Chapter 15

2013

             “Easy there!” Ibrahim called out from the edge of the yard.

“Okay, Daddy!” Hayvn chirped as she sailed past on her new rollerblades.

“Daddy?” He echoed amused. “I thought I was your mother’s brother, not her man.”

“Yeah, but you’re more like my dad, cuz I don’t have one remember?” Hayvn explained as she passed him a second time. “And I don’t have a Mommy either, so I need somebody!”

He couldn’t argue with that logic or be annoyed at how attached his niece had become to him. Nobody, save for her mother hopefully, knew who had fathered her, and her sorry excuse for a mother hadn’t called or seen her own damn child for over 3 years. Hayvn had lived and been raised in her maternal grandmother’s home from the day she was born and he hadn’t the heart to deprive her of this one consistency, so when Dorinda could no longer be there for her, Ibrahim had sacrificed to come to her rescue. After 5 years in Texas, he had returned to Kentucky a few years prior to raise his niece, a child who literally had nowhere else to go.

“You’ve got somebody and the nice home your G’Mama bought for us when I was a little boy.” Ibrahim said aloud to reassure her as she sailed past again and he reached out a hand to stop her. “Come on, let’s go inside now. You still need to eat and get dressed before we leave.”

Although Dorinda had become inactive in her last few years of life as depression took its’ toll and she found it hard to find solace in the promises of her faith, Ibrahim had immediately taken it upon himself to acquaint Hayvn with the doctrines of The Truth as followers called it colloquially and teach her all about Jehovah. They attended meetings at the local Kingdom Hall on Tuesday evenings and Sunday mornings, faithfully observed weekly family worship in the dining room of their home, and engaged in the door-to-door work whenever Ibrahim had a day  off from secular work. His faith was very important to him, a passion he had shared with his baby sister, who he knew he would see again one day soon, if he remained faithful.

I knew Amaris or Janoah as she asked us to call her. She was such an intelligent and well-mannered young lady who accepted The Truth whole soul. She didn’t talk much about what was going on at home except to say she lived with her older brother and his fiancée, so I can’t tell you how that was, but when she was at the Kingdom Hall or visiting with friends from the local congregation for game night she was always clean, well-dressed, and well-groomed. When there was food she was never ravenous and she usually said, she wasn’t hungry. In fact, once I recall her saying jokingly ‘I do get fed at home, you know? We’re not on welfare.’ If she was sick, she was taken to the doctor(she said she hated doctors, but she’d been dragged anyway) and I never saw one mark on her body the whole time. Her death has come as an indescribable shock. I know the circumstances are considered suspicious, but if somebody was abusing Janoah, neither I nor at least 25 others who saw her at least twice a week ever noticed anything was wrong!

Over the years, fellow Jehovah’s Witnesses from Florida had posted on the memorial Facebook page Karisma started in 2009, expressing shock over her sudden death which had not been widely announced there per their mother’s wishes and sharing what bits of information they had. Their shared pictures and recollections were a refreshing reprieve from the ignorant haters who had drunk the venom Isaac spewed and warped the situation. These people had known to a decent extent the girl he had helped to raise and remembered.

Your parents did a fantastic job of raising Janoah! She was an amazingly polite, well grounded, and smart girl. This was very impressive, because the area she lived in was known to be shady and the residence itself considered a drug house. I was her Bible teacher and never very comfortable when I went there, although she would usually be alone in the house, but when I did Janoah always looked well-cared for and when I picked her up for meetings she came out in clean modest clothes with her study materials excited. On a few occasions, I spoke with a man  in his early 20s, who she said was her older brother and in charge of her. He seemed to be interested in her wellbeing and was not opposed to the Bible study or Janoah attending meetings at the Kingdom Hall, as long as I had her back home no later than 15 minutes after the meeting. The last time I ever saw Janoah was in late October 2009 and when I went to pick her up for the Sunday meeting on November 1^st, both of her brothers said she had gone back to Kentucky to live with her mother. It was not until recently when I stumbled across the interview your mother gave in April 2010 that I learned Janoah had in reality been on life support in a local hospital. There were a lot of bad illegal things going on in that house, but it NEVER seemed to effect Janoah and if it had then I would have reported the situation to social services.

What the well meaning fellow Jehovah’s Witness did not know that Ibrahim had since learned was that someone had reported his unscrupulous twin to the social services. He had unearthed such information in his ongoing quest to find out precisely what had truly gone on after his little brother and baby sister were taken and held in Florida against their wills and the parental rights of their sole custodian mother. In corrupt as Hell Florida, investigations were often botched and written off, however Ibrahim had managed to obtain some information and records. The anonymous social services report was included, quoted verbatim.

 

 There’s two children living in a drug house smackdab in the middle of Cracktown and somebody needs to get them out of there! They live with their brother and if you could just see how he be hitting and hollering at that little boy and how he be giving pills to the little girl that she don’t need like she’s crazy or something. Go right now and see how scared them children are from being in that house. I ain’t just saying this to cause problems I swear. When he f***s around and kills one of them children, everybody gone be like “Why didn’t nobody call DFACS or the police?’ Well I be in that house around Isaac and them kids almost every day and I’m calling to say somebody needs to do something, because that ain’t no way for children to be living! If their mama can’t take care of them then put them into that orphanage over in Tampa, just get them the hell OUT of that house TONIGHT!!!

The report had been made in March 2007, around the time that all access to Wissy and No-No had ceased and Isaac dared their mother to report him to the authorities. From what Ibrahim could tell there had never been any follow up done which was not at all surprising in a state where thousands of foster children were essentially missing persons. If nothing else, the report confirmed his some of his long-held suspicions.

             “Eat fast and don’t get your dress dirty.” Ibrahim placed a bowl of ravioli in front of Hayvn and took a seat across from her at the kitchen’s island. Since he had a mundane desk job as an Actuary and was required to dress professionally, he himself did not need to do anything special to prepare for the meeting and he hardly ever got hungry. “How was your day in school?”

“Really good.” Hayvn nodded causing her reddish-brown ringlets to bounce. “We talked about the oceans and the continents.”

People who talked a lot or loudly normally got on his nerves, but Hayvn’s animated voice was music to his ears. She was as bubbly and lively as his mother had once been, never meeting any strangers and always optimistic. Her fiery and gregarious personality had come from nobody else except her beloved G’Mama.

“Can we go see them this weekend?” Hayvn asked as he cleared away her dirty dishes.

“We’ll see.” He sighed. “You know they’re not really, there, right? Remember what the Bible teaches us about death?”

“Yeah.” She acknowledged without skipping a beat. “They’re sleeping and don’t know it, but I still like to go.” Whereas most 8-year-old little girls would eagerly anticipate a trip to the park or a toy store, Hayvn more often than not requested to be taken to the cemetery when Ibrahim had a day off to spend with her. Though she did not yet know the history, her uncle had promised to tell her when she was older, she enjoyed visiting the shared burial plot where she had been told her G’Mama slept in death with two other people she did not know. Again, her uncle had promised to tell her all about them later too and she accepted this promise without protest seeing the sad look on his face when she asked.

“We’ll see.” Ibrahim repeated putting the shoes he had picked out to go with her dress on her feet and lifting her down from the high chair she’d been sitting on. He had no idea why his mother had bought these things when she herself had had two very young and short children at the time, who struggled to climb up and down. Her taste in decorum had been unmatched, yet practicality never factored into her choices. “Now get your meeting bag and let’s go before we’re late.”

The weight of the world and all of its’ cares with it would melt away the moment they entered the Kingdom Hall, a solitary refuge in an increasingly lawless world where innocent children were murdered and their grief-stricken mother took her own life while a murderer walked free. Hayvn did not yet know how the horrors of the modern world had personally affected her family and a part of Ibrahim hoped she never found out either. Eyes firmly on the prize, they lived in a bubble and longed for the day when paradise became reality.

He would only be able to hide from reality for so long though.

Months later, with eyes bloodshot from lack of sleep and fumbling fingers, Ibrahim would make one of his rare Facebook posts.

 For almost 5 years I have tried to push the thoughts out of my mind and detach myself from the tragic events that led to my family’s disintegration. Never in a 1,000,000 years did I believe I would one day accept reality and allow myself to feel the raw emotions that result from such devastating events.

 It was a book title that finally burst the dam. I read the words ‘When Tomorrow Starts Without Me: The Loss of a Child' as I was perusing Kindle books on Amazon and suddenly I, a nearly 27 year old grown man, broke down in tears. The woman, who had lost her son at the age of 19, under mysterious circumstances had chosen to write his life story in hopes of helping others. It reminded me of what I will have to do one day sooner or later. My 9 year old niece, who I am raising, was still a very young child when our family was torn apart and until now I have chosen to keep her ignorant of the happenings so I don’t have to relive them myself. She often begs me to take her to the cemetery to see her grandmother, my mother, yet she has no clue why there’s a triplicate headstone on the grave. One day I will have to tell her and explain that her beloved G’Mama died by her own hand after years of untold pain and suffering. Rather than continue dreading when that moment might come, I have chosen to tell everyone and write the story giving two forgotten souls their identities back.

In Loving Memory Of

Dorinda Rose Lewis (November 21, 1969-August 13, 2010)

Machlon Kamal Wisdom “Wissy” Lewis-Gessinger (November 3, 1992-November 2, 2009)

Amaris Janoah “No-No” Faith Lewis-Gessinger (July 5, 1994-November 3, 2009)

Dedicated to Hayvn,

On the day you read this book you will never look at your life the same way again and for that I am truly sorry. While I have tried to raise you right and have nothing except your best interests at heart, your Aunt No-No and Uncle Wissy fell into the deceptive hands of a wolf in sheep’s clothing and because of that they lay dead beside your G’Mama. My greatest wish is that you never know the betrayal, fear, and pain they lived.

 

Author's Note

Please feel free to leave honest critiques and let me know what isn't working.

Reviews

[SweetNutmeg]

Wow, that made me cry. Poor Ibrahim. Left all alone with Hayvn. Well, at least he has a beautiful child to raise. I was sort of blind sided by the religion aspect. I had no idea that No-No did Bible study or practiced any kind of religion before this. And I never got the sense anyone else did either. If you were aiming for a surprise. you did well. If not, if this wasn't supposed to be a surprise, you might consider going back and putting in some clues.

[MeratheRestless]

What blind sided you, the religious beliefs themselves or the unexpected source of information provided to Ibrahim by fellow believers?

[SweetNutmeg]

Well, it was the existence of any religious beliefs at all, not that they are Jehovah's Witnesses, but that they believe anything or practice anything at all. All the earlier chapters, they didn't come across as having any religious ideas at all.

[MeratheRestless]

Now that you bring my attention to it, with the exception of Amaris's obituary I have failed to mention anything about her faith. I will have to give it some thought and see if there's not a spot in an earlier chapter where I can try to lessen the surprise factor.