One Blood

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Twelve

1998

Angola, LA

Malcolm Wright exited the powder blue prison bus just inside the gates of the Louisiana State Penitentiary. The January air was brisk and cold. He took his first shuffling steps toward his cage, relishing the brisk wind after the stifling three-hour bus ride from the detainment center in New Orleans. The rattling of the steel chains binding his hands and feet brought on a memory of the creak of the rope around his lynched father’s throat as his lifeless body twisted in the breeze.

His father had been killed because he was the most successful sharecropper in Lake City and had the audacity to try and renegotiate his share of the yield. Malcolm was only five at the time, but old enough to comprehend injustice, even if it took him much longer to put a name to the endless well of anger filling his heart. Thankfully, his oldest brother Frederick had been able to secure work as a day laborer and provide for the five of them left—Malcolm, the youngest, their mother, and his three older brothers Ralph, Duke, and Ronnie.

Frederick became an effective provider without turning into a stoic like their father. He married a woman, Abigail, blessed with the gift of balancing out their mother’s alternating states of aggression, agitation, and depression. Ralph was the athlete of the family and a standout baseball player. But Ralph was playing ball in a pre- Jackie Robinson era, and his success had a direct correlation to the number of death threats he received. He eventually quit playing baseball for good and became a mechanic.

Duke was the family scholar. He introduced Malcolm to texts by Frederick Douglass, Marcus Garvey, and Richard Wright. Duke was murdered during a peaceful protest in Selma, Alabama in the early sixties. Ronnie and Malcolm, the youngest of the four brothers,  were only sixteen months apart and enjoyed the closest bond. When Malcolm was eighteen he followed Ronnie into the Nation of Islam. Years later, Ronnie followed Malcolm into the Black Mob, and the Black Mob led Malcolm to the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola.

He sniffed at the air. Yes. This was the place. This was home.

He turned toward the snapping sound coming from his blind side and saw photographers capturing his picture from behind the gates. He was grateful he’d finally be out of the public’s watchful eye.

The trial had gone smoothly. Except for his last conversation with Amir.

“Why did you do it, Dad?” 

Amir’s questions followed him all the way to his cell.

“Mom told me everything.”

Malcolm sympathized with the boy’s pain, but in time Amir would understand that, as always, Malcolm had done what needed to be done. Unfortunately, Amir didn’t yet understand sacrifice, what it took to bring about real change.

Just like in chess, the trick is to learn to win from a position of perceived weakness.

Still, Malcolm was relieved his son finally knew some of the truth, even if the knowledge caused him great pain. Malcolm wondered if Amir would ever forgive him. He’d never wanted to lie to the boy, but Juanita had insisted they were protecting him. All Malcolm ever desired was to give Juanita the safety she craved and to provide their son, born two years after they lost Lincoln, with the benefit of their collective love and wisdom. And he’d been successful for a time.

* * * * *

In the eighties, as the AIDS epidemic and crack infestation destroyed black communities from coast to coast, the four-block community within Houston’s Fifth Ward, known as Frenchtown, existed as a protected haven. Malcolm and his Black Mob created a veritable utopia for black businesses, schools, and families. Not even trickle-down Reaganomics could gain a foothold in Malcolm’s sovereignty. His word was law and he ruled with a murderous regard for the criminal elements infecting nearly every other ghetto.

Malcolm made examples out of anyone who didn’t adhere to the Black Mob’s strict code of ethics. As a result, the community rallied around and insulated him from relentless attempts by the FBI and police to divide and conquer the Black Mob. Amir grew up healthy, intelligent, and conscious that his reality was different from many of his peers because his father had created a better world for him.

  But it wasn’t enough for Juanita. Despite his best efforts, every year that passed with no sign of Lincoln pushed them further and further apart. Eventually, Malcolm left Frenchtown, his wife, his son, and all that he’d built to find Lincoln. If he could do that, he could finally have his wife back.

* * * * *

But now it was too late.

“She’s gone, Dad,” Amir said, tears streaking down his face like shooting stars.

The woman he’d loved since they were adolescents, the only woman he’d ever loved, died the day of his ultimate act of vengeance. She ascended before he could accomplish the two tasks he promised to complete—kill Randy Lafitte and find Lincoln. But she would not die in vain.

Malcolm prioritized his next steps. He had been checked into the prison, strip-searched, clothed, and oriented on the ways of his new home. The guards kept asking him to state his government name. He answered, “Panama X” each time until the blows came and they dragged him to the hole.

Juanita was raised a devout Catholic and never understood Malcolm’s conversion to the Nation of Islam. Then he returned from Vietnam claiming a new religion—Vodun. But it was his new first name—Panama—and the X connected to it, that upset her most, more than his foreign religious leanings. Juanita refused to call him anything but Malcolm.

He’d tried in vain to explain to her that Malcolm Wright was born poor and weak, a man who lived in fear of whites—until his brother Duke’s murder transformed that fear to anger. That anger became focused power once he gave up his slave name and slave master’s religion, and his power grew exponentially upon his indoctrination into Vodun.

Sitting in the dark, damp hole, he knew the last vestiges of Malcolm Wright had died with Juanita.

Panama X’s mission was just beginning, however. After speaking with Amir, everything fell into place. He now knew he’d been sent to Angola to reconnect with Lincoln Baker—the man Juanita believed was she and Walter Simmons’ long lost son.

It was ironic that Lincoln had been under his nose all this time. He’d grown up in Lake City, a mere two hours from his birth mother. Lincoln had also struck a far more significant blow against Randy Lafitte than Panama X had ever managed.

He killed the man’s only son.

Panama X relished their first meeting. He could hardly wait to take the boy under his wing and begin working to bring his ultimate plan to fruition. Lincoln was the linchpin. Amidst all the evil he’d sown, Randy Lafitte had made one crucial mistake.

He should have killed Juanita when he had the chance.