Stand Your Ground: A Novel

by Victoria Christopher Murray

  Tyrone reached over and hugged me and I hugged him back. From the backseat, Syreeta clapped.

  But while the two of them were thrilled, I wasn’t so sure. Because once they had a name, what would the Guardians do?

  Chapter 12

  Almost eight hours had passed since Tyrone had dropped me and Syreeta off.

  And once again I told him, “I wish you would stay home with me.”

  “You have Syreeta.”

  “But I want you.”

  “And I want to be here, too,” he said. “But I can’t stay here without our son, Jan. I can’t lay my head on a pillow in this house.” Then he kissed me and made a promise. “We’re getting close. And we’re not gonna stop.”

  Then he dashed out the door, but like he’d said, at least this time, I wasn’t alone.

  Even though Syreeta was the perfect person to be with me, I wanted my husband. So now I stood in almost the same place where he’d left me. Just standing. Just staring. Just praying.

  “That’s not going to bring him back any sooner.”

  I glanced up at my best friend, who’d changed hours ago into jeans and a T-shirt. She sauntered down the stairs the way only an I-would’ve-been-a-model-if-I’d-been-a-foot-taller woman could.

  “Come on, get away from that door.” She guided me into the family room. “Let’s take the load off, and maybe have some wine. You got some Moscato, right?”

  I nodded as I flopped onto the couch. “We have wine, but Tyrone refuses to buy Moscato. He says that’s for colored girls only.”

  She laughed. “He’s probably right. But never fear!” She turned and sprinted from the room.

  I had no idea where Syreeta was going, but I was too tired to care. I leaned back, closed my eyes, and wondered if I could stay this way till Monday.

  Our trip to the funeral home had been exhausting enough, but everything that followed had stripped away what little strength I had. From finding out that the police were going to release the man’s name, to going to Delores’s and arranging to have Marquis’s funeral at her church, to sitting in her crowded house with friends and church members all wallowing in the sadness of this occasion, it was too much.

  And it really went over the top when Raj and a couple other Guardians rode up, in full regalia, looking like they were going to war.

  That was my cue; I didn’t even ask Tyrone if he was ready to leave. I just stood up and he and Syreeta followed me.

  In the car, I once again gave Tyrone all of my facts and all of my opinions about the Brown Guardians. He just nodded, and said nothing. Until we got home—then he explained, then he left me again.

  “Okay, you don’t have to stand and give me an ovation,” I heard Syreeta say. “A simple thank-you will be enough.”

  I opened my eyes and could do nothing but smile. She held two wineglasses in one hand and a blue bottle in the other.

  “Don’t tell me you brought Moscato all the way from Germany?”

  “Nope.” She handed me a glass. “This is better. Eiswein. Once you’ve had this, you’ll never drink American again!” She filled my glass, then filled her own before she sat next to me.

  We clicked our glasses in a silent salute. This was no celebration, though, so we said nothing.

  I sipped and then frowned. “This is really good. Smooth.”

  Syreeta just smiled.

  We sat and sipped in silence for a few minutes. Until Syreeta said, “This doesn’t seem right.”

  “What? Me sitting here drinking wine while my son is lying in a funeral home?” I shook my head, then leaned back. “I should have started drinking a few days ago.”

  “I agree. I’m surprised you didn’t drink your way through your entire wine cellar.”

  “I don’t have a wine cellar.”

  “But if you had one . . .”

  We chuckled together.

  But then the laughter left her. “I’m talking about this.” Syreeta waved her hand like she was a The Price Is Right model. “You shouldn’t be here all alone.”

  “Uh . . . check this out. I’m not alone; you’re here.”

  “But it’s just me. This house should be filled with people supporting you.”

  “They’re all over at Delores’s house, remember?”

  “Oh.” She took a sip. “Yeah.” Then she took a large swallow and giggled. “All them old ladies; I guess this is best, huh? Just you and me.”

  I nodded. “The way it’s always been.”

  More silent time passed before she rested her glass on the table and then twisted her body to face me.

  “I want to ask you something. And it’s not that I will ever be able to understand what you’re going through. But there is something I don’t understand and I want to understand you.” She took a long breath and asked, “Why are you so against the Guardians going after that man and making him pay for what he did to Marquis? He murdered your son.”

  I let her words settle for a moment. “I want that man to pay. I want him to rot in jail before he rots in hell.”

  “So then let the Guardians fight for that.”

  “I don’t like the way they fight.” Now I let my words settle on Syreeta. “Here’s the thing. In a couple of days, I’m going to bury my son, and this will be the very last thing that I will ever do for him. I wasn’t there to save him, but now I can protect him. If the Guardians get involved, what will that look like for Marquis?” I didn’t give her a chance to answer. “You know what it’s going to look like. The police will drag my son’s name through the thickest mud. And then, Marquis will always be associated with the man who didn’t get tried in the courts, but who got tried in the streets. And if he ended up d—” I paused. I didn’t even want to speak that word into the atmosphere. “If he ends up with something happening to him, what kind of legacy will that leave for my son?”

  I let her think on that for a moment and she nodded a little bit.

  I said, “No one else may ever understand, but I do want justice. I want a mother’s justice. I want the kind of justice that comes in the right way. The kind of justice that will show that Marquis was a wonderful young man who had his life stolen. I want the kind of justice that when people look back, Marquis’s name will stand for something. Because this was handled in the right way.”

  It took her a few moments, but then she nodded again. “I get it. I never thought about how you would feel as his mom, hearing what we know the other side will say about Marquis. Now that you mention it, I don’t know how those other mothers have handled it because I’m just his godmother and if I heard anyone say anything bad about Marquis”—she shook her head—“I might have to cut somebody!”

  “See? The Guardians have you talking all kinds of mess. I’m more likely to cut someone than you will ever be,” I said, dismissing her threat with a wave of my hand.

  “Okay, maybe. But I’m just saying that I understand the Guardians, too. I get Tyrone and Raj. They understand that street justice is the only kind of justice you can get sometimes. That’s something that Raj used to always say to me.”

  I gave her a sideways glance. “Speaking of?”

  “What? Justice?”

  “Raj!”

  “Oh!” Even though her glass was half full, she grabbed the bottle and filled it to the brim. Then she took a swallow that half emptied the glass, sat back, and said, “Ask away.”

  If she didn’t think that I would go in, Syreeta didn’t know me. “How could you—”

  She didn’t even let me finish. “I know,” she said, holding up her hand. “I know what you’re thinking, but Raj really has changed.”

  I chuckled, though it wasn’t because I found her words funny. “You do know that there are cemeteries full of women who’ve said the same thing?”

  She stared at me long and hard before she rested her glass on the table. “Let’s not go there right now.”

  “I know it sounds harsh, especially now. But maybe it’s because of what’s happened and I can’t stand the
thought of losing someone else that I love. Women die because they wanted to believe their abusers had changed. Women who went back over and over again. Women who never left.”

  “First of all, no one said anything about me getting back with Raj.”

  I looked at her like I didn’t believe her . . . because I didn’t.

  “We’re just friends again,” she said. “And I think people deserve a second chance.”

  “He used up his second chance with you. His second, and third, and twenty-seventh and fiftieth.”

  “Okay, it wasn’t that much. He didn’t beat me that many times.”

  I raised my eyebrows. I wanted to ask her if her mother knew that she had somehow gone crazy.

  She said, “Really, you know it was just five times.”

  I slapped my hands on my thighs. “Just? You do realize that was five times too many, right?”

  “Yes. And that’s why he and I will never be a couple.”

  I twisted my lips.

  “Plus, he paid for his crime,” she said, sounding like she was sad that he’d eventually been charged with simple assault.

  That’s why I asked her, “You’re not sorry about that, are you?”

  She said no, though her tone didn’t change.

  “Well, to me, he got off easy.”

  “I know that’s what you think.”

  “He didn’t even serve the full year.”

  She nodded. “But those anger management classes really did help him.”

  “I can tell. He came right out of jail and joined the Brown Guardians.”

  She said, “Well, if you’re gonna be angry, at least channel it in the right way.”

  “Yeah, instead of beating up women, just kill men.”

  She held up her forefinger and then wiggled it with her words. “There has never been any proof that the Brown Guardians have killed anyone.”

  “You don’t believe that, do you?”

  “No, but there isn’t any proof. And if they did kill someone, it’s always been about justice. They don’t go around mugging old ladies or beating up old men. There hasn’t been a single case”—she raised her hand in the air—“where that person didn’t deserve that justice.”

  “And that’s the definition of ‘vigilantism,’ which is barbaric in addition to being illegal.”

  She shrugged as if that was all right with her. But it wasn’t all right with me.

  “I don’t think they’re vigilantes,” she said. “I just think they make wrongs right, and I respect that. And that’s where it begins and ends for me and Raj. I respect how he’s turned his life around, I respect what he’s doing with the Brown Guardians, I respect him, but we will never be together again.”

  “I don’t know how you do it because it’s hard for me to even look at him.”

  “Well . . . that’s not just because of what went down with me and him. It’s because of what went down between the two of you.” She let a moment pass, then, “So . . . how is Caleb?”

  That was a quick left turn. I waited a moment before I told her, “I spoke to him the other day.”

  “What!” Her body shot up straight. “Seems like I’m not the only one who has some explaining to do.”

  I held up my hands. “He called when he heard about Marquis. He was the one who told me about it being on the news.”

  “And that’s all he said?”

  “Yes.”

  “So he didn’t try to get the two of you together or anything?”

  “No. Well. Maybe.”

  “Oh, lawd.” She fell back hard against the sofa’s cushions.

  “Just to pray,” I explained. “That’s all he wanted to do. Get together to pray for me.”

  She looked at me for a moment and then busted out laughing.

  “That’s what he said.”

  “Yeah, okay.”

  “Well, it doesn’t matter because I love Tyrone and I’m not going back down that road.” I paused and thought about that time. “For the life of me, I still can’t believe that happened.”

  “It was a crazy tangle of situations,” Syreeta said. “You supporting me. Tyrone supporting Raj. Tyrone mad at you. You mad at Tyrone.”

  I nodded. “I know it was my fault, I know I was wrong, but I will always say that if Tyrone hadn’t moved out, I would never have been with Caleb.”

  She nodded. “I know.”

  “I just wanted the right thing done. Raj needed to be arrested.”

  “I should’ve been stronger,” Syreeta said. “I should’ve been the one to call the police.” She shook her head. “There are still times when I can’t believe that you turned in your own brother-in-law.”

  “Well, you’re my girl; we support each other. That’s just what we do.”

  “I know.” Then she paused. “So, if Raj were to apologize to you . . .”

  She left her sentence unfinished, so I filled in the words for her: “It would mean absolutely nothing.”

  “Oh, come on! Why not?”

  “Because what he did to me, he was just being dirty.”

  Her eyes got wide. “Only after you made sure he was arrested and charged.”

  I sat up. “So that was a reason to destroy his brother’s marriage?”

  “Uh . . . yeah. You tried to destroy his life. And really, he was just trying to protect his brother. I mean, yeah, there was a part of him that wanted to get back at you. But I think there was also a part of him that was just looking out for his brother. Just like you were looking out for me.”

  Of course, what Syreeta said made perfect sense. But I preferred to believe what I’d been telling myself for the last three years—that Raj was a low-down, woman-beating, dirty dog.

  Syreeta said, “With what’s happened to Marquis, we all need to realize that life is more than too short, it’s too precious to waste on being mad at people you once loved.” She shrugged. “Tyrone and I found a way to love each other again; I hope the same for you and Raj.”

  I said nothing, but Syreeta did get to me—a little. She laid her head on my shoulder and said, “We’re going to make it through this, right?”

  I nodded, and without even looking at her, I knew that she was crying . . . just like I was.

  “I’m so glad you’re here,” I whispered.

  “Me, too.” She sniffed. “ ’Cause I would hate for it to be Caleb that you were sitting with like this right now.”

  She laughed, and I laughed, too, though she didn’t know how true her words were. I really was glad that she was here because with Tyrone never coming home, and with my heart so broken, I don’t know what I would have done . . . if Caleb called again.

  Chapter 13

  There should have been more to do; at least I would have expected more to do when planning the funeral for my son. But it was all taken care of by the funeral home. And whatever they were missing, my mother-in-law and her pastor filled in. Sure, they tried to include me.

  The first call came in yesterday morning:

  “Hi, baby, I know it’s early,” Delores had said.

  I confirmed her words when I glanced at the clock. Yup, seven on a Saturday was too early to be calling me—before. But this was now. And I never minded waking up. So that I could fall asleep again and pray that Marquis would come to me in my dreams.

  Delores said, “What picture of Marquis do you want us to use for the program?”

  I had no idea, so I’d rolled out of bed and had gone across the hall to the guest bedroom and awakened Syreeta. Then, the two of us sifted through all the photos on my phone. But that quickly became a gargantuan task. How was I supposed to choose one that was worthy of being part of the final tribute to Marquis? One that would represent all that he was? There was no way for me to decide.

  So I left that choice to Syreeta, who texted a couple to Tyrone.

  Then a few hours later, Delores called back.

  “What scripture do you want to be read?”

  I was no Bible connoisseur, but I loved the f
ourteenth chapter of John. That always gave me such hope, even in the middle of talk about death. “Can someone read that?”

  “Whatever you want, baby. It’s about whatever you want.”

  What I wanted was for time to slow down so that I didn’t feel as if it was rushing to the moment when I’d have to say my final good-bye to my son.

  But time paid me no mind and Saturday turned to Sunday much too quickly. And so, today, I decided not to get out of bed, hoping that would slow down the quickening ticks of time passing by.

  So when Delores called and told me that she thought Tyrone and I should at least go to church this morning since Marquis’s services were tomorrow, I told her, “No thank you,” and I didn’t move. When Syreeta came to my bedroom and told me to come down to the kitchen for breakfast, I said, “No thank you,” and I stayed in bed. And when Tyrone called hour after hour, checking on me, asking me if there was anything that I needed, I didn’t say too much. Really, after the third or fourth or fifth time, I even stopped telling him that all I needed was him.

  But even though I tried to slow down time, it still moved. And now it was the evening before what would be another worst time of my life.

  Those were my thoughts as I sat in the middle of my bed with my legs crossed in front of me. Syreeta had brought up a tray of Chinese food, trying to convince me that she’d prepared it, even though I could almost smell the paper cartons that the food had been delivered in.

  Syreeta had been chatting away, but my thoughts kept words from my mouth. My thoughts were all about what tomorrow would bring.

  “Are you going to eat that egg roll?” Syreeta asked, though she had already grabbed it from my plate before I had the chance to tell her no. Then she chowed down on it and was halfway done when she said, “I hate to sound like a cliché, but you know you have to eat something, right?”

  I nodded. “I will. One day. Soon. Maybe.” I pushed the tray away.

  “Is that all you got for me?” Syreeta asked. She rolled off the bed and grabbed the TV remote from my nightstand. “If you’re not going to talk, maybe I can find some ratchet show that will make me laugh and make you curse, or something.”

  She aimed the remote at the television, clicked it on, and pressed the channel button, then paused.