Faces of the Game (15 page)

Chelle and Tia had been through a lot together with the circle of guys, from trafficking large amounts to bonding people out.  From sharing clientele for pounds to sharing personal sacks they had seen a lot in their latter teenage years.  The two girls went to high school together, and they ended up being roommates in college for a while.  This lead to a fast lifestyle of white collar criminology that they both had no regrets of living.  Neither of the girls discussed this much with anyone outside of their immediate ring.  They were smarter than the average females their age because they’d grown up around frivolous people that made big money without uttering a word about it.  Carrying weight for gentlemen wasn’t the easiest thing in the world, but they were built to make it work and they had a bond that could never be broken.  They always kept each other in the loop when necessary, and this was so necessary. 

              12:30 rolled around and Chelle had fallen asleep wondering what Chip was doing, if he was okay, she even wondered if he was still alive.  Finally, she prayed until she fell asleep.  Vae ended up calling her back at 1:45am but she was knocked out by then. 
Babe, I missed you where were you?  What’s going on?  What happened? Come home please, I have been worried sick.  Oh my goodness I am so glad that you called me. 
Chelle dreamed that Chip had finally called; she never heard where he was or what happened she just remembers him calling, before she knew it, it was 8am and she was rolling over ready to start her day. 

Investigation

              “
Although I hate to be a detective, I have got to get answers girl, if you find out anything let me know ASAP. Text me, call me, shoot me an e-mail, come to my house and knock on my door, hell bust up in my class room I don’t care just let me know.”  Chelle said to her friend as the two of them laughed.  “Well you sound a lot better than you did yesterday; I thought you were going to have a nervous breakdown.  Not Chelli Chelle, you know you think you are so hard.”  Ash said laughing, she was happy to hear her friend sounding better.  The two girls talked to one another on the phone until they arrived to school.  Chelle decided to make herself feel better by dressing nice and eating a muffin with a bottle of orange juice for breakfast.  She would never let anyone see her down that only could make the situation worst.  Chelle got to her first class five minutes early, realizing that hardly ever happened she thought that keeping herself busy and productive might be a good thing.  Chelle pulled out her technical writing text book and began looking over her notes in her notebook from the previous class.               

              Later, Chelle had finished going to classes for the day she felt it was a pretty good day despite the fact that she hadn’t heard from Chip.  She decided to watch a little television and cook dinner.  “Hello…”  Chelle said answering her cousin Tera’s phone call.  “Girl I am mad as hell, I just rode past Cory’s mama’s house and some bitch car over there.  I hate him oooh I hate his ass!”  Chelle just looked at her phone, turned her nose up and shook her head.  “At least you know he is alive, and where he is I can’t even ride past anyone’s house or anything it wouldn’t do me any good girl Chip has vanished into thin air!”  Chelle said, sounding as shocked as she was the first ten times she realized he wasn’t coming home. Tera totally ignored Chelle and began bickering about who it possibly could have been over Cory’s mother’s house.  Chelle listened to every word Tera was saying, but she got quiet until Tera realized that Chelle wasn’t saying a word.  “Hello?”  Tera said, thinking Chelle had hung up.  “I’m here” Chelle said in a very dry tone.  “Oh you didn’t say anything” Tera said.  “Yes I did” Chelle replied referring to her saying she hadn’t heard from Chip in what seemed like forever.  “Oh, so what do you think?  It couldn’t have been Maria because her car is not that color and it’s newer than the one that was over there anyway.”  “Let me call you back” Chelle said more aggravated than she was when she got on the phone.  With that the girls hung up the phone and Chelle went back to cooking.  She decided to blast a little bit of old school Xcape music and poured herself a glass of pink champagne while she waited for her pots to warm up and her water to boil.

              Chelle looked at her caller ID before answering her cell,
202…?
“Hello?”  “Sup baby?” Chelle looked at her phone to make sure the caller ID was right.  “Who in the hell is this?  I know it’s not…”  “Look, I had to leave I got everything from the house in the Tre, make sure everything is straight at the other spot.”  Chip interrupted before she could say his name.  “Here or there?”  Chelle asked, realizing that code talk was imperative at this point.  “Queens” he replied which indicated her to go check on everything in Charlotte, NC.  “Fly up to Queens 7:30, meeting at the Marriott right down the street from the spot, ten-twelve, you will find out what is going on then, love you bye.”  With that he hung up.  Chelle’s mind raced 100 miles per second.  She booked a plane flight to Queens, NY LaGuardia Airport for 6:30 am to throw anyone off who was listening.  She packed her overnight bag which contained a navy blue jogging suit by Guess, a pair of white Nike Air Max, toiletries, a minute cell phone and her .380, she was so uncertain of what was going on but she knew she had to go with the flow and play her cards right.  She turned off her pots and decided to get something from a local burger joint before calling Ash. 

              “Anything?”  Ash asked as she answered the phone.  “Yeah, I need you to take me to the airport early in the morning I am flying out to Queens.”  They had been under the assumption that their regular cell phones were tapped for a few months, Ash knew something was up but she didn’t ask any serious questions.  “To see your family?”  She asked.  “No girl to see Chip, he’s in Queens at the hotel.”  “Well I’m coming to Greensboro so we can wake up early in the morning.”  “Thank you girl, I owe you.”  Chelle said as she let out a relieving sigh and slipped on her sweats to grab a bite to eat.  Chelle slipped into a pair of boxers and a t-shirt and watched television as she waited for her best friend to get there.

              Ash had the key so she let herself in, “you owe me big time, I had to explain myself to that psycho cousin of yours ten different times, he was checking to see if my story changed.”  Ash said sarcastically.  Chelle looked at Ash with one eyebrow raised and said “ten times Ash?” and shook her head yes.  “I wonder if we should talk in here.”  Chelle said as she went in the kitchen to grab the bottle of Merlot.  “We straight, whatever it is it just started don’t start that paranoid stuff Chelle.”  “Ok, so here’s the deal, I need you to get me a rental car, please tell me you have your sisters ID?”  “You know I do” Ash responded ready to help her friend in any way possible.  “Good, I got a plane ticket to LaGuardia for in the morning, but I am going to cancel it and get my money back, refunds are not traceable not in enough time anyway.  I am leaving my car at the airport for a few days, I will take you back to your car in the morning once we get the rental but you need to move it to the other side of the complex.”  Ash rolled her eyes and shook her head, “come on, keep talking” Ash said as she grabbed her keys.  “Okay, so he called me from a D.C. number girl, all he said was check on the spot in Queens and to meet him at the hotel down the street, so that’s Charlotte but I know my phone is probably being tapped every time I pick it up, he knows that too.”  “So, you’re driving the rental to Charlotte right?”  Ash asked to make sure she was keeping up.  “Right, so anyway I will meet someone, I think him at the courtyard suites tomorrow evening, so I will call you the day after.”  The girls were walking back across the parking lot, they both checked the scenery to make sure no unusual cars were parked, and there weren’t.  They sat up for a few more hours and talked before going to sleep.

              Chelle’s cell phone woke her up out of her sleep about thirty minutes after she drifted off, “hello” she whispered into the phone without looking at the caller ID.  “What’s good?”  Tia said into the receiver.  “What’s up, what’s been going on?”  Chelle asked as she recognized the voice.  “You know B got locked up a few days ago” she totally caught Chelle by surprise, but it was starting to make a little bit of sense.  “Wow, are you serious?  What happened?”  Chelle asked, now sitting up in her bed.  She had been out of the loop for about two months, she fell off the scene every now and then to regroup and as soon as she did this time, the city got cloudy.  She shook her head and listened to every word Tia said.  “It started with Ant’s fat ass, we all know he talks entirely too much, he told on Jock you know that, well Jock told on B and Chip,  B was on the East Side somewhere on some bullshit and they jumped out on him FEDS with guns drawn and everything.”  “What in the…”  Chelle replied but before she could finish Tia cut her off, “Wait, let me finish.  You know they let Ant out on bail, well B bailed him out but check this they didn’t even set a bail for B, so of course Ant got out and crossed over with the pigs for a little while longer before they locked his ass back up.”  Chelle saw faces of all of these dudes running through her head, she thought about their facial expressions and the way they carried themselves.  “What in the world is going on Tia?”  Chelle said with incredulity.  “That shit hit the fan Chelle, and it hit hard we already knew this day would come we just didn’t know when.”  Tia responded.  “You are right girl, but they can’t get mad at anyone really because it’s all a part of the game everyone plays a certain position whether it’s Kingpin, Boss, Runner, Block hugger, Snitch, Informant or whatever.”  Chelle said now fully awakened and even more nervous for what might happen next.  “Well Tia I will call you later on tomorrow, keep me posted and I will do the same” Chelle said knowing that she couldn’t tell Tia everything that was going on.  Chelle trusted Tia but things were getting so cut throat that she hardly trusted herself to make the right moves.  She went into the living room and peeked in on Ash who was fast asleep.  Chelle went to get a bottle of water out of the refrigerator and climbed back into bed.  After reading a few pages of a magazine she dozed off.  As she drifted into a deep sleep, she began to reminisce.  She and Chip were sitting at the table at a Japanese Steakhouse with his homeboys and their girls.  Everyone was laughing and talking, Jock was quite as usual, B was telling jokes, Chloe was laughing and sipping on her mug of Saki, some random chick with B was leaning back searching in her bag for lip gloss probably and everyone was genuinely having a good time.  Just as Chip started to say something to her, the alarm clock went off it was 5 am and she felt like she had just went to sleep.  Chelle yawned and hit the clock for ten minutes of snooze time.  She wasn’t really asleep just lying there thinking of what Tia had told her, she could only do one thing while she slowly raised up out of bed.  She sat straight up and prayed for at least five minutes.  As her alarm sounded, she hit the off button and stepped out of bed to get her house coat.  Ash was already in the shower, so she decided to turn on the television and watch the news.  They were talking about the weather which gave Chelle a sigh of relief for some reason.  Ash went in the living room, “good morning sis, you straight?”  She said to Chelle as she grabbed her bag off of the floor.  “Good morning sis, I have got to tell you what Tia said but I will tell you when I get out of the shower.”  “No, I want to know now.” Ash demanded.  “Okay, so B got locked up no bond and Jock told on him, Chip and who knows who else.”  “Oh Lord, and I heard someone named Blu told on Jock.”  Ash replied with a non-verbal suggestion that this was a domino effect.  “I know I heard about that, so today is going to be crazy let me get in the shower.”

Perplexed

              Chelle swiftly walked into the airport, and into the rental car area where Ash dropped her off.  Now feeling uneasy about everyone that wasn’t immediate to her, she contemplated on whether or not she should go to the rental car place that Chip and the boys usually got their discounted rental cars from. 
Damn-it I’m not 25 years old, I have to rent a car from that chick.  I am going to give her an alias hopefully she won’t need to make copies of my license, I doubt she will. 
Since it was so early, Chelle decided not to unwrap her hair so she tied her scarf and made it look cute; she decided to use an Islamic name to throw the girl off.  She knew the girl would recognize her face, but she wasn’t sure that the girl would remember her name or anything else of that matter.  Chelle had to think quickly, so she took a chance so she could get the hell out of the airport.  “Hey girl, long time no see.”  Chelle said as she approached the counter.  “What’s up girl, I’m sort of in a rush.”  The rental car agent said as she was processing orders. 
Whew let me go ahead and get the car while she is in rush mode. 
Chelle thought to herself as she reached for her wallet, she glanced behind her to see if she saw any strange things happening or anyone acting suspicious.  She reached back into her bag and gave the lady $150, “I’ll give you more once I drop the car off if I need to.”  “Ok, just fill this form out you want a mid-sized sedan?”  “Yeah girl, that’s fine” Chelle said as she filled out the form.  She left Drivers License # blank, and she put Saadiya Aalam, and she put an address from her friends’ apartment complex since she remembered the zip code.  Thankfully the girl allowed Chelle to pay with cash and not even check for I.D. she almost seemed to be out of it, but it worked in Chelle’s favor.  Chelle grabbed the keys to the rental, slid the form across the counter and made her way outside.  Quickly scanning the parking lot with her eyes, Chelle walked across towards the car that she had rented, popped the trunk threw her bags in there and got in.  Her heart was racing so fast, she didn’t have anyone’s phone number but the minute phone number that Ash had, and the number that Chip had called her from.  This whole situation began to take a toll on Chelle as she bursted out in tears while quickly backing out of the parking lot.  She shook her head, wiped her tears and remembered that she didn’t have time to feel sorry for herself.  She checked her rear view mirrors and looked in both of her side view mirrors, she glanced from left to right a few times to check her surroundings and she went from the airport straight to I-85.  She felt like listening to Trick Daddy, so she popped in the CD and sung her heart out to “Thug Holiday”.  That song was so real to Chelle, and she was in the mood for some real rap.  Before she knew it, she was arriving exit 45-A in Charlotte. 
Whew, that was fast now should I go to the room or the Condo?  Damn what did he say again….. Oh Lord, okay let me go ahead and go by the crib first and then by the hotel.  I just hope nothing off the wall happen.  Ok Chelle, breathe…. 
Chelle felt like if she didn’t do something to calm herself down she was going to lose it all together.  Her hands began to shake a little as she tried to stay strong.  She backed into the driveway at the Condo and walked over to manually open the garage door.  His car was parked in there so she decided to back all the way in and park there as well.  Finally, she turned her pre-paid phone on as she walked back out of the driveway and went over to the front door as she scanned the neighborhood for anything that seemed out of place.  She dialed the number Chip had called her from.  “Yo…”  “I’m outside” Chelle said faintly.  Before she could blink, he opened the door.  They grabbed one another and in unison they hugged long and tight as tears streamed down Chelle’s face.  She felt so safe and warm in his arms.  He felt such a bond with her something that he had never felt before.  They were inseparable, almost as one and Chelle couldn’t begin to imagine how life would be without Chip, and Chip never wanted to leave her side.  They stood in silence for ten minutes straight, as they continued to hold each other tight.