Angela Hongo recently told her son Boaz Flemister that he’d be on his own for a few days next month while she was at a conference.
The 17-year-old jokingly told Hongo, “You’re leaving me by myself? That’s just wrong.”
On Thursday, Hongo said, between tears, “And now this is happening. He’s left me.”
Flemister was one of two people killed in a single-vehicle rollover crash on the Bishop Ford Freeway around 1:15 a.m. Thursday, Illinois State Police said. Three others were transported to a local hospital with injuries. The cause of the crash is under investigation.
Hongo said her son and the other victims were dancers with the South Shore-based Empiire Dance Company. The Cook County medical examiner’s office hasn’t released the identity of the second person who died, but Hongo said he was her son’s close friend who was a dance choreographer and an up-and-coming rapper.
Hongo, 56, knew something was wrong when Flemister’s location stopped moving on a tracking app she monitors. He was on his way home and was only about seven minutes away, she said.
“He was the baby of the family. I really don’t think (his death has) hit me yet. Not until I see him, and it’s like, for real, for real,” she said. “But just his personality, like, who’s gonna pick out my clothes? He would style my hair. Who’s gonna do that?”
Flemister was a bubbly person who had great charisma and style, Hongo said. A junior at Art in Motion High School in the South Shore neighborhood, Flemister loved shopping from the best brands like Michael Kors and Chanel.
But dance was his life, Hongo said. Flemister started dancing when he was a little boy and joined Empiire when he was 12. The choreography and “freeness” of hip-hop “took him to another element,” she said.
“He was just really good at it, and for his size — because he was a bigger guy — he could move with the best of them,” Hongo said. “Footwork, anything, he could just do it.”
Hongo said her son won countless trophies and ribbons over the years from dance. He was preparing to dance at Disneyland in California in the coming months. But some of his proudest moments were performing at and winning dance competitions at the Bud Billiken Parade.
“It’s what he lived for every year,” Hongo said. “Come March, he was like, ‘OK, you know the parade coming, Ma. I’m gonna need these shoes. I need a haircut.’ … It really ramped him up. It was like the highlight of his entire year.”
