I hated it in New York. There was nothing that made me happier than staying home to watch TV. I even mastered the skill of pretending to go to school while staying in the comfort of my bed with the covers over my head all day, every day. “It’s cold,” I’d say when coming out of the shower during the winter months in a house that didn’t have central air to even out the cold and the heat. “It’s too hot,” I’d say as I’d sweat even as I had nothing on and a fan blasting on my inner parts to keep me cool. Excuse after excuse, after excuse. That’s what I had for much of the time I spent in New York from the moment we moved back in 1997 to my second year at Transit Tech High School, located on the outer edges of Brooklyn and the beginning of the Ozone Park section of Queens. What a terrible decision it was to go to that school.
After growing up with a fascination with public transportation, as evidenced by my dozens of mini-school buses purchased when I was younger, I thought I’d want to drive a New York City Metropolitan Transit Authority bus or train. The description of the school made it seem like it would be easy to get a job with the MTA upon graduation. Though when I started attending things were far different from what I expected. Very much larger in size and population than that of I.S. 291, Transit Tech had felt even more like a prison than my former middle school simply because of the amount of scrutiny and security that high school life brought about. Every day you scanned in through metal detectors. Not so different from before. I was good with that. But if you came late to school, even by five minutes, they put you in a holding room which was the school lunch room until the next period started. This happened quite often for me even though the travel time from my house to the school train stop was barely even five minutes. I just couldn’t understand why they’d force you to miss a whole period just for being late by such few minutes. But they did. Although, the one solace I got from attending Transit Tech was the school lunch. It was like Subway every day with the right to choose your sandwich meat, cheese, and toppings. It was heaven. At least until I got cornered out of nowhere by a School Safety Agent asking me to remove a Band-Aid I had on my face. Apparently, they suspected that I was part of a gang as a Band-Aid on the face was a symbol for gangs. I had a cut on my face and was using what most people would to cover a wound. Coupled with more name calling by fellow classmates, I couldn’t take it anymore. I just couldn’t keep attending a school that I dreaded waking up every day to attend. A school I couldn’t wait to leave even before I stepped foot at the front gates. When escaping was your only avenue for joy at 3:00 p.m. each day, you know you have a problem. Unfortunately, the only thing that might have helped me feel better about myself was a move back to Florida. A place that was familiar. A place that was more structured. A place that wasn’t so lit up with people moving about every minute of every day making noises when you are trying to sleep, or making noises while you’re trying to keep to yourself. When the opportunity presented itself, I didn’t think much about it except that I’d be losing the attention of my mother. I’d be leaving her in New York while I went to live with my father. The man I despised. Why did it have to be him? Why couldn’t someone else have taken me in and helped me through my time of need? That I’ll never know, but other than the man himself, my time back in Florida was mostly pleasant. Although, the experience would only last barely eight months.
Nearly 24 hours after departing the Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York City, my mother and I arrived in Kissimmee, Florida. Her, myself and a few bags of luggage was all that we had. Everything else was being shipped via UPS in the days following our arrival. First on the agenda was being picked up at the terminal by my father who would be arriving right after he got off from work. Driving a forest green 2000 Dodge Intrepid, we were on our way back to
317 Cortez Court. The home my mother lost. The home I spent three minutes of my life in, but enough that would last me a lifetime. When I last lived there I received beatings for kicking the wall in. A beating for finding Christmas presents – a trio of bikes – in the guest bathroom. Heck, my sister even received a beating simply because she didn’t learn her times tables quick enough. She was only in the first grade. It’s not like being number one was a thing at the time. At least not in my world. And you already know what he did to my oldest sister, Cheryl. What were we thinking when we agreed to this? Well it was already too late. We were there and we had to move forward.
Within a week my mother had me registered as a student at Poinciana High School, the school I was on track to attend pre-New York move and where Cheryl and Manny graduated from. A school with over 2,000 students integrated from different cultures and nationalities, pre-dominantly Caucasian of course. I didn’t mind. That’s what I was used to. It was familiar. It was normal. It was expected. In hindsight, it sounds like I became complacent in my alleged role within society as an ethnic male (née black) and it’s probably true.
My guidance counselor, Ms. Quisenberry, was life for me. Short, black and more on the plus side with a southern flare. I immediately took to her. She understood what it was like raising a child without the father in the picture as she raised a daughter all by herself, who incidentally was also attending Poinciana High School at the time. A win-win for her. Every day during lunch I would go to Ms. Quisenberry’s office and talk with her. She became my sounding board for all the good things and bad going in my life. She would listen. She would ask questions. There were even times in which she would allow me to remain in the office when other students came by to discuss their academics. Students didn’t seem to mind, but if it became necessary I’d be asked to step out of to give Ms. Quisenberry and the student some privacy. Because of my constant presence in her office, it was like I became a virtual Student Aide for my counselor, although I didn’t know what that meant at the time. I’d make copies for her, or at least ask the ladies out front to assist me with something I was tasked. I’d even run a quick errand for her such as getting a student from class when necessary. I felt special. I felt like I had some importance in a building of thousands. The time I spent with my guidance counselor was some of the best times of the day that I spent during my period at Poinciana High School. In fact, because of her I got into classes I wanted to attend such as the TV production class that seniors were known to be taking at the time. I got A’s in that course and had fun editing on the AVID system along with building a network of new friends in my colleagues who produced the daily news for the school. In addition to working in the TV field, I also joined the school’s NJROTC program, something I’d never have the opportunity of joining if I remained in New York. While I didn’t see the military ever finding itself in my world, I learned a lot during that school year from it. I learned more about the chain of command when it came to our government body, which at the time was in transition from President Clinton to President Bush. Believe me, the first day post-Inauguration and you didn’t know the new chain of command? Boy, you’d be in for a long stretch of push-ups. Not able to hold a gun in the proper position, or if your shoes weren’t shined the proper way… you’d be forced into push-ups. The one thing you never wanted to do were those considering it was required of everyone each day regardless. You just didn’t want to do more than what was required considering 50 was already pushing it (pun intended). The trips were fun though. I remember one time when we went to Boca Raton. It was a weekend trip with a multitude of ROTC programs across the state joining together for several activities. Some received even rewards for their hard work from their respective schools. The night before we left, however, I almost died. We were playing a massive militarized version of hide and seek. I happened to be on the team that was hiding. The key to the game was not to be found by the group of seekers who were searching for you in the woods with their flash flights. Sounds easy enough. Unfortunately for me, as a group of us saw the other team coming to find us, we took off running. Considering we were in the woods with only the moonlight providing us with a sense of direction, we should have been more careful. I should have been more careful. Running with branches at my sides, I immediately lost all the ability to breathe. I’d hit a fallen tree. Mere inches to my right was a small branch facing towards me. That much closer to poking out my eye. Before I could finish processing my good fortune of being able to see, I fell to the ground. I still couldn’t breathe. The pressure from when I hit the tree was beginning to take effect. I had seriously injured myself internally. I felt like I needed to go the hospital as soon as possible. But how would I get there. Where is everyone? “Help!” I tried to say. “Help me,” I repeated. I don’t know where I got the ability to talk, but someone finally came. Then a few more. They helped lift me up and carried me to the center of camp. One of the faculty members, and mind you, not a medically trained individual as one would expect, looked me over and told me I’d be fine, notwithstanding the massive dark colored bruise on my chest that was looking larger and larger as time went on. But at least my ability to breathe was coming back to me. After breathing in and breathing out from the time they cleared me, I went back to my bunk and went to sleep. It was already time for lights out.
Outside of academics and extracurricular activities, I found myself seeking employment. Anything to get me out of the house and away from the presence of my father. When I learned that Walt Disney World would be having recruiters on campus as they sought to hire new candidates for open positions at the popular theme park destination, I was there. After all, I’d grown up loving all things Disney, and with its then recent purchase of the ABC Television Network, which I had dreamed of running since I grew up on many of their popular shows including Full House, Roseanne, Just the Ten of Us, Family Matters and Step by Step, it was virtually life coming full circle. With my father providing me with just $30 in spending money each week for school lunch, I found ways to stretch it enough so that I could go on mini-shopping sprees at the local supermarket. I’d buy a couple of VHS tapes so I could record some stuff on TV and I’d even buy a couple of romance novels so I could place myself in an alternate reality just to get away from time to time. With a job at Disney, I would be able to support my little habits by way of becoming a cast member at Walt Disney World. No, not as someone dancing along to Disney music in a character costume or wearing makeup and dressing like a side character from The Lion King, Aladdin or even Snow White. Nope, a cast member was also someone who served you drinks, food or snacks at the restaurants and shopping locations within the theme park. I thought it was weird too when they started telling us all about that during training, but it became a badge of honor. Once I learned I’d gotten the job, I neglected to consider one major caveat: how I’d be able to get to work. I didn’t have my driver’s license yet nor did I have the money to buy a car.
For the next month, I’d spend each weekend at training. Learning about the history of the theme parks and learning more than I ever imagined one could know about the Walt Disney Company itself. Not having a car to get to work meant I had to rely upon others to get me there although it became apparent that only my father would be able to take me since I didn’t have a car. I remember asking him shortly after getting my permit, which I was determined to receive, about getting a car for myself. He asked me, “What kind of car are you thinking of?” Without knowing which car I really wanted, I just spouted the first brand that came to my mind which was a Honda Accord. I knew he had the money. Not to sound cocky, but because of my mother’s inability to work following her car accident and heart attack years prior, she began receiving social security benefits on behalf of each of her children, which helped support us financially considering my father was still paying the measly $160 a month even at that point. Once I began living with him the money transferred into his name and he was now in charge of it, at least until the day I turned 18, or graduated from high school, whichever came first. I knew about this because my mother allowed me to utilize some of that money while I still lived in New York. It was roughly $650 a month. Enough to pay the monthly installment for a new car. I mean, don’t you remember seeing those commercials saying $199 a month for a Toyota Camry or even $399 a month for your average Lexus? I knew he could afford it. He even had two cars in the garage. He could have even given me one of those. But he didn’t. Nor did he seriously think about getting me a car, leaving me reliant on him to get me to work.
Being that he only worked on weekends at the time considering he was on the verge of retirement, I worked on weekends as well. I didn’t think much of it until I later found out that I was on a weekly schedule rotation by the manager of my division. Being sixteen meant you didn’t care about responsibility, so I had no idea what having a work schedule even meant. Boy, what a difference high school life was compared to the real world. I did learn how to manage money though, between physically exchanging funds from cashier to customer, and being an employee getting their check cashed. It was more fun getting a paycheck cashed because I almost got in trouble for missing money in my register. Thankfully it was miscounted by the person in charge of counting registers before and after the drawer is taken out and returned. Otherwise, I’d be in serious trouble with my job even though it turned out I didn’t hold the job for long. After just three months, I quit/was fired. I told them I couldn’t work the Christmas season and they said that was their high season. I never went back and they never called. Instead of working, I went back to New York to see my mother for the first time in what felt like ages. It was a pleasant experience. Proving that I needed her back in my life as living with my male equivalent of a parent wasn’t doing me any good. The constant bickering over the inanest things just kept building up. His need for us to eat the same foods each day was beginning to make me physically ill. Seriously, who would want to eat the same thing every day, every week and every month? Dry chicken with kidney bean rice, in case you’re wondering. When questioning the daily meal only results in adding chicken fettuccini alfredo to the rotation, you know you have a problem. One could argue that at least I wasn’t being starved, but I’d rather have been starved to death than be forced to eat the same thing. It’s virtually the same when you experienced it like I did. After returning from my trip to New York and no longer employed, I now had weekends free once more. With money left over from my time at Disney and the continued $30 weekly lunch stipend, I sometimes ordered large pizzas. Your basic cheese or your popular pepperoni. I ate the whole thing by myself, and threw out the box before he came home. I didn’t want him to know what I’ve done. He’d only throw it in my face. Things had to be done his way or no way. I made sure everything was cleaned up by 4:30 p.m. Like clockwork, he arrived home at that time every single weekend. No ifs, ands, buts about it. I had to make sure that I was home before he was or he’d question where I’d gone. The friends I made in school were only seen on the bus or during the passing of classes. I never went to anyone’s home. It was either being at the house, school, house, school, house, school. My house was never a home. A home is filled with love and caring among individuals. I didn’t care for him. I didn’t love him. He didn’t seem to care about me either. I was just a way for him to make some money while pretending to be a supportive parent. When the bike he had purchased for me a few months prior was stolen while I was out on one of my adventures one weekend, I couldn’t hear to last of it from him. He never would let me hear the end. Secretly, I suspected he took it from the library where I’d barely left it for 10 minutes. Life without the bike, and still no car, meant I’d have to take my weekly trips with just my two feet driving me to and from. Even though it took me two hours to get there and two hours to get back. I’d make the most of it. It didn’t hurt that it helped keep my physically fit.
Turning 17 was awkward. Older, wiser, but just as depressed as ever. My father took me to Red Lobster for dinner to celebrate, which is where I had my first taste of what would become an apparent allergic reaction to seafood. My lips swelled up and my throat was scratchy. He didn’t notice. I barely did, so I can’t blame him. I didn’t even think much of it. Thankfully it wasn’t life threatening or I’d be done at 17. But at 17 is where I had to stop this train wreck of a life and find a way out. I just couldn’t keep this situation going. Things were escalating and ready to reach a breaking point as the weather started getting better with the Spring season ready to bloom.
I knew what he did to my sister, Cheryl. I didn’t need anyone to tell me about it. I saw it for myself. When he brought me along with him and his girlfriend to Ft. Lauderdale for the day, he was the epitome of a single loving father taking care of his at high risk teenaged son. He showed love, compassion, interest and support. No, not to me, but to the little children who gravitated to him, particularly the little girls. They’d jump on him and he’d laugh and play with them. It didn’t sit well with me. I remember excusing myself from the group of people and going to the gas station down the street. There I saw they had the latest Eminem album, The Marshall Mathers LP. Even though it turned out to be a bootleg copy of the album – this was the era of Napster after all, considering its cost, I took it with me and listened to it over and over on the way back to the house. It was a way to keep to myself and distract from what I bared witness earlier in the day. He didn’t appear to do anything wrong. He wasn’t grabby like he was with my sister back in the day, it’s not like he could easily do any of that in a room full of adults, but it still bothered me. Weeks afterward we finally came to blows. I finally told him what I had known for many years. What he did to my sister. It all came out following another in long line of inane arguments we had. Grabbing me by the shirt, he was ready to punch me. But he quickly realized I wasn’t his equal. Hitting me wouldn’t be the same as hitting a wife or an adult son. No, I was still a child in the eyes of the law. And he knew I had a mouth on me. Nothing was going to stop me from saying anything if the cops came. He knew better. Instead of using his fists, he went on a hunt for his keys, got in his car and left the house. I would only find out where he went when a call came in and it was his sister, Daphne, on the phone. She started screaming at me. Asking where I came up with the bag of lies. Accusing my mother for putting me up to it. I tried to tell her I wasn’t lying. I tried to explain to her what I saw him do to Cheryl. She wasn’t listening to any of it. She had made up her mind. She defended her brother. She would always defend her brother. In some ways, I admired her for it. I knew I was the same when it came to my mother, but at the same time she was tarnishing my mother for something I said. Something I knew. Not only was I defending myself with what I knew to be true but I was also defending my mother. Trying to set this woman straight for what she said about my mother. Ironically, my mother was called to try to calm things down between my father and me. He wanted her to set me straight, so he purchased a plane ticket and had her at the house to do so within days after our confrontation.
“Do you want to live with your father?” was a conversation my mother and I began having when she arrived back at 317 Cortez Court. “No,” I said. My father asked me the same thing after she told him what I said. I repeated my words. He didn’t like it and he wanted me out right then and there. So, just like she did before, she took the initiative and went to Poinciana High School and signed me out. Ms. Quisenberry wasn’t very happy to find out I’d be leaving just weeks before the semester would conclude, but at that point I didn’t care about losing out on credits. Credits I earned. Credits I deserved. All that mattered was the want of my mother’s love and support. That’s all I needed and all I wanted. She was home. Anywhere she was meant that I was safe. I was loved. I mattered. Anything that was possible was a possibility. She was the difference between night and day.
It’s April 10, 2001. After quickly packing my bags and sealing up the final boxes, which were already on their way back to New York thanks to United Parcel Services, my mother and I were leaving Florida for what I would believe was the final time. Driving out of town and feeling like I was pushed out, I was sad. Sad, but content. Arriving at the Orlando International Airport for our flight to New York courtesy of my favorite airline, JetBlue, we spent barely an hour in the terminal. But in that time, I kept looking out the windows. Wondering what I could have done differently that would allow me to stay. How I could picture my future with a house, car and a steady job. As time went on, the image of Florida representing that future began to fade.
Boarding the plane and finding our seats, we were off. We were ready to return to a place that I said I hated. A place I never wanted to see again, but a place that I would have to accept and find some joy in. Just before landing in New York, I looked out the window once more. We were treading too close to Manhattan’s tallest towers. I recall thinking, “What would happen if a plane crashed into the Twin Towers?” The thought, of course, didn’t seem odd at the time but it would always remain in my head for reasons I and the rest of the world would forever remember in the months ahead.