by Tracy Brown
Ingrid smiled, and agreed to do just that. By the time they finished talking and eating, it was almost one thirty in the morning. Ingrid offered to walk Jada out to her car, since it was late, but she insisted that she would be fine. Her car was parked right downstairs, and it was a cold winter night. No one would bother her. As Jada left her house that day, promising to keep in touch regardless of whether she and Born ever spoke again, Ingrid felt like a proud mom seeing her baby girl succeed. Jada had made it through her darkest days, and Ingrid was happy for her. She hoped that Born would get the chance to see how well Jada had fought her demons, and how she had come through the storm, still wearing a smile. And as she watched Jada leave, Ingrid realized that she still believed in second chances. She hoped that Jada and Marquis would have a second chance someday.
36
A VOICE IN THE DARK
Jada left Ingrid’s house and headed for Sunny’s silver Jaguar, which was parked in the lot behind the building. She pulled the keys out of her pocket and disabled the alarm with the remote. She noticed that a black Suburban was parked beside Sunny’s car, and wondered why anyone would park so close to her in a nearly empty parking lot. As she got closer to the truck, she heard a voice behind her that made her stop dead in her tracks.
“You know, I never thought you would really be dumb enough to show your face in Staten Island again.” Jada spun around, and stood face-to-face with Jamari in the darkness of the deserted parking lot. Her heart beat rapidly, and she clutched her bag tighter. The money she’d come back to get was in there, and she’d be damned if Jamari would get his hands on it.
“Don’t talk to me,” she said. Jada hadn’t spoken directly to Jamari in over a year. There was a court-appointed professional who coordinated her visits with Sheldon, so that contact between the two parents would be nonexistent. But now she’d had the rotten luck of running into him on her first trip back to Staten Island since her release. “You grimy muthafucka! You stood up there in that courtroom and told them that I was a monster—”
“You are a monster. You’re a fuckin’ crackhead, and you made my son a crack baby. But you really got a lot of nerve coming back to Staten Island after you stole my money. Wizz’s money …”
“I didn’t steal shit from you. Or Wizz. You didn’t have to pay for that shit. You were working on consignment, so you didn’t take a fuckin’ loss!”
“I did take a loss, bitch! I had to pay Elliot back bit by bit for that shit before he died.” A cold and evil expression flashed across Jamari’s face. “I had to rat that nigga out, just like I did to your boy Born.” Seeing the surprised expression on Jada’s face he smiled sinisterly. “I swear to God, I’m gonna see you dead before I see you in my son’s life. Everything you love, I’m gonna take it from you! I swear I’m gonna get you back for everything I ever lost.”
“What you lost! Listen to you, you selfish bastard. I don’t owe you a fuckin’ dime. And I don’t owe you any explanation. I’m living my life, and I’m going to be a damned good mother to my son. You can’t control me anymore. Whatever power you had over me is gone. And now I see why Born hates you so much.”
At the mention of Born’s name, Jamari seethed. He looked at Jada, venomously. “Is that who you came looking for?” he asked, motioning toward Ingrid’s building. “You came looking for Born?” Jamari grinned. “I hope you know that he got somebody else now. She’s having his baby, and everything.” He smiled at her menacingly, and waited for her reaction.
Jada didn’t give him the benefit of seeing her sweat. She was glad that she knew already, so that he hadn’t caught her off guard. “I know about that, and I’m happy for him. At least he has the pleasure of having a baby with someone he really cares about. I got stuck having my son with an asshole.”
Jamari stepped toward Jada, and she stepped back. He was pissed, and it was visible on his face. “Fuck you!” he said. “You’ll be back on that crack in no time. Once a crackhead, always a crackhead.”
Jada didn’t show it, but those words cut deep. She thought back to what Born had said to her when he found her high in their house that day. ‘Once a fiend, always a fiend, huh, Jada?” Those had been Born’s words to her. She still remembered the tone in his voice, the look on his face. It made her heart break all over again, as Jamari said similar words to her now. She ignored his remark, and said, “Well, your mama was a crackhead, Jamari, and look how well you turned out.”
Before she knew what happened, he was in her face, and the barrel of his .40-caliber gun was pointed at her temple. Jamari had her back pressed up against the driver’s side door of the Jaguar, and Jada was frozen with fear. “You got a lot of mouth for somebody out here all alone in the dark in the dead of winter. I should kill you right here, you stupid bitch!” Jamari was so mad that the vein in his neck was throbbing. “You think I’m gonna let you be around my son when you had him breathing through a machine, and throwing up every fuckin’ thing he ate? You had my son addicted to that shit. You dirty bitch! Coming through here in your fuckin’ Jag looking for Born. I should kill you just for that shit!” Jada was scared as hell, and he loved the helpless look on her face. “Oh,” he said, “what’s the matter? You scared?”
Jada nodded, and looked around hoping to see someone she could call out to for help. Jamari saw this, and let out a sinister laugh. “You should be scared. ‘Cuz, ain’t nobody out here but us. And I want an apology.” Jamari cocked his gun, and stared coldly into her eyes.
Jada’s whole body trembled, and it made Jamari feel powerful. “Apologize to me, Jada. Tell me you’re sorry.”
She felt her heart racing in her chest. “I’m sorry.” Her voice was barely audible.
“Say it like you mean it,” he said, still smiling wickedly.
Jada wanted to cry, but she held herself together somehow. She spoke louder, and said, “I’m sorry, Jamari.”
He nodded his head, liking the return of the power he’d once had over her. “Very good. That’s more like it. Now, what did you do with the money?” he asked. “You didn’t smoke all that money up. Not that fast. Where’s it at?”
Jada quickly handed him the bag in her hand. Fuck it! He could have it. Jamari couldn’t believe his luck. She had the money with her right then and there! His surprise was obvious, and he lowered his gun, reaching for the bag. But before he could take it away, he heard “click, click!” and he turned to see Sunny standing with a .380 in his face. In the moment of his surprise, Jada ducked out of the line of fire, and grabbed Jamari’s gun. Jamari stood still, wondering where this woman had come from. Sunny’s smile was as sinister as his had been.
“Hey, muthafucka!” she said. “Hand it over.”
Jamari stared at the beautiful woman in front of him, and could tell by the look on her face that she meant business. Her gun had a silencer on the end, and Sunny stood in stiletto boots, jeans, and a black leather jacket, looking at him like she was growing impatient. The driver’s side door of the Suburban was open, and for the first time Jada understood why the truck was parked so close. Sunny had been inside the Suburban all along. He handed her the money, while she kept her gun pointed between his eyes.
“Something told me that if my girl Jada came back to Staten Island by herself, you might try some dumb shit. So I took my brother’s truck, and followed her here, waiting for you to make your move.” Sunny shook her head, looking at Jamari. “You didn’t disappoint me. You punk, bitch-ass nigga. You like cornering women alone and putting guns to their heads, Jamari?”
“This ain’t got nothing to do with you, ma.” Jamari’s voice was steady, but the look on his face showed that he was nervous. He thought about trying to take the gun, but knew from the expression on her face that any sudden move would have scratched Sunny’s itchy trigger finger. “Jada owes me that money. She took it from me.”
“You owed it to her. She didn’t take it; she was supposed to get that. I heard all about your little twisted games, muthafucka. You thinking Born is your broth
er; you wanting to be with her so that Born would get mad; you giving her crack, then taking her son. You’re a real piece of shit. Now,” Sunny looked at Jada. “You wanna off this nigga?”
Jada smiled at Jamari. My, how the tables had turned! She and Sunny had Jamari’s life in their well-manicured hands. She looked at him, his eyes pleading with hers to let him go. She thought about her son, and all the hoops she had to jump through just to see him. All because Jamari had assassinated her character in court. She thought about Born, and how Jamari had hidden his history from her, making it likely that Born would never want to see her again. “I want an apology, Jamari.” Jada turned his words back on him. Now she wanted what he had demanded of her moments earlier.
He looked at Jada like she had lost her mind. “Fuck you.” He frowned, and looked at this woman he had once loved beyond reason. “I ain’t apologizing for shit.”
Sunny shook her head, ready to blast him, and looked at Jada for a cue. Jada folded her arms across her chest. “You sure about that? ‘Cuz, I’m only gonna ask you once more.”
Jamari was done talking. He lunged for the gun, ready to kill both of these bitches. But Sunny was faster. Living life as a gangsta bitch had taught her well. As Jamari made his move, Sunny’s .380 spit a slug into his brain, sending his eyes flying open in surprise, and sending his body falling to the ground with a thud. Her gun still smoking, Sunny looked at Jada and said, “You got too much fuckin’ patience!” The silencer had muffled the sound of the blast, but the dead body at their feet would be hard to explain. “Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
The two women jumped into their cars and drove off, leaving Jamari to draw his last breath all by himself.
When they finally got back to Brooklyn, Jada was a mess. She was crying and scared, thinking that she was going back to jail, but for murder this time. She figured someone must have seen her and Sunny. Someone must have witnessed the murder they’d just committed. Sunny, on the other hand, was as cool as a cucumber. “Calm the fuck down, Jada! It was like one in the morning. People were probably sleeping, and even if they did see something, they can’t prove it was us. You gotta calm down, and let’s get our story straight.” Jada pulled herself together, and listened as Sunny ran down their makeshift alibi. She was still nervous about what they’d done. But Sunny made her see that at least she was finally rid of the sorry bastard who was her son’s father. Maybe now she’d be one step closer to having her son all to herself.
Jamari’s murder became another one of Shaolin’s unsolved mysteries. The police had come to question Jada, and to ask for her whereabouts on the night Jamari was killed. She had, after all, been locked in an ugly custody battle with him for more than a year. Jada explained that on the night in question, she and Sunny had enjoyed dinner with Sunny’s mother and brothers, and that there was no way Jada could have been anywhere near Staten Island. After questioning Marisol, who corroborated Jada’s story, the police stopped eyeing Jada as a suspect. Jada was forever grateful to Sunny for saving her life—more than once. But getting custody of Sheldon wasn’t such a walk in the park. With his custodial parent dead, the state of New York wanted to place Sheldon in foster care until Jada could petition for custody. But to Jada’s surprise, an unexpected ally stepped up to take custody of Sheldon until Jada could wade her way through the mountains of red tape that stood between her and her son.
Jada got a surprise phone call from her sister. The two of them hadn’t spoken in years, and it was with mixed emotions that Jada talked with her. It wasn’t that Jada wasn’t happy to hear from Ava. But she still hadn’t forgiven their mother for leaving her to stand alone when she’d needed someone to lean on. And she felt a certain anger toward Ava as well. Ava had left Jada’s house after finding out about her drug use, and pretty much never looked back. There had been numerous occasions over the years when Jada had longed for the comfort of her sister, and Ava had been nowhere around. They had written letters to each other during Jada’s incarceration. But to Jada that wasn’t enough to erase the void Ava had left when she walked out of her sister’s life.
Part of her reluctance to talk to her sister stemmed from some feelings that Jada never admitted she had. She felt inferior to her sister. While Jada had done so many things wrong, Ava had done everything right. Sure she had attempted suicide as a teenager, and been a chronic runaway. But Ava had turned her life around, finished high school, gone on to college, and then to law school, and was now a very successful attorney. Ava was a corporate lawyer working at one of Philadelphia’s top law firms, and was close to making partner. No kids, no husband. Ava was just living life to the fullest, and traveling whenever the mood struck her. Ava had never been addicted to anything, never been to jail. Next to her sister, Jada felt like a complete failure. Hearing her voice on the phone did little to soothe that.
The conversation was cordial. They caught up on what was going on in each other’s lives. Jada told her sister about Jamari’s sudden death, and the fact that the police had yet to find any suspects. She told her about the battle she was now waging in order win custody of her son, and how she’d been drug free for nearly two years. And most important, she had managed to do it despite the abandonment she felt from Ava and their mother. Staying clean was an accomplishment that Jada was proud of, and she felt stronger because she had accomplished them without her family’s support.
Ava had an ulterior motive for this phone call. She wanted her sister to finally forgive their mother for the pain she had caused her. But when the conversation turned to Edna, Jada shut down.
“I don’t really want to talk about her,” Jada said. “I still don’t see how you could act like she never did anything wrong. It’s like you erased all the shit from your memory what she did to us. The things she let J.D. get away with doing to us …”
“There’s some things that you don’t know about Mommy,” Ava began. Edna had sworn Ava to secrecy about her recent cancer diagnosis. She didn’t want Jada to forgive her only because she was sick and dying of an incurable disease. She wanted her daughter’s forgiveness from the heart, and for that reason Ava skirted the real issue at hand. “Mommy wasn’t the best mother on the planet,” Ava said. “We both know that. It took a long time for me to get over what she did when J.D. was violating me. She didn’t help me, and to be honest, she abandoned me. I hated her. I hated her so much. But while I was in the group home, they counseled me. I spoke to people about what had gone on, and I got help for what I went through. Meanwhile, you were out there on your own. And I never realized how unfair it was that I got help, and you just got swept up in the streets. I had a feeling you were using drugs, when we were in high school, because you started losing weight and acting all crazy sometimes. And I’ve always felt bad because I didn’t do anything or say anything to try and stop you in the beginning. Mommy knew, too, but she didn’t know what to do about it.” Ava sighed. “She understands your anger toward her, Jada. She really does. But she never stopped loving you. Every time I talk to her, she mentions your name. She wants to see Sheldon, and she wants to know if you’ve even told him about his grandmother. She needs to see him. And to see you …”
Jada shook her head, as she held the phone. “Well, I’m not really willing to see her anymore. When I was locked up, and I gave birth to Sheldon, I called her. I begged her to come and take custody of him so that he wouldn’t be taken away from me. You know what she said to me? She said God was in control, and she didn’t want to get involved. She told me to pray about it. I’m laying in the hospital, the night before they returned me to prison, begging my own mother for help. And she told me to turn to God. Like there was nothing she could do for me. I’ll never forget that, Ava. You know what happened? Jamari took my baby, and kept him from me for as long as he could. If it wasn’t for Sunny …” Jada caught herself about to divulge too much information. “All I’m saying is, where was my family? Where was my mother? She came to court, supposedly to help me. And she got up on the witness stand and t
old the judge that she regretted raising a fuckup like me, and she hoped she could get a second chance, if he allowed her to raise my son. What the hell was that? How could she have possibly thought that would help me?”
“Jada, Mommy is really into the Bible now. She probably said that in the courtroom that day because that was the truth, in her opinion. She wasn’t going to lie under oath …”
“Well, then what the fuck did she come there for, Ava? What the fuck did I need her for, if she wasn’t going to say something helpful? When has she ever come through for me? When? You tell me that.”
Ava was at a loss for words, and silence filled the phone. She had known that Jada would have a hard time letting go of the past. But Edna was dying now, and Ava was determined to bridge the gap between mother and daughter. She was tempted to just come out and tell Jada the truth. But her mother had sworn her to secrecy. She wanted to tell Jada herself. If Jada would only talk to her. Ava could see that this would be no easy task.
She talked to her sister for a while longer, and they made plans to get together sometime in the near future. Ava was in and out of New York often, and she told her sister that she would love to see her, and start the process of mending their relationship. Jada agreed, although she knew that she really wasn’t ready for that. From that point on, she avoided her sister’s phone calls, and went about her life as usual. Fuck her family, Jada felt. All she had was Sheldon, and all he had was her. They were the only family that either of them needed. Sunny had been the only one—family or otherwise—to help Jada rid her life of all its demons. So in Jada’s opinion, Sunny and Sheldon mattered more than any sister or mother she’d ever had. She lived her life as such. It was all about Sheldon.