Entangled (22 page)

He received a call from the security desk down stairs. The guard informed him that Candy Melton was in the lobby and that she wanted to come up and see him urgently.

Jamal walked to the bathroom, washed his face, and brushed his teeth. He hadn’t seen Candy since the day he’d put her out of his car and told her to walk home. He had moved since the last time he had seen her.
How in the hell did she find out where I live?

Jamal opened the door and invited Candy into his apartment. He offered her a seat, but she declined. “What brings you over here, and how in the hell did you know where I live?”

“Jamal, let me start by saying that I apologize for just showing up at your home like this, but I really need to talk to you about something.”

Candy sighed and turned away briefly before resuming eye contact. “I wish it was something like that, but it’s a little bit more complicated.”

“What do you mean?”
“Jamal, I think you need to get tested for HIV.”
“What the fuck are you saying?”
“I was seeing someone else at the same time I was seeing you.” “And?”
Candy didn’t say anything but looked away again.
“Okay, what does that have to do with me?”
“Yesterday the damn guy showed up at my apartment and said

that he thinks I should get tested.” Candy now had tears in her eyes.
“Does he have AIDS?”
“No, but he says that he is HIV positive.” She wiped her eyes with both hands.
“That’s the same shit in my book.”
Tears slowly rolled down Candy’s cheeks. “I haven’t been tested yet. Jamal, I’m scared. I don’t know what I’m going to do if I’m HIV positive.”
“I hope you don’t expect no sympathy from me. First of all, you come to my house and tell me that you have possibly exposed me to some bullshit,” Jamal said as he walked over to the door and opened it. “Get out of here before I kill your ass.”
Candy used her hands to wipe her eyes again as she took a step toward the door. “Jamal, I’m sorry, I swear to you.”
“You damn right you sorry. A sorry-ass bitch is what you is,” Jamal said as he was about to close the door. After a few seconds of contemplating, he yanked her back into the apartment. “You know what, I can’t let you get off that easy.” He closed the door. “Who is this nigga spreading this shit?”
“His name is Raoul.”
“What kind of name is that? Is this mu’fucka Spanish?”
“I think he’s half Dominican or something.”
“Where the fuck does he live?” Jamal asked.
“I don’t know?”
“Bitch, don’t lie to me.”
“I ain’t lying.”
Jamal grabbed her arm and twisted it behind her back. “Don’t fuckin’ lie to me.”
Candy’s face became flushed, and she struggled to get away. But Jamal was too strong. “Jamal, let my arm go. You’re hurting me.”
Jamal scooped Candy up and carried her into the bedroom, closed his door, pulled a handgun from underneath his pillow, and waved it in her direction. “You’re going to tell me where this nigga lives, or else you ain’t gonna have to worry about no fuckin’ virus.”
“He lives near the university.”
Jamal cocked the hammer on the handgun. “We’re going to pay this Raoul a visit.”
“Why are you doing this, Jamal? You don’t even know if you got the virus or not.”
“I just want to see how the nigga looks in case I have to kill his ass later. I swear to you, Candy, if I got the virus, somebody is going to die,” Jamal fumed.
Candy’s pupils expanded. She stared up at Jamal while lying on her back.
“Get the fuck up and take me to this mu’fucka.”

R
AOUL WAS A SMALL
-
TIME
crack dealer who pretended to have more money than he actually had. According to Candy, she had met him in the club one night, and he had propositioned her to have sex with him for a thousand dollars. When they arrived at the hotel room, he then confessed to having only five hundred. She was pissed, but she still took the money. They then started having sex on a regular basis. Candy admitted that she had actually started enjoying their sexual escapades so much, she stopped charging him because she wanted it just as bad as he did.

Raoul’s townhome was in a quiet neighborhood lined with huge oak trees. Jamal pulled in the driveway with his headlights off. He didn’t want any attention from the neighbors.

Jamal and Candy walked up to Raoul’s doorstep and rang the bell.
A few minutes later Raoul opened the door. He was a short man with curly hair and a thin mustache. “Candy,” Raoul said, then looked at Jamal.
“Raoul, this is Jamal,” Candy said.
“What’s up?” Raoul offered his hand.
Jamal left it dangling. “You tell me. What’s up?” Jamal said.
“What’s this guy’s problem?” Raoul asked Candy.
“Jamal thinks he may have been exposed to the virus because he and I were once involved.”
“Okay,” Raoul said.
“Is that all you can say?” Jamal said.
Raoul shrugged. “What do you want me to say?”
“Raoul, can we come in?” Candy asked as she looked around. “I know you don’t want your neighbors to hear all your business.”
“I don’t want this motherfucker to come in my house.” Raoul stared at Jamal. “I don’t like his attitude.”
Jamal shoved Candy aside and walked up to the doorway and brandished a stainless steel handgun. “I think you need to let us in.”
Raoul stepped back.
“Jamal, put the gun away,” Candy pleaded.
Jamal and Candy entered the house. Candy closed the door.
“Mu’fucka, you better convince me that I might not have the damn virus, or else you going to hell tonight.”
“You’re going to get out of my house making threats.”
“Listen,” Jamal said, pointing his finger in Raoul’s face.
Raoul knocked his hand down.
Jamal struck Raoul with the butt of the gun across the forehead. Blood spurted in every direction. Raoul fell backward, and the back of his head hit the floor.
Jamal stepped back realizing some of Raoul’s blood had gotten on his shirt. He rested over Raoul, pinning his arms to the floor using both knees. He stuck the barrel of the gun in Raoul’s mouth. “Imagine how close you are to death.”
“Get off him or I’ll call the police, Jamal.”
Jamal made eye contact with Candy. She was standing by the doorway with the phone in her hand. He realized he had too much at stake. He really wanted to kill Raoul. Even though he wasn’t certain he had the virus, the thought itself was troublesome. He knew he had been exposed because he and Candy had never used protection. He saw fear in Candy’s eyes, and tears had begun to well up in Raoul’s. Jamal’s mind then shifted to Dream. How would he tell her he had exposed her? She would definitely leave him at the worst point of his life. He thought about Dawg who was awaiting trial. His friend needed him to stick around at least until he found out his fate. He knew that if he killed Raoul he would have to leave town immediately, and he wasn’t quite ready because he hadn’t been charged with anything. He pulled the barrel of the gun from Raoul’s mouth and slapped him with the butt of it once more. Jamal darted out of the front door got in his car, and drove away.

The next day Jamal called a local doctor’s office and scheduled an appointment for an HIV test. When he got to the receptionist’s desk, he was told to pay a hundred dollars since he didn’t have health insurance. After he filled out the questionnaire about previous illnesses, the doctor came out and escorted him to a back room.

With a clipboard in hand the doctor studied Jamal’s paperwork. “HIV testing, huh?”
“Yeah,” Jamal answered.
“Do you think you’ve been exposed?”
“No,” Jamal lied.
“Do you want the results to be public record?”
“I have a choice?” Jamal asked, surprised.
“Yeah. Since you paid for the test out of your pocket, you have that option. If you had health insurance, we would have had no choice but to make it public record. Sometimes this information is sold to databases and can even end up on the Internet.”
Jamal was shocked. He couldn’t believe that paying a hundred dollars would ensure so much privacy. He wondered how many people were actually infected with the virus, living life as if they weren’t. Jamal was glad he had this option, because he definitely didn’t want Dream to find out. She couldn’t know whether the results were negative or positive. He didn’t want her to know that she had been exposed. “I don’t want anybody to know,” Jamal said.
The doctor then asked Jamal to sign a consent form. Shortly afterward, a nurse entered the room and withdrew a sample of blood from Jamal’s left arm. The nurse told him to sit in the lobby and that the results of the test would be available in twenty minutes. “The doctor will call you back and go over the results with you,” she said.
Jamal sat in the lobby wondering how everything had gone so bad at once. What did he do to deserve such bad luck? He had always thought of HIV as a gay man’s disease. He’d stayed clear of homosexuals while in prison. He was a real man and he prided himself in being a real man. He couldn’t believe that being HIV positive was so much a possibility. He glanced at his watch and twenty minutes had passed, so he approached the receptionist. “Excuse me. The nurse said the doctor would be calling me in twenty minutes.”
“Whenever the doctor is ready he will call for you,” the receptionist said.
“What’s taking the doctor so long?” Jamal asked.
“I don’t know,” the receptionist said. “Just have a seat, Mr. Stewart, and I’m sure someone will be with you shortly.”
Jamal returned to his seat; ten minutes passed and he still hadn’t heard from anyone. He stood from his seat and eased out of the front entrance.

Mark was confident that they would win the trial. The prosecution had sufficient evidence against Dawg. Besides the recording, Mark had purchased drugs directly from Dawg. He was relieved that the trial would be over soon. He wasn’t glad that Dawg was about to go to prison for a long time. He actually thought Dawg was a decent man who hadn’t had the guidance he needed to be a well-rounded person. Mark sometimes found it hard to separate his job from personal feelings.

During the past winter months, Mark had talked to Dawg extensively about his family, his future, and his goals. Dawg had told him he didn’t want to be involved in drug dealing for the rest of his life. He had aspirations to own his own business someday. He had told Mark that he wanted to have a carwash or a lawn service; something that didn’t have a lot of overhead.

Dawg’s mother was a hard-working woman employed by a local nursing home in downtown Charlotte. She was a maid and had worked there for the last fifteen years without missing a day, according to Dawg. Mark was almost certain he would see Dawg’s mother in the courtroom.

Steven Davis was only twenty-eight years old, facing at least twenty-five years behind bars if convicted. The only way he would get less than the mandatory twenty-five was to testify against Jamal and Angelo. Mark didn’t expect him to do that. Dawg and Jamal were like brothers. they had a special relationship. Mark knew the trial would be an emotional one, but he had a job to do.

Dawg’s jury of peers consisted of ten middle-aged white men, one white woman, and a black woman, Mable Johnston, who listed her occupation as a Sunday school teacher. The judge was Theodore Owens, a sixty-eight-year old Republican from Mississippi. He was often selected in drug cases and had a reputation for giving the maximum sentence allowed.

Mark sat behind the prosecutor’s table. Dawg, along with his attorney, sat at a table adjacent to the prosecution. His mother, Patricia Davis, was a light-skinned, heavyset woman with a natural haircut. His attorney, Michael Conner, was very capable and wellrespected in the legal community. Two weeks after Dawg’s indictment was issued, Michael had negotiated a ten-year plea agreement, which Dawg quickly declined, a move that made absolutely no sense to Mark. Now the stakes were higher, and today Michael would have to fight for Dawg’s life.

Once the trial began the prosecution began an all-out attack. Their witnesses included Ruff, Mark, and a car salesman. Jennifer was testifying in exchange for a reduced sentence. Mark was later called to the witness stand to testify about five kilos of cocaine that Dawg had sold him. A car salesman testified that Dawg made a large cash down payment on a Mercedes. All the testimony corroborated, and great details were given about the money and the cocaine with which Dawg had been associated. The next day the prosecution called a surprise witness, Psycho, an inmate from Dawg’s cellblock.

“What the hell is he doing in here?” Dawg shouted. “I need order in this court,” Judge Owens demanded. He slammed his gavel hard and peered down over his glasses. “Mr. Conner, you need to talk to your client about how to conduct himself in my courtroom.”

Michael turned to Dawg. “Listen, we don’t want to upset this judge. You need to get a hold of yourself.”
“I just want to know why in the hell is this guy on the witness stand.”
“Do you know this guy?”
“Yeah, he is in my cellblock.”
“Let’s just see what he has to say,” Michael said before apologizing to the judge for Dawg’s outburst.
For the next forty-five minutes, Psycho testified that Dawg had told him about trips to California to pick up large sums of drugs. He said Dawg told him about large quantities of money that he and Jamal had made weeks before the arrest. He ended his testimony by telling the jury about thousands of dollars Dawg had allegedly spent on cars, women, and jewelry.
After four days of testimony and rebuttal, the trial ended. It took the jury only thirty-eight minutes to return with a verdict. The judge asked everyone to rise. The jury foreman, a middleaged white man with a large brown birthmark on his balding forehead, was then instructed by the judge to announce the verdict. “We the jury find Steven Davis guilty as charged as to count one, guilty as charged as to count two; and guilty as charged as to count three.”
Mark had mixed emotions about the verdict. He was happy that he had been effective in doing his job, but at the same time; he was sad that another black mother would lose her son to the prison system. He glanced over at Dawg who was hugging his mother tightly as she wept.
The sentencing would be put off for another six weeks, and again, Mark would have to be present to see Dawg and his mother.