“Miss D! You gotta see this!” The voice echoed from the little music studio down the hall. I told the kids sitting at the computers that I’d be back to help them with their homework, and then I started searching for whoever was calling me, ducking between chairs and dodging dancing girls as I headed to the back room.
There were Zeek and Jordan, grinning like little kids and bobbing their heads to music that played on their headphones. Zeek slipped off his headphones and grinned at me.
“We recorded a new song, Miss D!” He motioned for me to come inside—not that I really fit. The room was already crammed with amps, speakers, and a table set up with a mixing board and computer. There was just enough room for two people to sit in chairs and record inside the walls lined with soundproofing foam.
I squeezed behind the boys’ chairs and pulled the headphones over my ears. Jordan turned toward me excitedly. “You ready?” he asked before he hit Play.
“We callin’ this ‘The Movement,’” Zeek said.
A thumping beat pulsed through the headphones. I could hear Zeek’s and Jordan’s voices rapping along with one of their friends.
Let’s do it, let’s do it
KOB is the movement
If you wanna be successful, you gotta prove it
Man, they think we’re stupid, they don’t think we can do it,
So do it, and prove it
Show ’em there’s nothing to it
“Oooh, I like that,” I told them, bobbing my head to the slick track backing up their voices. “Y’all sound real good.”
I tried not to let them see the tears of pride at the corners of my eyes. I still could hardly believe that these two boys were KOB leaders these days, that they were out rapping positive messages and taking young boys under their wings. I knew they had it in them, I thought. But back when Zeek first walked through my door in 2009, it sure seemed like a long shot.
Zeek walked in behind his cousin Delores, his giant lips sticking out in a pout so far I could see it from across the room. I guessed he was about eighteen years old, with light skin, his hair cut in a low fade. Everything he was wearing, from his low-riding blue jeans to his cute little T-shirt, was chosen carefully. This boy wanted to create a certain image for himself, and from the way he rolled his eyes as Delores pulled him toward me, that image was too cool for KOB.
“I told Zeek about you, Miss Diane,” Delores said after she’d introduced us. “I told him you be helping us, and he need to come talk to you.”
“Oh really?” I asked casually. He didn’t seem too interested in what an old lady had to say.
“He ain’t in a gang or nothing,” Delores said after Zeek sauntered away and slouched down in a computer chair. “But he’s got an attitude problem. I told him you can help us through all that kind of stuff.”
I fixed my eyes on her cousin. The boy’s lips were now twisted into a smirk, as if everybody in the room was beneath him. “Does he want help?” Lord knows you can’t help somebody with an attitude problem if they don’t think they need it.
Delores shrugged. “I don’t know. But if he don’t get it, his mama gonna end up kicking him out.”
I walked into the dining room. Lord, You gotta work on this boy’s heart, I prayed. I can’t help him if he ain’t ready.
Zeek didn’t say much as I checked on how kids were doing with their homework and asked them about their day. I loved hearing their stories and listening to them crack jokes. I had everybody right where I wanted them. All of us squeezed into the room like sardines in a can, laughing and going back and forth. All of us except Zeek. By now he was slouched down so far in his chair he was practically lying on the seat, that smirk still on his face. Everything about his attitude screamed, “I’m too good for y’all. Y’all are punks.”
I was patient, at first. I asked him questions, tried to make him feel included. He didn’t answer a single one with more than a shrug or a grunt. Maybe he’s nervous, I thought. Maybe he’s just worried about fitting in. But the more he smirked, the more irritated I became.
I’d worked with kids long enough by then to know that attitudes are contagious. If I let one boy get away with acting like he’s something else, I’d have a whole room full of kids thinking the sun shines out of their backsides. The last thing I needed was for kids to clap back at me like, “Well, you let Zeek do it!”
So after one smirk too many, I turned to face him.
“Okay, what’s your problem?” I said bluntly.
Zeek started, like he hadn’t expected me to call him out. “I ain’t got no problem,” he muttered.
“Oh, yes you do.” This boy wasn’t getting me off his back that easily. “But I just want to know what it is so I can help you with it.”
“You can’t help me.” Zeek’s voice was cold, defiant.
I shook my head and sighed. “Oh, you think that already, huh?”
There it was again. That smirk. “You can’t make me do nothing.”
I bit my lip to keep words from flying out that I’d have to repent of later. If there was one thing that infuriated me, it was some punk kid walking into my house acting like he was in charge.
“Well, you in my house, dude.” I locked eyes with him, my face dead serious. “Why are you here again?”
Now Zeek sat up straight. I could tell I’d gotten to him. “I don’t have to be here,” he shot back.
“Well, get to steppin’,” I said, motioning toward the door.
Zeek popped out of his chair in a huff, muttering curse words as he stomped through the living room and slammed the front door. Delores looked at me apologetically before she chased after him, begging him to come back inside.
A few minutes later, there he was again, flopping down in his chair like nothing happened.
“Oh no,” I hollered, wagging my finger at him. “You ain’t coming back until you apologize.”
Zeek’s face contorted with confusion. NBA players acting like they didn’t just commit a foul had nothing on this boy. “I didn’t do nothing!”
“You did something.” I kept my voice calm but firm. “You don’t come in here with that attitude. If something’s bothering you, let’s talk about it. But you ain’t sitting in here acting like you’re too good to be here.”
I wasn’t sure if I’d ever see Zeek again after he walked down the front steps with Delores and headed home. He sure didn’t act like he was interested in anything we did. My skin crawled every time I thought of that smirk.
But the next day, there he was, attitude and all. Day after day, he kept showing up. And every day, he had another excuse for why he slouched in his chair, refusing to talk. Sometimes it was because his mama yelled at him. Sometimes it was because he missed his dad, who he hadn’t seen since he was a kid. Other times it was because he’d gotten into it with somebody on the bus earlier that day.
I wasn’t having those excuses. It’s not that I’m cold and insensitive. His issues weighed heavily on his shoulders. This boy wasn’t the only one. Literally every kid at KOB had problems. I’d spent the last six years listening to kids tell me about their mom yelling at them or their auntie in the hospital or a friend who’d passed. But Zeek couldn’t see that. Whatever issue he had that day was worse than anybody else’s, no matter what it was. If he didn’t want to talk about it and deal with the problem, I wasn’t interested in hearing about it. Most of the time, his excuse led to an argument that got him kicked out.
“What’s that got to do with the price of beans?” I’d say when he offered me another lame excuse for why he was treating me like dirt.
Zeek looked at me like I’d lost my mind. “Huh? What’s that mean?”
“That’s old school,” I said. “It means, what’s that got to do with me?” Before he could smirk at me, I kept going. “Whatever happened, you can tell everybody about it. This is a safe place. But then release it. Let it go. Don’t bring it here.”
He stared at the ground, refusing to speak. I’m gonna get him, I thought, determined. One of these days, I’m gonna get him. This kid wanted help. Why else would he show up day after day, even when I kicked him out? Deep down, he knew he needed something that he couldn’t get on his own. Every day when he walked through my front door, I was hopeful. Maybe this is the day, I thought. Maybe today he’s ready.
Sure enough, something was different one day. Zeek slouched down in his chair and stuck out his lip like usual. But something in his eyes told me this wasn’t about some argument on the bus or his mama telling him to take out the trash. Something deeper was going on here.
“Zeek, what’s going on?” I didn’t expect him to say much. He never had before. But this time, he looked up at me with his big eyes and sighed.
“My mom said I gotta get a job,” he said quietly. “She said I gotta get on my feet and help out. Or else I gotta find my own place.” He stopped himself from saying more, as if he might start crying.
I sat down in the chair next to him, laying my hand gently on his shoulder. “Zeek, your mom is right. You a grown man now. If your mama needs help, you gotta get a job or do something.”
You could have knocked me over with a feather when the next thing I knew, Zeek scrunched up his face and broke down in tears. Every trace of swag was gone. The boy held his face in his hands and leaned into his knees. I forgot about how much he irritated me, or how he’d disrespected me in my house. None of that mattered anymore. My mother instincts took over as I scooped him up and held him.
“I do want to help my mom,” he sobbed, his tears flowing freely now. “I don’t want to sell drugs. I want a real job.”
I kept on rubbing his back, trying to comfort him. “Well, have you tried getting one?”
Zeek sighed. “I’ve tried, Miss D.” He had called me Miss D since the first day he’d walked into my house. “It ain’t that easy. While I was in school, I tried. I worked a couple of jobs. They didn’t work out.”
I pushed him back for a moment so I could look him in the eye. “Zeek, do you think your attitude is the problem?”
I waited for him to pull away in anger, to stand up and march out of the house. But instead, ever so slightly, he nodded. “It could be, Miss D.”
We didn’t speak. I waited for him to keep going. Zeek was opening up for the first time, and I didn’t want to say or do anything to make him clam back up. Finally, he spoke again. “I’m angry. I’m angry because my dad was not in my life.”
His words tugged at my heart in a way he couldn’t have understood. Instantly, I was a little girl again in my mind, watching my friends with their daddies and wishing I had one, too, asking my mama why my daddy didn’t come take me fishing or to the movies.
“Zeek,” I said slowly, “I know exactly how you feel.”
Zeek looked up, tears still running down his face.
“I hadn’t seen my father since I was five years old,” I told him as other kids gathered around to listen. “He came to pick me up one day. He took me to his mom’s house, and I stayed with them for five days. It might have been a little longer. I remember riding around in a little white convertible with the top down. I loved feeling the wind in my hair and laughing with him next to me. He brought me home to my mama. And then I didn’t see him again.”
Zeek nodded. I noticed a few other kids with eyes shining from tears. It was a story too familiar in our community, a story of growing up without a father.
“When I was seven years old, my mama told me why I hadn’t seen my daddy. She told me he was in an explosion at his job. His brother was killed, and my daddy had burns over 90 percent of his body.” I saw a few surprised faces in the room. That’s not where they thought my story was going.
“I had this fantasy that when my daddy got better, he’d come get me and we’d be a family. But he didn’t. So I looked for him. All those years, I dreamed that when I found him, he would wrap me up in his arms and hug me and tell me how glad he was to see me.”
I swallowed before I kept going. No matter how many years had gone by, this story didn’t get any easier.
“I finally found him when I was twenty-eight years old. But he wasn’t glad to see me. He said, ‘I already have my family. I don’t want you here.’”
I heard an audible gasp in the room as I finished. Everybody scooted closer to one another. One by one, they shared their stories. Stories of fathers they’d never met. Stories of fathers they wished they’d never met. I’d held it together the whole time I’d told them about my father, but one story from the kids and I was done. It seemed like everybody in the room was sobbing, and I was crying right along with them.
Finally, I stopped them. What can I do, God? I prayed. I can help a kid get back in school or fight for them to get out of a gang. I can help a homeless kid find a place to stay until their parents take them back in. But a hurt like this? I know that hurt. I don’t want nobody else to feel it. Ain’t nobody can help them but You.
“Everybody grab hands,” I said. “We gonna pray.”
Somebody switched on a Yolanda Adams gospel album as I called out to the Lord there in my living room. Her soaring voice filled the air as I asked God to heal each and every one of these kids, to fill the hole left behind by their fathers, to replace their anger with peace. Everybody, from young teenage girls to hardened gang members, sniffled and wiped their eyes. The Holy Ghost was there in that room. You could feel it. You could sense it in the way nobody wanted to move, even after I finished praying. Nobody wanted to play basketball or pick up trash on the block. Nobody wanted to rap or dance. We stayed there in the living room, talking and praying, long after the sun set.
Zeek’s attitude completely disappeared after that day. The sweet, caring boy hiding inside of him was now visible for all to see. This boy was like my right-hand man, taking charge and making sure the other kids went along with whatever we were doing that day. His smirk was replaced with a grin. Instead of sitting back and refusing to speak, Zeek was in the middle of everything. My heart just about exploded with pride every time I saw the way the other kids looked at him, like he was the kind of person they wanted to be one day. I knew it, I’d think, watching him from across the room. I knew I’d get him.
Jordan and Zeek watched me closely as I listened to their song. They weren’t disappointed—I oohed and aahed over the lyrics and swayed along to the music.
You better wise up before your time up
And if you need a mentor,
I’m right here
For real
I nudged Jordan playfully on the shoulder. “Jordan the mentor,” I joked. “You sure you wanna put that in your song? You don’t want the whole neighborhood banging on your door.”
Jordan laughed. “I’m serious, Miss D! I’ll mentor anybody. I really mean that.”
I knew he meant it. It seemed like every night, Jordan was picking up boys from his street after school and taking them to basketball games or out for pizza at Pizza Hut. He blushed red as a firecracker under his coffee-colored skin when he brought three of the boys he was mentoring to meet me. Those boys looked at him like he was Michael Jordan. He was a celebrity in their eyes, a cool older boy who was going places, and here he was taking an afternoon to spend time with them.
Back in 2009, most boys would have been scared to hang out with Jordan alone. He was in his early twenties when he first showed up on the lot with TO to play basketball. The other kids froze as he hollered, “Can I play?”
“That’s Jordan,” I heard somebody whisper.
Jordan’s family had lived in Roseland as long as anybody could remember. Everybody knew who he was. He was one of the few boys in the neighborhood who drove a car, and everybody said he always kept two guns in the trunk. Everybody kept their eyes on that car and held their breath anytime he came near it.
I’d never had a conversation with Jordan, mostly because he never came inside my house. Once basketball was over for the day, he’d wave to me and yell, “Hey, Miss D!” before climbing in his car and disappearing down the street.
So when I heard a knock on my door one September night, Jordan was the last person I expected to see when I opened it.
“Can I talk to you, Miss D?” he asked quietly.
I studied his face, wondering what was going on behind those dark eyes of his. “Of course,” I said, opening the door wider. “Come on in.”
Jordan sighed as he sat down on a folding chair and set his backpack on the floor. He leaned into his knees, still wearing his jacket, as he hung his head and stared at the ground.
“Miss D, this dude just beat up my sister.” He paused for a moment, pressing his lips together tightly, fury written all over his face. “I was going to shoot him. But something told me to come here first.”
My mind raced. This boy had never stepped foot in my house or said anything to me beyond a greeting. I didn’t know he thought enough of me to ask me for advice, let alone that he would be asking about shooting somebody. Don’t yell, I thought. Keep your cool. Talk some sense into him.
“Jordan,” I said slowly, “you a leader. But you a negative leader.”
Jordan frowned. “What do you mean?”
“These boys in the neighborhood look up to you. But they’re scared of you. They think what you’re doing is exciting. They think you don’t take no mess. But just think about what would happen if you were a positive leader. What if you were leading boys to do the right thing? What kind of impact could you have?”
Jordan was silent for a moment. “I don’t want to be a negative leader,” he said. “I don’t want everybody to be scared of me. But this place ain’t safe. I can’t trust nobody. Now this dude beats up my sister. And I’m supposed to let him just get away with it?”
I sat down next to him and placed my hand on his knee. “You have a right to feel like that. You’re right. This place ain’t safe. But you could change that.”
He shook his head. “How am I supposed to do that?”
“You can start with your situation. How you handle it. If you shoot this boy, that ain’t gonna make the neighborhood safer. It sure ain’t gonna make your family safer.” I looked into his eyes, so dark I could see my reflection in them. “I can’t make the decision for you. You have to do it.”
Jordan must have sat in my living room for two and a half hours before he finally picked up his backpack. “I want to get out of these streets, Miss D,” he said as he stood. “I really do want to change.”
I exhaled as he walked out the front door, trying to slow my pounding heart. God, I don’t know which way this boy is gonna go, I prayed. I said everything I could. Please let him make the right choice.
I barely slept that night. When I finally drifted off, I heard gunshots in my dreams. I startled awake, sure that I heard my phone ring, sure that somebody would be on the other line telling me Jordan was locked up for murder.
But when kids arrived for programming the next day, there was Jordan, smiling. “Hey, Miss D!” he called like nothing had happened. He nodded slightly as I locked eyes with him. He didn’t say anything else, but I knew he’d done the right thing.
I wouldn’t learn the full story until months later, when Essence magazine called me up asking for an interview. They were looking for a kid to include in their story. Jordan was the one to pop into my head. By then, he was known throughout the streets as Jordan the Mentor. He’d taken my words to heart. Nobody could call him a negative leader now. He was on a mission to lead young boys down the right path. So I gave the Essence writer his phone number.
When I read the article, I nearly dropped the magazine. There in black-and-white print was a quote from Jordan saying that night in my house, he had the gun in his backpack. He had every intention of leaving my house and walking straight to that boy’s house to shoot him. I’ll never know what made him come to my house. I’ll never know what made him turn around and go home.
I look at boys like Jordan and Zeek, boys who walked into my house one way and walked out completely different. I look at the conversations we had, the advice I gave them, the prayers I prayed when they left. Truth is, nothing I said was particularly special or unusual. And yet God used it. God used me. These boys turned their lives around, and I got to play a role in their story. Those are the moments that light my heart on fire, the moments that get me out of bed in the morning and push me to keep going.
But not every story has a happy ending. I’d find that out soon enough.