14. Rayzor
“Who is it?” Eris asked as I stood frozen inside our bedroom. We had just gotten back from Costa Rica and were unpacking. I guess it was more shit than clothes and souvenirs to unpack.
I knew her voice the moment it came through the other side, but that still didn’t make that alert come full speed. I hadn’t heard her voice over a phone since I was locked up. That conversation was still vivid.
You’ve made a mess of your life ever since your dad died.
You want everyone to pay for the mistake of the man who created the hell you’re living in, so you what…
play God yourself and hurt and kill someone else then call ‘em for help. When I made you leave here, I made a vow that that’ll be the last time.
You’ll have to sit and deal with your consequences. Take care of yourself, Courtland.
I remember the operator coming on the other end of the call after she hung up. My Mama didn’t give me a chance to explain from the time I was booked until this day. The only people who knew the real story were Naya, City, and now Eris. Mama stamped me and never turned back.
“I know you weren’t expecting me to call you of all people, but I need help.”
“With what?” I asked, thinking that she was about to ask for money or some shit like that.
She got quiet.
“I need you to come home.”
“What you mean?” I looked around the backyard. “I’m home.”
“No. Here. The house. Maleek,” she rattled off. “I don’t know what to do.”
I sat up.
“What’s up with Maleek?” I asked, trying to remain composed before I jumped to conclusions.
“He’s in over his head. I’ve tried. Look, I know something is going on between the two of you, and I’m the last person you want to talk to, but I’m trying to save my son before it’s too late.”
It was something about that last line. Saving him. What the fuck was going on?
“I can call him to see what’s going on?”
“No!” she yelled. “I’m sorry, but calling isn’t going to help. He needs male guidance. Your guidance.”
I sat quiet.
“He did something stupid last night after you didn’t show up for his science fair awards ceremony.”
“His what?”
“He won first place… he can tell you about it.” She exhaled. “Courtland, just come here, please. I don’t want to beg you. If it’s too hard for you to come because of me, think of it as something for him.”
Since I was already dressed, I went back inside to Eris and kissed the side of her head.
“I’ll be back,” I told her and exited the room. “Love you.”
“What’s going on?” she asked with worry.
I made a beeline for the whip before the door open.
None of this shit was making sense. Then, on top of it, I found out I missed an important night for Maleek.
It didn’t sound like he was crashing out, but he was lashing out instead.
He’s been doing a lot of that shit lately.
Hopefully, I’m not too late to save him.
“I’m on the way.” I ended the call with Ma.
I knew what it was like to be teetering on that edge because slow lashing leads to a full crash out that becomes uncontrollable. Maleek had a bright future ahead of him, and I had to save him before he made it complicated for himself like I did. Once you become an inmate, life was never the same.
On the drive over, I kept racking my brain trying to see where shit went wrong besides the obvious.
Our relationship was unconventional, but I tried keeping it as normal as possible.
I’ve also told Ma for years that this shit could backfire.
Now she wanted to call me when her method was losing fire.
When I pulled up, she was already opening the screen door like she was waiting on me.
“Thank you for coming,” she said softly. Her eyes were swollen like she’d been crying.
I didn’t need to know where he was. I found him locked inside his room with the music on loud as fuck.
“Why the fuck the music so loud?”
“He’s been having it on since all night. It stopped, but he started it right back up this morning.”
“Turn that shit off and open the door!” I barked.
The music cut, slicing the air. Then the door opened.
He froze, seeing me on the other side.
He rocked that same black hoodie he wore at my crib.
“Fuck you on?”
“She called you on me?”
He lay back on the bed.
I stepped into the dark room. It looked like organized chaos. Some shit a teenager would live in.
“What’s going on?” I asked, closing the door.
“Nothing. What are you doing here?”
“You know why I’m here. It can’t be nothing.”
“She tripping like always.”
“Let me be the judge of that.”
I grabbed the chair that sat at his desk and pulled it to the side of the bed.
“She says you had an awards ceremony. Why you ain’t tell me?”
He shrugged. “I guess the same reason you ain’t tell me you and Eris were engaged. We’re both missing out on important shit now.”
I sat back and slipped my hands into my pockets. I could’ve yoked his lil’ ass up but he was hurting, and if getting it off his chest helped then I’ll let him do it for now. We’re not doing too much disrespect, though.
“That shit got out in the blogs. You know I was gon’ tell you. So, you intentionally didn’t tell me because of that?”
“I did tell you.”
“When, Maleek?”
“I texted it to you.”
I pulled out my phone going through our threads and then I saw it. He sent it weeks ago.
“Damn, you sho did. I must’ve opened it and didn’t text back.”
“Yeah. ‘Cause you got a new family now. You ain’t messing with me no more.”
“What you saying? You’re bro, I’m always gonna be here.”
“You haven’t been lately. It seems like all we do is get into it and shit. I already gotta do that with Ma, now I gotta do it with you two.”
“Nah, you gon’ do that with me until you start following your own steps and not everyone else’s.”
“Why I gotta be following someone else’s? Why can’t it be in me too?”
“Because…” I didn’t even have the answers for real. I knew at an early age that boxing was going to follow me. Just wasn’t sure how until it happened. But Maleek was different. He was good at so many other things; boxing seemed like a temporary with him.
“See, you don’t have the answers.”
“When you weren’t boxing, wasn’t ball your thing? I remember the games, your favorite players…” I glanced around the room. “You still got the posters up on the wall.”
“You can be made for more than one thing. You know that, Court. You’re fire as hell at boxing, but you’re also a beast at football and other sports too.”
“Yeah, but you got a chance to do big with baseball. No record, clean living, it makes sense for you. That wasn’t my case, Leek. You keep trying to make our stories sync, and they don’t.”
“They don’t got to. I’m still doing it.”
“You think you got a choice?”
“I got somebody to back me. You and Mama don’t gotta like it.”
I stood up from the chair.
“Grab the gloves,” I told him and left the room.
Ma came around the corner with a white cloth in her hand. Tears and anxiety on her face. Prayers weren’t fixing this. Let me see if I had the answers.
“What happened? I told you he’s trailing a dark road.”
I put everything in my pocket on the hood of her SUV and stood in the front yard.
Ma came out seconds later.
“What’s going on?” she asked, worried.
“He wanna get in the ring, I’m about to see what he got.”
Maleek came out minutes later.
“I don’t got my gloves. Ma burned them.”
“It’s cool. A real hitta don’t need gloves.”
“You want me to fight you?”
“If you can beat me then you can continue boxing. If not, I want that mothafucka’s number that’s been putting a battery in your back.”
I got in my stance.
“Courtland, you don’t have to do this. I think he gets the point,” Ma pleaded.
“You called me. Your method wasn’t working. We’re doing it another way.”
Maleek wasn’t confident. His posture was droopy.
I didn’t want to do this with lil’ bro, but something gotta give. I saw too much of younger me over these last few months, and if I can stop it before it got too deep, then I did my job.
“I ain’t trying to do this with you, Court.”
“But you wanna get in the ring, right? One day you gon’ have to fight a nigga like me. What better time than now to get that practice in.”
He pulled up his sweats and switched off before locking in.
“This ain’t gon’ be practice,” his tone dripped.
“Show me what it is then.”
I counted his first move before he made it. He went directly for my face. I stepped back. He regained quickly as we circled each other.
I saw the opening and knew he wasn’t guarding himself, but I decided against it. When he went in for another jab, I matched it with my own, sending it straight to his side. He got me in the bottom of the jaw.
He swung widely and hit me once in the shoulder.
“Please, y’all. No,” Ma begged.
It wasn’t enough to move anything, but I peeped the technique. I remember those same moves. They were too similar to my own.
Then when I backed up, he went in again for the face and when I blocked, he opened with a double side shot. He had slight precision.
He’d been studying me and used my own moves on me.
“I told you, bro. This ain’t practice,” he mimicked confidently.
I knew then that he wanted smoke.
I got him up off me and hit his ass once, face shot. I felt his bones crack and the blood dripped. I went in twice more, knocking him straight on his ass.
He held his nose, looking up at me, not believing I did that to him.
“You might’ve been studying me, but you gotta know the teacher never tells the student everything they know,” I told him with my chest heaving.
I saw that light flicker in his eyes. It was relentlessness and hunger. I knew it all too well.
He pushed up from the ground.
“I ate that shit,” he said, staggering as he stood up.
“Maleek,” Ma rushed over to him.
He pushed her off him.
“Nah, Ma. I got it. You called him, it’s cool. Come on, let’s hit it,” he wolfed.
He wanted blood. That wasn’t a loss he was willing to take. He wanted to use that pain against me.
“Maleek, enough. I’m not about to let this happen.”
“Why? Huh?”
“Because he’ll kill you. Courtland is a trained fighter.”
“So. I’m still standing.”