Riding Dirty on I-95 (2 page)
Read Riding Dirty on I-95 Online
Authors: Nikki Turner
“Precious Lord, take my hand.” The choir singer took a deep breath and looked up to the ceiling.
“Lead me on. Let me stand,” the woman in the choir wailed. And the people wept.
After the hymn ended, the preacher got up and began to speak. Momma buried her head in Uncle Roland's chest, her tears wetting his custom-made suit, so she didn't notice a lot of what was going on around us, but I did. Right before the service was about to start, four nicely dressed guys had entered the church. Each wore a dark overcoat. They brought in beautiful flowers and placed them with the other arrangements. Looking over at my
mother, my uncle, and all of us kids, they took off their hats to show their respect.
One of them glanced at a big man across the aisle. He was tall with wide shoulders. Suddenly, Mr. Bigs looked over at me. He had greenish-brown eyes, and his face showed no expression at all. I felt a shiver and turned around quickly.
As I was listening to the hymns, I heard someone gasp and turned to see a heavyset woman wearing a plum-colored dress sitting in the pew behind me. She pulled out her cross and said, “Father, no.”
I wondered what was wrong. I didn't get it. None of us did. But she knew. She somehow knew all hell was about to break loose. Just then, one of the four men reached up and fixed his necktie. He left his seat, walked over to the casket, and pushed it to the floor. It landed with a bang. A high-pitched scream came from the woman behind me. And more people screamed as the other three guys hopped out of their seats and together all of them picked up the casket and started running out of the Lord's house.
A couple of my daddy's friends tried to stop them, but one of the guys pulled out a gun and gave them a look that said, “You can join him if you want.” I guess they didn't want to catch up with my father after all, because they both sat down like trained seals.
Everything happened so quickly. People were in shock, screaming and running for cover as my father's funeral turned into a circus. Someone tried to grab my sisters, brothers, and me to try to protect us and to keep us from witnessing this madness. Momma looked like she was about to pass out, and Uncle Roland held on to her. Ms. Pat, the only person Daddy trusted to run his numbers, grabbed me. But I broke loose and ran outside the church. As I ran, mud splashed all over my new black patent-leather
shoes, and the perfectly tied bow on my blue dress came loose, but I didn't care. I just kept running and running. It was almost like I was running in slow motion. I couldn't get to my dad quick enough no matter how fast I ran. Then I heard gunshots.
Boom, boom, boom.
I froze in my tracks, and when I looked up, I couldn't believe my eyes. Two of those men were firing shots into my father's already lifeless body.
I began to run again. I didn't care if I was caught in the crossfire or not. It would have been worth it. I would have been dying for what I believed in, and my dad was the one thing that I believed in more than anything. If I didn't have him, what did I have?
One of the other guys brought over a gasoline can and poured gas all over my father's bullet-ridden body. The fourth guy, a sorry heartless motherfucker, lit a match. My father's body ignited immediately. I screamed,
“No! Nooo!”
When I saw nobody doing anything, I took matters in my own hands. If nobody had my daddy's back, I did. I ran straight towards my father's body, but somebody grabbed me. To this day I don't remember who it was. I tried to break loose, but I couldn't—the hold was too tight. As I fought, in between the echoes of gunfire and screams, I could hear my mother.
“Mercy! Mercy!” she cried in despair.
I stopped fighting and turned around, because I wanted to make sure my mother was okay. I didn't need something to happen to her, too. My eyes met hers. I could see that she was relieved she had been able to bring me back to my senses. I don't know what I had planned on doing once I reached my father's body, but I just wanted to get to him. When I saw that Mother was safe, I turned back around. The guys with the guns were like ghosts. Just like that, they had vanished into thin air, gone, disappeared. Then
I saw that green-eyed man. He stared straight into my eyes before he turned and walked away.
When I finally saw my father's body, I cried like I had never cried before. My daddy's corpse lay in the middle of the street burning. In a matter of seconds, several of his friends came over with suit jackets and beat the fire out. Better late than never, I guess.
The street rumors all say my daddy went out in a blaze of glory, but I say there wasn't no glory in burning to a crisp in the middle of the street.
Most girls experience their first heartbreak when they are a lot older than I was, but I had my first heartbreak when I was just seven years old, and after that they kept coming nonstop. Life had dealt me a dirty hand, but I lived through it and I hoped that someday my cards would be different.
Everybody's Got a Hustle“
W
ould you like to say anything else before I make my ruling?” the judge asked.
Mercy looked directly into the judge's eyes as she spoke. “Your Honor, I would just like to say that I have been a model student in spite of my circumstances and it wasn't the state, my social worker, or any of the foster families I was placed with that made that possible. It was me, my determination, and my drive to rise above being molested, beaten, and mistreated while the state turned its back. I persevered and endured until a better day. This day Your Honor. The day my life would be placed into my own hands without any roadblocks to hinder me. If allowed, I could be a productive member of society.” She paused a minute to wipe her eyes. “So, Judge, I am asking you—I am begging you—please grant me independent living.” Her voice went soft as she swallowed. Despair was written all over her face as she prayed for her emancipation. “I can only hope that you don't make me go back to the group home. I am asking you to give me what no one has ever given me since I was seven years old—a chance.”
At seventeen years old Mercy stood in front of the judge and pleaded her case. Over the past ten years she had been in eleven foster
homes and one group home and had never even come close to being adopted. At the last foster home, her foster mother's boyfriend tried to molest her. He crept up on her in the kitchen and tried to stick his hands under her skirt. She grabbed the first thing she could, a steak knife. Lucky for him, the butcher knife wasn't closer. Once she stabbed him, there were no more foster homes for her. She was hauled off to a group home, even sent to a nuthouse for evaluation at one point. Now she wanted her independence.
The judge looked her over. Her smooth walnut skin bore no makeup, and her short, flat pageboy haircut made her look innocent. However, having a file of her entire life in front of him let him know different. Their eyes met, and he quickly redirected his eyes to the stacks of legal documents before him and began to write on the court documents before him.
Look at this redneck motherfucker
, Mercy thought
. I know he ain't going to have no mercy on my soul. He probably gets a hard-on every time a black person comes before him with their life in his hands. Hell, he ought to be wearing a white robe instead of that black one, and a white hood over his head at that. That damn gavel ain't nothing but a torch, and that high pedestal he's sitting up on might as well be a horse. Sittin' up there calling himself a judge when he ain't nothing but the grand marshal of the KKK.
Mercy couldn't help but grin a little, but then quickly hid her smirk when the judge looked up at her. He then looked back down at her file and began going over it again.
I don't even know why I'm getting my hopes up about all this. How could this old white man understand my struggle? He can't. But right now I hope he at least tries to. I just need him to cut me loose from this fucked-up life I've been living. Please just let me go. Release me to the wolves in this big bad world. Let me fuck shit up myself instead of appointing other people to do it for me. I guess it ain't no more I can do. I done prayed all I could, so now it's up to him. I hope he's having a good day. I hope he didn't wake up on the wrong side of the bed this
morning. I hope his wife sucked his dick good this morning or something. Damn.
“Mercy Jiles,” the judge said as he looked up from Mercy's file. He then took his glasses from the tip of his nose and rubbed his eyes. “Ms. Jiles, this has been a very hard decision for me. Your situation is similar to other girls' who come into my courtroom every day.”
Ain't this a bitch? Mercy
thought.
I got his card. We all look alike, huh? If he's seen one negra girl, he's seen them all. This Ku Klux Klan motherfucker is going to send me back to that fucked-up-ass group home, I just know he is.
Mercy took a deep breath and sighed.
“But, Ms. Jiles, you are different from those ‘other girls.’ For some reason, I believe that you are destined to be something. I see your determination and your hunger to rise above your circumstances. And that, I admire about you. However, you must understand because I am going to grant you your motion—”
“Thank you! Judge, thank you so much!” Mercy shouted, cutting off the judge. What else did she need to hear? She had heard enough. Mercy had never been so happy in her life.
The judge continued talking, but Mercy couldn't focus on all the stipulations he was running by her. Thankfully, her court representative later reiterated them. She had to get her high school diploma or GED as well as maintain employment. The program would give her a state-issued check on the first of each month and provide her with subsidized living in a small efficiency apartment. Mercy would be responsible for her utility bills and all her other needs, including clothing and food. If Mercy didn't comply, she would be forced to go back to the group home. At that point she could go before the judge and ask for a second chance. If she was denied, she would have to come back to court every year until she turned twenty-one, when the state could no longer keep her at the group home.
Mercy had no intentions of blowing it. She chose to complete
high school rather than cram years' worth of learning into just a few months. Some people say that book smarts only get you so far in life. Well, how Mercy saw it, she was pretty much nowhere as it stood, so however far school could get her was farther than she could have gotten herself otherwise.
In the days following Mercy's court hearing, Mercy applied for jobs everywhere, from fast-food joints to drugstores to retail shops. Things looked promising when she got a call back from McDonald's, where she even had to take a written test, which she passed, missing only one question. She kept checking her pager every five minutes that day, making sure she didn't miss any calls. When the manager called her back the next day, she was certain she had the job in the bag.
“This is the manager who interviewed you at McDonald's yesterday,” a man said.
Mercy took the phone from her ear, put it down to her side, and said, “Yes!” She then spoke into the phone. “When would you like me to start?”
The manager paused. “I'm sorry, Ms. Jiles. We're not going to be able to hire you. Your school hours conflict with the hours we need you to work. But we are putting you on the list in case a position should arise with hours you can work.”
“Well, guess what?” Mercy said.
“Yes, Ms. Jiles?” the manager said pleasantly.
“You're on my list, too,” Mercy yelled, slamming the phone down. One minute after the next it seemed as though doors kept getting slammed in her face.
“How the fuck I can't get a job at McDonald's?” Mercy cried. “Damn, is my luck that bad? It's McDonald's for Christ's sakes. What the hell McDonald's doing having second interviews and tests and shit in the first place when all a mothafucka gotta know how to do is say ‘Would you like fries with that?’ ”
Finally, Mercy had gotten out of the group home, and now she worried that she might not be able to uphold her end of the bargain. She was just about ready to say “fuck it” and let the state take care of her for another year, but she had to give job-hunting another shot.
The next day she met with success. She landed a job at the Ambassador Hotel, which was on the other side of town, and known for its drug traffic, but Mercy didn't give a damn. It kept her in the independent-living program plus put a few dollars in her pocket.
A senior in high school, Mercy was finished with her classes by 12:30 in the afternoon, so she went straight from her locker to the bus stop. She took three buses to get from school to work, and her commute was two hours. After transferring twice, Mercy usually arrived at work at her 3:00 p.m. start time on the nose. However, if the bus was running late, she was late. Sometimes she was able to sneak in without being noticed by her boss, Farrah. Other times she wasn't so lucky and she was either written up or her pay was docked, depending on how late she was.
At the hotel, Mercy was the check-in clerk. Farrah was what Mercy referred to as a BBWA (Black Bitch With Authority). She acted like she owned the whole damn company. Mercy had run across plenty like Farrah in her day, and she hated the feeling that developed in her gut every time she came around. Farrah wasn't mean only to Mercy; she was a bitch to all of the employees. Even when she praised an employee, it was in a condescending manner. “Good job, Mercy,” Farrah would say, “but good isn't great.”
