It was early Good Friday morning when time stopped for me. I was at work, and my phone rang. It was my ex-mother-in-law calling and saying there were three police officers at her home looking for Brince. I was somewhat confused because no one called him Brince. I responded, “Your Brince, or my BJ?”
She replied, “I don’t know,” and then the phone hung up. I began calling his phone number. It rang over and over again; his so-called friend answered and said “He’s gone, he’s gone, he’s gone.” I was puzzled, confused and curious about what “gone” actually meant. As I stood there and connected the dots within my own head, I realized it was my son BJ; she couldn’t tell me.
He followed his friend to a park to fight the men, pulled up drove around, pulled out the gun from the passenger-side window. Shots rang out; a bullet hit BJ in the heart, murdering him; the other one hit his shoulder. BJ just had his 21st birthday. Now, we honor him in March in April. The day he was born into the world and also day he was taken out of this world. Now we live with the ripple effects.