It wasn’t the worst day of my life, I’ve had my share of troubles. But it was pretty bad. And I’m not about to forget it anytime soon.
Errol and me went to the stores in Jerome Ave. That’s in the Bronx. It’s not something we do every day. You gotta have plenty of money to go into the stores. But Errol got paid extra that week, and none of the bills was overdue, so we made up our minds to go spend. And we did good. Shoes – two pairs for me, a jacket for Errol, some stuff for the house. Nothing grand but we had our hands full of packages.
Before we got on the train to go home we sat down on a bench near the station. Not many people around, only a few, and we had a smoke. As a rule Errol doesn’t carry smokes with him. That day he did. We’re relaxing, sort of pleased with ourselves. We don’t get to go out together that often. Errol works shifts. I’m a home carer so my hours’re all over the place. I used to think that’s why we got along, almost ten years we been together and still hanging in there. No kids, we sorry about that, but otherwise we were doing fine. My sister and her man never stop fighting and they see each other all the time.
Well anyway, we’re minding our own business, not bothering anybody, not many people there to bother. And these three men come up to us. Two big ones, one black, one white, and a small one, Spanish looking. They start going through the packages. They’d flashed their badges at us, must’ve thought we stole the stuff. But the receipts were all there. And no hidden weed. Guess they were looking for that ’cause they smelled we were smoking.
