Educational Experience

Chapter Thirteen

13.

First, there was a lot of screaming and cussing—the sound of glass breaking, too, which was definitely not good amidst the chaos.

And then I could actually feel the big battle at the door rippling through the crowd like ocean waves pushing me backwards. But when I finally made it to the dj booth, Big Man leapt down, bracing me with his arm like he was about to slam on the brakes in the Vee.

His eyes were worried.

“It’s that fool came to the house that time—cop that hauled you in!” he said.

“Fuck me—Friendly?!”

“And every other cop in the damned city, looks like—can you get upstairs?”

“Not a chance!”

Right about then, Mike popped up right next to me—the other two squeezed through, too. And I could have kissed them all--they had rescued Wyatt for me.

And of course, trust me to forget about all the hubbub and go right to, “What were you, a pole dancer in a past life or what?” Like her belly dancing was more important than me possibly getting arrested and jeopardizing the lives of everybody I loved in this world.

The goofy grin I got from her was priceless, though. If one of her students came into class like that she would’ve called Security for sure.

Or so I thought, until she said, “I worked my way across Europe doing that,” all proud.

Mike said, “Yeah? On whose pole?” and I shot her a look.

But that’s when something—somebody—lifted Aisha right up off her feet. She started kicking and swinging for dear life.

It was one of the cops—not Officer Friendly yet, but I knew this one almost as well. He was this really mean black cop who used to work the schools for a while, until they discovered he was selling the drugs he took off the kids. Sometimes right back to the kids he’d copped it from, too. Bastard.

Lloyd Harris, was his name. I barked his name at him, trying to startle him enough for Aisha to get loose. But he just gave me this snarky smile I remembered from back when when he would look at me from across his desk and go, “You think you about half nigga slick don’t you, white boy?”

Yeah, we go ‘way back, Lloyd and me.

He was the cop they sent looking for truants. And the principal was always having him give me these little “talks” about how if I was smart enough to work the system so well, I was smart enough to get As if I just showed up every day.

Only he never talked to me about that. He told me about “jive ass punks” like me, and how he couldn’t wait to see a bunch of big, ugly “mo fo’s” run a train on my little baby ass in prison one day.

And then he’d say, “Git outta my sight, fool!” and I’d wait ‘til I got ‘way out of ear shot to go, “Cock sucker” or something—I couldn’t risk really making him mad. They’d taken us from my mom before and I was determined not to have it happen again. No kid in my family was going into the system, ever. That was an unspoken promise I made to all five of ‘em.

And now my own kids and the girls were at his mercy—I could not have that.

So I dove in after him, but I grabbed Wyatt’s hand first and held on for dear life. Not just because I wanted to protect her, but also because she had no place to go but with us. And I knew I’d go nuts worrying about her over in Juvie or wherever he was taking me, if I didn’t know where she was.