are you doing?”
“Out running errands,” I said, lying through my teeth.
“Where at? Because I’m out, too.”
�
��I’m in Chesapeake with Seth,” I lied again.
Heather’s tone changed. “That figures,” she said. “So, why aren’t you at work?”
“Because I had a migraine when I woke up this morning.”
“You probably got it from that nigga and you don’t even know it.”
“For your information, I was assaulted yesterday at work by this asshole. That is the sole reason why I woke up with a migraine this morning.”
“Oh my God! What happened?”
I told her what transpired without going into excessive detail.
“Wait a minute. You mean to tell me you got headbutted by one of your old parole clients? And you didn’t do anything about it?”
“What could I do? The motherfucker hit me so hard, I crashed to the floor.”
“Well, I know you’re gonna press charges on him, right?”
“I’ve already done it,” I assured her. But that wasn’t enough, because she started going on and on about how dangerous my job was getting and that I needed to think about changing careers.
“Heather, you know I can’t change careers. I got a lot of years invested, so that wouldn’t be a good thing to do right now.”
“I thought you wanted to go into business for yourself?”
“I do, but that’s gonna take some time.”
“What, you need some money?”
“No, I’m fine. I’ve got a nice sum of cash in the bank. Besides, Seth said he was going to put up his part too.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me. Now, how in the world is he going to come up with enough money for you to go in business for yourself?”
“Well, he just got a job, for one.”
“OK, and how long is he going to be employed this time?”
“Heather, I know you mean well, but please, lay off Seth. He’s really trying hard to readjust to society.”
“Maxine, you just need to face the music that you’re involved with a thug and all he knows is the streets. He isn’t going to ever be a productive citizen; it’s not in him. The sooner you realize that you are not going to ever be able to change him, the sooner you can get on with your life.”
“Why are you always so negative?”
“I am not negative; I’m a realist. The sooner you become one, the better off you’ll be.”
“Do we always have to fuss about him every time we talk?”
“No, we don’t.”
“Well good, let’s talk about Danielle,” I said, changing the subject.
Heather hesitated a moment, but then she asked, “What about her?”
“Have you spoken with her since she and her kids flew back to Florida to be with her husband?”
“I spoke with her briefly this morning while I was on my way to work but she was having a hard time hearing me because her husband was standing next to her, fussing at the kids. I just told her I would call her back.”
“How did she sound in the little bit of time you spoke with her?”
“She sounded OK.”
“You think he’s going to cheat on her again?”
“Knowing him, he probably will. But who knows for sure?”
“Well, the last time I spoke with her—which was the day after her plane landed—I asked her how they were doing, and she said that they were fine. But I didn’t buy that for one second.”
“Both of y’all are the same.”
“And how is that?”
“Y’all don’t mind taking up for y’all’s man.” Heather laughed.
I laughed too, because she was right. Danielle and I both protected our men. I guessed it had a lot to do with how long we’d been with them or the amount of love we’d invested. I couldn’t speak for her, but I knew that my man loved me, so I would do whatever it took to protect him. Of course, Heather wouldn’t understand it, which was why I kept things of that nature to myself. It would be a moot point to her anyway, so why even bother? Our conversation went on for another fifteen minutes. We talked about everything and just when the conversation was about to get juicy, I saw Seth getting into his car. I cut Heather off in mid-sentence. “Hey girl, let me call you right back,” I said.
“OK, call me later.”
“All right.” I immediately disconnected our call.
I gotcha now! I said to myself as I dropped my phone into the passenger seat and sped off to follow him. The entire drive, I kept my distance and allowed at least two to three cars between us at all times. There was one time when I thought that Seth was onto me, but I soon figured out that he made the abrupt lane switch because the driver in front of him was driving five miles under the speed limit. That made me feel a lot better. Nothing would have made me feel worse than for him to know that I was following him.
When we got into the residential section of Portsmouth, I realized that I had to fall back a little more and allow traffic lights to catch me for the rest of the trip, since there weren’t a lot of cars driving through this area. It ended up not mattering because he soon made his first stop. I followed him down Lincoln Street, in the Prentis Park section of Portsmouth, and watched him make a right turn on Richmond Avenue. I put my foot down on the gas pedal and sped up, but by the time I reached that block and saw that he had parked his car at the corner, my heart dropped. I didn’t know whether to stop or keep driving. Keep driving, my mind told me, and that’s what I did. As I passed the block, his car door opened. I don’t know what happened afterward because by the time he was completely out of the car, I was gone. I didn’t go far, though. I made a right turn on the very next block so that I could circle around and catch Seth on the opposite end of Richmond Avenue. By the time I was able to turn onto that street, however, he was nowhere in sight. His car was parked in the same spot, but he was gone. I figured that he had to either be in the light blue, two-story house sitting on the opposite side of the street or the white, one-story house on the same side as his parked car. To find out which one he was in, I knew I had to pull over and wait.
While I waited, I noticed that there was a Hummer parked directly in front of Seth’s car. Since there was no other car parked within two hundred yards of his vehicle, I assumed that the Hummer had to belong to the people he came to see. I kept my engine running and waited. After about ten minutes, Seth and some big, black, tall, linebacker-looking guy came strolling out of the white house. They said a few more words to one another, shook hands, and went their separate ways. The guy driving the Hummer made a U-turn and left. Seth got in his car and followed him. I was glad that he went in the opposite direction, because I didn’t know how I was going to duck down in my car without being seen if Seth decided to exit the street from where I was parked. Lucky for me, things were working in my favor. My luck continued, and as soon as Seth made the U-turn to get back onto Lincoln Street, I was back in stride. I followed him for another two miles, and when he entered into the Dales Homes housing projects, I knew that this had to be his final stop.
Dales Homes was one of the oldest projects in the city of Portsmouth, and it was known for its heavy drug traffic. I used to visit this place often when I had a parolee who resided out there with his mother. I warned him all the time that it wasn’t a good place for him to be if he really wanted to keep his nose clean and stay off the street. Sorry to say, he didn’t listen to me. After about a year, I got a call from a Portsmouth Narcotics detective, advising that he had just busted my client and a few other guys for selling crack cocaine to an undercover police officer. Needless to say, things didn’t work out for him, because after the state judge handed him a six-and-a-half-year prison sentence, I violated him and gave him the other four years he had over his head. He had been gone now for almost two years, so I hoped he learned his lesson this time. If he hadn’t, he was going to spend a lot more time behind bars than he would on the streets. The only thing I could do for people like him was wish them well, because my main focus right now was Seth. He was a major priority for me. Finding out exactly where he was going and who he was affiliating himself wit
h would take precedence over everything I had to do today. How I would go about doing it was another issue, but I knew I couldn’t be too eager.
The apartment buildings were built side by side in the form of a horseshoe. There was one street that traveled in a semicircle, called Dale Drive. As you drove around it you couldn’t see what was ahead until you actually drove up on it, because you were constantly turning your steering wheel to the left. I figured if I wanted to avoid running into Seth, I needed to park my car and walk the rest of the way. Something told me not to walk down the block with my Dooney and Burke bag, so I tucked it underneath the driver’s seat of my car. After I got out, I activated the alarm so I wouldn’t have any problems. As I strolled down Dale Drive, I had to pass an array of people standing on the corner. I walked by a young woman who looked like she wasn’t more than twenty-one years old, sporting a blonde and blue, hard-wrapped wig. She was cursing out her two sons because they kept running in and out of the house. I also walked by this guy beating the hell out of his girlfriend. What was so crazy was that the block was filled with people, and no one broke it up. From the sound of things, he was whipping her ass because he caught some guy in her house. All I could do was shake my head and keep it moving.
There were a lot more people I came in contact with who were in really bad shape. One person who really stood out among them all was this light-skinned woman, who looked like she used to be attractive at one point in her life. She looked like she had one foot in the grave, and it wasn’t going to be very long before the other one joined it. As I walked in her direction, I put my head down to avoid eye contact with her. I felt like if I looked at her, it would appear that I was staring at the condition of her body, and I didn’t want to do that. You could never tell how these people would react if you looked at them funny, so, I wasn’t going to take any chances. I found out that she wasn’t going to let me by without stepping to me first.
