"I had a nephew killed in the 2600 block of Monument St.," he said. It was earlier this decade. The boy was 15. "Territory and the drugs," he sighed. "I didn't know all the particulars. They just got upset with one another. Whether it was meant for him, he was the one that got killed."
When the group was asked what it would take to quell the violence, more than one replied, "There's no answer." That upset Henderson. He grew up an orphan and resolved early on to help kids succeed. He bemoans the lack of recreational outlets and stable home lives. He's on a campaign to blanket the area with posters bearing the word respect and an image of a lion. The hope is that the idea itself will change attitudes and behavior among old and young alike.
"If everyone thinks, well, there's no solution, we'll remain right where we're at," he told the teens. "But if we come up with solutions, we can make things better. Be creative. Use your minds."
Candance Pearson, a 17-year-old high school senior, blamed the combustible mix of anger and guns. "They take it out by shooting," she told Henderson, "and then you got revenge, then you got gangs, then you got drugs. It's so much stuff."
Later, Pearson said she hears gunfire "all the time" at her home near Orleans and Rose streets. "It's gonna scare you, but then you're going to think, 'Oh, it's just another gunshot,' and you go on about your business."
She confided that her friends include drug dealers. The association puts her at risk of being caught in crossfire, but she professed to be unconcerned. "Then I learn my lesson from that, if I live through it."
Eric Walker, 18, is eager to escape Baltimore for Capitol College in Laurel, where he plans to study computer engineering. He works at JC Penney and the National Aquarium in addition to earning minimum wage through YouthWorks.
"I grew up with a good family," he said. "I'm not just going to go into no drug business. For what? I'd rather work for mine. Don't nobody in my family sell drugs. I don't want to end up like nobody else in jail. For what?"
Paige, the Patterson senior, lost not only her father, but a brother, Roman, four years ago. Now that it's just she and her mother at home, she feels trapped. She needs to stay put, she said, even though a sister has opened her Ohio home to her.
Paige's own experience with violence tempered her reaction to last week's cookout shooting.
