Image by Hands off my tags! Michael Gaida from Pixabay
Master Sergeant Vincent Trent had known that his would be the morbid responsibility of putting an end to the latest foolishness of a family of dealers – the Trents had been moonshiners down to his grandfather's generation, and then had transitioned to drug dealers by his generation. His father had pulled his branch of the family out, but still: three of the sergeant's brothers had succumbed to temptation.
“But not me,” he had said to his brothers and his cousins, “and not my children. I will see all of you imprisoned or dead first. I'll tell you like Papa would: try me and find out!”
Sgt. Trent's cousins had died while he was away in the military, and his cousins had been in and out of prison – but the silly ones had gotten out in time for Sgt. Trent to have that big military pension and a burgeoning business, and thought they would try him.
Cousin Darnell – he ended up running for his life in Stacey Adams, and those weren't good running shoes.
Cousin Nino – got “um humm”ed into nine felony counts of murder.
Everybody got a copy of “Kill or Die,” the rap hit nobody but Sgt. Trent knew he had in him – everybody except Cousin Nino, who was of course in jail, and not willing to be there alone, so he sold out a bunch of his other cousins. Thus it was only a few days before the unrepentant Trent cousins were either back in custody or went down fighting with police in Tennessee and the Carolinas.
“Only had to kick down one domino,” Sgt. Trent shared with his elder son, 21-year-old Melvin. “I knew Nino would flip. I've been warning them to leave me and us alone for years.”
“Well,” Melvin said, “you've been warning them since I was like eight years old.”
“And what is the one thing you know about what I say, son?”
“If you say it is going to happen, unless God intervenes, it's happening.”
“And what have I promised you, and your mother, and your siblings?”
“ 'As long as there is strength in my body, and as long as I can get a prayer through after that, I will take care of you.' We saw you doing that even after the divorce, Dad … you put yourself on child support, made sure Mom had whatever she needed, and when you were home off deployment, you always stayed nearby. And then you got us all back together!”
“Because what I said in my vows, I meant, son. We had some problems, but what I said, I meant. What else have I told you and Vanna?”
“ 'If you get out there and do right and have trouble, I have your back to the end of my days. If you get out there and act too much of a fool, you won't need to worry about police and the rest. You will explain it to Jesus and I will make sure you get there personally to do that.”
“Are you really going to tell Velma, Milton, and Gracie that?”
“What's my middle name, son?”
“Vincent Consistent Trent, yes, sir,” Melvin said, shaking his head. “I didn't dare ask at age 16, but … would you really, uh …?”
“Act enough of a fool out there in my lifetime and find out, Melvin.”
“Yes, sir on the 'no, sir, not me,' sir.”
“Ah, my firstborn,” Sgt. Trent said with a smile, “like your Trent grandfather would have said here, 'Melvin, my boy, you gon' live a long, long time.”