5
It Just Got Real
Kenya was all cried. Full of emotion, she walked down the stairs to find her sister trying her best to salvage whatever she could from the lower level of the home. “Hey, sis,” Kenya sniffed, pushing the redial button on her phone. “Is O.T. back yet? Have you seen him or Paris?”
“Oh, please, stop it! Don’t you think you would have heard that loud, obnoxious Negro you deal with?” London barked, going from room to room, throwing stuff into a garbage bag.
“Girl, he’s not that bad, girl!” For the first time since they had returned from the airport, Kenya gave her twin a slight grin, holding the phone to her ear. “You just gotta get used to him. He’ll grow on you after a while.”
“Well, I’m sorry. I have no intentions whatsoever of him growing on me. I feel sorry for his girlfriend and anyone else that has the misfortune to spend any more than ten minutes in his presence.” London went on making wise comments pertaining to O.T.’s offbeat character. “He’s a real jerk if I ever met one! She’s a better woman than me.”
Kenya held up her hand to shush London while she tried to leave another message in Storm’s voice mail. However, it already was full, making that task impossible. Kenya was heated all over again, throwing her phone against the still-wet walls. Pounding her fist on the table, worry started once more to consume her thoughts. London, startled, ran from the kitchen to see her sister enraged.
“I swear to God I’m gonna kill a motherfucker if something done happened to him! I swear I am—I swear!”
“Calm down, Kenya!” London urged.
Just as Kenya finished ranting, Paris and O.T. returned. London wasted no time in opening the door to let the pair inside.
“Did you find out something?” Kenya rushed up to O.T., almost knocking him off his feet. “Did he call? Have you heard anything? Tell me he called you!”
“Naw, baby girl,” he regretfully hated to say. “But I did find out that fugazy wannabe playa Royce’s new number and shit.”
“Well, was he with them? Do he know something? Where did he say Storm was?”
“Kenya, pump ya brakes, will ya?” O.T. said, moving her to the side so that Paris could get all the way in the condo door. “His phone goes straight to voice mail too. I tried calling that fool at least a good ten times—same thing—voice mail.”
“Damn!” Kenya shook her head, desperate for any information to ease her fears.
“Relax, girl!” Paris spoke up, hugging her friend. “It’s gonna be okay. Storm is a soldier—you know that. He’s gonna call. Don’t worry—you’ll see.”
“When I get you and your sister settled, I’m gonna shoot by Royce’s peoples and try to find out if they heard from him yet. Just try to chill,” he reasoned, obviously still worried himself. “I’m on it!”
“I’m trying to be calm, but this whole thing don’t make no sense to me at all!” Kenya whimpered, not being able to hold back another round of tears. “I need to stay here just in case he come home!”
“Listen up, girl. Me and Paris done handled the Deacon situation for now, may he rest in peace, but I still don’t think it’s safe in here. Whoever did all this and killed my manz might come back. Y’all should just jet until we hear something.”
“No damn kidding, Sherlock,” London interrupted, ready to be anywhere but there.
The tension in the air and dislike she was feeling for O.T. was transparent and obvious to the entire room. Being a career class-A asshole was second nature to O.T., so he was used to people having an instant hatred of him. Brushing her smart comments off as nothing, he finished his statement without even missing a beat.
“Look, I’ll fall through tomorrow myself and really clean up the bathroom and that nasty-ass fish tank with bleach and some of that strong-ass industrial-strength disinfectant that’s down at the club. We can’t risk letting anybody else inside here until we know what’s what.”
Everyone, even Kenya, agreed with O.T. that it would be for the best for the twins to vacate the premises, at least for the time being. Paris, loyal to the end, started to help London gather some of Kenya’s things, so she and O.T. could take them to get a hotel room until they could get a handle on the real deal and sometime down the line get some workmen over to survey and repair the damaged condo. Besides, it was no way on God’s green earth that the girls were gonna feel comfortable spending one night in a spot where who-knows-what had taken place.
“Come on, y’all got enough stuff for a few days.”
“All right, O.T., we’re coming.” Kenya replied. After close to a hour of being in the house, all four of them emerged out onto the small porch. O.T. carried most of the bags to Kenya’s car, while Paris grabbed the rest. London stood over toward the far side of the door as Kenya locked up, trying to secure the rest of her belongings even though crime almost never occurred in their secure community. In the midst of all the commotion that’d taken place since their arrival from Detroit, the overflowing of the flower-design mailbox was overlooked.
“Hey, Kenya, it looks as if you’ve got a lot of mail piled up in this box. You want me to get it?”
“Yeah, London—grab it out for me. Just throw all that mess in your bag. It ain’t probably shit but a bunch of bills and catalogues. I ain’t got time to give a damn about that junk now!”
Kenya double-checked the locks on the condo door; the same locks that failed to keep the intruders out. London stuffed all the mail, including a small-sized manila envelope, in her purse without even a second thought. She didn’t take notice that a small parcel had nothing written on it front or back; meaning that more than likely, someone had to have left it in the mailbox personally.
After both taking showers, trying to unpack a few things and relax, Kenya laid across the bed dialing Storm’s number once more, while London emptied the items in her purse onto the dresser in search of a comb and a brush.
“Oh snap! What was that?” Startled, she leaped backwards, almost tripping over her own feet.
“What’s wrong, London? What is it?”
“Girl, there’s something moving in this envelope.”
“What envelope?”
“That one—right there,” London pointed from afar.
“You bugging! Where did you get it from? And what you mean moving?”
“Stop playing with me, fool! It’s the mail from your house, Kenya! That’s where I got it from!”
“Well, who is it addressed to?” Kenya bit her lower lip as they both moved over closer toward the hotel door.
Bzzzzzzzz . . . The envelope vibrated once again.
“Go over there, London, and see what it is.”
“Excuse me, Miss Kenya, but that’s your dang-gone package, not mine! It came from your house—your mail! So you go!”
“Okay, but come with me,” Kenya bargained with her sister.
As they slowly approached the dresser, the mystery mail buzzed once more. Kenya bravely reached over, carefully picking the package up with two fingers. Moving slowly, she walked over to the lamp on the desk. Taking a deep breath, she tried holding it up to the light, but couldn’t make out its contents.
“Just open it,” London insisted, knowing if it was a fragile bomb they’d both be dead by now. “It’s not explosive, but be careful of poison.”
“Okay, okay, okay!” Kenya tore open the envelope, dumping what was inside onto the bed.
“I’m confused. A silly old cell phone and an old burgundy-velvet ring box?” London casually asked, expecting something more. “Who would send you stuff like that?”
Kenya placed her hand over her mouth to muffle her scream. “That’s Storm’s cell phone! He’s the only one who I know that has a neon-green antenna on his shit and an airbrushed tiger on the back! That’s his phone!”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, London, I’m certain. This is definitely his!” Kenya snatched the phone off the bed, flipping it open. It said the words Capacity Full across the screen.
“What about the ring box, Kenya? Have you seen it before or what? What’s in it?” the twin asked her confused sister.
“I’m still bugging out on this phone,” Kenya told her sibling, holding it up in her hand.
“Well, I’m gonna open it.” London leaned over, swooping up the small velvet box, shaking it slightly before peeking inside.
“What’s in there?” Kenya waited before starting to go through Storm’s phone for any clues to his whereabouts.
“Oh, my God! Ugh!” London dropped the box on the carpet, revealing a small note and what appeared to be a severed piece of an earlobe with a diamond earring still attached. To Kenya’s dismay, it was the same earring that Deacon was wearing; the same one that she also owned. It was Storm’s. It had to be. Now it was proof positive that Storm was definitely injured badly, in danger or worse than that, dead.
Kenya, exhausted from grief, fell to the carpet, passing out. As her twin sister lay sprawled out on the hotel-room floor, London didn’t know what else to do. Without hesitation, she rushed to the telephone, dialing the number that O.T. left for her. There was no need calling the cops for assistance. The way Kenya, Paris, and O.T. made it seem, they couldn’t help anyhow.