URBAN: Chosen By A Kingpin (30 page)

“Yo!” He answered quickly.

“Yeah man, it’s me.” Antwon answered in a calm tone.

“What the fuck? Yo, I’ve been calling you, why haven’t you been picking up the phone? I was trying to see what’s going on with you?”

“What do you mean by that?”

“What do I mean? You’re the one that left that voicemail talking about you were going to do something.”

“Yeah?”

“So…”

“So, what?”

“So, what the fuck happened?” Lionel found himself yelling on the phone.

“Look, just come pick me up. I’m in the Bronx. I’m a block away from Co-op City.”

“Co-op City? What the fuck are you doing all the way out there?”

“Just come and pick me up.”

Antwon ended the call. Lionel slammed his hands against the steering wheel. His friend could piss him off sometimes, but he just had to swallow all of this anger. He began to call Antwon again to get specific directions, but Antwon beat him to it. He sent him a text message with exact directions.

“I can’t with this nigga.” He muttered under his breath. He turned on the GPS and put in the directions. When it had a lock on the location, he switched on the radio station and drove off.

Racing through the streets of Brooklyn, Lionel’s mind was going just as fast as the car. He didn’t want to know what Antwon did. He kept trying to put out positive thoughts, but he knew how his hothead friend was. He knew that if Antwon went to the club, he was just going to confront Martin. Ever since finding out that Martin may have been the person to shoot him, Antwon’s been itching to get back at him. Even though Lionel knew it would be best to wait it out and sneak on them. If Antwon simply waited, he would have came up with a good plan. Maybe set them up and get all the answers to their questions, but now that Lionel thought of it, it was a foolish plan. It was foolish to ever think that Antwon would have been patient.

When he arrived at his destination, he had to look hard. He was sure that was Antwon in front of him, but something about him looked different.

“Whose car is this?” Antwon remarked the second he sat inside. “This car is nice.” He added. “I think it’s only a year old. Damn, where’d you get this?” He was smiling from ear to ear. Lionel didn’t answer him. Lionel was still staring at Antwon..or at least he thought it was.

“Excuse me, but what the fuck is going on?” Lionel cut to the chase. “Why the fuck do you look like that?”

“Look like what?” Antwon leaned back.

“Your hair. What have you done to your hair?”

“I dyed it a lighter shade of brown.”

“A lighter shade of brown?” Lionel repeated back to him. “Ever since when did you care about that hair color shit. You always kept with your black hair low cut Caesar.”

“I can’t change?” He shrugged his shoulders.

“Yeah, but you even dyed your eyebrows.” He pointed out. Antwon shrugged his shoulders. “And what about your clothes?” He asked him.

“Now you got something to say about my clothes?” He scoffed. “Go ahead and tell me Lionel.”

“Why does your clothes look like it’s from 1990?”

“I always wear baggy clothes.”

“Stop fucking lying.” Lionel said. “You wear your clothes to fit you, just like me. You hate baggy clothes. This whole shit is weird. I find you in the Bronx, with different color hair, and old ass clothes. What the fuck happened?”

Antwon shook his head. He really didn’t want to speak, he just wanted to get home.

“Can we just drop it?”

“Drop it?” Lionel almost found himself laughing. “What happened?”

“I went to the club looking for them.”

“I figured as much.”

“I didn’t see them. I bumped into a old girl I use to fuck with back in the day. She lives in The Bronx. I smashed, got some shit spilled on my clothes, and just grabbed whatever she had there.”

“That’s it?”

“Pretty much it.”

“And what about your hair?”

“She’s a beautician. She convinced me to do this shit.” He told his friend. Lionel squinted his eyes at him, but he didn’t acknowledge it. “Now, can you take me home? I’m fucking exhausted.”

“You’re tired from just having sex?”

“If you fuck the way I fuck, you’d be tired too.” Antwon gave half a laugh but Lionel didn’t join along. “Let’s just go.”

“Son, are you telling me the truth?”

“Can we fucking go?”

Lionel decided not to push any further. He pulled away and started to head back to Brooklyn. The car was awkwardly silent so he decided to turn the radio back on. The sounds of music filled the car but then it was cut short.

“We have some breaking news coming out of Brooklyn New York. There has been a double shooting in front of the strip club Allure…”

Hearing the club’s name Lionel’s attention went to the radio. He turned the volume up, but Antwon turned the radio off.

“Why did you do that?” Lionel went to turn it back on but Antwon stopped him.

“I told you that I was tired. Can’t I just get some sleep for a little bit?”

“But-”

“Please! Just for a little bit.”

Lionel shrugged his shoulders and let it go. He has been friends with Antwon for a long time. He knew when to push an issue and when to let it go. As Antwon started to close his eyes, it was clear this wasn’t the right time. So he just shrugged it off and drove his friend to his apartment building.

“Yo we here.” He nudged his friend awake. Antwon didn’t bother to thank him.. He just got out of the car and went upstairs to his place. Normally, Lionel would have went up after him, but he had to return the car. When he got to the rental place he saw Tasha was closing it up. She turned around after he honked the horn. She ran to the car and got inside the passenger seat.

“Hey.” He looked confused. “I thought you’d want to have the car back.”

“I do.” She pointed out. “I’m just so tired, that I don’t think I should be behind the wheel.” She explained. “I’m thinking that since I did you the favor of giving you the car, the least you could do was drop me off at home.”

“Actually, the least I could do is nothing.” Lionel laughed.

“Come on, I’m too tired to drive.” She pushed him playfully. “Do you really want to risk me out there sleeping behind the wheel.” She gave him a half smile. “No, I don’t think so. You owe me.”

“All this for one favor.”

“And for all the times I let you cheat off of me in high school. Now please chauffeur, to my home. I’ll input it into the GPS.” She faked a yawn. “Now, mush.”

They both laughed. Lionel felt at ease around Tasha. Just laughing with her, was taking away the stress of whatever Antwon was doing. He just laughed and joked with Tasha. They talked about their high school Spanish teacher.

“Do you remember Ms. Vida?” She asked him already laughing. “You could barely understand what she said.”

“How can you say that when you would always have really high grades? I used to always cheat on you and it used to suck when she would ask me for some answers and I would look like an idiot.”

“I told you before we did all that, that we should do tutoring and cheat, but you were so lazy.”

“I wasn’t lazy.”

“You know what? You are right. You weren’t lazy, you just didn’t want to do it at all. That’s why I told you that I should tutor you.”

“Well that was a good look, because my grades went up.”

“Do you remember when she thought you were cheating so she made you take a pop quiz?” She grabbed his arm laughing.

“Yeah!” He laughed out loud with her. “And I passed! She was so confused. You were smart to start tutoring me.”

“I might know a thing or two.” She smiled and he smiled back.

He finally got to her building. He looked up the tall building and saw that it had a doorman in the front.

“Damn, this is how you living?” He asked looking at the luxurious building.

“It’s not that bad.”

“Not that bad?” He laughed. “The way that you’re talking you would think that you’re living in the projects.”

“I just don’t make a big deal about it.”

“You’re 22 living in a condo. I hate to be the one to break it to you, but that’s not only a big deal..that’s a blessing.” He told her.

“I remember my ex said-”

“No offense, but I’m tired of insecure dudes making ladies feel like they got to put their goals down because he’s not doing the best that he can.”

“It’s not that, he just had it bad.”

“That’s understandable, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t be proud of this either. Never let someone make you feel like that.”

She gave him a half smile. She was used to people either being in awe of her place or bringing it down. She never had someone telling her that she should be proud of what she had. After her ex boyfriend made her feel like her accomplishments were somehow failures, she thought that’s how every guy felt, but Lionel was different. It felt nice to not only laugh but have someone make her feel good.

“Thank you.” She finally said. “You can actually park the car in the parking garage that we have.” She pressed a button on her keys and they heard a garage door open up. He drove into the parking lot and parked in her space. He walked her to the door and she brought him to the front entrance.

“Before I go, I need to thank you again.” He told her right by the entrance. “You don’t know how bad I really needed that car. You’re a lifesaver.”

“It’s no problem.”

There was this weird tension between them. They knew that they said all they had to say, but they both stayed and lingered. It was like they didn’t want to leave each other. Although they didn’t know each other that well, it felt like they were more than just friends.

“Do you want to come up?” She offered gesturing to her apartment.

“Yeah, sure.” He started to walk towards her but then he remembered that he left Giselle. He hadn’t even checked his phone but he knew that she must have called. “You know what, I got to get back. I left my girlfriend because of this emergency. I need to get my head together and get back to business.”

“I understand.” She walked to the elevator. She turned her head to wave bye and he nodded his head.

“I need to get back to Giselle.”

“So he called you to pick him up?” Giselle asked Lionel as they went to a restaurant. He wanted to take her out to make up for the fact he left her...again.

“Yes.”

“And he was wearing hand-me-downs?”

“Yes.” Lionel pulled out her chair.

“And then he didn’t tell you anything?”

“Nope.”

“Nothing at all?”

“Nope.”

“That’s some bullshit.”

Lionel’s eyes opened wide. He never really heard Giselle curse. He was so used to her being prime and proper, or even her being reserved. Giselle, on the other hand, didn’t mean to curse, but she didn’t get Antwon. The way he was so angry, she knew that something had to have happened. She squinted at Lionel. She had this gut feeling that he was holding something back. When he told her the story all he said was that he picked Antwon, he wore old clothes, and he brought him home. He didn’t mention Antwon’s attitude or him borrowing the car from Tasha.

“I know it’s crazy, but let’s not think about that now.” Lionel smiled. “I’m out here with you and that’s all that matters to me.”

“But doesn’t it drive you crazy?” She leaned over and asked. “It would drive me crazy. I guess if it was something worth saying he would say it, but to say nothing? I think that just doesn’t make sense.” Giselle pointed out. “The way he sounded on your voicemail, you just knew that he was going to do something. How does it make sense that nothing happened at all? Something is going on.” She shook her head.

Lionel was going to say something, but when he saw his waiter coming over, he felt relieved. He knew in a sense that Giselle was right, but he didn’t want to hear it. Antwon was like a brother for him and he knew him for many years. Antwon never held any secrets to Lionel. Whatever Antwon knew or did, it wasn’t that long before Lionel knew as well. He knew that if his friend said nothing happened, then that’s what it was.

After they ordered, Lionel steered the conversation away.

“So, your birthday is about five months away. Are you excited?”

“For what?” Giselle shrugged her shoulders. “To be honest, it’s hard to get excited because it’s so close to the dates that my parents died. On top of all that, I’m only turning 18.”

“But turning 18 is a big deal.” He wiped his mouth. “I remember when I did, I thought everything was going to change overnight, but it didn’t really.”

“There has been so much going on in my life, a birthday isn’t going to change much...it’s just going to remind me of what happened.”

“But you should be glad.” He closed his eyes after he realized what he said. “I didn’t mean..”

“Did you just say glad?” Giselle dropped her fork. “What part of me is supposed to be glad? Am I supposed to be glad that my parents is gone? Am I supposed to be glad that I’m shit out of luck without them? Just what am I supposed to be glad about?”

“I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant that you shouldn’t only focus on the sad part. You’ve been through so much but look at how strong and resilient you are. You’re not this weak little thing anymore. The you that you are now, that’s something to be proud of.”

Although what Lionel said about Giselle was true, she wasn’t trying to hear it. After he made the mistake of mentioning her parents, she shut down. He even tried to continue the night by being extra sweet, but it was effort wasted. Lionel smiled as he signaled the waiter. The dinner had come to an awkward end. He helped her get up, but she was still mad.

“I’ll get us a cab back to the building.” He told her but she had her arms crossed. He could feel that she still had an attitude. He knew that if he spoke about it, that it would only make it more difficult, but he has fallen for her. So because of his feelings, he had to speak up. “I said that I’m sorry.”

“I just don’t get why you would even say something like that.”

“It was a mistake. It was a slipup.”

“But how can you make a mistake like that?”

“It just happened. Just like how mistakes just happen, this one just happened! You’re mad at me as if I purposely planned to say it. I didn’t mean any disrespect to you or to your parents. I would think that after I told you about my uncle you would understand that I would never disrespect the dead.”