Neighborhood Watch

“Neighborhood Watch”

Adrian Villarreal – Second Place

That August 2011 night was like every other summer night in LA. The heat of the day hid in our homes, forcing us out into the cool air outside. Chris, who lived a house away from me, was dribbling a basketball in place at the edge of the street near his dad’s parallel parked truck. Every so often Richie would step up to him and put his hand in Chris’ face to blind him from the imaginary basket. Ruben rocked himself back and forth on the penny board nearby. I leaned against Chris’ dad’s truck exhausted from soccer practice. The skin of my sleeveless arms was stiff with dried sweat and felt cool against the steel. Someone was saying something about the possibility of us having classes together for senior year when a police car with its headlights turned off sneaked up on us. The driver’s door swung open before the car came to a complete stop. The suddenness of its arrival threw Ruben off balance, kicking his board under the truck.

“You guys live around here?”

All four of us heard the question. None of our mouths moved. We knew better than to say anything to the police, especially a cop who didn’t look or sound like us.

“What happened to that board?” The cop turned his flashlight on and spotted it. “Who does that board belong to?” He looked at Ruben. Ruben shrugged. He then turned his head to the radio on his shoulder and mumbled phrases and numbers under his breath we didn’t understand. “Why don’t you all go and take a seat on the curb.”

Carlos, Chris’ older brother, came out the house barefoot and shirtless about the same time the second police car arrived with its flashing lights. He walked right up to the police officer who suddenly began to cuff Chris.

“What’s going on? Why is my brother being detained?” Carlos asked.

“Take a seat,” Cop #2 replied.

“Sit? For what?”

“Sit down or I’ll throw you in the car.” Cop #2 pulled out another pair of cuffs.

“Are you detaining me?”

“No,” said cop #2.

“Then I’m free to walk away.” Carlos was persistent with his questions and knew all the right things to say. The officer didn’t respond. He reached for Carlos’ wrist, brought his arms behind his back, and cuffed him.

None of us understood what was happening.

When I was five, my mom and I saw a swarm of cops outside my grandma’s house. Electric tension filled the air up and down her street flooded with police cars. Grandma was out back with a broom in her hands. We walked up the driveway that ran alongside the house and into her backyard. The Southeast LA sun broke through the early marine layer fog and onto the concrete where my grandma stood.

“What’s going on?” Mom asked.

Grandma led us into the kitchen. The counters and glass table shimmered with golden morning light as if the sun were rising in the center of the room.

“It’s Danny again.” Grandma untied her apron, dropped some bread in the toaster, and poured mom some coffee. “I heard the officers banging on Mari’s front door. I bet she thought he was at school.” She explained how she’d watched her neighbor’s teenage son climb out his bedroom window and jump the chain-linked fence. He ran across the backyard where she was sweeping, and then jumped into the other neighbor’s yard. The officers must have heard Danny struggle over the high fence. They stormed up the driveway towards my grandma.

“And what did you tell them?” my mom asked.

“Pues, nada.” She shrugged.

Mom nodded and took a sip from her mug.

I didn’t understand. In all my five years of life on earth, I was always told to be honest. Tell the truth. And here were the two most important women in my life nodding their heads in agreement about lying to police officers over coffee and burnt toast.

A third police car arrived. Chris, Carlos, and Ruben were all thrown into the backseat of the first car. Richie and I sat on the curb. By now the whole neighborhood was out. The red and blue lights spilled on their houses and flooded their dark bedrooms. It wasn’t their curiosity that dragged them out of bed, it was the need to bear witness to anything that might happen. Everyone stood just a few feet from the curb on the sidewalk. They wanted the cops to know they were being carefully watched.

One of the officers finally explained that two nights ago someone was assaulted by a group of unidentified men just a couple blocks away. The victim was hit over the head with a skateboard, and the injured party was now sitting in the back seat of the third police car ready to identify his assailant. My friends and I were instructed to stand in front of the car and await our judgement. A line up on Mines Avenue on a cool summer night. One by one, we were escorted before the car’s glaring high beams. The cop that walked each of us over seemed disappointed every time the radio told him this wasn’t the offender they were looking for.

“Alright,” he said into his shoulder as he turned to look at me. “Last one.”

I stood up and walked toward the lights. I turned to look at my mother who stood on the sidewalk with my younger brothers. She was expressionless, stoic. My siblings hid behind her, their arms wrapped around her legs. She watched intently, not blinking so as not to miss a moment, transforming every movement into memory in case an eyewitness was later needed. I struggled to keep my eyes open. It was all white under my lids. I soon realized I was standing there longer than anyone else had. The voice over the radio finally said, “negative,” but the officer hesitated to walk me back. He kept me there for all the neighbors to see as if to say, are you sure? Are you absolutely sure this isn’t the one we’re looking for?

As a kid, I was taught the cops patrolling our neighborhoods were the good guys, the heroes. I thought they were always on our side. Now I realize my grandma knew the same thing my neighbors knew: the only people that can truly look out for the community is the community itself. I often think about what would have happened to Danny had my grandma told the officers which way he went, or how my life could have changed in an instant had the neighborhood not been on watch that summer night.

The block grew quiet again. We all stood there under the dim glow of the streetlights. No one was in the mood to hang out anymore. We didn’t feel safe. It didn’t take long for me to go home. We were better off inside tonight.

I waited for Chris outside his house, not far from where we were detained that summer night ten years ago. We walked a quarter mile east down Mines Avenue. At the end of the street is the entrance to the San Gabriel Riverbed. Chris pulled out a can a beer from his pullover sweater pocket and handed it to me as we went passed the gate. It was near midnight, but the full moon reflected off the water and illuminated the bike path before us.

“So, your brother’s a narc now, huh?” I said.

“Yeah, man. Not the best idea to become a cop right now.” Chris opened his beer and took a drink. “George Floyd’s murder is still on everyone’s mind.”

I thought about the national attention resulting from a few bystanders’ posting footage on social media. The world witnessed a murder by a cop in full uniform. What about those with no community to witness their injustices? We were lucky that night we were detained that our mothers and fathers and neighbors were there with us. Vigilant communities sometimes save lives.

“I told Carlos to watch the way he treats people when he wears the uniform,” Chris continued.

I pulled out an unfinished joint, lit it, and handed it to Chris. “He knows what it’s like to be treated unfairly by cops.” Chris noddled silently and took a hit. “When do you head back to Phoenix?”

“I’ll be home till the end week.”

A couple days later I was sitting in my truck when Carlos walked up to the driver window.

“What’s good, officer?” I asked.

He chuckled. We bumped knuckles. Carlos had only been on the police force of a nearby city a couple months.

“Nothing much, just getting off work,” he said. “How’s it been so far?”

“Good. Crazy, but good.”

“People have a hard time trusting cops,” I said.

“It’s true. But I’m trying to be patient with people.”

Carlos was always the patient one out of all of us. Eager, but patient. He’d always wanted to be a cop. I wondered if it was the mistreatment we experienced from the police that shaped his decision. Perhaps he wanted to occupy this space, eliminating one less bad cop from joining the force. But what if he was wrongfully charged that night? Assault with a deadly weapon in California is a felony. Felons can’t be police officers. And what if I were wrongfully convicted that night? Felons can’t receive federal student aid. I wouldn’t have been able to attend university. Things could have turned out different. We could have been another statistic. It all felt like luck. Luck, and a little vigilance from a close-knit community.