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“Go by and see your godsister, Monique,” said Mama. “She been asking for you.”

Monique lived just two doors down on Oliver. I ran by and found her in the kitchen making greens.

She gave me a taste. I love greens.

“Haven’t seen you in a while,” she said. “Where you been, girl?”

“Here and there,” I told her.

I heard the front door open.

“You expecting someone?” I asked.

“Nope.”

When I turned, I saw a policeman standing there.

Just like that, I started out the back door. But a policeman was standing there as well.

Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.

Cop in the kitchen said, “We just wanna question you.”

I didn’t say nothing.

He approached me with cuffs.

“You gotta cuff me to question me?” I asked.

“’Fraid so,” he said.

By then the kitchen was filled with cops. Must have been six of them.

They escorted me out the front door. Now the whole neighborhood was out there. Everyone was looking to see what was happening. There was a whole squadron of police cars.

I could see Mama coming out her front door. She caught a glimpse of me. I saw the hurt in her eyes.

There was nothing I could say, nothing I could do.

MORE THAN

A MINUTE

The Snoop that shot a woman before the woman bashed her head in with a bat, the Snoop that ran and hid, the Snoop that was stupid enough to go out the house, only to be seen and caught—that Snoop was me.

Hard to believe the things I did when I was barely a teenager, but I did them. I watched myself get into this mess, figuring my protectors would get me out.

Mama didn’t have no money for lawyers, but Uncle did. Uncle and Father both told me to stay cool, they’d find me the best criminal defense attorney in the city.

I tried to stay cool, but how cool can you stay in the city jail waiting for your case? That shit takes forever.

“How long?” I asked Uncle when he first started explaining about the criminal justice system.

“More than a minute,” he said. “There were a bunch of witnesses who saw you shoot.”

“Well, I did shoot,” I said, “but only to save myself.”

“The witnesses might not have seen it that way,” Uncle explained. “They might have heard the gunfire and then seen you holding the gun.”

“Who knows what the fuck they saw?”

“That’s my point, Snoop. I gotta talk to those witnesses.”

“How you gonna find them?” I asked.

“I’ll find them,” said Uncle.

“How long do you think that’ll take?”

“I keep telling you, Snoop—more than a minute.”

23/1

They had raided Mama’s house and taken away pictures of me. They put me on wanted lists and were hunting me down from different directions. I should have known better than to step out like that.

I stepped out and got snagged.

And that was that.

I’d been arrested before, but it was all petty stuff. In and out after an hour or two.

Now my ass was in city jail for God knows how long.

I can’t say I was all that scared ’cause most of the niggas in there were boys I knew. Half of them was from around my way. It was like homecoming week.

“Whassup, Snoop,” they said. “We glad you gonna kick it with us in here.”

I wasn’t glad, but I sure as shit wasn’t lonely.

Uncle came by. Father too. Both said, “Look here, babygirl. This here lawyer’s coming through to help you. And besides that, we talked to the witnesses and none of them saw you shooting no one. Cops got a weak case.”

Whether the case was weak or strong, the case took forever to get going. There were all sorts of delays.

“Delays,” said the lawyer, “work in your favor.”

Maybe so, but because the judge didn’t trust me with no bail, I had to sit in city jail while the wheels of justice turned awfully fuckin’ slow.

City jail was boring and bad. Same old damn thing day after day. Go to school in a trailer. Boys on one side, girls on the other. Of course I wanted to sit with the boys, but that was prohibited. The teaching was lame. The teacher was half asleep. The TV at night only got two channels.

I studied my lessons—always did good in school—but that didn’t make the boredom go away.

There was no sex, at least none