The Second Doublewide on the Right, part 76

I’m Fixin’ To present part 76 of The Second Doublewide on the Right:

Quantavious reached up from the seat of his rented Cadillac and retrieved the rental agreement from behind the sun visor and passed it, along with his driver’s license, to the Ocmulgee County Deputy Sheriff, who had pulled him over for speeding while he was heading south on Hwy 86 on the way to visit his grandmother before orchestrating one last dope deal, and then collecting his fee and taking all the cash in his safety deposit box at the bank in Decatur, before heading for an island somewhere.

He was attempting to conjure up a picture of that island in his mind when his thoughts were interrupted.

“I clocked you doing 82 in a 55 zone,” the deputy said as he inspected the license and the rental agreement form. “What’s your hurry?”

“No hurry, deputy,” Qunatavious replied in as respectful a tone as he could command. “It’s just that this Caddy drives so smooth, and me not being used to it, well, it just got away with me.”

“Sit tight,” the deputy said just before he turned and headed back toward his cruiser.

Quantavious observed in his rear-view mirror as the deputy disappeared back inside his unit, and figured he was writing him up a speeding ticket, however, it sure seemed like it was taking him a long time.

Suddenly, another county cruiser skidded to a halt in front of his rented Caddy. “What the heck!” he said to himself. “This sucker needs some back-up just to write a dang speeding ticket?”

The next thing he heard was the voice of the deputy who had first pulled him over saying, “Get out of the car with your hands over your head!”

The second he got out both the deputies were right on his tail, and shoved him face first down on the hood of the Cadillac.

“Hands behind your back!” one of them demanded.

Quantavious almost panicked when he felt the cold steel of the handcuffs and heard the snap of the locks as they tightly bound his wrists together.

The deputy must have felt him go tense because he said, “Just try to relax and things will go a lot easier on you. Do you have any drugs or weapons on you?”

“Naw, I don’t use drugs,” he responded in a weak voice.

“Hey, what’s this?” the newly arrived deputy said after he opened the passenger side door of the Cadillac. “What’s that peeping from under the seat. I thought you said you didn’t have a weapon!”

“Naw, what I said was that I didn’t have one on me,” he replied.

“You got anything else in this car you want to tell us about? You don’t mind if we take a look, do you?” one of them asked.

Still face down on the hood of his rented car, Quantavious was getting a small degree of his courage back when he said, “Look all you want. If you find anything it’ll be something y’all put in it, not me.”

“What the devil is that supposed to mean?” one of them asked in a threatening tone.

That’s when Quantavious decided to take his uncle’s advice and keep his mouth shut. He refused to speak anymore and passively responded to their request to get into the back seat of the first squad car. While he sat there, all cramped up, he watched them bag up his pistol and search the inside and the trunk of the Cadillac. It gave him a small amount of pleasure when he heard one of them say, “It’s clean.”

Then both deputies walked back toward him and the first one opened the door and said to him, “Mister Carter, the reason we’re detaining you is because there is an outstanding warrant out for your arrest on some serious drug charges. I’m going to read you your rights and then I’ll be transporting you to the Ocmulgee County Detention Center.”

As the squad car drove along all the landmarks were familiar to Quantavious, although he had never observed them from such a disadvantageous point of view.

That’s when he realized he wasn’t fixin’ to go visit his grandmother after all.

(www.teddunagan.com)