Roy Glenn: No More Tears In The End

“Mr. Black said to expect you. Come in,” Mrs. Phillips said and stepped aside to allow me to enter the apartment.

Not wanting to be rude, not to mention having respect for my elders, I went inside. “Thank you.”

Mrs. Phillips was slow getting around, but she led me into the living room and offered me a seat. “Can I get you something to drink?”

“No, thank you. I wouldn’t want you go to any trouble,” I said and tried to hand her the envelope again, but she wouldn’t take it.

“Nonsense. It’s no trouble at all. What would you like?”

“Whatever you have is fine.”

“I just made a pitcher of iced tea, or would you like something a little stronger?”

“It’s a little early in the day for me,” I lied. Lately, I’ve been waking up to Johnnie Black.

“I usually have a glass of brandy around this time of day. One drink in the morning and one before bed, it’s the secret to living a long life.”

Since I wasn’t about to argue with her wisdom, I accepted. “That’ll be fine. Can I help you?”

“No. You relax and be comfortable,” she said and disappeared into the kitchen.

When Mrs. Phillips returned with our drinks, she sat down in a chair by the window. “Come sit by me,” she said and pointed to the chair closer to her.

“I want you to know how sorry I am about your granddaughter,” I said as I came toward her.

“That’s her in that picture,” Mrs. Phillips said and pointed to a picture frame.

I picked up the frame. “She was very pretty.”

“And smart too. Wasn’t like so many of these young girls her age. Out there runnin’ these streets, doing God only knows what. She was a good girl. Going somewhere, had a future ahead of her.”

I saw a tear run down Mrs. Phillips face and I felt her pain.

“Do the police have any idea who shot her?”

Mrs. Phillips laughed. “Do they ever?”

“Not in this neighborhood,” I laughed too.

“Zakiya called me that morning, like she always did. I mentioned that she didn’t sound like herself. Zakiya was one of those bubbly kinds of people. Always smiling, always had something nice to say, but that day she just didn’t sound right. Didn’t sound like herself. She said that she was meeting somebody at that place and that she was a little nervous about it.”

“Did she say what she was nervous about?”

“No, and when I asked her about it she just said it was nothing and changed the subject.”

“What else did the police tell you?”

“They said it was drug related, but that’s a lie. They said that the boy she was with was a drug dealer. They said those kind of people don’t need a reason to kill; probably killed my baby for kicks or for some type of initiation.”

“But you don’t believe that, do you?”

“No. Zakiya would never be involved with drugs or drug dealers. I told you, she had her life planned out. Knew where she was going and was on the road to getting there.”

For the next hour, Mrs. Phillips and I sipped brandy and talked about Zakiya. Naturally, she mostly talked and I mostly listened. Mrs. Phillips raised her after shooting heroin consumed her mother’s life. Zakiya never knew her father.

Mrs. Phillips told me how Zakiya went out of her way to avoid drugs and not get in with the wrong crowd, so she could get an education. She was determined to be somebody, because she refused to turn out like her mother, a teenaged mother strung-out on drugs. Zakiya had a bachelor’s in sociology with a minor in psychology. She was about to attend law school in the fall. “Does that sound like the type of woman who was involved in drugs?”

“No, it doesn’t.”

“You damned right it doesn’t.”

The longer I sat there, the more Mrs. Phillips reminded me of my grandmother. She raised me after my parents disappeared. One day when I was eleven they just didn’t come home. No one really knew what happened to them. My younger brother and sister went to live with my aunt and uncle in Mississippi.

They didn’t want me.

My uncle said they were just babies and they would raise them in the church. He said that I was into too much trouble and he was right. Those days I was into everything. After that, it was decided that I would go live with my grandmother, and I didn’t see my brother and sister again. After awhile, it didn’t matter as much. My grandmother was good to me. She showed me much love. She died five years later. But I had a new family by then.

About a year ago I went to Mississippi and tracked them down. My brother is a deacon in the church and my sister is married to the minister. I saw them, talked to them, but I didn’t tell them who I was. They had no idea that they even had an older brother. They were two- and three- years old when I last saw them. I guess my uncle never even told them about me. Look how I turned out as opposed to them. Their brother: the gangster, the killer.

“You tell Mr. Black that I appreciate him sending you over to give me that money. I can’t remember the last time I entertained a handsome young gentleman.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“It was meant to be one.” Mrs. Phillips smiled. “I’m not accustomed to taking money from people.”

I stood up and put the envelope down next to Zakiya’s picture. “I understand that, but please take it to cover funeral expenses and that type of thing.”

“You tell Mr. Black if he really wants to do something for me, he will catch the people who took my baby from me. You promise me that, Mr. Simmons.”

“Please, call me Nick.”

“Promise me that you will find out who did this and see that they get what's coming to them.”

“I can’t promise you that, but I promise to do what I can.”

“That’s all I can ask for, Nick.” Mrs. Phillips laughed. “It’s more than the police offered me. To them it was case closed.”

“Do you have a picture of Zakiya that I could borrow?”

She gave me a picture and told me where Zakiya lived. I left that apartment thinking that I probably wouldn’t be able to find the bandits, but I would do what I could. One more thing to get me out of the house, and my mind off Freeze.

I was up five o'clock that next morning, ready to go and out the house before Wanda opened her eyes. I wanted to be at the police station before the first shift came in. I needed to talk to Tamia Adams. She’s a New York City police sergeant who used to provide information for Freeze. I wanted to see if she had heard anything about the robbery. I had to catch her there because she’d moved and I had no other way to contact her.

Tamia took Freeze’s death very badly, much worse than his so-called woman, Tanya. So bad, that she cried through the whole funeral. After that, Tamia had to take some time off from work ’cause she was cryin’ all the time. That’s why she moved out of her apartment; said there were too many memories of Freeze there. Since then, any time she has something for us she’s been talkin’ to Black directly.

“Sergeant Adams,” I said when I saw her walking toward the building. I guess I startled her ’cause her head snapped around. She relaxed a little when she saw it was me. Tamia gave me a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

“How you doin’, Nick?”

“I’m good. The question is: how are you?”

“It gets a little better everyday.”

“Is there someplace we can talk?”

“Not around here.”

“I understand,” I said and we went back to my car to talk.

“What’s up?”

“There was a robbery at one of the businesses we own.”

“Which one?” Tamia asked.

“Paradise Fish and Chicken.”

“I know the place. Good take-out.”