Previously: When we saw houses that looked like we could reach them, the man circle his motorboat, like how you go fishing. We then got off the boat wearing our lifesavers and swam to rescue folks. There was this old man, he ain’t got no legs, just his torso. So me and KK carry him. He so scared. He keep sayin’, “Please don’t drop me. Please don’t drop me.” Finally we get close enough to pass him over to Calio and the man driving the boat. When we got back to the projects, we heard about some shootin’. So we went to the old side, where we found an old addict we know, named Butch. He got hit by bullets in his leg and on his side. That bullet burnin’ him, and he so soakin’ wet. All him bleedin’ make him drippin’ pink all over. He hollerin’ “Help me!”
KK grab one side of him and I grab one side. We escort him down the stairs like that. Ain’t nothin’ we really could do but get him some towels. He bleedin’ so bad, we didn’t want to touch that, so we reach him some towels and he tie them around his leg.
Only thing he really care about was tryin’ to get them drugs in him.
After that we left him on our side of the projects with my homeboys who was looking after things.
Then me, Calio, and KK go out once again to see if anybody need help.
We see a U-Haul, not a big one, but one of them baby U-Hauls floatin’ and tilting-like. You could see it rockin’. So I say, “Damn see that truck? Look like somebody in that truck!”
When we open it, there was a lady and a man inside. They say, “Please help us.”
So we helped them out of the U-Haul and onto the boat with us. After that we asked the man where he was trying to go. He say, “Anywhere,” and that he was trying to drive the truck.
I tell them, “We can take you to the Superdome.”
On the way we ran into another dead body in the water. It was a young girl in her 20s floatin’ in them floodwaters. That’s when we started seeing kids’ shoes, baby shoes, baby clothes, kid’s dresses. We didn’t know who the body was. We cruisin’ down in the boat and it came from nowhere.
All we could do was let it float by.
I said maybe the lady had kids with her because we seen clothes and shoes, but we had to just keep goin’ to try to get the people where they goin at.
That’s when I say, “We gotta make a way to get outta this place.” This time I mean it.
When we drop the people from the U-Haul at the Superdome, the National Guard told us whenever we ready to surrender to leave they would escort us with trucks and helicopters.
What he say stood in the back of my mind, and I say to Calio, “Are we ready?’
He kept saying, “We might don’t have to leave man.”
I said, “Nah. One way or the other we gotta get outta here.”
That’s when I told KK that tomorrow we gonna go to them National Guard by the Superdome and the Convention Center and let them know we got a lotta people stuck here at the project and they afraid to come out and we afraid they ain’t gonna make it.
We gonna tell them people here stuck with seizures and bad hearts. And that we don’t have no food and no more water. People complain they need their medicine, all kind of things. Our way of helping them survive just ain’t workin’ no more.
We gonna tell them all this, like exaggeratin’. That’s the only way to get them moving fast like we want them to.
The next day, Calio agreed to go with us. We got to the Superdome and the Convention Center and we told the guards they need to get to the uptown projects as soon as possible. I tell them it’s the one near the Greyhound Bus Station.
The man say, “There any wires?” That’s in case they have to use helicopters.
I told them, “No, it’s all clear.” They say they’ll go there.
So we return back to the projects. I was getting out of the boat, and I slipped and hit my face in the water. I don’t know what it was but something bit me in that water. It swoll my whole face up.
To be continued . . .
