Authors: Niobia Bryant
Chloe smiled. “I don’t think so, Liv. I’m done.”
Three months later
Chloe hopped out of the back of the yellow taxi, the bustle and blaring of New York her backstop. She pulled her leather coat tighter around her body to block the brisk February winds that were blowing. The sun was shining brightly but offered no reprieve from the cold. The weather report called for snow flurries that afternoon, something Chloe was dreading because she didn’t react well to winter. She motioned for the doorman, Mr. Harrison, to retrieve her luggage from the trunk of the taxi.
“Good morning, Ms. Bolton.”
“Hello, Mr. Harrison.”
She pulled a fifty-dollar bill from her Coach billfold and walked over to the window to hand it to the portly taxi driver. “Keep the change.”
“Thank you, Ms. Bolton!” He honked his horn briefly twice before pulling off into the static New York City traffic.
Chloe paused, the chilling air whipping around her, as she listened to the sounds of the city. She listened to the blare of the car horns, the screech of car tires, the bellowing of angry New Yorkers, the shrill sound of sirens from ambulances and police vehicles, and the clattering drill of street repair.
New York. Busy, fast-paced, congested and tiring.
No longer my kind of town
, Chloe thought. She hefted her tote onto her shoulder before she entered the exclusive Central Park West building where she owned a luxury apartment.
The thirty-floor granite structure spoke of wealth and affluence. Each floor held just two spacious apartments. Her neighbors in the building were some of the wealthiest people living on the East Coast. Sometimes Chloe actually forgot that, financially, she ranked amongst them.
She took the two thirty-inch Samsonite suitcases from the doorman and politely refused his offer to assist her to her floor. Using the handles, Chloe pulled the luggage behind her onto the elevator for the short ride to the fifth floor. When she stepped off the elevator, she glanced down the Persian-carpeted hall to her neighbor’s elaborately carved door. In the eight years that she owned the apartment, she’d seen the elderly Jewish couple a total of five times, and even then that was in passing in the elevator or in the foyer downstairs. She shook her head and in wonder, reaching into her tote bag to retrieve her keys.
It was more than a month since she had been in her apartment. First there was the two-week photo shoot, for what would now be her last swimsuit calendar, off the coast of Spain on the beautiful Balearic Islands. After that she left for a two-week book signing tour in Europe for her just-released fourth beauty aid book, appropriately entitled
Chloe’s Beauty Secrets.
She wanted and needed time for a normal life. Hell, she felt like a stranger in her own home. It seemed she was always on the go, always on an airplane jetting somewhere, always living out of suitcases in expensive hotels and eating restaurant food. She couldn’t remember the last time she had a home-cooked meal.
Tomorrow they began shooting commercials for Ashanti’s new line of moisturizing lipsticks. This meant she had one day to recuperate from her month-long travels before hitting the airport again, headed for yet another destination.
It was all too hectic.
Whenever she thought of her upcoming retirement, Chloe actually felt like a ton of weight was being lifted from her shoulders. It was like she had been running a nonstop marathon for eighteen years and now the finish line was finally in sight. It was the pure and sweet feeling of relief.
Both Liv and the board of directors for Ashanti cosmetics had graciously agreed to release her from her contracts early. She shuddered to think of what she would’ve done if they had exercised the right to force her to work.
She left the suitcases in a pile by the door of the marbled foyer. The elaborately decorated and spacious apartment was a far cry from the small two-bedroom apartment she had lived in with her mother before her career began. But Chloe had long since left behind the innocence and wide-eyed wonder she once had for wealth and all its trappings. She was unimpressed by her elegantly furnished home, which only hinted at the wealth she has smartly accumulated over the years.
The apartment consisted of three bedrooms, each with its own full bathroom plus another off the den, a sunken living room with a spectacular view of New York, a full, professionally equipped kitchen and a balcony that ran the length of one side of the dining room.
When Chloe first bought the place, for a small fortune, she had hired a professional interior decorator who catered to the wealthy elite. Due to her busy schedule, Chloe had left the entire job and almost all the decisions up to the woman and her staff’s discretion. The only instruction she gave were to keep it simple. Thus the ivory and gold decor throughout the entire apartment were not her doing.
Overall the apartment looked fashionable and elegant, just not what Chloe would’ve chosen for herself. If she had decorated her home she definitely would’ve toned down the crystal chandeliers and some of the more elaborate Elizabethan decor. Definitely more color would’ve livened up the place. Visions of warm colors like blues and maroons with lots of flowers and plants.
Well it didn’t really matter now. She hardly was home anyway. But when she finally was retired she had plans for a lot of changes to be made and not just in the decor of her apartment. June just couldn’t come soon enough.
∞
After a long nap, Chloe quickly unpacked in her bedroom, adding the clothes she had taken with her and the new outfits she bought to her already bulging wardrobe. Currently every closet in her home was filled with clothes, coats, shoes and hats. She knew she needed to sort through the hundreds of outfits and accessories and donate what she didn’t wear any more to charity. Three walk-in closets and a hall closet filled with close was extreme to her.
Brrrnnnggg.
She glanced over to the ringing cordless telephone on the bedside table and decided to let her answering machine pick it up. She just got home and had barely had time for a good nap before the phone had begun to ring off the hook.
“Hey, Chloe here. Leave a message.”
Beep.
“Chloe… Chloe… I know you’re home so pickup. I’m downstairs and for the thousandth time I’m about to strangle your doorman —”
Chloe dropped the clothes she was putting on hangers and flung herself on the bed to snatch up the phone. “Hey girl. Come on up.”
Her lifelong best friend Anika sucked her teeth, and Chloe could envision the full-size beauty rolling her expressive eyes heavenward. “I would if Harrison would
let
me. I mean
why
do I have to go through this every time I try to venture into the living area of the rich and famous to see
my
best friend in the world. You know if I was —”
“Hold on, Anika.” Chloe laughed as she rolled off the bed and crossed the floor to the intercom system in the hall just outside her bedroom.
She pushed the button labeled talk. “Mr. Harrison, please admit Ms. Foxx upstairs. I’m sure you know who she is,” she said playfully.
“Yes, Ms. Bolton. I am
very
aware of Ms. Foxx. She is hard to… forget.”
“Then what’s the problem, Mr. Harrison?”
“She refuses to sign in.”
Chloe sighed and push the button again, knowing Anika could hear her voice as well as the doorman could. “Anika, just sign in. It’s the policy of the building as you know because you been through this with Mr. Harrison before.”
The phone in her hand began to buzz, signaling that it was off the hook. Anika had obviously hung up her end of the line. Chloe pressed the button on the phone to end the noise.
Pushing the button labeled listen, Chloe hurt Anika grumble as she signed the guest log book and showed the doorman her identification.
“I mean this
isn’t
the White House,” she heard Anika snap.
“Yes, ma’am, and you have a…
wonderful
day,” was Mr. Harrison’s reply.
Shaking her head, Chloe walked back into the bedroom and put the phone on the base before walking back out to go and open the door for her friend.
Chloe and Anika had known each other since they were in grade school. Anika and her rambunctious family, consisting of four older brothers, her obviously-in-love parents and her grandmother, had rented the one-family house next door to the three-family house where Chloe had lived with her mother. The two have become instant friends and had remained so for the past twenty-five years. Even when Chloe began modeling at the age of fifteen and moved away at eighteen, she remained in close contact with her flamboyant friend.
Chloe never felt that Anika had envied her growing success, and she had made sure to share as much of it as she could with her. When she had passed the age of eighteen and was allowed by her mother to attend the celebrity-filled parties, she had always taken Anika along with her.
Chloe loved her to death and it was her friend, along with her mother, that had helped keep her grounded. There was no room for too much ego around Anika, because she would bring anybody back to reality in a hot second. The woman was just that brutal at times. But it had also been Anika who helped her through her grieving when her mother passed away with breast cancer eight years ago. Even though she had mourned just as deeply for the woman she lovingly called Mama Dell, Anika still had the inner strength to help her best friend through it all.
Chloe opened the door and was leaning against the doorjamb when Anika stepped off the elevator. She was statuesque and, in Chloe’s opinion, one of the most beautiful women ever.
She wore her hair short in a wave rod-set that was jet black. It perfectly offset her round face, large expressive eyes of a soft mocha, a short upturned nose, high cheekbones and well-defined full lips that seem to constantly pout. A flat mole, which she called her beauty mark, was just below her bottom lip. Her lashes were long and full. Chloe truly believed that Anika was far prettier than she was.
She was five feet eight inches tall and weighed about one hundred and eighty pounds, but every bit of her was firm and solid. No hints of overhanging fatty bulges or cellulite existed on her body. Her shoulders were broad but softly rounded, continuing down to long, toned arms. Even her stomach was flat and her long legs shapely. Her body was the epitome of an hourglass figure.
Anika’s confidence lured meant to her. Her sense of style made women envy her. Her sense of humor and sharp wit were the trademark that made everyone want to be around her. She was truly one of a kind.
Today she wore a charcoal gray close-fitting ribbed turtleneck with matching wool pants beneath a gray leather pea coat and matching leather high-heeled boots. The only make up she wore a one her smooth caramel complexion was clear lip gloss and mascara.
“Anika, why do you have to take Mr. Harrison through those changes every time you come to see me?” Chloe watched as Anika breezed past her to enter the apartment, leaving a cloud of raspberry scented Victoria’s Secret body lotion and after bath mist behind.
She pulled off her gloves and coat. “Maybe I don’t want people to know I’ve been here. I mean what if there is a murder? I might become a suspect and not know a thing about what went down in this building.”
Chloe laughed. “Girl you are crazy. Where do you come up with some of the things you say?”
She winked. “I like to keep things lively. So you just got in, huh?”
Chloe nodded. “Come on back to the bedroom. I was just unpacking.”
“Well hurry up because I’m starving,” Anika complained as she followed her slender friend down the short hallway to the master suite.
“You want me to cook something?”
Anika flopped across the foot of the bed as Chloe stowed a now empty suitcase in the top of the closet. “Oh no. We’re going to the Plaza. I heard Wesley Snipes is in this Big Apple taping a new movie and he might be staying at that luxurious hotel. This time if I spot him I’m going to make my move.”
“Yeah, right,” Chloe scoffed. “You’ll just freeze up like you did the last time. You do remember when I introduced you to him at the premiere for
Passenger 57
.”
Chloe laughed as she sat on the bed next to her friend. “What were the words you said? I know they forever etched you into his memory.”
“Aw, go to hell,” Anika muttered.
“Oh year. I remember now.” Chloe cleared her throat and faked a doe-eyed look, staring off into the distance. “Hi… hi… my, uh, name… is… uhm…it’s nice for you to meet me!”
Anika reach for a throw pillow on the floor as Chloe fell backward onto the bed in a fit of laughter. Playfully she swatted the gorgeous supermodel with it. “I was nervous,” she said. “Besides, it
should’ve
been a pleasure for him to meet me just as much as it was for me to meet him.”
Anika’s confidence never wavered.
They fell silent as Chloe swallowed the last of her laughter with a long sigh and folded up the clothes that were in a jumbled pile on the bed.
“How long are you in town?”
“A day,” Chloe said. “We begin shooting the new commercials for Ashanti tomorrow. They have a new line of moisturizing lipsticks.”