Page 20 of This Is Law 3
“Yeah, it’s true,” was all that I said in response to that.
I had a feeling that word would eventually get out about that shit. I knew that officer Smith wouldn’t be the one to speak on it, but when I was in that small, meeting room, beating Dutch’s ass, and after I was pulled away from him, and I said what I said to him, I had a feeling that the other correctional officers that were there would talk. I knew that word would travel. I’m not upset about it because the second word started traveling, and niggas in that jail learned that Dutch was responsible for killing my pops, it was going to be hell in that jail for him.
“I want to say something to you Crawford, and again, sorry if I get out of line. I’ve been in this line of business for a littleover forty years. Years ago, when your father was murdered, I wasn’t captain at the time. I’d just made detective probably three years prior. When your father was killed, I was called to the scene, along with other officers and detectives. In all the homicide cases that I’ve worked, your father’s case was the only one where we couldn’t get to the bottom of it, so we had to scrape the case. There were no witnesses, no cameras, the bullets that we found on the scene, they didn’t come back to any gun that we had in our system either. Whoever did it, they were skilled, and they knew exactly what they had to do to cover their asses. Back then, wasn’t any fancy ring cameras that people had on their porch, so the killer had been able to get away scotch free. Because we didn’t have any angles to turn to, that’s why the case was dismissed. Till this day, that was the only case in my career that I ever had to scrape because just like you, I do my job, and I do a damn good job at it. Not even for my bragging rights, but you don’t know what that did to me that I couldn’t give you, a three-year-old little boy at the time, and your mother the justice that you both deserved,” he finished, and I had never heard this before from him.
His words kind of caught me off guard, so I ended up taking a seat back down in the chair. My eyes were on him, deeply paying attention to him, and from the way he was standing there looking at me, I just knew that he was being sincere.
“I don’t want you to think that I’m saying this now because the truth is out about Dutch, but man, even back then, I always had this nagging feeling in my gut that it was him that did it. I’ve seen so many homicide cases that I knew that the way the murder was executed, it had to have come from the inside. Your father was shot in the back, walking in the house with gifts in his hand for you because it was your birthday. I’m telling you I’ll never forget anything about that case. Someone that didn’t know your father on a personal level, they wouldn’t kill him inthat manner. It was too personal. I knew what your father did for a living. Couldn’t prove it, but I knew he moved weight. With that, I knew that it wasn’t one of his rookie block boys that probably got upset with him and gunned him down. Those rookies would have been too stupid for that, plus they had too much loyalty to him. For years man, I thought that it was Dutch. We questioned everyone that was close to Knox, and with that, Dutch was questioned as well, but he had an alibi. He showed proof of his plane ticket, showing that he’d already left Miami the night before Knox was murdered. Knowing now that it was him, I wouldn’t be surprised if he came back earlier. I just don’t know man. As much as I suspected it was him, you know as well as I know that in this business you don’t put people in jail based on suspicion. You gotta come with hard proof, and that’s just what I didn’t have,” he explained to me.
I took in everything that he’d said. I sat quietly because honestly, the shit was lowkey depressing me. He walked over, and he put his hand on my shoulder, as he stood on the other side of me. That’s when I looked up at him.
“Let me ask you something man. My mind so fucked up, that I really don’t know what to believe anymore. Since you were on the scene, can you tell me what my mom was doing? She lost her mind behind that shit. His death took a toll on her, and that’s the reason she’s in a mental facility now,” I revealed. He sighed heavy after I revealed that to him.
“Her cries, man. Her cries were pierced in my head for years. The screams that I heard were a big part of the reason why I felt so bad that we had to toss the case. I couldn’t give her the justice that she deserved for her husband. I remember when we arrived at the scene, and she was outside on the porch with him, cradling his head in her lap. All the blood that he’d lost was on her clothes. I remember taking one look at her, and life looked as if it was sucked out of her. She died with him too. Physically, she’sstill here, but I’m telling you that her soul went with him. When I saw her like that, I told one of the officers that she would never be the same, and she was going to need some serious therapy,” he concluded.
His words fucked with me, and because they did, I was going to leave the conversation alone and not ask anything else. The shit was hurting too badly, and there wasn’t anything that I could do to change the situation, so I was going to just dead the topic altogether.
“I appreciate the talk, man,” I said, standing up from the chair, going to leave for good this time.
“We didn’t get justice for your father, but Crawford, I’m going to send what you sent me over to forensics, so that they can get a move on it. I don’t want you to view the justice system as one that’s never in favor of you,” he responded, and I told him that I appreciated that, and I left out of his office.
Walking out, I had to pass the detectives again that were on desk duty. Even with me not being in the best of moods, and a little down from the things that captain Roy just shared with me, I still found it in me to be petty, and I laughed at them on my way out. I’m sure everyone here was happy that I was making my exit because I came through starting all kinds of problems.
I made it back to my truck, and instead of going back to the office like how I’d planned, I just decided to head over, and chop it up with my mama. I haven’t seen her in a few days, and after hearing these things from the captain about how she was on the floor with my pops, his blood all over her, and shit, I just wanted to pull up on her, bring some food, and have lunch with my lady. I wasn’t sure the kind of mood that she was in today, but I was going to pull up with positive vibes, in hopes that she would be on the same shit.
When my mama had an appetite, and she wasn’t being mean, I knew that she liked to have a good burger, and fries. That shithad to have been genetic because me, and my kids were a sucker for juicy burgers, and fries. There have been times before in the past that I would come with food fromfive guys,and we would eat that together, so that’s where I stopped for the food. I got her the double patty with fries, while I got the triple for myself. The fries were nice, and greasy in the bag, just how I liked them.
It wasn’t long before I was pulling up to the facility with the food in my hand. One of the pictures from the sonogram was resting on my dashboard, so I grabbed that, putting it in my pocket, just in case she was in a good mood, and I could show it to her, so that she could see the twins that Yaya was carrying.
I made it inside of the facility, and there sat one of the intake coordinators up front. Her name was Jada, and she’s been working here for a little over five years. Jada and I were cool. She knew me on a first-name basis, and those days of her greeting me as Mr. Crawford were over because I told her a couple of years ago that she could call me Sevyn, or Law like everyone else.
Although Jada worked the front desk, she made it her business to go and see about my mom every day that she could, even if it was something so simple as swinging by her room to hug her when she was getting ready to clock out. I’ve had a few deep conversations with Jada over the years, so I knew that her grandmother raised her, and she’d lost her a few years ago to Alzheimer’s. Even though Alzheimer’s isn’t what my mom was suffering from, Jada could relate to having a loved one that had practically lost their mind, and I know that’s why she cared about my mom the way that she did. She told me before that her witty attitude, her slick tongue, and even her stubborn ways reminded her a lot of her grandmother.
“Hey Sevyn. Me, and the ladies in here were just talking about you. Solace got her hair done this morning. She actually sat down and allowed the stylist to pamper her. After that, she got her nails and toes polished. You couldn’t tell her nothing.She’s not in her room right now though. They’re outside in the back doing yoga, but she’ll be done in the next ten minutes. You can go out there, and wait for her,” Jada said to me, and that made me smile, hearing that my mama allowed them to pamper her today.
She didn’t play that shit when it came to these folks touching her hair. Damn near every time that I saw her, her hair would be in a ponytail because she wouldn’t allow them to style it. Crazy because when people talk about the Solace from back in the day, they talk about how she didn’t play that shit when it came to keeping her hair looking up to par. Her nails were always long, and flashy, and when it came to her dressing skills, she could run circles around any other woman. She was a prissy woman, that cared about her upkeep, and that was another trait that I’m sure I’d inherited from her. I liked to look good. When you looked good, that shit made you feel.
“Aww shit. Let me head to the back, so that I can see my girl. I was just on the way over here saying that I wanted her to be in a good mood. I been having some tough weeks, so it would mean a lot to me if I could come down here, sit with my mama, and see her smile a couple of times,” I shared with Jada.
“I told you before that that woman loves you. All that cutting up that she does with you when you come, where she acts like she doesn’t want to be bothered, I know that it’s all a front. Go head to the back, and see your girl,” she finished, handing me the badge for me to put on my shirt.
I thanked her for it, pinned it to the front of my shirt, and I made my way through the building, still holding onto the food in my hands.
Some of the nurses that I saw in passing, I briefly spoke to them, and the security that I walked past, I nodded in their direction. I made it out back, and the weather was nice, and sunny out. It was a wide-open courtyard in the center of thismassive facility. The big yard was fenced in on each side, but because the building wrapped around the yard, this area felt ducked off, as if this was the residents private little place that only they knew about. The grass was nice and green, damn near looking artificial.
I stood here, squinting my eyes a little bit, trying to make out where my mom was. The yoga class was happening right there in the middle of the yard, and I could see the two instructors up front, and there were about ten residents, and a few of the nurses were out here monitoring.
My eyes landed on my mom. She was in the back, right on the end. Seeing her, you would have thought that I was somewhere watching one of my sons show off one of their many talents by the way I sat the food, and drinks down on the table, and I pulled my phone out, so that I could record her. I was really standing here, phone glued to my hand, cheeks burning from the way that I was smiling because I never really got to witness her doing shit like this. They would always have outside sources come in, giving them little activities to do, and my mama never wanted to participate in those things, so to see her out here, sitting in the butterfly position along with the rest of the residents, and keeping her eyes closed, as she took deep breaths in, and out, it just made me happy. To say that I was proud of her was an understatement.
Just like Jada told me up front, the yoga class quickly wrapped up. The residents all stood up, and they rolled their mats up. That’s when I grabbed my things, and I took the steps down, going over to the area, where they were.
“You see your mama out here participating, boy? You better go over there, and tell her how proud of her you are,” that was one of the older nurses, Ms. Patrice. I loved Ms. Patrice like a grandmother. She took damn good care of my mama, and I made sure that every holiday, every birthday, and sometimes,just because, I would come down here, bearing gifts for her because she did a damn good job with my mom, and I knew that it wasn’t always easy.
I showed love to any staff here that would play their part in looking after my mom, and making sure that she was straight.
“I see her. What’s up? You good?” I asked Ms. Patrice.
“I’m doing pretty good this morning, Sevyn,” she let me know, and with a smile on my face, I nodded, and then I headed in the direction of my mom.
