Knockout Games

by G. Neri

  He had been watching me.

  “Then I heard you went down to juvie? And I asked myself, why would she do that? She wouldn’t . . . she wouldn’t rat us out, would she? Not after what she’d done herself? No, I couldn’t believe that, despite the fact that Prince here thinks you’re a snitch. No, I said, she’s a good girl, just confused; seeing a dead person probably freaked her out, am I right?”

  I nodded.

  He traced his finger softly up my calf. “I’ve seen a few myself and it’s not a nice thing. Still, I wondered what you talked about? I mean, I know that the surveillance video didn’t show shit, and for some reason, they couldn’t get anything off your camera that you happened to leave behind.” He scowled at me good, then shook it off. “So I figured it out. They needed a witness, someone who knew not only everything that went down that day, but everything about us.” He took a deep breath, exhaled.

  “But I wonder if that person remembers that she wasn’t the only one with a camera and maybe some other videos might be making their way into the wrong hands. . . .” He was neither threatening nor angry nor confused. He was certain—certain that everything would go bad for me . . . if I didn’t play ball.

  “Did you talk to Rodney Graves?” he said, matter-of-fact.

  I had lots of answers in my head and things to get off my chest, but before I could, Jamison caught my eye and glared at me for talking. Kalvin ducked back into the shadows. I turned back around and sat there, making sure I didn’t look like my crazy ex was standing underneath me. Jamison stood there for the next fifteen minutes, until Tuffy finished his story. Kalvin had stopped talking, but I could feel him breathing on my leg the whole time. I pressed my hands to my stomach and prayed that I would get my period soon. I tried not to imagine the other possibility.

  Destiny practically jumped out of her seat the second it was over. She didn’t want to talk to her brother or Kalvin or me for that matter.

  When everyone else stood to leave, Kalvin reached out and slid something into my hand. “I can’t let you take away everything I’ve built. I just can’t. I need you to understand that.”

  He and his crew disappeared into the shadows. I looked in my hand. It was Mom’s driver’s license.

  36

  I freaked. Called home. Voice mail. I dialed Dad’s cell. When he picked up, I started rambling a mile a minute. He’d been out all day, had not seen Mom, and was trying to interpret my incoherence as to why I was calling him before lunch. I made him come pick me up. He heard the panic in my voice and came right away.

  Evans said I could leave, but only after I told him that I had been intimidated by someone. When he asked by whom, I just said people that shouldn’t be here. He caught my drift.

  As soon as we pulled up to our house, I raced upstairs. The front door was unlocked.

  I ran into Mom’s bedroom.

  Empty.

  “Mom!” I cried out. “Mom!”

  “Hello?” she answered from the bathroom.

  I stood there, my head spinning. “Are you . . . OK?”

  The toilet flushed and my anxiety dropped away. “Jesus.” I collapsed onto her bed.

  Dad walked in. “Now would you mind telling me what this is all about?”

  Mom shuffled into the room half asleep. “I thought I was going to get some rest today. . . .”

  I took out her license and handed it to her. She blinked. “What’s that?”

  “Um, your driver license?”

  She looked puzzled. “Why are you handing it to me?”

  “The real question is who handed it to me?” I said.

  “What are you on about? Why aren’t you in school?”

  “That’s what I still want to know,” added Dad.

  “Mom, focus. Did you leave the door unlocked?”

  “No, I don’t think so,” she seemed unsure. “Why?”

  I hugged her. She was surprised, but I didn’t want her freaking out more than I was. “He was here, Mom. He was in this room.”

  She tensed up. She understood immediately.

  “Who was here?” asked Dad.

  “Kalvin. Kalvin came to school this morning with a message. A warning, more like,” I answered.

  Dad got it. He walked straight to the front door and checked the lock.

  “Are you OK?” I asked Mom.

  She felt her clothes like she was checking for stab wounds or something. “Yeah,” she nodded.

  Dad came back in, visually sweeping the room, looking under the bed. “I’m reporting this,” he said.

  “What are you going to say?” I asked. “That he stole her driver’s license?”

  “How about breaking and entering, for one? Threatening a witness? He’ll be behind bars today if I can help it.” He took out his phone and called Mr. Graves.

  Mom was in shock. “I can’t believe they were in here. Watching me.” She shuddered. She looked tiny and frail in her nightgown. When I thought about Kalvin standing over her and what he might have done . . .

  “It’s all my fault,” I said, hugging her again.

  She hugged back, but didn’t disagree.

  Dad put us on speakerphone as he told Graves what had happened. I added the part about my encounter at the assembly. Graves said they were going to bring in all the suspects tomorrow. They needed extra time to work out the details because the crew were all minors. But they would try to pick up Kalvin tonight just to be safe. After tomorrow, things would be alright again, he assured us.

  “And in the meantime?” he asked.

  “We can send a squad car over to stay with you, if you like.”

  “No thanks,” said Dad. “Just do your job and I’ll do mine.” He patted his chest. I could see his holster strap under his jacket.

  Mom leaned into the phone. “Send the car,” she said.

  Dad stared silently at the squad car parked outside our apartment. He ordered the locks changed, but in the meantime, I took a chair from the kitchen table and propped it up against the front door. When it was jammed in good and firm, he asked, “So we’re on lockdown?”

  “Yep.”

  I wanted to talk to Destiny about everything, but Dad wouldn’t let me. At some point, I was getting too antsy. Even though I was grounded from communicating with the outside world, Dad allowed me to go online. I got onto the St. Louis Post-Dispatch site and saw the candlelight vigil was happening tonight, right outside the library. I showed my dad.

  “Maybe we should go?” I asked.

  He put his hand on my head, something he used to do when I was tiny. “I don’t think it’s a good idea with all this going on. It’ll be dark, with lots of people. You never know who will be in that crowd.”

  I agreed. Maybe they’d have a live feed online or something.

  I checked my e-mail. Nothing from Destiny or any of the others. But there was a Facebook notice that I had been tagged in a video. I clicked the link.

  A page came up and a video called Heavy Metal Mama. I clicked Play. A serene image came up of a park somewhere on a crisp sunny day. And then I saw him: Metal Detector Man—and me coming up behind him.

  I shut the laptop. Dad looked at me funny, but I tried to act normal. I opened the laptop again and untagged myself, but now I knew Kalvin still had the video. Something would have to be done.

  Mom got up for dinner, which Dad actually cooked—a first. Even though it tasted horrible, I could see he was trying. We didn’t talk about much. I suggested that maybe I stay home tomorrow, but Dad said if they got Kalvin tonight, it would be good to show my face, to show the rest of them that I couldn’t be intimidated. “It makes a difference in court,” he said.

  “How?” I asked.

  He didn’t answer.

  Mom suddenly got brave after being cooped up with us two. “I’m going to work, then. He’s not going to make me a prisoner. What’s he going to do, march into the lab? We have security.”

  So we all drove to Mom’s work. The squad car followed us and it felt like havi
ng our own Secret Service detail. We dropped her off, and Dad said he’d come pick her up in the morning.

  On the way back, Dad took a different route. “Where are we going?” I asked, but as soon as I saw the crowd, I knew.

  We drove by the library and there were about three hundred people standing in silence, the candles lighting their faces. Some people had signs saying DEATH IS NOT A GAME and SHE DIED FOR PEACE. They marched in a circle in front of the library. There were pictures of Mrs. Lee on each sign. Someone was singing “Imagine” and playing a guitar.

  Dad stopped across the street, but kept the engine running. He just wanted me to see it.

  “Snow,” I said. The snow was falling gently and silently, making the whole scene angelic.

  After a minute, someone startled us by knocking on the window. It was one of the cops in our Secret Service. “Just wanted to let you know that they apprehended Mr. Barnes, sir. Still, we should probably get back to your home.”

  “Did he go quietly?” Dad asked.

  “He gave us a bit of a chase,” said the officer.

  I imagined Kalvin flipping them off and hitting the streets like one of those parkour guys, hopping walls and jumping off bridges.

  “They caught him hiding in the bushes.”

  So much for parkour.

  37

  The next morning I woke up and felt like I was going to puke. I sat staring at the toilet and thought: who feels sick in the morning? Pregnant girls.

  Shit. I wanted to pretend all the stress was keeping my period away. This was the last thing I needed in my life. I prayed the stress would go away, along with everything else. There was only one kind of blood I wanted to see now.

  Dad drove me to school. He was in a better mood. “With Kalvin behind bars, I think this whole thing will crumble now. You just have to stick to the plan and everything will work itself out.”

  Jamison was there to meet us. I got the same stares, same comments behind my back. But around 10:15, Jamison came into my class and told me to come with him. Someone hissed, “Busted....”

  We ended up in the principal’s office. Evans was dressed in a dark suit like he was on his way to a funeral. He gestured for me to sit, while he just sat there behind his desk, staring out the window. Something was going to happen; I could feel it in the air. “We’re expecting visitors,” he finally said. “I thought it best that you stay here until they finish with their work.”

  He didn’t say anything more until I saw four police cars and two black vans pull up quickly in front of the school. They skidded to a stop and the doors burst open. About fifteen cops jumped out, dressed in black riot gear. Half of them went to the middle school; the other half came running into ours.

  Evans handed Jamison a list he had handwritten on a piece of paper. He told him to go give it to the cops and to make sure they didn’t cause too much of a commotion.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  “Taking care of business,” he said, watching. “It’ll be over soon.”

  I heard them marching down the hallways. Classroom doors were opened; names were shouted; scuffles followed. After ten minutes, I saw them marching back out with three students, including Prince Rodriguez and a couple other Tokers. They had plastic bands tying their wrists together.

  Suddenly, I saw Tyreese sprinting across the grass. He had seen the cops coming out of the high school and took off—a gazelle trying to escape a mob of hungry cheetahs. The cops sprinted after him, but he moved fast, slipping in and out of their grasp. When they surrounded him on the front lawn, he spun around, running them in circles until he slipped on the grass and went down. Three cops pounced on him and it was over. He squirmed about as they tried to pin him down, but eventually they dragged him off to a van. They had seven other middle schoolers, including C-Jay and Doughboy. Then as quickly as they came, the cops hustled everyone into the vans, and just like that, they were gone.

  “Well, that made a statement,” said Evans.

  “Can they do that?” I asked.

  He ignored my question. “Hopefully, our students won’t forget this little show and it’ll be more effective than Kindness Day. Unfortunately, you all tend to respond more to getting caught than having empathy toward the victims.”

  “And what about me?” I asked.

  He studied at me with lizard-like eyes. “It seems you have a little more breathing room for now. I would still keep a low profile, if I were you.”

  I left his office a bit stunned. It had all happened so quickly. I expected Jamison to escort me back, but Evans’ secretary told me he hadn’t returned from the raid. Besides, they said the threat was gone, so I was on my own.

  I found myself alone for the first time in days. It was eerie. I started down the hallway until I felt somebody watching me.

  I turned and saw Mrs. Lee. The poster of her from the assembly was standing outside her office. It was a blowup of one of those bad yearbook photos everyone had to take, the ones where you had to look optimistic and hopeful. I gazed at it for a long time, hoping it would wash away the images burned into my brain from the crime-scene photos. This was a much better way to remember her.

  During lunch, Destiny found me alone, shivering on the bleachers. I didn’t mind the wet seat; I wanted to feel numb again.

  “You know they got this thing called indoors, right?” she said.

  She waited for me to say something. When I didn’t, she zipped up her jacket and sat down next to me. We sat there in silence for a good couple of minutes, until she meekly said, “Are we still friends?”

  I shrugged. “Oh, now you’re asking,” I said.

  She bit her lip. “I didn’t . . . set you up. I guess I just got caught up in everything . . . and then my brother showed up. . . .”

  “Well, if it means anything to you, I’m not seeing Kalvin anymore.”

  We both looked at each other and busted out laughing. It was such a stupid thing to say.

  “Was it the prison duds that turned you off?” she said, barely able to get it out.

  We laughed until we couldn’t anymore. Then we got serious again.

  “So, I guess I should say thanks,” she said. “Seems someone left me off the TKO list.”

  I had managed to overlook her picture in the yearbook. “I’m always saving your ass.”

  She was about to say something back, but nodded instead. “I remember when my brother made me swear I’d leave the TKO club,” she offered.

  “And why didn’t you?”

  She scrunched up her face. “I wish I had, way back when. I was too young. But I guess I was no different than the rest of ’em. . . .”

  “You’re like me. Too stubborn to listen to anybody who tells you not to do something. Besides, if you had left, we wouldn’t be friends now.”

  She nodded, sheepishly. “I didn’t know K was gonna be at the assembly.”

  I believed her, but didn’t say so. We sat in silence.

  “You gonna testify?” she asked finally.

  I shrugged. “Someone’s gotta stand up for Mrs. Lee, right?” I said, mostly to myself.

  She put her arm around me in a sisterly way. “You do what you gotta do. I got your back.”

  I was surprised. “Really?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know; I have a thing for losers. If I don’t stand with you, who will?”

  “Thanks.” I put my hand on hers and felt the warmth of her skin. “You wanna ditch school with me?”

  She did a sly double take. “Now? Aren’t you supposed to stay out of trouble?”

  “I can’t stay here. There’s something I have to do. And I want you to come with me.”

  38

  St. Matthew’s Cemetery was only a short bus ride away. When we got off and she saw where we were headed, she shot me a look.

  I nodded. When she saw the news crews in the parking lot, she got it. She saw I meant business. “Whatever you gotta do. . . .”

  We waited under a tree for about twenty
minutes. People began to arrive. All kinds of people. Much more than just family and friends. The community was turning out for this one. Evans and some of the staff were there too. I didn’t care if they saw me.

  We walked in with the rest. Everyone was dressed in black, except for us. As we headed up the hill, a funeral procession of black cars turned into the main gate, led by a hearse. We watched them pull up to a freshly dug grave at the top.

  I saw Joe Lee emerge from his car. It was hard for me to breathe. He looked like he’d aged ten years in three days. When I turned away, Destiny put her hand on my back.

  “I got you, remember?”

  It was a gray and unforgiving day. The priest did all the things that he usually did every time someone died. Then the mayor got up. With him was a man leaning on a cane with a bandage on his nose. He was probably that city councilman Prince hit. There were a lot of people there that looked important. Destiny said she saw some sports stars there too.

  The mayor spoke about being “appalled” by Mrs. Lee’s violent death, and of feeling “helpless” to prevent more of them. He gathered himself and continued, “But seeing everyone here today and the responses in the paper and online has given me hope. Maybe Alice Lee didn’t die in vain. Maybe her death has a deeper purpose behind it. To bring people out of their shells so they don’t accept random violence as a way of life. We are better than this. The great Gateway Arch that you see in the distance is not just a tourist attraction. It’s a doorway—a doorway to a greater future of unlimited possibilities. We cannot let the acts of a few ruin the acts of the many. We are better than that, and Alice Lee will stand as beacon of hope when all is said and done. Enough is enough.”

  Many people spoke after that. Some knew Mrs. Lee well; others knew her only by her community work. The only one who didn’t speak was her husband Joe. He had to be assisted to his chair beside the grave. He had a neck brace, and bruises on his face. Maybe he couldn’t talk.