Two weeks after Bip died on the concrete, one week after his funeral where a collage of ex-girlfriends, junkies, and gangstas packed every corner of a Baptist church we never attended—all screaming louder than newborn crack-babies—I sat.
Alone in the same corner of my house, in the same clothes, looking at the same Polaroids wondering who would do this. Who? Who could kill my bro and why?
My mom called me every day, telling me to pray. Bip wasn’t her son but she felt his loss through me. I got on my knees and looked up at God for an answer two or three times a day but never got a response.
A lot of us have to put all of our faith in heaven because our lives here on earth are so messed up—the afterlife has to be better than the pain that comes with black skin.
East Baltimore is a place where people come and go. Loyalty, not blood, makes you family here because people are gained, trusted, and loved as quick as they fade. Some began to resurface after Bip passed. I felt like half of the city had stopped past my crib. They all had wild theories on what happened. A regular shooting transforms into a global massacre by the time it reaches the fifth dude. I wasn’t really trying to hear it. Some really wanted to offer condolences but most came because they heard I was giving away Bip’s old things. I passed out bags of hoodies, leather coats, and unworn sneakers.
A steel battering ram ripped our door from its frame two days after his murder. Narcs buried my face in carpet while they tossed around my belongings. A bacon-colored captain stood over me. “The murder was drug related, son, this is normal procedure!” His coworkers looted our home, leaving only the items with no value. I managed to hold on to some jewelry but the bulk of our goods were placed on drug hold, or so they say.
The cops were so busy taking jewelry, and Sony products, they didn’t even notice the two-hundred-pound safe in the basement. Bip used to tuck money and gems in there, and he taught me how to open it in case of an emergency. But I couldn’t care less about that safe or any material thing in general. Bip—my influence, my definition of family, the person who made me inquisitive, the one who taught me everything from how to play basketball, how to save money, and how to study to how to drive, and how to protect my face in a fight—was a memory.