With love,
Natasha
PS. The last time I saw your mother, I had just stopped by on a whim. She looked good, like I said, so I made sure I told her cause I wanted to keep her spirits up. She just kept saying, “Honey, I look good, but I got secrets. I got secrets tearing me up inside.” Maybe she was hurting about something you didn't even know about. Maybe it wasn't you who broke her heart.
Â
Â
Â
January 22, 1995
Â
Natasha, I'm so nervous right now I don't know what to do. I know it's been a long time since we spoke, but I guess you was the only person I could think of to write and tell how I feel. I'm going to be up for parole soon, like within the next thirty days. This is it, baby. This is my chance to get out of here and get back on the outside. Ms. Harris said that she was gonna recommend me to get parole, and so was the supervisor of my work program. I already worked out in my head what I was gonna say. My lawyer had me write everything down and we been practicing almost every day, how I'm gonna say it word for word. But I don't need any practice. I could speak from my heart and tell it like it is. They gonna ask me do I feel sorry about what I did. I'm going to let them know that they have no idea how truly sorry I am for what I did and what I put everybody through. I'm going to tell them that five years up here wasn't my greatest punishment. My greatest punishment was looking in the mirror every day and living with what I did, knowing that I left my mother without a husband, even though he wasn't no good for her, but he was still her husband and I didn't have a right. I'm gonna let them know how much I hurt my family, and how I had to sit and stare at the ceilings and walls and think about that shit every day. I'm gonna tell them that if I could ever go back and change that night, I would have never come home, I would have never took that piece from Black's cousin, I
would have never put a knife at my father's throat and said I hate you and let the blade sink into his skin. I would have never wrote out a plan to kill him in my notebook at school. I would have put my arms around him instead. I would have put my arms around him and said, Daddy I need you I love you I need you to love me too. I would have held him tight and my whole family tight together and I would have never let go until the fighting and cursing and arguing and money problems and shit stopped. Instead, I blew everything up. I ruined my brothers' lives, I killed my mother. I almost ruined yours, but you were wise enough to cut me loose. I'm going to beg them for another chance, another stab at my life. I don't want to let anyone down anymore. Keep your fingers crossed. Pray they let me out of here.
Love,
Antonio
PS. I'm going to try real hard to do that transcendentalist shit from now on. I'm going to go in there with my head up proud, I know I can be better than my environment. I'm going to set my mind free. I'm no longer going to feel like a damn puppet. I'm going to control the strings from now on.
Wish me luck,
Antonio
Â
Â
Â
February 7, 1995
Hey Antonio,
Â
I remembered your birthday is coming up so here's a card to say hi. I heard from Laneice that you got parole. Congratulations, baby, I always knew you could do it. I knew you wouldn't be behind bars for life. Remember when you went in and you thought it was all over? Well, now it really is all over. See, you made it through. I wish I could make the homecoming party Black's throwing for you, but unfortunately, I can't. I'm trying to graduate early, so I have to take finals for five classes in March. But have fun, enjoy yourself, and I'll see you around. I guess.
Love,
Natasha
Â
Â
Â
July 11, 1995
Â
I don't even know why I'm writing this cause you probably won't respond, but I was wondering if you wanted to get together and go out to dinner or something? I know you graduated from college and everything. Congratulations. I don't know if you're in New York or not, but if you are I really want to see you. Nothing serious, just get together for old times' sake. I'm staying with my uncle on 159th Street. You remember the apartment we used to come to every now and
again when we wanted to be alone? He got me a job as a porter in these buildings on Convent. It's shitty, but I'm making enough ends to have some pocket change. It's off the books, so I don't have to worry about Uncle Sam scraping me. Soon as I got out, I went back to the block to check out whose there now, who been sent up, who's been a casualty of the streets. Same old same old. Black's laying low, got a side gig running for some Rican in the Bronx cause he got laid off from the MTA. He asked me if I wanted in. I told him I'd keep his game on the DL, but I ain't trying to have no part in it. The temptation to start slinging was there, but I'm trying to walk the straight and narrow. I just got out the joint so the last thing I want to do is deal with baseheads all day. For a while I didn't even leave my uncle's spot cause whenever I went outside, it felt like the streets was watching and calling my name. Right now, all I wanna do is be an example for my brothers. Trevon is at a community college down in VA now, and I can't let my fuckups affect him. When I get my own apartment, Tyler and Trevon are coming back to stay with me. So, shout out to a nigga when you get a chance. Let me know how you doing and if you want to get together sometime.
Antonio
Â
Â
Â
July 19, 1995
Â
Hey Antonio. Mommy gave me your letter. I'm actually not in New York. I decided to take a summer internship
at this law firm in Philadelphia. I'm going to the University of Pennsylvania to get my law degree. I come up to New York sometimes on the weekends, but not much because I'm working crazy hours at this place. Like fifteen a day and I even have to come in on weekends sometimes. I barely have time to sleep, let alone get on a train to New York. It's good to hear that you're doing all right for yourself though. I don't know, maybe the next time I'm in the city me, you, and Laneice and Black can all get together and do something, “for old times' sake” as you put it.
Natasha
Â
Â
Â
October 16, 1995
Natasha,
Â
I'm sorry to be writing on this poster, but I just gotta tell somebody about this and you the only person I know who actually will read a letter these days. But I'm at the Million Man March, you know, that big Farakkan thing everybody been talking about. I mean, I ain't no Muslim cause I always thought they was a little weird, but Mohammed had been calling me, telling me about this shit. Spread the information, he was saying when he called me cause we still politik from time to time. And me and Black was like, We ain't got shit else to do. Let's do some positive shit for a change. So we hopped one of them express trains to
D.C. at about midnight last night, just like that, on a whim, just so we could go to this shit and check it out. I'm running out of room so I'm gonna start writing on the back, but this shit is holy, Natasha. This shit is real it's love it's what I need what I been missing for so long. Brothers standing shoulder to shoulder like we ready to battle, like an army. It look like a flood of people so damn long and wide and far and deep and strong that nobody can break it down. I want all of us to leave here, Natasha, to walk arm in arm and tear this country down and rebuild it all over again, but this time with the odds in our favor. This time with the black man and his woman on top. And I want to apologize to you, Natasha, cause we talking about making peace with each other and our women. I want to apologize to everybody in my life for what I put them through. This day, this hour, this minute has made me a better man. There's not a man standing here who ain't crying. Including me.
In Solidarity,
Antonio
PS. Sorry I messed up your souvenir poster.
Â
Â
Â
October 19, 1995
Â
Antonio, thank you for my poster. I'm glad you got a chance to experience such an historic event; I can't imagine what it must have been like for you to be there. Getting
your parole has done you some good, I see. Your writing even sounds differentâhopeful and more alive. That's a good sign, Antonio. I'm happy for you, happier than you could ever know. I've hung your poster up, right above all my books, because yours is another story that the whole world needs to know.
Love,
Natasha
Â
Â
Â
November 12, 1995
Dear Natasha,
Â
I feel like Holden now, on an odyssey to find my place in the world. When a c.o. said Free Man walking on my way out, I almost didn't believe it. Inside, I lost my identity. I forgot the real me and the world outside, out of necessity really cause I wouldn't have made it through otherwise. Now, like Holden, I've gotten out and I have to search this city to find the real me. At first, I didn't want to leave my uncle's apt. I was used to being holed up in concrete, and something about the gates on the windows made me feel safe. One night I woke up and stared outside my window and the streetlights were shining on piles of garbage and their shadows looked like the guards that used to be a part of my life. And I thought, Oh, I'm back home. Then I threw up, right in the bed cause I couldn't make it to the toilet, because I knew it was sick to ever think about upstate
as home. When I got back from the March, all of that changed. I woke up early one morning and bought a pocketful of tokens, just so I could ride and ride and ride the trains all over New York City. The roar of the train, the energy of people fighting to get on and off, the rumble and the vibration shot through my body and made me remember there was blood flowing through my veins. I rode to the top of the Bronx, then back down to the edge of Brooklyn. I stood on the boardwalk and imagined I was an explorer staring at the end of the world. Then I turned my back to the water, and let the breeze hit me in the back. And I imagined the wind and the water were working together to push me forward, like the hand of God ⦠further and further away from the end of the world and into a new beginning for me.
Love,
Antonio
Â
Â
Â
December 21, 1995
Â
Hey. Couldn't let a Christmas go by and not get you a card. Or send you a letter. I figured that just cause I'm not locked up no more, don't mean I can't write. Happy Holidays. I hope it's a good one.
Love,
Antonio
Â
Â
Â
June 18, 1996
Â
Happy Birthday. Just wanted to check up on you, see how things was going. You almost a big-time lawyer now so I guess you ain't got time for a brother no more. I'm just kidding. Anyway, might as well tell you I got a shorty on the way. Before you break on me for getting some poor helpless girl pregnant, let me just tell you I'm happy about it and so is she. I hope it's a boy: Michael Antonio Lawrence III. I'm with this chick from around the way. Her name is Rhonda, and she treats me real good. She's a CNA now, but she trying to be a nurse. I don't know if it's gonna last. I met her a few months ago and felt like falling in love again and shit, having a female to depend on. We was both coming uptown on the A and she smiled at me, and we just struck up a conversation. It wasn't even about the yum-yum. I got out the joint and didn't even think about getting none. I just wanted to feel good about myself again. She's sweet and good and remind me a lot of you. I moved in with her, but I feel funny about this shit. I'm a man and I want my woman to be able to move in with me. But as I'm getting back on my feet, I have to realize manhood isn't just about what you got. She wants me to be there for her while she pregnant, and I'll do that for her if that's what she needs from me. So, we're gonna try to do this thing and see what happens. If the shit don't work out, I'll always have my kid, right?
Soon as I found out, I set out getting me a better job.
But I was walking around with nice shiny shoes on and khakis and shit, going to job fairs, filling out applications and having to leave half of it blank. Education, employment ⦠I got all that in the joint. I can't let anybody know that. They had an open call or something like that for the City; I just walked out without filling out the application cause I couldn't leave it blank, but I damn sure couldn't fill it in. I just grabbed my coat and left without explaining shit. And forget about marking that box where they ask you if you ever been convicted of a crime. Nobody's going to see me, Antonio, and realize that I was just a kid who made a mistake. They're just going to see I've been convicted of a felony. I know, cause I had just two job interviews after filling out about forty applicationsâone at a hotel to be a doorman and another at this diner place in Midtown to wash dishes. And I saw the interviewer's eyes staring at me up over the application, knowing without even asking why I had left so much of the paper blank. Both of them just said, Thanks for coming in and they would call me if they need me. I been coming home every day asking my girl if anybody called, and of course nobody did. I came back from the march with a lot of hope. On the train ride back, me and Black even talked about how things was gonna be better, for both of us. Now, I'm not so sure. But no matter what, I will have my son. I'll school him about life way deeper than my pops schooled me.