The Quarantine Chronicles: Day 9 _The Riots

The Job site was full in the morning. Granted, it was chaotic, but full, nonetheless. Not all of Mr. Bajruku’s men, whom I’d finally learned hailed from regions near Kosovo, spoke English. The individuals that did, didn’t seem too keen on helping.

Matt looked at me with a bit of desperation in his eyes. I simply shrugged. He wanted the site to be open, now we’re open. He would figure it out.

I excused myself from the confusion and made my way to the office, my head buried in my phone. I’d been trying to get a grip on a story that I’d received several messages about since I woke up. The collective sentiment of correspondence I’d received was: ‘Can you believe it?’

I backtracked through the outrage and grandstanding articles on my phone until I finally reached the source: A non-descript link that you sent you to a YouTube video. I noticed as it was loading that it had over a hundred million views overnight. A side effect to the whole country being on house arrest. Everything on the internet was consumed at an astonishing pace. When the video finally loaded, I wished it hadn’t. The scene was horrific but not something unfamiliar in this country. Four white cops strangling a Black man in handcuffs. One repeatedly yelled, ‘stop resisting,’ even after the body went limp. Something cops tended to do whenever they were using excessive force. In case there was a camera nearby, the audio would capture it and could be used in a defense: A cop’s word versus a dead criminal. Experience had taught me that even if he wasn’t a criminal at the time they killed him, he would be by the time they released a statement.

What sent chills up my spine was the realization that the little girl screaming and begging the officers to stop in the foreground was his daughter. The video lasted for 8 minutes. For eight minutes a girl watched her father strangled and executed in broad daylight on a crowded street because he went to the grocery store the day before he was scheduled to. Eight minutes. I wondered for whom the eight minutes seemed longer, the little girl or the father. Playing it back for the third time you could see the moment his eyes unfocused and closed as he lost consciousness. The last view he had of this world, his daughter in tears while a cop yelled, ‘stop resisting’ in the background. Even half-manned the local police had managed to make a bad situation worse.

Of course, the official story was to be released at a press conference at 10:30am. I was sure by then the police would make him look like Al Capone: ‘A threat and menace to society.’ The sad truth was however that the days of trusting the media were behind us long before the pandemic hit and stripped what little faith was left. What was more, traditional media was too slow for the modern age. This video had a hundred million views in 12 hours. The story was already out there. And unlike the big TV stations, with social media, you saw the video from twenty different sources at twenty different angles all at once It was the only good thing about social media, if you ask me: very difficult to censor.

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By the time work ended several hours later, the streets were filled with protesters. The masks they wore were mandatory, but the sense of anonymity it gave emboldened the crowd. People who hadn’t been out in the streets for months aggressively stormed through the most famous blocks in the world. The city suddenly was alive again; and it wasn’t happy. One racist cop from the middle of nowhere had unknowingly lit a match on a powder keg of historical proportions.

The military seemed unclear as to the rules of engagement. They simply stood in their respective positions. The police must have been called back from off-duty. Sticking to their usual M.O., they were more than excited to defend one of their own. Even one that should not be defended.

I stopped at the sight of the crowd. There was an ongoing debate internally and I couldn’t move. It was my duty to take care of my daughter. If something happened to me, I couldn’t do that. But I also owed it to her to stand up for what is right. To be counted among those who wanted a better world for her when she came of age. So, when did my responsibilities as a father end and my responsibilities as a decent human begin? I would bet anything that Sara was standing somewhere with a bullhorn leading her ramble of protesters at this very moment. I decided on a compromise with myself. I would simply walk with the crowd for ten mins or so until the next closet subway stop.

It couldn’t have been more than a dozen blocks between the station I usually take and the next. I made it four blocks before all hell broke loose.

I would later find out why. At exactly 6pm the President, per his usual barnyard logic, sent out an order to disperse the mobs ‘by any means necessary.’ Their gathering posed a risk to the ‘entire nation’s health and security.’ It was 6:05pm when the first tear gas capsule exploded in the street ahead of me. It did not have the desired effect on the confined, enraged, and disgusted members of the crowd. Filled with righteous indignation, the provocation caused a rush forward. The virus was to thank for the crowd being equipped with all manner of masks.

I briefly glanced behind me and saw the crowd charging. There was no turning back. There was only be trampled or rush the line of cops. It was a decision as old as conflict itself. Try to surrender or go out on your shield. I chose the shield.

There was some emotion that filled me as I pressed forward. Tear gas volleyed from in front me to behind me. Molotov cocktails volleyed from behind me to in front of me. I was filled with an odd sensation of déjà vu. I ran forward, and in that moment, I realized that it’s what I’ve always done. It’s all I knew. I had a vision of Sara and I on a beach somewhere far away from here; far away from anywhere. My daughter playing at the waterline in front of us. Then I saw it fade away slowly and replaced by the war zone playing out.

Rubber bullets exploded in rapid succession around me. Breaking various types of glass: Apartment windows, parked cars, bus stops. I ducked behind a bench for cover, just as one of the Molotovs hit home breaking through the window of a parked police cruiser. The interior of the car went up in flames instantly. The crowd cheered at the small victory.

Another canister was shot, it ricocheted off a street sign and landed in front of me. For an instance, I forgot about my daughter. I forgot about my brother and his problems. I forgot about Sara. My ambitions took a backseat. I lunged forward and grabbed the canister and lobbied it back over the line of cops in riot gear. There was no explanation for this. The inequality and desperation felt from this country’s make-up had reached a fever pitch in everyone in their own way. The racial, economical, classist, sexist injustices had struck a chord with everybody on that street. In that exact moment nothing else mattered. I just wanted to win this battle; right now. I just wanted to be on the right side of something. In that snapshot in time, it was important.

The mass of people responded to my brazen act. It wasn’t exactly my intention. In truth, the video had been replaying in my mind since I saw it. I kept imagining if it was my daughter. If that was my last sight, my last thought? I would want them to burn it all. Leave nothing but an ember. Tell my daughter the story: here once stood the greatest city in the world, until your father was killed, and we reduced it all to ashes.

Everything that happened after that seemed to be in a fast-forward. The cops were apparently annoyed because someone challenged what they felt was their supreme right to kill whomever, whenever they saw fit. Afterall, they did get their GEDs and pass a sixty-minute exam.

I quickly relocated as the crowd pushed past me. There was a tiny three step stoop that held the entrance to a small apartment building. I planted myself there for a few beats, crouched under the short brick wall that served as a railing. I saw the mob of people of every race imaginable fighting for something. I felt strangely proud. For a fleeting moment, it all seemed so beautiful. It all seemed like home again.

A peculiarly subdued figure broke into my thoughts as he walked among the chaos. I zoned in on him. He looked profoundly out of place. Which was saying a lot. He glanced around cautiously. As if amid this melee he would be the center of attention. More than his mannerism, his shoes kept bothering me. Black boots, laced all the way up, with his pants tucked inside of it. The dull glistening of recent shining. Standard Police issue. My eyes traveled to his black gas mask. Good quality, hard to come by, and areas of darker black circles and strips, as if the wear and tear of the sun and usage had affected every spot on the mask except these specific areas. I glanced over the wall to get a glimpse at the cops that had given up holding the line and were engaging in several mini skirmishes all around. The masks. The darker areas matched exactly where the Police Department stickers were. He must have peeled his off. This was a cop walking with the protesters. I turned just in time to see him smash the window of a nearby car. It seemed to encourage those who saw him peripherally. He continued the opposite direction of the front line; breaking car windows until he got to the intersection. He lifted the steel trash can that was positioned at most city corners and threw it through the storefront window of a shop.

He continued on until he disappeared from my vantage point. In his wake, several frenzied members of the mob entered the store. The looting had been given a boost.

My phone vibrated in my pocket; I was surprised I even felt it. Out of habit I checked. It was a text from Mr. Bajruku: Flights been moved up. Have your family at the hanger 8 a.m., tomorrow.

I looked at my current position and waited for an opening. I broke in a full sprint in the opposite direction. Back to my original subway stop.

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I made it home in time to hear the tail end of the press conference by The President. One in which he referenced the protesters as ‘thugs’, ‘criminals’ and ‘animals.’ Not the most diffusing words I know of. It wouldn’t have been so enraging if just a month prior, he hadn’t referred to the Liberate America Terrorist group as ‘misunderstood good people with good intentions’

“…Today you saw them breaking store windows and looting.” He was saying to the press, “When the looting starts. The shooting starts. I gave the military the order to intervene.”

I looked up at the screen, knowing who actually started the looting earlier. Was this a tactic to sway public opinion? To distract from the murder of an innocent man by law enforcement? I wanted to be shocked, annoyed. I wanted to be disgusted. In truth, I wasn’t surprised.