When everything calmed down, I felt relaxed and settled. In the middle of October, 2014, I lost my youngest son.
“C. Logan, report to the slot,” The corrections officer announced on the pod’s intercom. I was in prison serving a 10-year sentence. It was very early in the morning. I walked to the control booth, “What’s up?” Then placed my ear close to the slot. “The captain wants to see you in his office,” the officer said. “Ok!” I replied and then went to my cell to get ready.
As soon as I got dressed, I began looking at the possibilities. “Maybe a c/o wrote me a charge. Maybe it’s a drug screening.” These were my thoughts.
On my way to the watch commander’s office, my blood pressure and heartbeat increased. Under normal circumstances, a trip to the watch office meant you were either in trouble or you were about to snitch (tell) on someone–and I wasn’t going to tattle tell.
“You can go ahead in,” an officer instructed me. Before I opened the captain’s door, I took a deep breath. The door squeaked as I pushed open the old wood door. “Have a seat, relax, I’ll be with you in a minute,” the captain said. The captain sat across from me with paperwork building up on his desk. As cool and collective as his demeanor was, I knew then that something wasn’t right.
“What’s he up to?” I thought as I stared strangely at the captain. All of a sudden he dropped his pen, picked up his office phone, and dialed a number. After a brief confirmation with the person on the other end of the line, he handed me the phone. I tightened my face then grabbed it. “Hello…” I said hesitantly. It was my cousin, Kimmie. “…Little C is dead,” were the last words I heard before I faded into the blackness, grey shade after grey shade after grey shade.
What I felt at that particular moment was a pain I had never felt in my entire life. My baby boy was gone, and there was nothing I could do to bring him back. At the expense of my son’s life, I learned that “the good die young.”
On the day my son was murdered, he was in route to work when a gunman had mistaken him as someone else. I’ve heard about people losing their lives because they resembled another person, but I never thought I would be the father of a mistaken identity victim.
My son was a good, law-abiding man who was fatally shot to death. There’s no “my fault, I shot the wrong person” after you kill someone.
Only a grieving parent can fully understand the pain another sobbing parent endures. A mixture of emotions blended in my mind, and a fist of agony punched my heart. In other words, I was drowning in a pool of tears.
It wasn’t until I sat down that I allowed my mind and heart to calm down. I had to breathe and collect my thoughts. As I laid back, the memories of my son planted a smile on my face. I had calmed down and now I was ready to deal with Little C’s funeral arrangements so his soul could rest in peace.
(fiction)