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When you shoot a man, watch him fall to the ground, and leave him for dead, it’s terribly shocking to see said man walking and talking like nothing happened. It’s just harrowing to see him on your doorstep.
The woman who shot Clay had done so at the behest of the man, Jamar, with whom she lived and had a child. Laura Gilbert is the same criminal that her son’s father is, but it is easier for her to play innocent to outside observers who underestimate the criminality of females. She was sure that Clay would bleed out and show up on the news as a warning to other members of the neighborhood not to play hero against the burgeoning criminal organization that Jamar was creating in his home. He has paid off local law enforcement and his community of middle class black and hispanic families are unaware that he is practically the sheriff of their area. Jamar is the reason that the community is relatively safe; he organizes the drug dealers to avoid conflicts and he arbitrates disagreements to maintain the peace. The police are happy to let Jamar police his neighborhood and look the other way as he exploits women and those struggling with the disease of addiction. Laura is happy to reap the benefits of Jamar’s criminal organization and he trusts her as a reliable right hand. She won’t marry him because she knows that he has sex with any woman who catches his attention, but he is an incredible provider and she doesn’t care where his money comes from. She has no qualms raising her son in the house where Jamar pimps women and addicts do drugs; that all happened on the first floor of the house and she had made the second floor, that has an exit and stairwell that allows them to avoid the first floor altogether, into a loving home for her son. But she refuses to be passive, afraid to trust Jamar to sustain the business, and she inserted herself into the management of operations. She is the mother of Jamar’s only child that he had allowed to be born, the only child he takes credit for, and when he was beat up by Clay and humiliated in front of school children, he trusted no one more than Laura to not only exact revenge, but to send the important message that Jamar could not be challenged and members of the community should fear and respect him.
Laura has killed before, it is not a foreign concept to her. She had killed the preacher who raped her sister in self defense and she was empowered to threaten any man who made her feel unsafe. She had smiled after she shot Clay, he had threatened her life and the life of her family.
Laura watches Clay walk away from her door with a smile on his face. He is tougher than she had anticipated. And she would have to deal with him on her own while Jamar finished up his legal situation.
Laura knows people though, and later in the day, she goes to a different part of town, to the projects where she finds her friend Daphne Jackson.
“I need your brother.” Laura says when she is standing in the small kitchen of Daphne’s house.
Daphne has a stocky build and she sits chopping collard greens into a plastic bowl.
“I thought you came to see me,” Daphne says. “I ain’t seen you in forever.” The two are old friends.
“You know I love you girl, but I ain’t got time for socializing. I need Desperation.”
Daphne puts her knife in her bowl and looks Laura in the eyes.
“It ain’t cheap, not even for friends.”
“Who you talking to?” Laura asks sheepishly.
“Alright, but I’m gonna tell you the same thing I tell everybody else. If I call him, he won’t stop ‘til he kill whoever you set him on. Ain’t no changing your mind.”
“Somebody fucking with my family. I want this done quick.”
Daphne nods. “Pay upfront…” Laura slams cash down on the table, “I’ll give him a call.”
Ivan likes his new life in Clay’s house and Brittany quickly becomes his sister. She works third shift and is home during the day while Clay works. Ivan doesn’t have a job and he mostly does chores around the house to earn his keep.
He and Clay had talked in earnest after the news report and Clay was determined to find Jamar and exact revenge.
“What does that mean?” Ivan asked him.
“I don’t know. I’ll know when I find him.”
Ivan shook his head. “You want me to find him?”
“No, I want him to come back home. I want the neighborhood to see me punch his fucking head off.” Clay was mad but he breathed calmly to control himself.
“Maybe we should just report him to the police….” Ivan started.
“There’s no evidence of it now. Ivan I don’t have a gunshot wound.” He lifted his shirt and Ivan ran a hand along his torso.
“I wonder what that means.” Ivan said.
“I don’t know, but it won’t happen again. What do you think I should do?”
Ivan honestly had no idea. He wouldn’t let Clay kill the man, but maybe he deserved it. If Jamar had managed to kill Clay, Ivan wondered if he would have exacted revenge. And then the thought infuriated Ivan and Clay saw his eyes sharpen with rage as green fires raged from each of them.
“Babe…” Clay said, “use your words.”
“I could kill him. But we won’t. Once he gets back, we make him confess to the human trafficking thing. Let’s shut down that house and put him in jail for as long as possible.”
Clay nodded and wouldn’t allow himself to consciously think that he would have to see if he could control himself when he was face to face with Jamar. He didn’t want Ivan to know the truth. But Ivan is always in his mind, he couldn’t stop it if he tried.
Clay has an engagement ring for Ivan that he bought with Alia when the two were in Wilmington. He keeps it in his pocket and when he gets breaks at work, he rolls it over in his hand.
Clay has been working with a construction crew to repair a local church. He went to a different church in his youth with his mother, but he would admire the church that he is working on when he passed it. It seemed to be the biggest church in town and was mostly attended by the white population of the community.
The crew that he works with is mostly black with a few Hispanic workers and they feel dictated to when a pastor of the church hovers over them and barks orders to move the project along. Needless to say, Clay is not happy at work, but going home to Ivan everyday makes it worth it.
By the end of the first month that Clay is working at the church, Ivan sits and waits for him on the front porch. Today when he is off work, Clay gets out of his car, and Ivan is there to kiss him.
And looming just beside the bushes at the edge of the yard, is a big black man, smiling and showing all of his teeth. “This faggot bitch. This shit ain’t even gonna be work.”
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