I remember the first time I heard those words. Seven years ago. And he didn’t say them to me. He said them to my mother. “Winnie,” he said. My mother’s Chinese name is Fu Yin and somehow that turned into Winnie when she came to the States. “There’s been an accident.”
I had been sitting on the couch watching “Power Rangers”, a show I couldn’t stand to watch after that night. I still don’t think I could stomach watching an episode. Because all I could think that night was the Power Rangers should have been there instead of my daddy.
They should have been the ones going to the drug bust; they should have been the ones who broke into the derelict house in College Park and shined their flashlight around and had their specially trained German shepherd tight on a leash and called out, “This is the police!” except they would have said, “This is the Power Rangers!” and the Power Rangers would have been prepared for anything. Prepared for the shouting and the shooting and the bullets.
But the Power Rangers weren’t there. And those bullets went straight into my daddy’s face, my daddy’s handsome, perfect face, and blew it all to bits.
This was all I could think that night as I listened to Officer James talk in a low voice, glancing over at me and Marcus to make sure we weren’t listening. Marcus wasn’t, he was wrestling with Aaron on the floor, but I opened my ears as big as I could, turned them into sound-catching tunnels, and heard every word.
That’s how I knew what happened to my daddy’s face. Officer James was as delicate about it as he could be, but there are only so many ways to sugarcoat that someone was shot in the face. My mother’s face was pale, pale, pale, the kind of pale on the tubes of whitening creams my LaoLao gets sent over from China.
That wasn’t the first time my daddy had been shot. Or even the second time. Part of the job description, he said when he came home with his arm wrapped in layers and layers and layers of bandages. Part of the job description, he said when he came home with stitches snaking down his back.
But Officer James had never come to our house to tell us.
“Winnie,” said Officer James, “I’m so sorry.” He paused, let my mother take a deep breath, probably the worst breath of air she ever took in her whole life, and then went on. “I’m going to need you to come with me. To identify him.”
Still, even as my eight-year-old brain was starting to process what this meant, my mother clung to a frail sliver of hope. “Where is he?” Her voice was trembling like a spiderweb in a thunderstorm.
“Winnie,” said Officer James again. “I’m sorry.”
This was when my mother reached out and slapped Officer James in the face, the sound so loud and unexpected that it made Marcus and Aaron look up from their wrestling match. Made LaoLao rush in from the kitchen and Granny Dee run down the hall.
“My husband is dead and all you can tell me is that you’re sorry? Where the hell were you? Where were you? You’re his partner, damn it!”
The word dead echoed in the room. It ricocheted around all the corners. It stopped and whispered in all our ears and then it screamed in our faces and then it went out the door before we could stop it. Before we could stomp on it and cut it into a million tiny pieces and make it disappear.
Officer James didn’t move. He just kept staring at my mom with that same somber, solemn expression. The Power Rangers started battling one of the bad guys, and it was loud, so loud in the silence left by the word dead, and my mom turned toward the sound, and I’ll never forget how her face looked. Her eyes were dark tunnels that led to nowhere and then she screamed “Turn that thing off!” and threw a book at the TV.
It was a heavy book, and the corner went straight into the screen and then the TV started smoking and my Granny Dee, who had been rocking back and forth and whispering to herself, praying over and over and over again, her words spiraling and spilling until all she was saying was “Lord Lord Lord Lord Lord,” started screaming like someone was dragging nails down her back, and LaoLao ran to my mother and took her in her arms and my mother started sobbing against her own mother’s chest and Marcus and Aaron were cowering and sitting so close they might have been conjoined twins, and I was on the couch alone while the blue and red lights in front of our house flared and blared and made our living room look like a circus.