I stared him in the eyes and watched the blood drip from his mouth. I was so glad I hurt him, but I wished I had bit it off!
“You could have had anything, Reese, anything you wanted, but it’s cool. One day, li’l girl, one day.” He turned and walked out my room.
From that day until this one, he’d never looked at me again.
After he stood at the door a few seconds longer he finally left, then Momma came out of her room. I figured she was trying to see if I was all right with all of the arguing they had been doing.
“Reese, I see you walking in that kitchen. You need to go to bed. You have that field trip in the morning, baby,” Momma said.
“I’m getting somethin’ to drink first. Then I’m going to bed, Momma.” I smiled, leaving the kitchen with a big cup full of grape Kool-Aid. When I got down the hall the curiosity hit me.
“Hey, Momma? Did you take the twenty dollars you gave me from Yellow? I heard him say he was missing money.”
“He gave it to me, and you don’t worry about that! You stay in a little girl’s place . . . Silent! Now, good night.” She stood there, grinning, with her hands on her hips. I shook my head and smiled; and then I walked in my bedroom and shut the door.
About an hour later I was awakened abruptly by what sounded like furniture being thrown. Someone was yelling and screaming and it startled me. I jumped out my bed, opened my bedroom door, and went to the living room where the noise was coming from. Momma was in there sitting on the couch, smoking her cigarettes, and Yellow was standing over her, hollering. He hadn’t noticed me but Momma did. She looked over at me and waved her hand for me to go back in my room, but I stood there.
“Sophia, you think this some kinda game? I told you before don’t touch my money, didn’t I?”
He was high. I could tell because I knew the actions that came with him getting high, and he had no problem snorting that stuff whenever he sat in the living room and watched TV. He would take some of the cocaine out of a little plastic tube, lay it on the coffee table, lean his head down, and sniff. Every time he did, it wouldn’t be long before he would turn into this monster, acting invincible. That’s how he was acting now. Yellow was out of control.
I looked around the living room and saw that the front door was wide open. I could see the television that usually sat in the living room now outside on the sidewalk, busted. Glass was everywhere! The front window was broken out, too, and there was a big hole in the living room wall.
My mother couldn’t take her eyes off me. She waved for me to go back in my room again, but I didn’t. She sat there so calm, not even blinking from Yellow jumping up in her face. Her eyes shifted from looking at me to looking at that fool. She lay back on the couch, crossed her legs, then puffed on her cigarette. She leaned her head back, closed her eyes, and blew out the smoke. “I know you don’t think I’ma give you any money now. Look at this place!” She flung her hand in the air. They both looked around at all the damage.
She shook her head, then continued, “I put you out, and you come back in here through the window? And to top it all off you bust it out! I’ma have to pay for that, Yellow! Oh please, get out of my face!”
She waved him off, put her cigarette out in the ashtray on the table, and then she crossed her legs and began to shake one on top of the other. I hadn’t ever heard her talk to him like that before. I covered my mouth from giggling, thinking, that’s what he gets! “Yellow, it’s over. I can’t stay in this relationship!” She closed her eyes before she said anything else and he watched her, waiting for her next word. “I’m off the drugs, tryin’a do right by me and my daughter, and this”—she pointed back and forth to herself and then him—“is not healthy. Then you come here and break everything up.” She took a big sigh of frustration. “I start my job tomorrow; Reese has school in a couple of hours . . . It’s over. It’s time for you to go, Yellow.”
She got up off the couch and walked to the front door, which already stood open, waiting for him to leave. He walked over to her as if he was going to leave. He paused, and then grabbed her face with his hands and squeezed. “Who you think you talkin’ to? Huh?”
His face turned grim and his pupils looked black. He yelled and pulled her down to the floor. “You must be out of yo’ mind! Don’t forget who I am! I may be a li’l high on this coke, but I ain’t no dope head!” Yellow demanded, and pulled out his gun.
I was scared. I ran back to my room and called 911. “Hello, my momma and her boyfriend are fighting, can you please send someone around here? He has a gun!” I said to the 911 operator.
I was pacing my bedroom floor back and forth. My hands were shaking and my heart was beating faster than ever before. I could hear Momma trying to get away from him. The commotion in there was extremely loud.
“Don’t be scared now. You talkin’ all that mess! Say somethin’ now, Sophia! What you got to say now? Huh?” He was yelling at the top of his lungs. I was surprised none of our nosy neighbors didn’t come out. I knew they were listening.
“Yellow! Put that gun away ’fore somebody gets hurt. Please, baby, my baby is in the next room!” I heard Momma pleading.
I was sure he couldn’t hear anything she was saying by now. He was in a full rage. The monster was out.
“You shouldn’t have took my money! Why would you go in my pockets like that? Huh?”
I couldn’t move. All I could do was listen. I heard Momma in the living room begging for her life. She was pleading for him to put the gun away before somebody got hurt, but he was high, hype, and completely out of his mind.
Momma was crying and pleading. “Yellow, please let’s just go to bed. It’s late. We can talk about this in the morning. I took the money’cause you told me to get it out of your pocket, please remember. I wouldn’t go in your pockets. I wouldn’t disrespect you, baby. Please remember.”
It got very quiet in the house, almost as if he was thinking and contemplating going to bed. Then I heard him speak again. “Naw, Sophia, I heard you; you said you was leavin’ me. You know . . .” He laughed. “That’s what you said. Now you got yo’self together you wanna leave me?” Then the wrestling between them started again.
“No, baby, that’s not true. I won’t ever leave you. Please, put the gun down and let’s go to bed. Just put the gun away, baby,” she cried, her voice trembling something awful. “Please . . . I love you,” she whispered.
This eerie feeling was in the air. It got quiet throughout the whole house. I hoped he would listen to her and just go to bed. I heard him mumbling something to Momma. He had to have been very close to her. Then I heard her cry out very loud and that’s when I heard her start praying as if she knew her life would be over soon. “Jesus, please forgive me of my sins. Please, Lord, forgive me.” As she prayed she cried. “Please! Forgive me.”
I covered my ears with my hands and tried to forget that this was going on. I felt like I was losing my life, my breath; my breath had left my body for a second.
I was lost, but no matter how hard I tried to ignore what was happening, I could hear Momma. “Lord, please send your angels to protect my Reese.”
That was the last time I ever heard my momma’s voice. Even though I heard her cry out to God, all I could ever hear for years on were Yellow’s words.
“If I can’t have you, nobody will!”
I couldn’t see what was happening, but from what I could hear, I knew what was next. I closed my eyes and prayed. I asked God to come into my house and save her. I pondered whether he would stop if I ran in there, but I was too frightened. I couldn’t move.
“Please, Jesus! I don’t know what to do without my momma. Please don’t take her.” Then I dropped to my knees and begged God to save my momma.
Next I heard the gun fire. I lay on my floor, dead; I felt dead anyway.
Then I heard another shot. I jumped. I stayed in my room a few more seconds, looking at the thread that twined the carpet fiber together. I looked at my hands, took them and pushed myself off the carpet. I staggered to my feet, opened my bedroom door, and went in the living room.
I could hardly breathe. I felt like I was suffocating. Momma was lying there, lifeless; then I saw the one shot to her chest.
“Momma!” I screamed. “Momma! No!” I cried and grabbed her. I put my arms around her. I was trying to get her to wake up. “Momma. Please. You gonna be okay. Wake up, Momma, please wake up.”
Tears continued to flow from my eyes. There was blood everywhere and all over me. It was on my hands, in my hair, and all over my legs. I felt like I was in a nightmare. All of this for twenty dollars, I thought.
I realized she was gone. There was nothing I could do. There was nothing I could say to bring my momma back; she was gone. Just that quick, she was gone.
