CHAPTER 82

THE FIRST CHECK COMES A MONTH LATER, made out in my name. I’ve never had my own check before. It takes me a while to work out what it is. When I do, I want to tear it to shreds. Don’t want to live off the government anymore, off the pigs.

Instead I hold the envelope in my hand, sit on the edge of the bed, and cry. Raheem found a new way to sell out, and he did it for me. To take care of me, make sure I can eat like a person and dress like a Panther really should. He did it all for me. And I sold him up the river. Across the ocean, as it turns out. To a place called Vietnam. A place where people die, and maybe there are even real live panthers stalking the jungle.

“Raheem enlisted,” I tell Mama. “He’s in the army now, headed to Vietnam.”

“That’s from him?” she asks, looking at the letter in my hand.

“Yeah,” I lie. Let her think he’s writing us direct, that it’s more than his soldier’s family stipend coming our way, that the words on the page are really from him and not generated by anonymous fingers in a typing pool someplace. “He says not to worry, and he promises we’ll be taken care of.”