start acting like one.
I sluggishly walked into a totally quiet house. Everybody must have been asleep, so I parked myself on the living room sofa, cut the television on, and just stared at it.
Chapter 2
James
On the Loose
October 28th, 2018, 7:34 A.M.
“Parks, let’s go,” I heard the guard yell as I packed up all my belongings. My ass was finally getting out of this hellhole, the FCI in Cumberland, Maryland.
I was sent to this medium-security prison because, according to the judge, “I wasn’t a real threat, but I had a potential to be one.” I laughed to myself when he said that shit, because he really didn’t know me well. I had some more tricks up my sleeve, and was still as wild as Oprah’s hair at five in the morning.
The sound of my cell doors clanking open meant that I was now a free black man again after enduring ten long years behind bars.
The sentence turned out to be a breeze. At first when I got here, I thought I was going to have to fight my way through the time, but these punk niggas didn’t see me coming. I had all of them eating out of my hands and my ass. I even had some of the guards on my “turned-out” sheet.
I pretty much did anything I wanted to. I showered when I wanted to because half these bitches in here liked it when I sucked their dicks off as good as I did. I was so good, they asses could see their ancestors when I finished with them.
I even worked the warden off a couple of times. His ass was weirder than most. He wanted me to fuck his ass with a nightstick while he sucked his own dick. That muthafucka was flexible as shit though. He even taught my ass some tricks.
I walked down the tier with my prison gear in my arms, waving my good-byes and giving daps to guys who I fucked on the down-low. I even saw a couple of hard-ass niggas with tears in their eyes as I made my way to checkout. I slipped a couple of guards the number where I could be reached, just in case they needed to hook up on the outside.
This is it! I breathed a small sigh of relief as I walked out the final gate into the parking lot for new releases. It was really breezy and cold.
I looked around and saw all of the other guys being picked up by their girls and families. Kids were running and jumping into their arms. You could see the tears and hear the joy in their voices as they hugged and kissed their freshly released family members. I almost kinda felt like I was missing out, but that was short-lived when I spotted my ride home.
I made my way to my ride as he patiently waited for me to make my exit. I quickly hopped in the passenger seat, and we pulled off headed toward my destination.
“So how ya been?” I said, glancing at the now seventy-three-year-old Carl Black as he drove down the highway headed to his home.
“I’ve been waiting for you, baby,” he said, patting my leg.
Carl Black was a nasty-ass bastard that blamed his son for his wife putting him out. His old ass was now totally fagged out, and he was so gross to look at, with his skin all wrinkled and blotchy. His Cadillac smelled of alcohol and Ben-Gay, which I could hardly tolerate in the behemoth of a car. And the heat in the car was on, making it quite warm and dry.
This isn’t going to be easy. “Me, too,” I mustered up the courage to say back. Just looking at him made my skin crawl. I so badly contemplated jumping from the moving car to end my misery.
When his ass mailed me the letter telling me about my children, I knew I had to use him to get my plans in order. He was so old, nobody really wanted his ass, so he clung to me by writing and calling me to say how much he wanted us to be together when I got out of jail. He also put me on his cell phone plan a month before I was to get out, and I gave my mama the number as soon as I got it, so we could keep in contact.
He said he lived in a retirement community ever since his wife had put him out and was receiving social security benefits every month. I almost laughed when he told me I could live with him and we could share his eight-hundred-dollars a month check. I knew that shit was only enough to pay my car note and insurance. I proclaimed my love for him over the phone a couple of times to get him where I wanted him, and his Depends-needing ass fell for it hook, line, and sinker. I’d only played along and agreed to live with him, because he said he would help me get my children from Mona, and his son, Shawn. I really didn’t want to raise them. I just wanted Shawn to pay for cheating on me with his wife and my bitch of a cousin, Sherry.
“Hey, Carl, I’ve been wondering about something.” I turned and looked at his senile, decrepit ass.
“What is that, baby boy?” he asked, keeping his eyes on the road.
“How did you find out I was the father of Mona’s children?”
He cleared his throat as if he had to think about it. “Well, after the party you had with my son, I was leaving out of the hotel and I ran into an old buddy of mine from college. He was one of the guys I messed around with in my experimenting days in college. We decided to have a drink at the bar, and one thing led to another, and we started to fool around as well. His name was Henry Grant and he was a very successful gynecologist.”
I nodded my head in approval of what I was hearing and signaled him to keep going. “And?”
“Well, after everything went down at my anniversary cookout and you were sent to jail, I started seeing him more. I wasn’t in love with him. He was just someone to pass the time with. On one of his visits over to my place, we were in my bedroom, and he saw a picture of Shawn and Mona on my dresser. He told me that he was her doctor and that she had just come into his office for a paternity test on all her children. Since it was made public knowledge at the party that she had slept with you, I put two and two together and figured it out.
“He also confided in me that none of the children were Shawn’s. He said he only told me because Shawn was my son and he thought I should know. So that is how I got the info to mail you. I knew you would need it to get back at that ho my son married. My son, on the other hand, should have left her cheating ass after he found out about it, but he didn’t. I can’t help what happened to him after he decided to stay with her. He got what his hand called for.” He shook his head like he felt sorry for his son.
Again, I was in awe of how delusional this old-ass fart really was. I didn’t know he was this sick. I was speechless. For one of only a few times in my life, I had nothing to say, so I just rode in silence, contemplating my next move.
“I’ma need you to stop by the bank before we go back to your place,” I said, smiling at him while squeezing his leg. I almost threw up because his shit felt all clammy and mushy.
I had stored away over fifty thousand dollars for a rainy day. I knew putting that money away in that safety security box under my birth name would help me out in the long run. I had two birth certificates, one with James Parks, the other with Jerry Parks. I’d decided to change my name to James when I moved to Baltimore. I even had my crazy-ass cousin Sherry calling me James.
I walked to the teller and showed her my ID. “I would like to make a withdrawal from a security box,” I said with my “just-got-out-of-jail” smile.
She made a couple of entries into her computer. “I’m sorry, sir, but we can’t find a box with that name on it.”
I immediately went into pissed mode. “Look, ya Cindy Brady lookalike, you better find my money because I know I put my shit in this bank.”
“Look, nigga,” she said with a little bit of sass, as if her ass had a little ghetto in her. She probably had a black boyfriend or some shit. “I’m sorry but—”
“Bitch, don’t mess with my money,” I almost yelled, cutting her off, my finger pressed into the middle of her forehead.
She had a look of fear on her face. She looked like I was trying to jack her for her car or something.
“You know what