DaytonDailyNews.com

The voice on the other end of the phone wanted to know one thing: "You Aaron's mom?"

For Sharita Pogue, the question came out of the blue Wednesday night. She'd just spent the past few hours immersed in the world of her other son, Jami, who had turned 12 that day:

"Me and him did the day together to celebrate his being 12. We saw a movie (Spider-Man 2) and went to dinner at a place of his choice (McDonald's) and then we got a couple of toys. We got home about 8:30 and I was getting him ready for bed — it was a school night — when the phone rang."

From a great day with her son, she instantly found herself in, as she put it, "a parent's worst nightmare."

The voice on the line — she still doesn't know who it was — said, "Aaron just got shot!"

Sharita's voice began to waver Saturday afternoon as she sat in Miami Valley Hospital and recreated the conversation:

"My heart dropped. I remember saying, 'Where's he at?' When he goes, 'Kentucky Fried Chicken,' I just dropped the phone and ran for the car."

Her other kids — Jami and 18-year-old Erica— and a nephew joined her for the frantic drive from their home off North Main to Salem Avenue a few minutes away.

Aaron — the 6-foot-9 senior center of two-time state champ Dunbar High and a talent recruited by some of the nation's top college basketball programs — had been shot while sitting in a parked car with 25-year-old Dorian Hoover, the 6-foot-10 former Sinclair Community College big man headed to California (Pa.) University.

After playing in an open gym at Sinclair earlier in the evening, the pair had ordered food at the KFC drive-though on Salem, then pulled out of line and into a nearby parking lot because they said their sputtering car was running out of gas.

They said they were waiting for Hoover's dad to bring gas when someone opened fire on their Pontiac. Five shots hit the car in what Dunbar coach Pete Pullen said appears to be a random shooting. Hoover was shot in the foot, Pogue in the back, the bullet lodging near his spine.

"When I pulled on the scene, cruisers were everywhere," Sharita said. "I started running and came up on the kid he'd been with. He was lying on the ground and said, 'Aaron's down, he's by the KFC.'

"I could see my son's body, but the police wouldn't let me get close. I begged them, but they said he was headed to Miami Valley (Hospital)."

With her nephew now driving — "I started coming apart," Sharita said — they got to the hospital just as Aaron was being wheeled in. "I couldn't see if his eyes were open or closed. I didn't know his condition for an hour, so I sat there and gave a prayer."

Her eyes now teared, her voice began to tremble: "I just said, 'Lord, spare my son ... I don't care what comes after that ... just spare my boy.' "

It was all so out of context, she said. Two days earlier, Aaron had announced that even though he'd passed his college entrance test, he was heading to Vincennes (Ind.) University, a junior college where he'd prep before a likely jump to a program such as Illinois, Tennessee or Pittsburgh.

"I just couldn't fathom my son getting shot, never in a million years," said Sharita, who — after splitting with Aaron's father a few years after their son was born — raised her kids on her own with her parents' help.

"I know what people say, that if he's a young, black male, he had to be doing this or that," she said. "But you can't stereotype every young black kid. Aaron's a good kid. He don't drink, go clubbing, smoke. He lives, breathes, sleeps basketball."

Basketball had been her son's magic carpet, taking him from "a fat little dude," as she called him, to a kid who added height to his girth and became a centerpiece of Dunbar hoops.

Wednesday, the team was honored at the state house in Columbus, but Pogue — after a ride mix up — missed the bus. By the end of the day, his basketball future was in jeopardy.

The injury is not life-threatening, but the bullet is lodged near his spine and Pullen said it will be left there in hopes muscle tissue grows around it.

As for Pogue's basketball career, it was a subject that again brought a moment's silence from Sharita. Finally, Pullen, who sat next to her, stepped in:

"The main thing is just getting him healthy. We don't care if he bounces another basketball. We just got to get him healed."

Saturday, for the first time, nurses had Pogue walking briefly in the hallway outside his hospital room. It was an exhaustive exercise.

"I stopped by Aaron's room five times today to see him," a MVH aide told Sharita. "Each time he was asleep...with his mouth open."

Sharita smiled and that led her to say today — Mother's Day —will be special: "Truthfully, I feel blessed. It could have been so much worse. My prayer was answered. I have my son."

Pogue has been visited by family members, teammates and select friends, but Sharita said he wasn't yet ready for the press.

Besides, he had to save his strength for Saturday night. That's when Dunbar is holding its prom on the UD campus and he had to pose for a picture with his sister.

Erica, a Belmont High senior and an aspiring model headed to Howard University, was to represent her brother at the prom.

Originally, she was going as Aaron's date. She'd gotten a special green dress and he had a complementing cream-colored tuxedo.

Then, a couple of days before he was shot, he dumped her when he got a different date. He pawned his sister off on a teammate and, to match his new partner's dress, he had to get a black tux.

Now he has a third prom outfit.

Before heading to UD, Erica planned to stop by Miami Valley to pose with her brother in his open-in-the-back hospital gown.

It's a photo Sharita will cherish.

Like she said: "It could have been so much worse."

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2156 or tarchdeacon@DaytonDailyNews.com.