Grace After Midnight

by Felicia Pearson

  We followed them past Shoe City. One of them turned and gave us a look that said, “What y’all going to do? Pop us in the mall?”

  We popped ’em in the mall.

  My little man K did the shooting.

  Then there was shooting on the corner of Biddle and Marfat.

  I’m walking down the street with my nigga. Just chillin’. Here comes a U-Haul truck. Me and my boy look at each other like this ain’t right. The U-Haul truck is going real slow. You don’t see slow-moving U-Haul trucks on this street every day. And the driver’s looking nervous. I catch his eyes and see something I don’t like.

  We step back.

  U-Haul pulls to the curb.

  Back of the truck slowly rolls open.

  And suddenly the spraying starts.

  Niggas from the west side with nothing better to do than to come east and start spraying.

  Fuck those motherfuckers.

  Me and my boy duck behind some garbage cans. I pull out my nine-millimeter and blast back. The fools in the U-Haul are sitting targets.

  Two of them go down.

  They don’t touch us.

  They run outta there with us still shooting at their asses.

  Then there’s the graveyard. Seems like we always go to the graveyard. The funeral home and the graveyard.

  The graveyard is all foggy this afternoon. It rained in the morning and now a thick fog has moved in. We’re there ’cause our friend J was killed by mistake. They killed J thinking he was B. J was a sweetheart. J was our homeboy. B is an asshole. The sweetheart got shot and the asshole is still walking around. B is up there with us telling J good-bye.

  We walking toward the grave to bury J when, behind us, we see this guy approaching. We don’t know who the fuck he is.

  The eyes. The eyes always give it away.

  This stranger’s eyes are showing nervousness. And before we know it, he starts shooting at B. Shooter was sent to J’s funeral to get B, the nigga they wanted dead to begin with.

  We say, “Oh, no. Not up in here. You can’t disrespect J by turning his funeral into a fuckin’ shooting gallery.”

  My man hits the shooter with a silencer. He goes down slowly, slumped over someone’s grave.

  We leave him there and go bury J.

  A few days later someone catches up with B and shoots him dead.

  Wu-Tang Clan is out with “Protect Ya Neck.” Later they screaming about “C.R.E.A.M. . . . cash rules everything around me.”

  Word.

  LEAD BAT

  Who did I think I was?

  Why was I doing what I was doing?

  I look back and wonder why.

  I look back and ask myself questions that are hard, maybe even impossible, to answer.

  But at the time questions weren’t part of my life. Questions weren’t part of my thinking.

  I didn’t ask.

  I just did.

  “What the fuck you doing?” Uncle would ask. “Word out there is that you crazy and getting crazier every day. You got to slow down, Snoop.”

  “What for?”

  “To keep your little ass alive—that’s what for.”

  I knew Uncle loved me. I knew he cared. But Uncle wasn’t stopping me.

  Neither was Father. I’d see Father roll by in his hundred-thousand-dollar ride. He’d pull over and say, “You staying outta trouble, Snoop?”

  “No way,” I’d answer honestly.

  He’d laugh and lay a hundred on me.

  “This is for schoolbooks,” he’d say, “and nothing else.”

  I’d take the money and buy another joint.

  Seeing what I saw, being who I was, I knew it was my balls and my nine-millimeters that was keeping me alive.

  I wasn’t backing down from no one. I wasn’t backing down from life.

  Life was the streets and the streets didn’t scare me none.

  Then these dreams. The details were fuzzy but the dreams kept coming back to me. They’d change up, but one thing was always there:

  In the dream I’d be driving a car when a lead baseball bat would fly through the window, right at me. I’d wake up in a sweat.

  In another dream I’d be walking through downtown Baltimore, kicking it with my niggas, when I’d look up at a lead baseball bat about to crack my head open. I’d wake up drenched in sweat.

  There was a dream when I’m in a roller coaster and I look down and see some crazy man beating the controls with a lead baseball bat until the roller coaster starts collapsing and I start plunging to my death. Wake up in more sweat.

  I don’t understand dreams—then or now. There’s nothing you can do about what you dream. But I have to say that in this case those dreams saw something I didn’t—until I saw it in the flesh.

  This shit was strange.

  This was what happened in sure-enough life. This was no dream.

  Can’t remember the day of the week when it came down. Can’t remember the weather. Might have been cloudy. Might have been clear. Don’t know what jams were banging back then. Maybe MC Lyte and “Ruffneck.” Maybe Da Brat getting “Funkdafied.”

  I remember that rumors were floating around how Tupac had shot two cops in Atlanta. Tupac might have been on my mind ’cause Pac had just come through our neighborhood.

  He knew a lot of the niggas on our block. Couple of weeks before the day that changed my life, I was on the corner when I heard everyone saying, “Pac’s around. Pac’s down on the Boulevard, Pac’s chilling with the niggas.” I went down there to see for myself. And there he was.

  Beautiful cat. Eyes all bright and lit up with love. Lit up with intelligence. No security either ’cause he knew he was safe with us. We loved Pac. He was short, compact, killer good-looking, and had huge feet. All the big-time dealers came out to see him, protect him, and welcome him.

  I got to say, “Whassup, Pac,” and see him smile right at me.

  His smile was real sincere and his attitude real cool. Seemed like he had time for everyone. I was wishing I could hang with him, but so many people were wanting that same thing. Figured I better leave him alone. Wish him well. Go on my way.

  It’s something when you see a real star.

  On the day when my dream came to life, I wasn’t looking for no stars. Wasn’t looking for a damn thing. Fact is, I was minding my business, walking my usual walk.

  Father once told me, “You don’t walk, Snoop. You stalk. You walk like you don’t want no one to fuck with you.”

  “I don’t,” I said.

  So I was stalking through the neighborhood. Forgot where I was going or what I had to do. Doesn’t matter ’cause I looked across the street and saw a fight about to come down.

  Didn’t know the people. Didn’t know why they was fighting. Didn’t know nothing except fights always drew me. Something about the energy of a fight. The excitement. The danger. I wanted to get close and see what was happening.

  So I crossed the street.

  I fuckin’ crossed the street.

  Had I gone straight or turned the corner away from the fight, my whole life would be different.

  Funny how so much hinges on five or six little steps.

  I took those steps across the street and saw that tempers were boiling over. People calling each other motherfuckers and dirty bitches. Fists were flying.

  Then it happened.

  The bat.

  The lead baseball bat.

  A girl looked at me with murder in her eyes. I didn’t know her. Never had seen her before. Don’t know why she came at me. Made no sense. I wasn’t cussing her. I wasn’t threatening her. I was just walking by, watching this fighting, when she picked a slugger lead baseball bat—the same bat that had been coming at me in my dreams—and started swinging it at my head. If she caught me, I’d be dead.

  I screamed for her to stop, but she wasn’t interested in stopping. She wanted to take my head off.

  I tried to get away but by then the crowd was too thick. I couldn’t move. I was hemmed in by
people while this crazy lady was lunging at me with a lead bat.

  There was only way to stop her.

  I took out my shit. I figured once she saw it, she’d back off. But she wasn’t backing off. Even the gun couldn’t stop her.

  Only one thing could.

  Shooting the gun.

  Before she got to me, I got to her.

  I shot her clean.

  My lead stopped her lead.

  She fell to the ground.

  Dead.

  I ran.

  MURDER WAS THE CASE

  Snoop Dogg said it. Snoop Pearson lived it.

  Snoop kept running until she got to one of her niggas’ house.

  She stayed there for a night. That night she dreamed. Baseball bats were still flying at her head.

  In the morning, there was a knock on the door. She peeped through the blinds. Uncle was standing there.

  He hugged her. She expected him to cuss her out but he didn’t.

  “I know what happened,” Uncle said. “I done heard all about it.”

  “The bitch was coming after me with a goddamn bat,” Snoop explained. “What was I gonna do?”

  “You did what you did,” said Uncle. “But now you can’t stay here. This neighborhood’s too hot.”

  “Where am I gonna go?” asked Snoop.

  “My crib,” said Uncle.

  Uncle’s crib was way ’cross town. Uncle put Snoop in the back room and told her, “You lay low.”

  Laying low was hard for Snoop. Snoop had to hit the streets. Snoop hated being cooped up anywhere for long.

  “If you don’t lay low you gonna be cooped up for a lot longer than you can imagine,” said Uncle.

  “How long I gotta stay here?” asked Snoop.

  “Long as I say,” Uncle made clear. “Lot of people saw what you did.”

  “What I did was done in self-defense.”

  “Whatever you did, the heat’s on. Don’t move from here.”

  Snoop had a hard time not moving.

  On the television she’d watch The Cosby Show. She loved The Cosby Show. She pretended like her daddy was a doctor and her mama was a lawyer. Her daddy would say funny things and act the fool, but he’d always be there for her. Her mother was young and beautiful. She’d have all these sisters and brothers, one cleaner than the next. They’d have their little dumb-ass problems like the new dress is too long or the curtains in the bedroom are the wrong color. Snoop would imagine being surrounded by all these people night and day. Nothing could happen to her. Nothing could go wrong.

  “Nothing will go wrong long as you keep your ass right where it is,” Uncle would tell Snoop soon as he came home from supervising his shops.

  “Can’t even go out to buy some chips?” Snoop asked.

  “We got chips up here in the crib. Stay put.”

  Staying put meant watching more television.

  Reruns of Mama’s Family. Snoop loved Mama’s Family. Loved laughing at those crazy white people. Loved how Mama would shoot her mouth off any damn way she pleased.

  But how many hours can you watch TV without going nuts?

  Snoop would peep out the window. Car rolling by. Snoop Dogg spittin’ ’bout “Murder Was the Case That They Gave Me.”

  Biggie blowing up with “Ready to Die.” “Big Poppa” and “Juicy” all over the streets.

  The streets were calling.

  “Stay inside,” Uncle kept saying.

  “Just wanna see what’s happening,” Snoop kept saying.

  “I’ll tell you what’s happening,” said Uncle. “They after you.”

  Snoop stayed in. Four days, five days. Then a whole week. More Cosby. More Mama’s Family.

  More dreams.

  More nightmares.

  Then came the rain, thunder and lightning. Rained like holy hell for days on end.

  Cooped inside. Going crazy. Going stir crazy. Rain pounding against the roof. Pounding and pounding and pounding.

  Then silence. Sweet silence.

  Snoop woke up. It was morning. House was empty. Went to the window. Peeped through the curtains.

  Sunshine!

  Blue sky!

  No clouds! No rain!

  Beautiful, beautiful day!

  Had to get out.

  Just for a minute.

  Just for a quick walk to the corner store to buy a little candy bar.

  Wouldn’t take more than a minute.

  Once I was out, I was gone. I was feeling bold. Feeling like they’ll never find me. They’ll never catch me. I’ll duck in this alley. I’ll hide behind this van. I’ll keep moving so fast, changing up routes and crisscrossing the city, that no one will trace my path.

  I had all the moves.

  I had all the confidence in the world.

  I was so confident, in fact, that I even went back to East Oliver. Stopped by to give Mama a quick kiss. Mama didn’t know that I was on the run. She didn’t have to know.

  “Go by and see your godsister, Monique,” said Mama. “She been asking for you.”

  Monique lived just two doors down on Oliver. I ran by and found her in the kitchen making greens.

  She gave me a taste. I love greens.

  “Haven’t seen you in a while,” she said. “Where you been, girl?”

  “Here and there,” I told her.

  I heard the front door open.

  “You expecting someone?” I asked.

  “Nope.”

  When I turned, I saw a policeman standing there.

  Just like that, I started out the back door. But a policeman was standing there as well.

  Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.

  Cop in the kitchen said, “We just wanna question you.”

  I didn’t say nothing.

  He approached me with cuffs.

  “You gotta cuff me to question me?” I asked.

  “’Fraid so,” he said.

  By then the kitchen was filled with cops. Must have been six of them.

  They escorted me out the front door. Now the whole neighborhood was out there. Everyone was looking to see what was happening. There was a whole squadron of police cars.

  I could see Mama coming out her front door. She caught a glimpse of me. I saw the hurt in her eyes.

  There was nothing I could say, nothing I could do.

  MORE THAN

  A MINUTE

  The Snoop that shot a woman before the woman bashed her head in with a bat, the Snoop that ran and hid, the Snoop that was stupid enough to go out the house, only to be seen and caught—that Snoop was me.

  Hard to believe the things I did when I was barely a teenager, but I did them. I watched myself get into this mess, figuring my protectors would get me out.

  Mama didn’t have no money for lawyers, but Uncle did. Uncle and Father both told me to stay cool, they’d find me the best criminal defense attorney in the city.

  I tried to stay cool, but how cool can you stay in the city jail waiting for your case? That shit takes forever.

  “How long?” I asked Uncle when he first started explaining about the criminal justice system.

  “More than a minute,” he said. “There were a bunch of witnesses who saw you shoot.”

  “Well, I did shoot,” I said, “but only to save myself.”

  “The witnesses might not have seen it that way,” Uncle explained. “They might have heard the gunfire and then seen you holding the gun.”

  “Who knows what the fuck they saw?”

  “That’s my point, Snoop. I gotta talk to those witnesses.”

  “How you gonna find them?” I asked.

  “I’ll find them,” said Uncle.

  “How long do you think that’ll take?”

  “I keep telling you, Snoop—more than a minute.”

  23/1

  They had raided Mama’s house and taken away pictures of me. They put me on wanted lists and were hunting me down from different directions. I should have known better than to step out like that.

  I
stepped out and got snagged.

  And that was that.

  I’d been arrested before, but it was all petty stuff. In and out after an hour or two.

  Now my ass was in city jail for God knows how long.

  I can’t say I was all that scared ’cause most of the niggas in there were boys I knew. Half of them was from around my way. It was like homecoming week.

  “Whassup, Snoop,” they said. “We glad you gonna kick it with us in here.”

  I wasn’t glad, but I sure as shit wasn’t lonely.

  Uncle came by. Father too. Both said, “Look here, babygirl. This here lawyer’s coming through to help you. And besides that, we talked to the witnesses and none of them saw you shooting no one. Cops got a weak case.”

  Whether the case was weak or strong, the case took forever to get going. There were all sorts of delays.

  “Delays,” said the lawyer, “work in your favor.”

  Maybe so, but because the judge didn’t trust me with no bail, I had to sit in city jail while the wheels of justice turned awfully fuckin’ slow.

  City jail was boring and bad. Same old damn thing day after day. Go to school in a trailer. Boys on one side, girls on the other. Of course I wanted to sit with the boys, but that was prohibited. The teaching was lame. The teacher was half asleep. The TV at night only got two channels.

  I studied my lessons—always did good in school—but that didn’t make the boredom go away.

  There was no sex, at least none on my part. I didn’t know any of the girls well enough to get that close to them. I was getting my survival shit together, and sex was the last thing on my mind.

  One thing that was on my mind was escaping. Wasn’t my idea, but a girl in my cell called N. Actually, N got the idea from watching MacGyver, the TV show about a secret agent.

  In one episode, some dude escapes jail through a ceiling. Then he sprinkles pepper behind him so the dogs can’t pick up his trail.

  “We can do that,” said N. “Look up in that ceiling. We can push back that tile and crawl out to the street, pepper it up and be outta here.”

  I was skeptical, but what else did I have to do? N convinced me and also convinced S, the other girl in our cell.

  N had me to steal some pepper from the kitchen. Then we got us extra blankets and towels we’d use to climb up to the ceiling.