Maya's Choice

by Earl Sewell

My mother fought back as best as she could and said, “Well then, you need to tell your ex, Novia, to stay away from you. I’m tired of your ex-girlfriend smiling at you like she wants to make secret plans with you. Are you still dealing with her?”

  Martin shook her violently once again. “I’m not dealing with anyone but you. But I think you’re trying to creep around on me. That’s what my boys are saying. They told me that you were going around—”

  “Let her go, or else,” I said as I tightened my grip on the knife, which I kept concealed from his view.

  “Oh, you want some of this, too, little señorita!” Martin’s eyes were bloodred and filled with rage. He was so angry I wouldn’t be surprised to see steam coming out of his nose.

  “I’m working on saving up enough money so I can get me and my mother out of here and into our own place. We don’t need you!” I bravely stood up to him.

  “Did you hear her?” Martin looked at my mother, then let her go. He started walking toward me. I once again tightened the grip on the blade, ready to plunge it deep into his neck if he so much as lifted a hand to me. “What you don’t understand, little girl, is that your mother belongs to me. I own her. And since you’re part of her, I own you as well, and if I—”

  “Baby, look at me. I’m sorry. You were so right. I should have told you the moment that guy started bothering me.” My mother stood in his path and prevented him from reaching me. Martin turned his attention back to my mother.

  My mother glanced over her shoulder at me. Black lines of mascara ran like railroad tracks down her cheeks. Her eyes were just as red and glassy as his. “Viviana, it’s okay, honey. This is what all couples who love each other do. Fighting is just a natural part of being loved.”

  I gazed at my mother, completely perplexed by what she was saying.

  “Go on back to your room, or better yet, go visit your new little friend downstairs. And stop all of that nonsense talk of us getting our own place. We don’t need one, because Martin is providing us with all we need.”

  My jaw dropped when my mother said that to me. I didn’t understand how she could possibly want to live in Martin’s grubby apartment. At that moment I thought maybe she was considering marrying him.

  “Are you going to marry him?” I asked.

  “Viviana!” My mother gave me an evil look that said that was the wrong question to ask.

  “Maybe I should marry you and turn you into a respectable woman instead of a—”

  I interrupted Martin. “What about my father, Salena? Don’t you miss him at all?” I snapped. My mother knew that I was equally ticked off because I called her by her first name.

  “Ain’t no logic in loving a dead man, little girl.” Martin found the love of my father to be something to laugh at. “As far as I could tell your daddy was a real—”

  “Be careful of what you say!” I snarled.

  “Oh, are you threatening me?” Martin tried once again to reach me, but my mother blocked him.

  “No, no,” she said, pressing the palm of her hand against his mighty chest. I waited for my mother to say something that would make Martin honor my father, but she didn’t. She just continued to plead with her eyes for me to leave, but I refused.

  Finally she said, “I’ll be okay. Martin and I just had a little too much to drink, isn’t that right?” My mother flipped the script and was now lovingly caressing his brown cheek.

  “I can hold my liquor. Now, the stuff I was smoking, well, that’s a different story.” He glanced down at my mother, fire still in his eyes.

  “Run along now, Viviana. I know how to make my big strong hombre feel better.” Now my mother had flipped the script yet again by speaking the mixed language in a loving way instead of an angry one. I stood frozen and confused. I didn’t know what to think. My mind was swirling. Anger, fear, revenge and contempt were all competing for control of my next move.

  “Go!” my mother said, as Martin’s hands began gliding up and down her spine.

  I didn’t know if they were in love or hated each other’s guts. The only things I knew for sure was that he wasn’t my father and I didn’t trust him any more than I’d trust a drug addict in a room filled with dope. And my mother, well, she still believed that her love was strong enough to save men who had hearts of stone. My mother eased her way over to the door, and I stepped out of the room. I was looking back at her when she slammed the door shut. Bewildered, I turned around and walked back to my grimy bedroom.

  Later that morning I got a text from Toya telling me to meet her outside in front of the building. I was dying to get out of the house. It didn’t take me long to get dressed. As I walked out of my room I heard the stereo in Martin’s room blaring loudly. It was playing some old song “Always and Forever” by a group called Heat Wave. The only reason I knew the song was because I’d once caught an episode of the George Lopez show, and George was doing his stand-up comedy and he’d mentioned the song and the group.

  Utterly disgusted with my mom, I grabbed my duffel bag to place my stolen merchandise in and rushed out the door without so much as leaving a note on the refrigerator door as to where I was going and when I’d be back. My mother couldn’t have cared less either way. When I saw Toya, she was standing on the driver’s side of a black Camaro lip-locked with some guy. Once their kissing session was over, the dude got in the car and drove off.

  “Who was that?” I asked.

  “My baby daddy,” Toya proudly said. “He came to pick up his son. Are you ready to hop on the bus and head downtown to do this?”

  “Yeah, but couldn’t he have like, given us a ride?” I asked, thinking that if he had a car as nice as a Camaro, why wouldn’t he have given us a ride?

  “He doesn’t have time right now. He has to go and handle his business,” Toya explained. I was about to question what business he was going to handle with a baby, but decided that it wasn’t worth starting an argument.

  “Come on,” I said and started heading toward the bus stop.

  “My, aren’t you eager today,” she said, noticing my brisk pace.

  “I need to make some money so I can get the hell out of that apartment with my mother’s boyfriend. He’s a real—”

  Toya finished my sentence for me. “Jackass?”

  “That and a bunch more,” I said.

  “What do you think about you and me getting an apartment together?” Toya asked.

  “How are we going to do that? You live with your blind grandmother,” I reminded her.

  “She’s been talking about going into a senior citizen apartment building lately. It’s not like I want to live with her forever. Besides, she has too many rules. Not that I follow them, but sometimes it gets on my nerves.”

  “I’d love to get an apartment with you and be your roommate, but how are we going to pull that one off? We’re too young to sign a lease and we don’t have jobs. The best I can hope for is to convince my mother to leave that idiot.”

  “Girl, we live in the ’hood. I know plenty of shady landlords who only care about one thing, and that’s getting paid. As long as we can come up with the rent, we’re cool.”

  “And if we don’t?” I asked.

  “Then we just negotiate some new terms with the landlord, that’s all.” Toya smiled confidently. I glanced at her for a moment, but said nothing.

  “I’ll think about it,” I said, not wanting to make any type of real commitment to that plan, because in spite of everything wrong in my life, I couldn’t stand the thought of being without my mother. I’d already lost my father, and to lose my mother as well would make me go even crazier.

  During the bus ride downtown, Toya and I mapped out the places we’d hit. The Illinois State building in downtown Chicago had a massive food court and there were always tons of people there. We also agreed to hit all of the commuter train stations, as well as the Amtrak train station. It would be really easy to pick someone’s pocket there, because people had a tendency to fall asleep while waiting for their train
.

  “I just had another brilliant idea.” Toya leaned in closer to me.

  “What is it?” I asked curiously.

  “I don’t know why I hadn’t thought of this before.” Toya thumped her forehead with the heel of her hand. “Airports,” she whispered.

  “Huh?” I asked, confused.

  “Viviana, we could hang around the baggage terminals at the airport.” I gave Toya a quizzical look, and I could see her idea was still developing in her mind.

  “Think about it. A lot of luggage looks alike. We could walk in, grab some luggage and walk right out the door and no one would even question us,” Toya said.

  “Why would I want someone else’s funky clothes?” I was totally grossed out by the idea.

  “It’s not the clothes we’re after. Well, not unless someone has some nice designer stuff.” Toya made a funny gesture with her hand. “It’s the other stuff that people put in their luggage, like cameras, jewelry, computers and other gifts that they may have picked up while on vacation.”

  “I thought people had those little locks they put on luggage. We wouldn’t be able to even open it up,” I said, thinking that her idea wasn’t a very good one. But Toya had an answer for me that I didn’t expect.

  “No. I heard on the news that people can’t lock their luggage up anymore. It’s one of those Homeland Security requirements.”

  “Okay. Say that we can get the luggage open. We don’t have X-ray vision. How are we going to know which piece of baggage to walk off with? And what about all of the video cameras they have in airports?”

  “Oh, those are good questions. I hadn’t thought about that stuff,” Toya conceded.

  “See there. Besides O’Hare Airport is so far away from where we live,” I said.

  “Yeah, but Midway Airport isn’t. Look, we’d just have to take our chances. We could have on hats or dark sunglasses to hide our eyes and face.” I could see that Toya wasn’t giving up, and the dangerousness of her idea was actually exciting to her. That was something I’d noticed about her. Stealing, to her, had no boundaries and the exhilaration of it all was like a drug high. I, on the other hand, was just doing it as a way to get money so that I could move on. I figured that if I could save up about three or four thousand dollars, I’d be able to find a little place for my mom, and still have enough rent money to last for a little while. My mom could work on getting another job, and I could find a little part-time job doing something. I really didn’t care what type of job it was, just as long as it was legal and the pay was steady. First, I had to get the money and, according to Toya, on a good day she could easily pull in a thousand dollars. So I figured if we did six or seven hits, I’d have the money in no time at all.

  “I think we should at least give the airport thing a shot. We can hit the places downtown, and once we’re done we can catch the El train out to Midway Airport,” Toya said.

  “Okay,” I said, but in the back of my mind, I still thought it was a lame idea.

  As the bus drove past the McCormick Place convention center, both Toya and I noticed there was some huge conference going on.

  “What do you think about hitting a big meeting like that?” I asked, watching wave after wave of people walking into the building.

  “I don’t know. I’ve never tried to hit a place like this. Besides, it looks like all of these people are dressed in business clothes and I don’t have any outfits like that, that would help me blend in.”

  I looked back at Toya and chuckled. “Well, when we take some of the luggage from the airport, let’s hope you find one filled with business clothes that are your size.”

  Toya laughed. “Yeah, right, I don’t want to wear someone else’s funky clothes.”

  “Now you see what I mean,” I said as I continued to laugh.

  Toya and I arrived downtown and went to the Illinois State building first. Once there, we split up and agreed to meet one block away in about an hour. I walked around hoping some woman would leave her purse draped over the back of her chair, but that type of scenario never appeared. After seeing that I wasn’t going to get lucky I decided to leave. However, before I did that I noticed that one level up from the food court there were a bunch of shops. I decided to kill time browsing. I looked at some pretty outfits that I couldn’t afford, expensive jewelry, fashion accessories, fabrics and other items that I longed to have.

  I finally met up with Toya as planned and was anticipating that, just like me, she’d had no luck.

  “How much do you think you pulled in?” Toya asked.

  “Nothing, no one left their purse on the back of their chair,” I said.

  “Are you kidding me?” Toya looked at me as if she was ticked off.

  “What?” I asked, baffled.

  “Viviana, I’ve taught you better than that. Why didn’t you just find a mark and pick their pocket?”

  “Because I didn’t see any. There were mostly old and sickly looking people there,” I said.

  “Duh! They’re the ones with the money,” Toya said angrily.

  “Don’t tell me you ripped off the elderly,” I said, feeling that old people were off-limits. As much as I wanted to do what Toya did and be as good as she was, I just couldn’t see myself taking money from old people.

  “Damn right I did, and I made four hundred dollars,” Toya proudly boasted. We walked toward the Amtrak train station. “Look, girl. If you’re going to hang with me you’ve got to be willing to do whatever it takes. I’m starting to think that you’re not cut out for this. You’re starting to make me think that you’re just full of it!” Toya raised her voice at me and I didn’t like it.

  “So, what are you saying?” I stopped walking and decided to address the situation right then and there.

  “What I’m saying is that you need to stop acting like a frightened dog in a thunderstorm. You need to step up to the freaking plate and take some swings.”

  “I’m not afraid,” I said.

  “I don’t know. I think ever since that beat down you took on the bus, you’ve gotten cold feet.” Toya sneered.

  “I don’t believe you just said that to me.”

  “Hey, I’m just calling it like I see it.”

  “Well, you need to get your damn vision checked!”

  “Then prove me wrong. When we get to the train station, I’m going to pick someone out that you should be able to get. If you don’t do it, I’m going to beat you down for wasting my damn time!” Toya swerved her head from right to left disapprovingly.

  “Whatever! You don’t scare me, Toya,” I snarled, and walked ahead of her.

  When Toya and I arrived at the Amtrak train station it was crowded with people who were waiting on the train. Some of them were asleep on seats with their luggage next to them, others were just standing around. Toya and I stood in a corner and took everything in.

  “Look, right over there.” Toya quickly pointed.

  “What?” I asked.

  “The white girl holding the baby in her lap,” Toya said.

  “She’s just holding her sleeping baby,” I said, noticing the baby appeared to be between the ages of one and two years old.

  “She’s about to make her move on the guy sleeping next to her,” Toya said.

  “No, she isn’t. How do you know that? The guy is probably her father or something.”

  “Just watch. She’s using that baby to block the view of everyone else.” Sure enough, as we continued to watch, the young girl was able to slip her fingers inside the man’s pocket and remove money. She was also able to slip off his watch.

  “Oh, she’s damn good,” Toya said, admiring the girl’s work. Once the girl was done, she dropped the items into a nearby diaper bag and then moved away.

  “See, Viviana, that’s what I’m talking about. I can respect a girl like that. She’s freaking fearless!” Toya became excited by what we’d both just witnessed. “Oh, wait a minute. I just spotted a perfect one. You see the guy over at the ticket booth.” Toya pointed th
e man out.

  “Yeah, I see him,” I said, noticing he was a handsome Asian man wearing a black business suit.

  “He’s going to put his wallet in the inside pocket of his suit jacket,” Toya said.

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because I just saw him take it out of it.” We both watched as the man pulled out a money clip full of cash to pay for his ticket.

  “Oh, yeah,” Toya whispered, “and he is carrying a wad of cash.” A vile smile formed on her face.

  “I’m going to get this one. I want you to watch and pay close attention. Then I’m going to pick out someone for you. Obviously, the pickings here are pretty good if the white chick is hanging out and making her rounds.” Toya was in the zone and nothing was going to keep her from victimizing the man at the ticket booth. I scanned the room for the location of the white girl and noticed her watching the same guy.

  “Hey, I think—”

  “Shhh,” Toya silenced me. “Just watch me work.” Toya moved away from me and approached the man. Someone had left a copy of a newspaper on a seat and Toya picked it up. The newspaper would conceal her hand when she slipped it inside the man’s pocket. From my point of view I noticed that the white chick holding the baby had spotted Toya. I don’t know how thieves can spot each other, but the white girl definitely knew Toya was going after the Asian guy.

  “I think the white girl wants the same target Toya is after,” I mumbled to myself. I was about to warn Toya, but she’d gotten across the room rather quickly and was now standing directly behind the Asian man. As soon as he turned around he’d have no choice but to bump into her. I looked around again for the other thief in the room and noticed that she was talking to a police officer who had a black-and-brown German shepherd with him.

  “Oh, my God!” I whispered. “She’s pointing Toya out to the police.” I suddenly felt as if I were watching a movie. The cop focused in on Toya. The Asian man turned around and bumped into her, and with lightning-quick fingers Toya had slipped inside the man’s suit pocket, lifted his wallet and hid it within the fold of the newspaper she was carrying. By the time the Asian man apologized for bumping into Toya, the cop and the K-9 were standing next to them. The police officer asked the man if he had any identification on him. The poor man reached for his wallet and realized that it was missing. Toya, as swiftly as she could, turned and tried to get away.