PART I:FATHERS AND ANGELS

1.Is Daddy Coming with Us?

2.In Search of Home

3.Foreign Ground

Introduction

This is the story of two boys living in Baltimore with similar histories and an identical name: Wes Moore. One of us is free and has experienced things that he never even knew to dream about as a kid. The other will spend every day until his death behind bars for an armed robbery that left a police officer and father of five dead. The chilling truth is that his story could have been mine. The tragedy is that my story could have been his. Our stories are obviously specific to our two lives, but I hope they will illuminate the crucial inflection points in every life, the sudden moments of decision where our paths diverge and our fates are sealed. It�s unsettling to know how little separates each of us from another life alogether.

In late 2000, the Baltimore Sun published a short article with the headline �Local Graduate Named Rhodes Scholar.� It was about me. As a senior at Johns Hopkins University, I received one of the most prestigious academic awards for students in the world. That fall I was moving to England to attend Oxford University on a full scholarship.

But that story had less of an impact on me than another series of articles in the Sun, about an incident that happened just months before, a precisely planned jewelry store robbery gone terribly wrong. The store�s security guard�an off-duty police officer named Bruce Prothero�was shot and killed after he pursued the armed men into the store�s parking lot. A massive and highly publicized manhunt for the perpetrators ensued. Twelve days later it ended when the last two suspects were apprehended in a house in Philadelphia by a daunting phalanx of police and federal agents. The articles indicated that the shooter, Richard Antonio Moore, would likely receive the death penalty. The sentence would be similarly severe for his younger brother, who was also arrested and charged. In an eerie coincidence, the younger brother�s name was the same as mine.

Two years after I returned from Oxford, I was still thinking about the story. I couldn�t let it go. If you�d asked me why, I couldn�t have told you exactly. I was struck by the superficial similarities between us, of course: we�d grown up at the same time, on the same streets, with the same name. But so what? I didn�t think of myself as a superstitious or conspiratorial person, the kind who�d obsess over a coincidence until it yielded meaning. But there were nights when I�d wake up in the small hours and find myself thinking of the other Wes Moore, conjuring his image as best I could, a man my age lying on a cot in a prison cell, burdened by regret, trying to sleep through another night surrounded by the walls he�d escape only at death. Sometimes in my imaginings, his face was mine.

There�s a line at the opening of John Edgar Wideman�s brilliant Brothers and Keepers about the day he found out his own brother was on the run from the police for an armed robbery: �The distance I�d put between my brother�s world and mine suddenly collapsed� Wherever he was, running for his life, he carried part of me with him.� But I didn�t even know the other Wes Moore. Why did I feel this connection with him, why did I feel like he �carried part of me with him� in that prison cell? I worried that I was just being melodramatic or narcissistic. But still, I couldn�t shake it. Finally, one day, I wrote him a simple letter introducing myself and explaining how I�d come to learn about his story. I struggled to explain the purpose of my letter and posed a series of na�ve questions that had been running through my mind: Who are you? Do you see your brother? How do you feel about him? How did this happen? As soon as I mailed the letter, the crazy randomness of it all came flooding in on me. I was sure that I�d made a mistake, that I�d been self-indulgent and presumptuous and insulting, and that I�d never hear back from him.

A month later, I was surprised to find an envelope in my mailbox stamped with a postmark from the Jessup Correctional Institution in Maryland. He had written back.

�Greetings, Good Brother,� the letter started out:

I send salutations of peace and prayers and blessings and guidance to you for posing these questions, which I�m going to answer, Inshallah. With that, I will begin with the first question posed �

This was the start of our correspondence, which has now gone on for years. At the beginning of our exchange of letters�which was later expanded by face-to-face visits at the prison�I was surprised to find just how much we did have in common, aside from our names, and how much our narratives intersected before they fatefully diverged. Learning the details of his story helped me understand my own life and choices, and I like to think that my story helped him understand his own a little more. But the real discovery was that our two stories together helped me to untangle some of the larger story of our generation of young men, boys who came of age during a historically chaotic and violent time and emerged to succeed and fail in unprecedented ways. After a few visits, without realizing it, I started working on this project in my mind, trying to figure out what lessons our stories could offer to the next wave of young men who found themselves at the same crossroads we�d encountered and unsure which path to follow.

Perhaps the most surprising thing I discovered was that through the stories we volleyed back and forth in letters and over the metal divider of the prison�s visiting room, Wes and I had indeed, as Wideman wrote, �collapsed the distance� between our worlds. We definitely have our disagreements�and Wes, it should never be forgotten, is in prison for his participation in a heinous crime. But even the worst decisions we make don�t necessarily remove us from the circle of humanity. Wes�s desire to participate in this book as a way to help others learn from his story and choose a different way is proof of that.

To write this book, I conducted hundreds of hours of interviews with Wes and his friends and family, as well as my friends and family. The stories you will read are rendered from my own memory and the best memories of those we grew up with, lived with, and learned from. I engaged in extensive historical research and interviewed teachers and drug dealers, police officers and lawyers, to make sure I got the facts�and the feel�right. Some names have been changed to protect people�s identities and the quiet lives they now choose to lead. A few characters are composites. But all of the stories are painstakingly real.

The book is broken up into eight chapters, corresponding to eight years that had a decisive impact on our respective lives. The three parts represent the three major phases in our coming of age. Opening each of these parts is a short snippet of conversation between Wes and me in the prison�s visitors� room. It was very important to me that we return again and again to that visitors� room, the in-between space where the inside and the outside meet. I don�t want readers to ever forget the high stakes of these stories�and of all of our stories: that life and death, freedom and bondage, hang in the balance of every action we take.

The book also features a resource guide listing more than two hundred �Elevate Organizations� that young readers, their caregivers, and anyone who wants to help can use as a tool for creating positive change. One of the true joys of this project has been learning about and creating bonds with some of the organizations that are on the front lines of serving our nation�s youth.

It is my sincere hope that this book does not come across as self-congratulatory or self-exculpatory. Most important, it is not meant in any way to provide excuses for the events of the fateful day February 7, 2000. Let me be clear. The only victims that day were Sergeant Bruce Prothero and his family. Rather, this book will use our two lives as a way of thinking about choices and accountability, not just for each of us as individuals but for all of us as a society. This book is meant to show how, for those of us who live in the most precarious places in this country, our destinies can be determined by a single stumble down the wrong path, or a tentative step down the right one.

This is our story.

1982

Nikki and I would play this game: I would sit on the living room chair while Nikki deeply inhaled and then blew directly in my face, eliciting hysterical laughs on both sides. This was our ritual. It always ended with me jabbing playfully at her face. She�d run away and bait me to give chase. Most times before today I never came close to catching her. But today, I caught her and realized, like a dog chasing a car, I had no idea what to do. So, in the spirit of three-year-old boys everywhere who�ve run out of better ideas, I decided to punch her. Of course my mother walked into the room right as I swung and connected.

1984

The phone was up to its eighth ring. It was nine in the morning, and Wes hadn�t seen nine in the morning since his summer break started. He climbed out of bed slowly, irritable, his eyes still half-masted when he picked up the phone in his family�s narrow hallway.

�Hello?�

�Where�s Mom at?� Tony asked.

�Probably at work already. Try her there.� Their mom was usually out of the house by 8:30 and didn�t come back until well into the evening. Wes, now eight years old, was free from any adult supervision till then. His brother, six years older, was the closest thing Wes had to a caretaker during the daylight hours and was fiercely protective of the little brother who idolized him. But lately even Tony hadn�t been around much. Tony was spending most of his time in the Murphy Homes Projects, where his father lived.

The Murphy Homes were built in 1962 and named after George Murphy, a legend in Baltimore for his work as a groundbreaking educator, but just as often they went by a self-explanatory nickname, Murder Homes. The seventeen-story monoliths were among the most dangerous projects in all of Baltimore. The walls and floors were coated with filth and graffiti. Flickering fluorescent tubes (the ones that weren�t completely broken) dimly lit the cinder-block hallways. The constantly broken-down elevators forced residents to climb claustrophobic, urine-scented stairways. And the drug game was everywhere, with a gun handle protruding from the top of every tenth teenager�s waistline. People who lived in Murphy Homes felt like prisoners, kept in check by roving bands of gun-strapped kids and a nightmare army of drug fiends. This was where Tony chose to spend his days.

The conversation between brothers quickly turned to school. Tony knew Wes had just finished elementary school and asked him what he was doing to get ready for the start of middle school at Chinquapin, pronounced �Chicken Pen� by all of its students. Chinquapin Middle was 99 percent black. Close to 70 percent of the kids were on the school lunch program.

Wes mumbled the verbal equivalent of a shrug. Tony was enraged. �Yo, you need to take this shit seriously, man. Acting stupid ain�t cool!�

Wes sighed into the phone. He had heard it before. He loved his brother but had learned to ignore his occasional �do as I say, not as I do� tirades. Tony, by contrast, was desperately trying to give his little brother information he thought he needed, the kind of information that Tony never got. Tony felt his brother�s life could be saved, even if he felt his own had already, at age fourteen, passed the point of no return.

To Wes, Tony was a �certified gangsta.� Tony had started dealing drugs in those shadowy hallways of Murphy Homes before he was ten. By the time he was fourteen, Tony had built a fierce reputation in the neighborhood. Despite his skinny frame and baby face, his eyes were lifeless and hooded, without a hint of spark or optimism.

Tony�s dead-eyed ruthlessness inspired fear. He spent much of his time in West Baltimore but had decided to try to open up a drug sales operation in East Baltimore as well. Baltimore is a territorial and tribal city. Once the boys in East Baltimore heard that a West Baltimore guy was attempting to take over their corners, tempers flared. Tony ended up in a shoot-out with a few of the corner boys. Ten minutes later, it was Tony�s corner. But no matter how tough he was, or how many corners he controlled, what Tony really wanted was to go back in time, to before he�d gotten himself so deep in the game, and do it all over. He wanted to be like Wes.

There�s a term in the hood for a face like Tony�s, that cold, frozen stare. The ice grille. It�s a great phrase. A look of blank hostility that masks two intense feelings�the fire evoked by grille (which is also slang for face), and the cold of the ice. But the tough fa�ade is just a way to hide a deeper pain or depression that kids don�t know how to deal with. A bottomless chasm of insecurity and self-doubt that gnaws at them. Young boys are more likely to believe in themselves if they know that there�s someone, somewhere, who shares that belief. To carry the burden of belief alone is too much for most young shoulders. Tony had been overwhelmed by that load years ago. Now he wanted to help Wes manage his. Like a soldier after years of combat, Tony hated the war and wanted Wes to do whatever he could to avoid it. He was willing to risk seeming like a hypocrite.

When Tony finished his rant, Wes hung up the phone and went back to bed. As soon as he was comfortably under the covers, the phone rang again.

�Yo, you coming out today?� a gruff voice barked out.

�It�s too early, man!� Wes replied. �Wait, okay, okay, give me ten minutes.�

Wes was talking to his new friend, Woody, one of the first people he�d met when Mary moved the family to this neighborhood a year earlier. It was their third move since Tony was born. The first was from Pennsylvania Avenue to Cherry Hill to get away from Wes�s father. The move from Cherry Hill to Northwood was to get away from Cherry Hill.

Wes spent his earliest years in the Cherry Hill Apartments, a planned construction built after World War II to provide housing to returning black veterans. A neighboring development, the Uplands Apartments, was the white counterpart, built at the same time under the city�s �separate but equal� policies. The Uplands became home to a thriving middle class, while the over 1,700 units in Cherry Hill became a breeding ground for poverty, drugs, and despair. There was never a question that Cherry Hill wasn�t built as a sustainable community for its families. Isolated and desolate, it had no main streets. Small, poorly constructed, faux-brick homes lined the streets like dormitories. There were three swing sets in the middle of the complex that sat vacant at all times because all of the children had been taught to stay clear of them. The rest of the courtyard remained busy with drug activity. If you�re not from Cherry Hill, you don�t go to Cherry Hill. Over half of the eight thousand residents lived below the poverty line.

Mary shuddered every time she left the house and was plotting her escape from Cherry Hill almost as soon as she got there. When she moved from public housing to a three-bedroom home in a suburban area in the Northwood section of town, she was trying to create more distance between her and the city�s imploding center. Compared with the chaos of Cherry Hill, Northwood was a paradise of neat houses with fastidiously maintained lawns. Black professionals constituted the bulk of the residents, many of them graduates of the universities that sat on its borders, Loyola College and Morgan State University. Mary felt safe and hopeful here.

1987

�Just stand next to the white people. They�ll get off by a Hundred and Tenth Street.�

Justin broke down his strategy for securing a seat as we shoved ourselves onto the crowded Number 2 train heading uptown. We had spent the day in Manhattan, taking a break from the Bronx, prowling the city�s sneaker stores, checking for the new Nikes we couldn�t afford. Now on the subway back home, we stood in a crush of executives, construction workers, accountants, and maids�a multicolored totem of hands clinging to the metal pole in the middle of the car for dear life.

Six stops later, Justin�s prediction proved out. A business-suited exodus emptied the train when we hit 110th Street, the last outpost of affluent Manhattan, and we were finally able to sit down. A subway car full of blacks and Latinos would continue the bumpy ride back up to Harlem and the Bronx. Justin smiled at me just as the train�s last yuppie scurried out ahead of the closing doors.

Justin and I bonded from the first time I met him. We wore the same haircut, a towering box cut made popular by rappers like Big Daddy Kane, whose elegantly chiseled high-top was the gold standard. Justin loomed over me, standing at almost five foot six in fifth grade, and his skinny frame made him appear even taller. His voice was deep, an excursion into puberty that had left the rest of us behind. He lived in the Soundview Projects, just minutes away from our house in the Bronx. We knew each other�s neighborhoods, each other�s friends, and each other�s families. There was one other thing that helped us bond quickly: he was one of the few other black kids at my new school.

My mother decided soon after our move to the Bronx that I was not going to public school. She wasn�t a snob, she was scared. My mother was a graduate of the public school system in New York herself, and the daughter of a public school teacher in the same system. She knew the public schools in the area. The schools she�d gone to were still there�same names, same buildings�but they were not the same institutions. The buildings themselves were dilapidated�crumbling walls and faded paint�and even if you were one of the lucky 50 percent who made it out in four years, it was not at all clear that you�d be prepared for college or a job. Just as the street corners of the Bronx had changed, so had the public schools. Things were falling apart, and the halls of school were no exception or refuge from the chaos outside.

But no matter how much the world around us seemed ready to crumble, my mother was determined to see us through it. When we moved to New York, she worked multiple jobs, from a freelance writer for magazines and television to a furrier�s assistant�whatever she could do to help cover her growing expenses. She had to provide for us, and she was helping out her parents, who were living off two small pensions and their small monthly Social Security check. My mother would wake us up in the morning for school, and before we had even finished getting dressed, she was off to work, leaving my grandparents to get us there. My grandparents would pick us up after school, prepare dinner for the family, and get us to bed. Late into the night, my mother would come in from her last job and walk straight to our bedroom, pull the covers tight around us, and give my sister and me our kiss good night. The smell of her perfume would wake me as soon as she walked in, and then comfort me back to sleep.

My mother first heard about Riverdale Country School when she was a girl growing up in the Bronx. It was the sort of school you might find in a storybook, a fantasy for a public school kid. It sat along the banks of the Hudson River, and the rolling hills and lush quadrangles of its campus gave it the grand appearance of a university. The ivy-covered buildings were like a promise to its students of what awaited them. It was the school John F. Kennedy attended as a child.

When my mom visited the school again as an adult, she was immediately convinced that this was where she wanted my sister and me to go. Riverdale was in the Bronx but was its own little island of affluence, a fact local residents were quick to remind you of in hopes of keeping their property values from collapsing to the level of the rest of the borough. My mother saw Riverdale as a haven, a place where I could escape my neighborhood and open my horizons. But for me, it was where I got lost.

Justin and I got off the subway�covered with graffiti tags and all-city murals�at Gun Hill Road and began the ten-minute walk home. Everything about the Bronx was different from downtown Manhattan, more intense and potent; even the name of the street we walked down�Gun Hill Road�suggested blood sport. As soon as we hit the Bronx bricks, our senses were assaulted. We walked through a fog of food smells blowing in from around the world�beef patties and curry goat from the Jamaican spot, deep-fried dumplings and chicken wings from the Chinese take-out joint, cuchifritos from the Puerto Rican lunch counter. Up and down the street were entrepreneurial immigrants in colorful clothes�embroidered guayaberas and flowing kente and spray-painted T-shirts�hustling everything from mix tapes to T-shirts to incense from crowded sidewalk tables. The air rang with English and Spanish in every imaginable accent, spoken by parents barking orders to their children or young lovers playfully flirting with each other. By now, all of this felt like home.

On the way to my house, we decided to stop by Ozzie�s to see if our crew was around. Ozzie was our boy, tall and dark-skinned, with a close-cropped Caesar and a soft Caribbean accent like his father�s. His basketball skills transcended his years; he was only in fifth grade when high schools started to recruit him.

As expected, there they were�our little crew, sprawled along the white stone steps of Ozzie�s house. Before I could properly get into the flow of conversation, Paris turned to me.

�How y�all like it up there at that white school?�

Paris was a good-looking guy with a brilliant smile that he rarely cared to share. He leaned back as he spoke�his question was a challenge.

�It�s cool, it�s whatever,� I quietly replied, looking down at the ground. It was a sore spot. In the hood, your school affiliation was essential. Even if you weren�t running with the coolest clique, you still got some percentage of your rep from your school, and the name Riverdale wasn�t going to impress anyone. If anything, it made my crew kind of suspicious of me. So I quickly changed the subject.

�What�s up with the Knicks this year?�

Lame, I know, but I was desperate. Most of my neighborhood friends were attending public schools in the area; a few were attending Catholic school. But Justin and I were the only two who actually went all the way across town to attend a predominantly white private school. It would take as long as an hour and a half some days, depending on traffic, stalled trains, weather, and other factors, but we would make it there. And on time. At least initially.

�Nah, for real, what�s up with Riverdale?� Paris asked, bringing the topic back. His voice rose on the last word, as he made his best attempt at a proper British accent. I had to admit that Riverdale sounded a little like something out of Archie Comics. It was embarrassing. I decided to try a different tack. �Yeah, it�s cool, man, nobody messes with me over there. I have the place on lock,� I started, unconvincingly. My feet shuffled and my voice lowered a few octaves. I caught Justin out of the side of my eye, shaking his head with amazement at the nonsense that was coming out of my mouth. I could feel the burn of his skeptical stare on the side of my face, but I pressed on.

�Let me tell you how I run things up there,� I said and launched into the story of my recent suspension from school.

A few weeks earlier I had been suspended for fighting. I was playfully wrestling with a kid from my grade when I decided to go for a killer move: I grabbed his right arm with mine and hoisted him over my shoulder, then dropped him hard on the ground. The fall was awkward, and he landed on his head, opening a small but surprisingly bloody cut. After the boy was rushed to the school nurse and eventually to the hospital to get a few stitches, I was suspended for fighting.

That was the truth.

For my friends, I decided to juice the story up a little. Or a lot. The story I told had the boy disrespecting me and me getting in his face to respond. When he kept jawing, I picked him up over my head and slammed him to the ground. Then I stood over his bleeding body, taunting him like Muhammad Ali over Sonny Liston, daring him to get back up.

My friends looked over at Justin, who had a pained expression on his face. He knew the truth, and soon the rest of my friends did too. I became the butt of pretty unrelenting taunting. My attempt at creating a Wes Moore legend had backfired.

I was saved after about twenty minutes when a man stumbled toward us. His hair looked like it hadn�t seen a comb in weeks. There were laces in only one of his filthy sneakers.

�Can you young brothers spare some change? I need to make a phone call,� he stuttered. An old and unpleasant odor preceded him.

Ozzie responded first, his Jamaican accent a little thicker than usual. �Get the hell out of here, man. Nobody has any change for you.�

The man slowly moved away, peeking backward a couple times, hoping one of us would overrule Ozzie�s rejection.

Ozzie shook his head in disbelief. �If dude wanted to buy some rock, he should have just said it. Who the hell was he gonna call if we gave him some change?� We all laughed as the panhandler staggered back up the block to look for sympathy elsewhere.

1990

�Dude, I am going to ask you one more time. Where did you get the money from?�

Tony�s fists were clenched and his jaw tense as he eyed his little brother up and down. His stare was serious, and his stance like that of a trained boxer preparing to pounce. Wes�s body language was evasive. He refused to look his brother in the eye.

Tony had come by the house that morning to see Wes and his mother. When he strolled past Wes�s room, he noticed it had changed significantly since the last time he saw it. One wall was covered with a tower of sneaker boxes�inside the boxes were a rainbow assortment of Nikes, each pair fresher than the last. The smell of barely touched leather seemed to fill the room. It was like walking into Foot Locker.

Tony found his younger brother and asked for an explanation for the leaning tower of Nikes. Wes stuttered out a story: he�d become a popular DJ in the neighborhood and was making incredible loot DJing parties. It was the story he�d used with Mary, and she�d bought it whole. Maybe because she really believed him. Maybe because she really wanted to believe him. She�d asked Wes about the shoes when they started to multiply, but after her first inquisition, she�d left the subject alone.

Tony knew better.

Tony had now spent over a decade dealing drugs and knew how much money could be made in the game. He also knew there was no way for someone as young as Wes to make that kind of money DJing. There were not enough records to spin, enough beats to play, to buy that many sneakers.

Tony grabbed Wes�s shirt collar and pulled him in close. �How many times do I have to tell you to leave this stuff alone, man?� His tone was low and serious, but he barked his words out like a challenge as the two boys squared off on their front lawn, out of sight of Mary, who was inside the house.

Wes�s eyebrows arched up and his voice rose, his best play at sincerity. �I told you, man, I made this money DJing!� he repeated, almost convincing himself that it was the truth.

Tony closed his eyes and asked again, pounding out every word. �Wes. Where. Did. You. Get. The. Money?�

�I made the money D���

Before Wes could even finish his sentence, Tony cocked back his arm and punched him dead in the face. Wes tumbled backward onto the grass. His left eye immediately began to swell. Tony jumped on top of him, pinning Wes�s arms to the ground with his knees. Once he�d locked Wes�s arms down, Tony unloaded blows, striking his younger brother�s chest, ribs, and face with wild abandon. Wes was trying hard to wriggle free, but his stronger and tougher older brother was getting the best of him.

Mary heard the commotion and ran outside. She rushed over to the boys and tried to pull Tony off Wes, screaming for an explanation. After a brief struggle, Wes wrestled free and jumped back from his incensed brother.

�What the hell is going on here!� Mary screamed.

�Wes is out here hustling! I told him to leave this alone, but he won�t listen!� Tony yelled back.

�No he isn�t, he is making the money DJing,� Mary said.

Hearing this, Tony pulled back his anger at Wes and turned it on his mother. �Are you serious? You really believe that? Are you blind?�

Mary hesitated. Her voice was less assured when she responded. �Well, that�s what he told me, and I believe him,� she said. Her eyes turned to Wes. He stood about ten feet away from them, head tilted back, trying to stop the bleeding from his nose. He suddenly jerked his head down to spit out the blood pooling in his mouth. Mary knew her younger son was no innocent. In addition to the knife fight when he was younger, Wes had been arrested a few years back after being caught stealing a car. But the sight of Tony punching Wes in the face infuriated her. Maybe it was because Wes was younger than Tony and Mary knew well how violent Tony could be. Or maybe it was because she wanted so much for Tony to be wrong. She knew what her older son was into but didn�t think there was anything she could do for him now. She hoped that Wes would be different.

Wes was completely taken aback by his brother�s anger. Tony had tried to keep Wes in school and away from drugs for as long as Wes could remember. But Tony was still deep in the game himself. Wes didn�t think Tony was a hypocrite exactly�he knew why his brother felt obliged to warn him off. But it was clear that Tony himself didn�t have any better ideas or he would�ve made those moves himself. And the truth was, Wes now had more money in his pocket than he�d ever had before, which kept him outfitted in new clothes�including the two-hundred-dollar Cross Colours set now covered with grass stains and dirt.

Tony looked over at Wes, his clothes, his crisp green footwear, the laces gleaming white even after their tumble through the grass. They were a long way from their days of youthful innocence: catching lightning bugs in jars, playing freeze tag on the Cherry Hill streets, and going to the Ocean City beach on summer days with their mother. The days of using a shopping cart as a go-cart, pushing it to the top of a hill, and letting gravity pull them down to the bottom were over. He realized he was staring at a mirror image of himself.

�You know what, dude,� he said, �I�m good.� Tony was exhausted. Tired from the beating he just gave Wes. Tired from repeating himself. �If you won�t listen, that�s on you. You have potential to do so much more, go so much further. You can lead a horse to water, but you can�t make him drink, right?�

Tony leaned over to pick up his hat�it had fallen to the ground during their fight. He spun it around and placed it backward on his head. He walked off the lawn and into the street. Mary called out to him, asked where he was going. Tony yelled back over his shoulder, �Home,� and kept walking down the block. He didn�t look back again.

That was the last time Tony ever tried to talk to Wes about the drug game.

Mary raced over to Wes and examined his nose. The bleeding had slowed. �I am so sorry, Wes. That�s just how Tony gets sometimes,� she said.

Wes looked back at her but said nothing. They walked together into the house, where Mary wet a rag and started to clean up the scrapes and bruises Tony had left on his brother�s face and body. The wet rag felt good over the open cuts on Wes�s face. The deeper bruise, however, Mary could do nothing about. Wes knew he was disappointing his brother, which hurt much more than the beating he�d just taken. Wes was so confused. He loved and respected his brother. Tony was the closest thing Wes had to a role model. But the more he tried to be like his brother, the more his brother rejected him. The more he copied him, the more Tony pushed back. Wes wanted to be just like Tony. Tony wanted Wes to be nothing like him.

1991

�Get up, get up, get out of your racks, plebes!�

It was 5:30 in the morning, my room was pitch-dark, and the sound of half a dozen teenagers screaming at the top of their lungs startled me out of the light sleep I�d just drifted into. I was on the top bunk of a metal bed that was more sturdy than comfortable�and probably built during the Second World War. My roommate was awake too�I could tell because he jumped out of the bottom bunk and stared up at me; even in the dark I could see that his face was masked with panic. He was wearing an oversize white T-shirt that draped over his bony shoulders and gray thermal underwear that covered his legs, which were now trembling in fear.

�Moore, we have to get up and go in the hallway!� he said. His pubescent voice was cracking from the stress.

He stood there for a moment, waiting for me to respond, shuffling his feet as if he had to go to the bathroom. His face was aimed at me, but his glasses sat on the wooden desk next to the bunk bed. The lenses were as thick as Coke-bottle bottoms, so I doubt he saw much.

I watched him do his pee-pee dance for a moment, then peeked over at our clock, which sat across the room. I couldn�t believe it.

�Bro, it is five-thirty in the morning! You tell them to come get me around eight,� I said and yanked my covers tighter around me. �I should be ready to go then.�

My roommate somehow managed to look even more dumbfounded. Just as he was opening his mouth to say something, another yell came from the corridor, a single voice now, ordering us into the hallway. My roommate�s attention shifted; he wasn�t going to waste his time trying to convince me to get up. I was either really brave or really stupid, and he was not going to wait around to see which. Within moments, I was left alone in the room.

Once I had the room to myself again, I rolled over, turning my back to the door, and pulled the covers over my head to avoid the commotion coming from the hallway. Seconds after getting comfortable, I heard the yelling voice with a new clarity. It was right on the other side of my door.

�Why is there only one person outside this room?�

My door slammed open, and in walked First Sergeant Anderson, a high school senior with an impressively premature five-o�clock shadow, a scruffy voice, and the posture and mannerisms of a bulldog. Still half-asleep and turned away from the door�I refused to believe this was happening�I heard the sound of boots approaching my bunk and then stop. And that�s when the screaming started. Anderson�s anger, efficiently transmitted through his sonorous, full-toned voice, had shifted from general displeasure with all of us to a focused rage pointed in my direction.

�Get your goat-smelling ass out of the rack!

�I am going to smoke you so bad, they will need dental records to identify your body!

�You better get that z monster off your back, turdbird!�

Some of the curses he used I hadn�t heard before. But I could figure out they weren�t compliments or normal pleasantries.

I turned around so I could face him and was met with a fusillade of saliva as he continued his tirade. Why in the world was he yelling so early in the morning? And who did he think he was, screaming at me like that?

I slowly sat up and wiped the cold out of my eyes. The first sergeant paused for a moment�he saw me moving and must�ve figured his tantrum had done the trick. As silence finally returned to my room, I moved my hand from my eyes and calmly spoke: �Man, if you don�t get out of my room ��

His eyes widened, then slitted. His angry face broke into a devilish smile. Just as quickly as he�d come into the room, he walked out.

This was my first morning at the military school.

1994

The steady flow of people entering the Northern High School gymnasium had slowed to a trickle as the three o�clock start time for graduation arrived. The wooden bleachers that circled the floor were full of family, friends, and supporters of the crop of graduates, who had yet to enter the room. Within an hour they would watch the high school experience of their children, grandchildren, siblings, nieces, and nephews come to an end. Many in the audience had thought the day would never come, but all were happy it did.

The state of Maryland had one of the highest graduation rates in the nation. Seventy-six percent of high school students who began high school in Maryland completed. In Baltimore County, the number was as high as 85 percent in some years. But in Baltimore City, where Northern High School was located, it was a dismal 38 percent. For many in the audience, this was the first high school graduation they had ever attended.

The procession of black robes entering the room was replaced by a wave of forest green robes�the students trailed shortly after the faculty. Smiles, waves, cheers, and whistles rang out. Camera flashes blinked over the parade, parents and friends shooting as wildly as paparazzi. Because his last name put him toward the front of the class, Woody was one of the first to enter the gym, walking with a confident strut. He saw his parents, sister, and grandmother, and smiled. He grabbed the edge of his green cap between his thumb and index finger and tipped it to them. A sign of respect, and gratitude.

Woody was one of the students who made it across the finish line kicking and screaming. He�d needed two points in the last few weeks to pass English. Gym was his favorite class. Every other class tied for last place. But as he entered the area where all the students were sitting to prepare for the ceremony, he knew none of that mattered. All that mattered was that he was here. He had accomplished his mission of completing high school.

The principal, valedictorian, guest speaker, and the rest of the graduation speakers gave their speeches as Woody fought to stay awake. Finally the moment he was waiting for arrived. The principal asked the class to rise, and one by one they walked across the stage to receive their diplomas. If the entire class that had started the ninth grade here had finished, it would have been a very long ceremony. But only eighty-seven seats were filled that spring morning. This wouldn�t take nearly as long as it should have.

When it was Woody�s turn, he practically danced up to the principal. The crowd laughed as Woody shook the principal�s hand and looked up at his family, throwing his arms in the air in a triumphant stance. He carefully jogged down the steps at the end of the stage. As he turned the corner and looked at the dozens of folding chairs where the graduates were sitting, his mind wandered to the people who weren�t there. He thought about Daemon, a ninth-grade classmate who didn�t make it to the end of the year. Dae took a month off from school to care for his mother, who was sick with sickle cell. That month turned to two, and finally Dae stopped being a student. Woody thought about White Boy, his boy from the neighborhood, who picked up a job working at a restaurant called Poor Folks. He was tired of school and decided joining the workforce was a better option. Most of all, Woody thought about Wes, who had stopped going to school two years earlier.

1997

�Five minutes!� the jumpmaster yelled from the front of a C-130 military aircraft.

�Five minutes!� my entire chalk of Airborne candidates yelled back at him in the military�s famous call-and-response cadence. We all knew what was next, and now we knew how long we had before it was time to face it. Five minutes.

I stood toward the middle of the C-130, staring at the back of another soldier�s Kevlar helmet. The late-summer Georgia heat beat down on the metal shell of the airplane that we�d been packed into for over an hour. Sweat that had been beading all over my face was now streaming uncontrollably but, afraid to move, I simply let it fall. The only relief came from the open door at the front of the plane that our instructors�the Black Hats, we called them�occasionally looked out to inspect our drop zone. A Black Hat would brace his hands against each side of the door and stick his head into the open air, slowly turning from side to side to check for any potential obstacles. I had gotten used to the fifty pounds of gear cumbersomely strapped to my back, torso, and legs. My bladder verged on explosion because of the crazy amount of water we were forced to drink to stay hydrated. None of this now mattered. I was about to jump out of the plane. I was about to become a paratrooper.

An excited nervousness overwhelmed me. It had been a little more than a year since I decided to make the Army a fundamental part of my future. As my high school career was coming to an end, I was still being avidly recruited by college programs. The New York Times had even run a two-page article on my high school sports career and future prospects. I got a firsthand taste of the athletic campus visitation process, complete with young and attractive �tour guides� who showed me around and made me feel welcome�and wanted. It was a seductive ego stroke. Initially, it just reinforced my belief that I was special, that I was chosen. The young female admirers who seemed to come along with the package added to the allure. But eventually, all of these treats started to feel meaningless.

As I began to play against nationally ranked players at various tournaments and camps, I realized that the disparity between my potential and theirs was glaring. I played hard while they played easy, with a gracefulness and effortlessness that I lacked. When you step on the court with players like Kobe Bryant or six foot eight point guards who can dunk from the free throw line, your mind begins to concentrate on your other options.

I realized that I had to make sure these schools knew my name regardless of what I did on the ninety feet of hardwood that had brought me to their attention. Just as military school had slowly grown on me, so had academic life. I actually liked reading now. My mother, sensing my apathy toward reading, had bought me the Mitch Albom book Fab Five. The book is about the Michigan basketball team led by Chris Webber, Jalen Rose, and Juwan Howard, a team with five freshman starters who made it all the way to the national championship game. The Fab Five sported baggy shorts, bald heads, and a swagger I recognized from the streets of the Bronx, all reflective of the way the hip-hop generation was changing the face of sports, and college basketball in particular. I was riveted by that book. The characters jumped off the page, and I felt myself as engulfed in their destiny as I was in my own. I finished Fab Five in two days. The book itself wasn�t what was important�in retrospect, I see that it was a great read but hardly a work of great literature�but my mother used it as a hook into a deeper lesson: that the written word isn�t necessarily a chore but can be a window into new worlds.

From there, I leaped into every new book with fervor. My fresh love of reading brought me to the transformative writers who have worked their magic on generations of readers. I explored Spain with Paulo Coelho. I listened to jazz on the North Shore of Long Island with F. Scott Fitzgerald. I was reminded by Walt Whitman to think of the past, and I awaited �The Fire Next Time� with James Baldwin. But there was a more recent author and public figure whose work spoke to the core of a new set of issues I was struggling with: the Bronx�s own Colin Powell. His book, My American Journey, helped me harmonize my understanding of America�s history and my aspiration to serve her in uniform. In his autobiography he talked about going to the Woolworth�s in Columbus, Georgia, and being able to shop but not eat there. He talked about how black GIs during World War II had more freedoms when stationed in Germany than back in the country they fought for. But he embraced the progress this nation made and the military�s role in helping that change to come about. Colin Powell could have been justifiably angry, but he wasn�t. He was thankful. I read and reread one section in particular:

The Army was living the democratic ideal ahead of the rest of America. Beginning in the fifties, less discrimination, a truer merit system, and leveler playing fields existed inside the gates of our military posts more than in any Southern city hall or Northern corporation. The Army, therefore, made it easier for me to love my country, with all its flaws, and to serve her with all of my heart.

The canon of black autobiography sensibly includes scores of books about resistance to the American system. For instance, reading The Autobiography of Malcolm X�a book that begins and ends in the madness and pathology of America�s racial obsessions�is a rite of passage for young black men. Malcolm never stopped pursuing truth and the right course, based on the best information he had at any given moment. His response to the world he confronted in the middle of the twentieth century was profound and deeply felt, but he didn�t speak to my experience as well as Colin Powell did. Powell, in his pragmatic way, wanted what I wanted: A fair shot. A place to develop himself. A code that would instill discipline, restrain passion, and order his steps. A way to change the world without first unleashing the whirlwind. In the chaos of the world I grew up in, those were as appealing to me as Malcolm�s cry for revolution was to his generation. I don�t claim that Powell had it all figured out: American history bedevils the most earnest attempts to make sense of it. And, of course, the problems of race that Malcolm confronted have not disappeared by any means. But Powell gave me another way to think about the American dilemma and, more than that, another way to think about my own life.

As I started to think seriously about how I could become the person I wanted to be, I looked around at some of the people who�d had the biggest impact on my life. Aside from family and friends, the men I most trusted all had something in common: they all wore the uniform of the United States of America.

I thought about Lieutenant Colonel Murnane, my tenth- and eleventh-grade history and social studies teacher, who lit a fire in me about the importance of public service. I sat in the front of his class entranced as he spoke about the Constitutional Congress and the Federalist Papers, and their relevance to our existence today. I thought about Rear Admiral Hill, the former superintendent of the Naval Academy, who served as the president of Valley Forge in my last three years of high school. Admiral Hill had thousands of cadets, faculty, staff, alumni, and trustees to deal with on a daily basis but always made it a point to know the names and stories of as many cadets as he could. He also taught me an important lesson about leadership: it always comes with having to make tough decisions.

I thought about Colonel Billy Murphy, the commandant of cadets. He was one of the most intimidating but fair men I have ever met. He and his command Sergeant Major Harry Harris demanded excellence from every unit, every platoon, and every cadet. They believed that excuses were tools of the incompetent and forced every cadet to believe the same. One of the last times I saw Colonel Murphy was in our chapel. I sat toward the front. The hard wooden pews forced us to sit up straight, and the message coming from the pulpit demanded everyone�s attention. Colonel Murphy ascended to the podium, looking as strong as ever, his eyes still alit with a sense of purpose. Then he announced that he was leaving Valley Forge to undergo treatment for his advanced-stage cancer. He said something I will never forget. �When it is time for you to leave this school, leave your job, or even leave this earth, you make sure you have worked hard to make sure it mattered you were ever here.� The notion that life is transient, that it can come and go quickly, unexpectedly, had been with me since I had seen my own father die. In the Bronx, the idea of life�s impermanence underlined everything for kids my age�it drove some of us to a paralyzing apathy, stopped us from even thinking too far into the future. Others were driven to what, in retrospect, was a sort of permanent state of mourning: for our loved ones, who always seemed at risk, and for our own lives, which felt so fragile and vulnerable. But I started to see it a little differently that day. Life�s impermanence, I realized, is what makes every single day so precious. It�s what shapes our time here. It�s what makes it so important that not a single moment be wasted.

My next decision was clear. I wanted to stay at Valley Forge and attend its junior college, which would allow me to go through the early commissioning process, receive my associate�s degree, and become a second lieutenant in the Army. I wanted to lead soldiers.

2000

The phone had been ringing continuously for three minutes. Mary sat on her sofa, unflinching. She was in no mood to talk, no mood to explain, no mood for consolation. She simply leaned forward, with her elbows resting on her knees, watching the television screen flickering just five feet in front of her. Her hands trembled.

Ten minutes ago, a news report had stopped her cold. Mary didn�t watch much television; she felt she never had time, but she just happened to have it on this evening. She saw file footage of a jewelry store she didn�t recognize, its redbrick exterior surrounded by police and yellow tape, accompanied by the newscaster�s somber narration of events. Mary had been so busy that she was completely unaware this story had gripped the city for days. But as she sat on the sofa, she got caught up on what she had missed.

Epilogue

Wes has spent every day of his life since 2000 in the Jessup Correctional Institution, a maximum-security facility in Maryland. His day begins at 5:30 A.M. He works as a carpenter, making desks and tables, and sometimes he makes license plates. He gets paid about fifty-three cents a day, which he can use at the prison commissary to buy toothpaste, snacks, stamps, and other miscellaneous items. Lights go out at 10:00 P.M. Guards tell him when to wake up, when to eat, and when to go to the bathroom. He has two hours of free time a day, �outside time� that he can use to play basketball or talk to other inmates.

Wes is now a devout Muslim. Initially, he went to Friday mosque services because they were the only opportunity he had to see his brother, Tony, who was also in Jessup, but eventually he started to pay attention to the message and decided to learn more. He is now a leader in the significant Muslim community in the Jessup prison.

Wes�s family still visits him occasionally, but the visits are not easy on Wes. He is exhaustively searched before being let into the visitors� area. The joy he feels when he is sitting across from a loved one quickly dissipates at the end of the visit as he walks back through the gate to his cell. It hurts him that he has no control over what�s happening with his family on the outside. He has stopped answering questions like �How are you doing?� His answer doesn�t change. His days don�t change. When he gets visitors, he mainly sits and listens.

In 2008, Wes and many of his fellow inmates followed the presidential campaign closely, hoping for the election of the first black president in American history. The inmates celebrated when Barack Obama won, but their enthusiasm faded quickly. Wes and the other lifers realized that, no matter who the president was, their fate was sealed.

At the time of this book�s writing, Wes has just become a grandfather. He is serving the tenth year of a life sentence. He is thirty-three years old.

Here�s what some of the other characters in this story have been up to since 2000:

My mother retired from her job with a foundation for disadvantaged children, where she managed communications for grantees. She is now running her own consultancy focused on helping foundations use film and media to tell their stories. She works in Baltimore and lives just outside the city. She says she enjoys the slower pace and quiet. She remains the rock of our family.

My sisters are both doing very well. Nikki runs her own event-planning business in Virginia. Shani graduated from Princeton University in 2001, after which she attended Stanford Law School on a full scholarship. She and her husband live in Los Angeles.

Uncle Howard has remained a mentor and guide in my life and was the co-best-man (along with Justin) at my wedding. He lives in southern New Jersey with my aunt Pam and their two daughters.

Despite having a difficult time with the death of his mother, Justin managed to finish high school strong and received a scholarship to college. While he was in his senior year of college, his father passed away in a house fire, and Justin himself battled and beat a rare form of cancer. Since graduating from college, he has worked in education and now serves as dean at a prestigious high school outside Philadelphia. He has devoted his professional life to addressing the educational disparities in this country.

Captain Ty Hill graduated from Valley Forge Military College and earned the rank of second lieutenant in the United States Army Reserve. He served in the Army as an officer from 1992 to 1999 and has worked as a corporate lawyer since. He was a groomsman at my wedding and remains a cherished friend and mentor. He lives in New York and still intimidates the hell out of me.

My grandfather passed away from complications of stomach cancer in 2005. Despite the best efforts of my chain of command to get me back to the Bronx from Afghanistan, I could not get there in time to say goodbye. Fortunately, I was able to be home for his funeral and was one of hundreds who were there to pay their respects and let him know how much he meant to us as he was laid to rest.

My grandmother still lives in the same home in the Bronx, presiding as ever as the family matriarch. She is in her eighties and still watches over her family like a lioness protecting her pride. She still makes a mean batch of codfish whenever we come over.

A Call to Action

I originally agreed to write the Call to Action for this book because of my high regard for Wes�s beloved mother, Joy. But as busy as I was when I started to read Wes�s manuscript, I could not set it down. The intriguing narrative of Wes and Wes urged me to consider more deeply the wisdom of my dear brother Dr. Cornel West, who steadfastly contends that �our roots help to determine our routes.� The choices we make about the lives we live determine the kinds of legacies we leave.

The truth is, some of us have been blessed beyond measure. What some call �the favor of God� I call �unmerited favor,� that is, grace and mercy. The parallels and trajectories of the two Weses� lives remind me to count my many blessings every day and to pray that when the evening comes and the night falls, I will have done something during the day for others that I can present to the Lord so that I might not feel so ashamed.

The words of the author Samuel Beckett summarize the central message of this text: �Try again. Fail again. Fail better.� In fact, I believe that this describes the ebb and flow of life itself�try again, fail again, fail better. Failing doesn�t make us a failure. But not trying to do better, to be better, does make us fools.

In the spirit of the Covenant series, The Other Wes Moore is a welcome component of a larger conversation in this nation about the decisions we make and the people we have in our lives who help us to make these decisions. My call to action, our call to action, is this: read these words but, more important, absorb their meanings and create your own plan to act and leave a legacy.

Fundamentally, this story is about two boys, each of whom was going through his own personal journey and searching for help. One of them received it; the other didn�t. And now the world stands witness to the results. Small interactions and effortless acts of kindness can mean the difference between failure and success, pain and pleasure�or becoming the people we loathe or love to become. We are more powerful than we realize, and I urge you to internalize the meanings of this remarkable story and unleash your own power.

There are organizations around the country that are helping to do just that every day, and in many different ways. At the back of this book, Wes has compiled an impressive list of more than two hundred youth-serving organizations that open their doors to help young people walk through to brighter tomorrows. I implore you to reach out to them and others in your communities for help, whether you are a young person in search of direction, an adult in need of support for the young people in your life, or a philanthropist or community servant who is looking to help.

Wes Moore has written a most engaging polemic that is enlightening, encouraging, and empowering. The Other Wes Moore serves as a reminder that ultimately the battle of life is won in the trying, and in the serving. God will take care of the rest.

Tavis Smiley

Resource Guide

Here is a list of organizations that are helping youth across the country live up to their greatest potential. For an up-to-date list, visit www.theotherwesmoore.com.

Acknowledgments

This book is a culmination of support from friends, family, and mentors from all aspects of my life, and for all of them I am eternally thankful.

But, most important, my first acknowledgment goes to my God and Creator. To Him goes all the glory.

Micha Bar-Am once said, �If you�re too close [to events], you lose perspective. It is not easy to be fair with the facts and keep your own convictions out of the picture. It is almost impossible to be both a participant in events and their observer, witness, interpreter.� Therefore, I went into this process with a tremendous amount of humility and uncertainty�both about whether or not to take on the endeavor and how the final product would ring true to its intent.

There were countless people in my life who helped me make this decision and transition to the literary world. To Terrie Williams: before anyone else, you believed in my ability to develop a story that is transcending. You are an angel and a guide. To my book agent, Linda Loewenthal, thank you�you helped me shape this project from a reluctant idea to a proud reality. To Cindy Spiegel and Julie Grau, whose reputation in this industry truly precedes them, you took a big bet on an unproven entity and threw your overwhelming support behind it. Sally Marvin, Barbara Fillon, Karen Fink, Avideh Bashirrad, Tom Perry, Debbie Aroff, Carol Schneider, and the entire Spiegel & Grau team, from editing to production to marketing�I could not have aligned myself with a better shop and a more committed and talented group of literary activists. Mya Spalter, you have helped guide this process from jump and I am sincerely grateful. And to my editor, Chris Jackson, you are part genius editor, part psychiatrist! I am thankful for your God-given skill, your diligent eye, and your belief in this project�s purpose. To you all, thank you.

To my researchers, William Davis, Nikki Moore, Ginger Wilmot, Yetsa Tuakli-Wosornu, and Patricia Nelson, your diligence made this project more than simply a story�it added the context to the anecdotes. To my �ghostreaders,� Ian Klaus, Randy Baron, Mustafa Riffat, Taiye Tuakli-Wosornu, and Shani Moore Weatherby, you never hesitated in reading and rereading my drafts and keeping me focused. Your fingerprints are all over this, and I am honored to have such talented friends and family. And to my �author friends,� Craig Mullaney, Alex Kotlowitz, Jared Cohen, Nate Fick, Paul Rieckhoff, Steve Mariotti, Bill Rhoden, Khephra Burns, Susan Taylor, Reverend Dr. Suzan Johnson Cook, Hsu-Ming Teo, Angela Giltrap, and Mirta Ojito, thanks for the help and warm embrace into the club.

I am thankful for the transparency and honesty of Wes, his family, and his friends. Mary, Nicey, Woody, Coach, Alicia, and all the others, you gave me hours of your time and, most important, your trust. This project was not an easy one to navigate, but your openness helped ease the process. To the family of Bruce Prothero, your strength and the memory of Bruce sat with me every day, and always will.

There are a handful of people who, very early on, believed in this project and lent their voices and influence to make it happen: Juan Williams, Armstrong Williams, Dr. Ben Carson, Dr. Sampson Davis, Mayor Cory Booker, Geoffrey Canada, Stephen A. Smith, Judge Gerald Lee, Tavis Smiley, Reverend Dr. Brad Braxton, Dr. Freeman Hrabowski, the Honorable William Cohen and his wonderful wife, Janet Langhart Cohen, Ambassador James Joseph, and Dr. Na�im Akbar. Thank you for your early and stalwart support.

Very special thanks and a debt of gratitude go to my maternal and paternal family. You have been the roots that have allowed me to grow, and I know that without you there could be no me. There are countless people who grace this group, but to every Moore, Thomas, Flythe, Anglin, Avant, Banks, Blue, Boyd, Broadnax, Cannon, Carolina, Clarke, Coleman, Crawford, Drayton, Duncan, Dwyer, Hackett, Jarvis, Moyston, Simmons, Traylor, and Weatherby, thank you. Special acknowledgment goes to Mama Win, whose love and example are extraordinary and overwhelming. Have faith, not fear! My mother, words can hardly express what you mean to me; you are the epitome of love and compassion, and the kind of parent and friend I hope to be. You wore sweaters so we could wear coats. Dawn, my soul mate and battle buddy, years after marrying you I still get butterflies when I am around you! �Even when the skies are gray, you will rub me on my back and say, �Baby it will be okay.�� To my sisters, Nikki and Shani, and Rita and brothers Jamaar and Earl, you have always kept me grounded and I am eternally grateful to be your brother. To Mama Gwen; Pandora Flythe; my aunts Pam, BB, Donna, Dawn, Evelyn, Toni, Tawana, Michelle, Valerie, Thea, Camille, Karen, Cheryl, Ellen, Iris, Carol, Connie, Cookie, Osie, Angie, Mira, Linda, Pam, Mary, Helen, Edna, Vicki, Gail, Alexis, Debbie, Thursa, and Lark; to my uncles Howard, Ralph, Ty, Gerald, Bernie, Bobby, Sonny, Cecil, Derek, Garrick, Harold, Donyell, Milton, Robert, David, and Kermit; to my cousins Denise, Phil, Marcus, Tenai, Elijah, Adrian, Aaron, Erroll, Lamar, La-Toshia, Ciara, Christian, Julisa, Tamara, Mimi, Michael, Paul, Ryan, Wayne, Carlton, Maurice, Taira, Nikki, Craig, Terrell, Guy, Phillip, Fred, Roland, Patty, Linette, Annette, Lisa, Karen, Blossom, Dorice, Ladrice, and Naquan�your gentle love and generosity helped fuel my journey. I have hundreds of family members, from Washington State to Washington, D.C., and in dozens of nations around the world, and I am thankful for all of you.

Papa Jim and Daddy, no acknowledgment list would be complete without you. Your soul, spirit, and love live on. I am who I am because you were who you were. I am also so thankful because I know, and can feel, even from your new perch, your love and guidance. I love you, I love you, I love you.

Along the way, there have been people who have touched my life in special ways and been so helpful through various phases of this process�Justin Brandon and Angela Miklavcic, John and Marcy McCall-MacBain, Tod Lending, Kathryn Shagas and Tony Machowski, Kris Coffey, Billo Harper, Karen Thomas, Linda Duggins, Dia Simms, Ericka Pittman, Toni Bias, Tanya Carr, Lois Vann, Denise Pines, Derick, Kendra, and Wynter Ausby, Nikki and Jeff Harris, Mike Fenzel, Tom and Stephanie Pellathy, Donald and Godly Davis, Jeshahnton Essex, Tommy and Christy Ransom, Lev Smirdov, David and Debbie Roberts, Howie Mandel, Lee Hendler, Chris, Jean, and Margaret Angell, Tom and Andi Bernstein, Loida Lewis, Don and Katrina Peebles, Ty Hill, RADM and �Mom� Hill, LTC Murnane, Barney and Carl Smith, Ken and Judy Ravitz, Nikki and Jeff Harris, Bill and Sue Floyd, Mike and Lisa Fenzel, Alonzo Fulgham, Darrell and Felice Friedman, Tracey Alexander, William and Wendy Brody, Jarvis and Stacey Stewart, Faye Charles, Doris Atkins, LaRian Finney, Robert Reffkin, Howard Buffett, Zach Druker, Coach Ogs and Spring, Dan and Avery Rosenthal, Adrian Talbot, Tahir and Priti Radhakrishnan, Jan and Larry Rivitz, Eddie and Sylvia Brown, the entire Lunn family, Sharon Lopez and Raisa Lopez-Rhoden, David Lasky, Tricia and Ken Eisner, Ralph Smith, Doug Nelson and the entire Annie E. Casey family, Julian Harris, Esther Tang, Vic Carter, Kai Jackson, Lawrence Penn, and Khalil Byrd. Thank you all for being there at every step of this book process.

To my Valley Forge and Army brethren, you are my role models and friends. I pray that this book illustrates, in some way, how much your example, love, patriotism, and professionalism have meant to me. Tim, Sean, and Josh, five-year family forever! And to the leadership of Phi Theta Kappa, I continue to be in awe of your commitment to scholarship and excellence.

Johns Hopkins will always hold a special place in my heart, not simply for the education I received, but for the friendships I treasure. To the graduating group of 2001, and to the board members I now share that title with, thank you. You are the model of commitment to and concern for our nation�s future.

My Citi team could not have been more supportive of this book process as well as of my career development. Pam Flaherty, your support and belief in me brought me into Citi, and your support and that of so many others have kept me there. Ray McGuire, you inspire me to be a better financier and, more important, a better man. �Eagles do not fly in flocks.� Special thanks to Liz Fogarty, who has been a third eye throughout this process. Your support has been invaluable.

Bobby and Dawn Wylie, not only did you make our transition at Oxford easy, but our friendship has lasted. My entire Rhodes class, Rochelle Aucheim and the Rhodes Trust, and the alumni of the Scholarship have been nothing but encouraging.

To Daniel Pellathy, Michael, Holley, and Noelle Thomas, Mark Vann II, and Earl Flythe IV, I could not be more proud of you. I will always be there for you.

And to other young people who will read this book, understand this: you have never been, and will never be, alone. We have all walked our own personal journeys�flawed and all�but our goal is the same: to ensure that we end up closer to a more beautiful and God-honoring destiny.

There are so many others I am indebted to who have also stood by me and loved me throughout this journey of life. I have the most extraordinary set of friends and mentors a person could ask for, so if I have not named you specifically, please know that I hold you in my heart and I hope and pray you understand just what you mean to me.

God bless you all and thank you�.

Elevate�.

Wes

About the Author

WES MOORE is a Rhodes Scholar who was also a paratrooper and is a combat veteran of Afghanistan. He worked as a special assistant to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as a White House Fellow. He currently serves as an investment professional in New York and is married to Dawn Moore. This is his first book.