A Moment of Silence: Midnight III (The Midnight Series Book 3) (65 page)

The doors swung open. She was blocked from being seen by the COs who walked her in. Men were stretching their necks, inching sideways, trying to get a look. Then she walked out and away from the COs guarding her, in a manner like she didn’t want them guarding her in the first place. She stood directly in the front, placed herself right in the center of the men where the aisle divided the crowd into halves. We were all looking at her. At the same time, she began
looking at us, it seemed one by one, without skipping anyone. She surveyed until her eyes filled with tears. Watching her fill with natural emotion made some of the men emotional. They began clapping for her tears and stomping their feet. CO blew a whistle that was drowned by the sounds of applause. Then the thunder fell to absolute silence. She looked calm and comfortable. In her eyes was a force. They contained the calm of water and the fury of fire. I wondered how they occupied the same space. Her skin was pretty and clear. She was the opposite of “ran through.” Her energy was clean. She looked eighteen years young and innocent. Either she was, or she was a fox with ninety-nine tails. That’s more than Aunt Tasha has. I smiled at the thought.

“I love you,” she said, and the men cheered as though it was their first time ever either hearing or believing those words, maybe both.

“I love you. Not because I am naïve. Not because I lack intelligence. Not because I am unaware that some of you have done wrong on purpose, and others of you have done wrong by mistake. And still some have been wrongly accused. I love you because my soul has been missing you. My eyes have been searching for you. My heart has been wanting you, the fathers, the brothers, the sons of our hearts. We need you to be home,” and the men went crazy cheering.

“We need you to be strong. We need you to be capable and above all to be true. We need you to be loving us, the women, as we work together with you, side by side.

“A person should always know who they are and what purpose they serve. A person should also know
who they are not
, and what they will and will not do or allow to be done with them or to them. So, I’ll start off by telling you who I am not.

“I am not your bitch!” And the men threw their hands in the air, jumped up and down, and hollered like an unseen, unheard of exorcism.

“I am not a bitch. I am not that naked chick posed and pasted
or taped or pinned to your wall while you jerk off.” The men were high-fiving, some shocked, some shaking.

“I am not disrespectful. I am not disloyal. I am not the one who will disgrace you or who you will disgrace, slapping me in my face, punching me in my ribs, or shoving me down the stairs. I am not your bitch, your ho, your piece, your skeezer, or your baby’s momma who called the police on you, dimed you out, fucked your friends, or aborted your seeds.” The volume of the men’s expression became so wild the riot guards eased off of their post and stood on either side of the girl facing the inmates with their shields raised up high.

“I am not the bitch who had your children, then hid them from you, placed a restraining order on you, dragged you into court, and sat silently while the judge ran your pockets. I am not your bitch who lied on you, who stole your money, or pawned your jewels. I am not that bitch you met in the dark, or fucked in your car or in the back of your building or on the stairwell.” The men reacted as though the riot guards were absent, no threat at all.

“I am not the bitch who sucked your dick, without having your heart in my hand, your diamond on my ring finger, and my heart in your soul,” she said, and the guards stepped up to the crowd.

“Calm down or we will shut it down,” they threatened. She ignored them.

“I’m not your psychiatrist or your private eye. I am not your mother. I am not the police. I am not your parole officer. And you are not my hostage, my prisoner, or my slave. So don’t be doing the running man when you see me. Look at me with love and affection,” she said, placing her hands on her hips and twisted left, then right. Slight gestures that caused a frenzy among the caged.

“I am your sister. We are family. If someone fucks with you, they fuck with me.” The crowd roared.

“I am a young woman. I am a fighter. I am known for four words, ‘We are at war!’ ” The stomping began again. “Not because we want to be. Not because we ain’t got nuthin’ better to do. But just
because we are. We have been set up! We’ve been sucker-punched! We’ve been southpawed. We’ve been stabbed from behind. We’ve been blindfolded. We’ve been gagged. We’ve been wronged. We’ve been wrong. We’ve been held down too low for too long.” Now she was covered in a light sheen of summer sweat. She inhaled, then exhaled. She clenched her fingers and her face filled with ache.

“Brothers and sisters, we gotta get our hearts right. Love the right things. Hate the wrong things. Brothers, we gotta get our minds right. Read the right books. Write the right words. Rhyme the right lyrics. Sing the right songs. Speak the truth, Brothers! We gotta get our souls right. Praise the right God . . . ’Cause if you are telling me that you are God, you better be the solution and not the problem.” That was it. Her words tore the house down. No bodies were still. Even the guards looked shocked and somehow pleased with her and what she was saying and what she was evoking from the men, which they had never before seen.

“Only God is perfect. Men are not. Women are not. Praise God, not your self. Not your woman. Not your man. Fight your enemies. Not your friends. Not your family. Not your people.

“Handle your business! Every man knows that every man has to do that. Where my hustlers at?” she asked, and most of the men acknowledged, “We right here!” Then she stripped them. “You are loved. You got the right skills but the wrong product. You got the right look, young, fine, and fashionable. You got the cars, the jewels, and the women. You got the strong team, but the wrong target, made the wrong investment and created the wrong results. Men must build more than they destroy,” and the Five Percent were cheering, even the ones who hustled.

“Where my pimps at?” she suddenly said, and the men who were normally good at game and sharp and slick failed to peep her next setup. They acknowledged, “We right here!” She turned a little and leaned forward. “You pimping her. Whose pimping you? You dress her up and throw her out on the block or the club or behind the building to spread her legs for paper. Now, whose dressing
you up and forcing you to spread your legs for paper? The prison system in America,
cheap forced labor.
They dress you up in these odd striped jumpers, green jumpers, orange jumpers and orange hats. They make you spread your legs and raise your hands and shut your mouth and spread your cheeks and get out there and work the whole day for them every day. You earn less than a ho on the stroll.” And the place exploded. Some COs broke their stance and laughed.

“The real pimps are in the government and the corporations. Sometimes, they’re one in the same. They’re collecting the money you earned and not giving you your cut. Check the labels. At least know whose getting paid off of you. Who got the contract to build these prisons? Who got the contract for the heavy machinery, the prison vehicles, the prison weapons, the prison furniture, the prison inventory? Who made those prison jumpers you’re forced to wear? Who got the contract for the horrible food they serve you? Who made your bedsheets? Check the labels! See if I am lying to you.

“You were supposed to be our army! But the only ones you fighting is yourselves. Men divided by race, culture, faith, and language, all getting pimped by the same politicians, the same entities. All cooperating with the same scam. Look around the room.” The men began checking their surroundings. “All blacks and Latinos, Latinos and blacks. All Africans and Latinos, Latinos and Africans. All African men!”

“Even the African and Latino COs are caught up in the color scheme,” she said, and the room went to a hush. “They think you’re the enemy. You think they’re the enemy. They got the same problems you got. They think you’re the product. They got the wrong product. But both groups are getting pimped by the same true pimps. CO can’t pay his rent same as you.” And the crowd cheered. “CO can’t handle his women, same as you. CO can’t afford his child support, same as you. CO can’t afford the car he’s driving, same as you. You’re locked up now. CO is locked up in here, right with you!” It was fire on top of fire and it was spreading across the room, igniting everything. Then she softened her tone and dropped her convo back into the realm of the personal.

“I am nothing but a warner. I am nothing but a reminder, a woman. The same woman who will care for your babies. The same babies, not born from my womb. The same woman who will raise your daughters and sons to be better men and women than any of us have ever been. I don’t hate your women. But I can teach them how to love you. How to get their minds and hearts right. How to see you in a better light. But, in order to do that, you have to be a better man. I love the black man, but I need a better product, a purer cut, a finer grain.”

At that point, I observed cold-blooded killers, niggas who had two, three, four bodies on their charges. Men who got nabbed with kilos of cocaine and a truckload of weed. Men who ran guns and pimped women and committed armed robberies and even raped were on their feet with fists pumping in the air, with total loss of composure, and cheering like they were at the horse track or an auction or the strip club, but louder and stronger, and not from the groin but from their hearts.

“I’m calling for a complete humbling of every man and every woman. I am even calling for the humbling of myself. I am not your bitch! But, if I was, and even if I ever used to be, I am not anymore. And, I wouldn’t be dumb enough to be bragging about it if I was. Arrogant and proud and flaunting it. I wouldn’t be parading around standing in front of audiences, acting like I didn’t know better, didn’t plot and scheme to do it, and didn’t get nothing out of it. Lying bitches. Fake bitches,” and I saw a hard rock cry. “If I was your bitch before, I’d be correcting myself now.

“Work hard! Strive hard! Fight hard! Love hard! Man and woman, woman and man, let’s build a nation where we can thrive. Where the police don’t reign supreme and the slaughter of our children isn’t sport. Where white is just one shade of skin without melanin, not to be worshipped or imitated or served.

“In the words of Marcus Garvey, ‘One God, One Aim, One Destiny.’ In the words of Malcolm X, ‘By Any Means Necessary.’ In the words of Harriet Tubman, ‘Freedom or death.’ Peace.” She took a bow.

She tried to catch her breath as she and every man in the room recovered from something that couldn’t be described. A bond that couldn’t be broken. A woman who could never be forgotten. Words that would revolve around the minds of the oldest men, and even around the brains of the most ignorant men, and even within the youngest and darkest of souls. Young, I knew her words would stay with me. I felt I would somehow see her again, in another time, in a better place.

From the back row where I stood, I remained calm and still, even though I was moved. I see these men every day. I watched her instead. She was wearing jeans and a long-sleeve “in the summer” T-shirt that said
LOVE
. She was covered. It didn’t matter, though. Her shape was crazy. She wore pumps, not kicks. She was camouflaged so well, she looked like she wasn’t. She looked like a pretty ’hood chick without the glaze or glamour or attitude. Feminine feeling, without any confusion, she looked soft. Her teeth were white and her smile was warm, like she meant it.

Bold, her mouth was a machine gun. Her tongue, a machete. There was nothing about her physical look or her ordinary fashion that would give anyone a warning of what she would say or do.
She’s a powerful bomb
, I thought. A bomb with a silencer, no tick or buzz or boom, no red light or alarm to alert people to stay away, don’t touch or tease or insult her. She would detonate.

I asked myself,
what exactly is the feeling she caused me to feel
? It wasn’t sexual, although she was lovely enough. It wasn’t danger, although she was deadly enough. I wasn’t challenged, although she was sharp enough. It was that even though she said she was not naïve, and even though she spoke as though she was not innocent, and even though she said she was a fighter, she was naïve enough to enter a filthy place, be surrounded by hundreds of men, and feel no fear or sense of personal threat. She wore those tight jeans as though she wasn’t standing before a herd of hungry, starved beasts, and as though she would not possibly be looked
upon as food or prey. She was still a woman to me, ruled by emotion. And I felt a strong feeling, and the urge to protect her.

They ushered her out. She looked like she wanted to stay. She reached her hand through the guards and touched the hand of every prisoner who was close enough to reach in. Soon as she was gone, all masks came off. The guards turned back into hate and the inmates turned back into the hated and vice versa.

In our darkened cells, men hugged and held the bars. Through the open spaces and the vents, the conversation began.

“Word to mother, I’m speechless.”

“Yo, DeQuan, thanks for the hookup.”

“We should have her speak at the Parliament.”

“Nix that, she might influence the Earths.”

“I hope she does.”

“Might be better to leave it the way it is.”

“Y’all scared of her.”

“Non cypher.”

“Yo, god Understanding, I seen you shed a tear.”

“Who got her address? I’m ’bout to write her a letter.”

“She got no time for that.”

“Man, shut the fuck up.”

“I’m ’bout to wife her.”

“She don’t want you.”

“She got high standards.”

“Yeah, but she ain’t no gold digger. She’s low maintenance.”

“She’s a soldier,” DeQuan said. “The Minister put out a word of protection on her so the streets don’t touch her. Go at her the wrong way, you lose your life.”

“That’s how it should be,” I said.

“What minister?”

“You know, the only one who matters.”

*  *  *

By the end of the week, the vibe flipped. The topic changed. Lavidicus’s wedding in the youth house happened smoothly. However, his mom got arrested trying to bring in contraband. Now she’s locked up in the Rose M. Singer Center, the Rikers maximum security jail for women. DeQuan lost a mule. Lavidicus lost a mother.