Once a King, Always a King: The Unmaking of a Latin King

by Reymundo Sanchez

  I left the empty apartment to go look for a department store open all night, where I could possibly buy something comfortable enough to sleep on. As I left the neighborhood, I realized that I had no clue which direction I should drive in order to find a store open that late. I ended up at a pay phone calling Lisette. Lisette acted surprised that I was calling her. When I told her Lilly had left, she told me she didn’t know anything about it, but the tone of her voice said something different. Lisette assured me that Lilly wasn’t with her—she lived with her mother. I asked if she knew of a store where I could go shopping at that hour of the night and she said no. “I don’t care that she left,” I told Lisette, “but I would certainly like to find something to place on that floor to sleep on.” Lilly paused, then said, “Go home and wait for me. I’ll be right over.” “It’s OK, you don’t have to,” I responded. I said good night and hung up the phone.

  I drove around for about half an hour with no sense of direction, and finally headed home. When I got there, Lisette was parked in front of my building. “Didn’t I tell you to come home and wait for me?” she asked as I walked toward her car. She pulled two comforters, a sheet, and a pillow from the back seat and handed them to me. “I’ve got a couple of joints upstairs. Come on up and smoke one with me,” I offered Lisette. She locked her car and followed me up to my apartment.

  We lay the comforters on the floor and sat down and smoked a joint. Lisette said she felt guilty for helping me out. She felt that she was betraying one friend, but at the same time she couldn’t find the heart not to help another friend. I had no desire to talk about Lilly. That chapter in my life was over. I didn’t want to even think about her. I changed the topic of conversation to my desire to attend college. Lisette seemed happy about my decision to do that, and told me that she planned on going to college herself. We lay back on the comforters talking and staring up at the ceiling. Next thing I knew Lisette was fast asleep. I turned off the light and went to sleep myself.

  In the morning, Lisette had mixed emotions about having spent the night there with me. One moment she was joking about how people would say that she was the replacement girlfriend, the next she was down about people thinking she was a bitch for being with her friend’s ex. She finally concluded that, as long as she knew the truth, it didn’t matter who said what. I tried to take Lisette’s mind off her worries by joking that I’d never seen her in a T-shirt and sweatpants and without makeup until that day. I teased her about the torture she was putting my eyes through, and that got her laughing and throwing friendly insults my way as well. We ended up deciding to go shopping for furniture after she went home and changed into the “real” Lisette. After she left, I again walked around the empty apartment, looking for any feeling of regret. I found nothing. I took a shower, got dressed, and waited for Lisette to return.

  Lisette took me to a furniture store owned by a friend of her mother’s. She told me that, with her there, I would get a hell of a good deal. When we got to the store, I realized as I walked through the door that there was nothing there I could afford. Lisette talked to the saleswoman, who had greeted her by name, and was able to get me approved for credit on a bed and a living room set. Lisette would have to co-sign in order to complete the deal, which she did without hesitation. I was very thankful. I picked out relatively inexpensive bedroom and living room sets and charged them, and then used the cash I had planned to use to take Lisette out to dinner. We waited for the furniture to arrive and then went out. That night Lisette spent the night with me again, only this time we lay on the new bed and did very little sleeping.

  My landlord had heard about Lilly’s departure, and, during the following week, came by to make sure that everything in the apartment was OK. I told him that I would be living there by myself and that he shouldn’t worry about the rent being paid. He surprised me by offering to let me use a stove and refrigerator he had stored in the basement with the agreement that I find a way to bring them up to my apartment, and that I would take good care of them. That weekend a couple of guys from work came by and helped me move the stove and refrigerator upstairs. I thought it was a miracle that, within a week of Lilly’s leaving me, I had refurnished the apartment without spending a cent.

  Although Lilly made no attempt to contact me, she was in the constant company of my mother and sisters. They would come over and plead with me to go and beg Lilly to come back to me. They told me where I could find her and berated me with the notion that I would never find a woman as good as Lilly. As far as they were concerned, the breakup was my fault and I should therefore find a way to do right by Lilly so she could take me back. Their words only distanced me further from Lilly and the idea of ever taking her back. I grew to hate Lilly.

  Three weeks after she left me, Lilly showed up at my door. Lisette and I were watching a movie when there was a knock on the door. Lisette thought it was a friend of hers who was supposed to come by and drop off some weed for us, so she went with me to answer the door. I opened the door looking back at the television and without asking who it was. When I turned toward the door, I saw Lilly standing there, staring right past me and into Lisette’s eyes. Without saying a word she lunged past me and scratched Lisette’s face. I picked her up and carried her out on my shoulders. “You left, so stay gone,” I yelled as I put her down on the sidewalk in front of the building. Lilly was so upset that she lost her balance when I put her down and fell. “I don’t want you anymore, Lilly,” I said as I turned and walked back to my apartment. Before I got there, my neighbor came up to tell me that Lilly was outside, scratching my car with her keys. I ran back out only to have Lilly attack me. Somebody called the police. They found me holding Lilly face down over the hood of my car so that she couldn’t hit me. The police officers put me in handcuffs until they found out what was going on. Lisette came out and told the officers what had happened and my neighbor told them what she had witnessed. After the police were satisfied that Lilly was the aggressor, they took the handcuffs off me and asked Lisette and me if we wanted to press charges. Neither of us wanted to see Lilly go to jail; we just wanted to be left alone. The police instructed Lilly to leave and warned her that she would be arrested if she returned. Lisette and I went back to my apartment where I nursed the scratch on her face and apologized for what had happened. I would see Lilly again only once. We ran into each other at a dance club about a year later, and she slapped me.

  The events of that night ruined what had seemed to be a solid, growing relationship between Lisette and me. Lisette was not able to get past Lilly’s anger, and we slowly grew apart. A month and a half after the incident, we officially stopped seeing each other. We never talked to each other again.

  For the first time in my life, I went through the routine of going to work and then back home to be alone. I paid my own bills, and cared for my own sanity. I had no woman in my life, and I didn’t desire one. My goal became to establish a relationship with myself before I tried to share myself with others. I started taking classes at UIC and spent most of my nights studying. Every so often I would visit my mother, but I never felt that I belonged with her. I always had this odd feeling at her place that I was a burden to her. There was this tension in the air, like something needed to be said, but no one was able to take that step to say it. My sisters had all become romantically involved with gang members, so I rarely saw them, by choice. We never got around to talking about the dysfunctionality within our family, to this day. I think we all purposely avoided the subject so as not to deal with issues we might not be able to understand or cope with. This has always made me feel that we are strangers.

  The time I spent by myself helped me to slowly deal with the demons in my mind. I began to have the nightmares again. They haunted my sleep. I sometimes went days at a time without sleeping because of the horrors that awaited me when I closed my eyes.

  I also still had problems dealing with women. Although I was learning that not all women were out to hurt me, I was still unable to have a relations
hip with a woman that wasn’t sexual.

  Beyond that, I still had to watch out for the idiots who didn’t know how to leave gang life behind, who therefore concluded that everyone was like them. Trying to get completely out of gang life is like trying to quit an addiction. Just when you think you’ve got it beat, it seems like temptation comes up everywhere in your life. The fact was that I could still easily have acquired a weapon to carry for “protection.” I could still have visited a Latin King in the penitentiary and gotten brothers on the street to back me up if I ever wanted. I did neither. What I did was acknowledge the cowardice of those who felt they needed to prove their manhood through mass violence without provocation, and I moved on. I accepted that the ignorance of gang life was once my way of life, and I refused to ever be so stupid again. But I knew that sooner or later I was bound to be backed into a corner where that addiction that is gang life would again get hold of me, and I knew it could destroy everything I was working so hard to accomplish. I just hoped I would be able to resist that temptation.

  I was tested the first time I tried dating a woman who wasn’t in some way connected to the ’hood. Her name was Michele, a petite Caucasian girl who had grown up in the Chicago suburb of Addison. Michele and I met in a creative writing class I was taking at UIC; she was drawn to me by what she thought were “very descriptive” stories I wrote for my assignments. We started going out for coffee after class and helping each other out with assignments. We went out to the movies a couple of times and had several lunch dates. Then one night after class we decided to go get some pizza. I took her to my favorite pizza place in Chicago, Bella’s Pizzeria on Damen and Chicago Avenue. Bella’s had been located on that corner for as long as I could remember. In my opinion they had the best deep-dish pizza in town.

  We got to Bella’s at about eight p.m. We sat across from each other in a booth and ordered a couple of beers and a deep-dish pepperoni and sausage pizza. We made small talk and sipped our beers while we waited for the pizza. About ten minutes after we arrived, a group of Puerto Ricans walked in and sat two booths up from us on the opposite side of the restaurant. I noticed them immediately and knew that they were gang-bangers, but paid them no mind. They didn’t seem to be paying any attention to me, either. Our pizza came. We began to eat as we continued to talk, mostly about Michele’s family. At that moment, one of the Puerto Ricans got up, looked my way, and started staring at me as if he knew me. Then he walked toward the back of the restaurant.

  I became nervous and oblivious to what Michele was saying. I pictured his face in my mind and tried to remember if I knew him or not and where he might know me from. I finally figured he was just giving me the “I’m tougher than you” stare that all gang members seemed to give strangers and tried to put it out of my mind. The guy came back to his booth and again stared my way. This time I stared back, not so much to stare him down but to try and figure out who the hell he was. He sat down and apparently told the others at his booth about me because all of a sudden everyone with him was trying to take a look at me.

  I sensed that something bad was about to happen but I didn’t know how to react. I feared more for Michele’s life than for mine. Michele had heard many stories about the Chicago gang crime problem but had never experienced it firsthand. She had no clue how real and dangerous gangs could be. She also had no clue that I was once a Latin King.

  I glanced toward the booth several times, and each time I found myself being stared at in a manner that wasn’t at all friendly. I thought about going over there and asking what the problem was, but I didn’t want to be fingered as the one who started a fight. I thought about asking Michele to leave with me but realized that we were probably safer staying inside the restaurant. If we went outside, we could be followed and murdered right there on the street. I sat there and tried to remain calm and ignored the occupants in the booth the best I could, but at the same time I kept my eye on them so that I could see what was coming my way.

  The group of Puerto Ricans suddenly began to make it clear why they were looking my way. They had apparently recognized me from my days as a King and began making gang hand signs at me. Every time I looked their way they would flash the King sign going down while putting the Disciples hand sign up. I hoped that not reacting to their signs would make them realize that I wasn’t a gang member anymore or at least give them the pleasure of having punked me out. In the meantime I decided to come clean with Michele and let her know what was going on.

  I leaned toward Michele to talk to her and noticed one of the guys at the booth get up and walk our way. I leaned back and got ready to jump out of the booth at him. The guy stopped right at our booth and looked at me. He was young, about sixteen or seventeen years old, with his hair cut really short with six earrings in his right ear. Michele just looked his way and smiled, not knowing what he was there for. I looked him in the eyes and prepared to grab his hand in case he went for a gun.

  “Are you Lil Loco from the Latin Kings?” he asked me. “No, I’m not in a gang,” I answered. “My Folks recognized you as Lil Loco. You’re a pussy denying it,” he said. The others at his booth were now getting up to stand behind him. One of the waiters noticed what was going on and told the manager of the restaurant. “Get the hell out of here before we call the police,” someone yelled from the back of the restaurant. “Get out of here now!” the voice came closer and louder. “King Killer, motherfucker, Disciple love,” the guy standing in front of our booth said to me. Michele didn’t say a word but I imagined she must have been scared out of her mind. “I’m not in a gang,” I said one more time. “Fuck you, punk. You won’t live long,” one of the other guys said as they began to walk out. “You lucked out tonight, pussy,” the last guy to walk by us said as he lifted his sweatshirt to brandish the head of a semiautomatic pistol. “Oh, my god,” Michele gasped. She began to cry.

  “Don’t worry. I’m going to tell the waiter to call the cops,” I told Michele. “Leave me alone, just leave me alone,” she responded. The manager of the restaurant asked if I knew the guys. I told him I didn’t. Everyone in the restaurant was now staring at me as if I was some kind of freak. I knew what must have been going through their minds. They were thinking that I was one of those “damn gangbanging Puerto Ricans” ruining the city for everyone else. I felt like crawling under a rock. The fact that Michele was crying, asking me to get away from her, and asking the restaurant manager to call her a cab didn’t help the situation.

  I sat back down and began to plead with Michele, but I didn’t get very far. “Please leave me alone. Go away! I’ll take a cab,” she yelled. I got up, gave the manager enough money to cover the food and tip, and headed for the door. “Wait in here until the cops come,” he said. “I’ll be alright. They know you called the cops and are gone,” I said with certainty. I walked out, got in my car, and drove away unharmed.

  At my next creative writing class, I couldn’t look Michele’s way and she avoided me completely. I don’t know if she ever mentioned the incident to anyone in the class, but nobody ever said anything, so it was easy to put the incident behind me. I was embarrassed to be a Puerto Rican. I didn’t, however, let any of this keep me from continuing on my quest for a new way of life.

  11 A Different Kind of Girl

  THE INCIDENT WITH Michele made me realize that to many people I would always be just a gangbanger. Even if I succeeded in making a positive contribution to American society in the streets of Chicago, I would always be Lil Loco to some folks. I finally realized the true meaning of “once a King, always a King.” I began to understand why so many claimed that once you become a member of a gang, you could never leave.

  My fear that the Michele incident would repeat itself over and over again turned me into a loner. Although I still went to an occasional happy hour with my coworkers, I stopped trying to pursue any lasting friendships. I spent most of my days locked up in my apartment, alone, but in peace. Every so often I would talk myself into going out to a dance club, but I woul
d always see faces I didn’t want to see. I was satisfied with my life, going through a daily routine with minimal human contact. Even at work I tried my best to avoid any conversation that didn’t have to do with work. The few extremely nice people who tried to enter the shell that had become my life soon left, most likely feeling that I was some kind of antisocial being. I can’t say that I did any deep thinking or that my loneliness led to enlightened thoughts. No, what I felt was lonely, incredibly lonely. This was my life for several months. The only thing I had to think about was the nightmares that unexpectedly haunted me from time to time. At least they didn’t haunt me as often as before. I lived with the feeling that everyone was better off without me around. I didn’t see how I could contribute anything positive to anyone’s life. I did, however, observe how my presence caused pain and suffering to many. (That thought process has become part of my personality and has led to a life where no long-lasting friendships can exist.) It did, however, help me prepare for the arrival of the most significant person who ever came into my post-gang-member life—Marilyn Garcia.

  On a cold February morning a couple of days after Valentine’s Day, I got a call at UIC from a woman looking to see if her diploma had arrived. I asked for the necessary information to do a search for any record of the diploma. She was seeking the whereabouts of her master’s degree. While I scanned the paperwork of ordered and received diplomas I made small talk with Marilyn. “Garcia?” I said, “Are you Puerto Rican?” “Yes, I am,” she responded. “I’m Puerto Rican also,” I said. “My name is Reymundo Sanchez. It’s nice to see someone from my own raza (race) graduating from college; not many of us do.” Marilyn didn’t respond to my comment; she seemed to just want to get her information and get off the phone.