Expired (7 page)

Read Expired Online

Authors: Evie Rhodes

Tags: #Fiction, #Thrillers, #Suspense

13
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till shaken by her spooky telephone conversation, Tracie sat between Michael and Dre on the plush sofa in the living room of her brownstone. The entire room was done in white and silver. The room was sleek with angles. The entire brownstone was prewar, boasting high ceilings and long windows.
Tracie looked at the old-fashioned hourglass sitting on top of the fireplace mantel. The sand in the hourglass was at the bottom. Tracie tried to empty her mind of all thought, but she was having difficulty achieving this.
She took Michael's hand in hers. She pressed it to her lips, kissing the blue and gold class ring. Dre and Michael were very precious to her. This fact had been rammed home with total clarity since the loss of Randi.
“Hey, Rebound,” she said to Michael. “You were on the court today, right?”
“Yeah, Mom. You know I was.” As good as Michael was, he was somewhat shy, and sometimes it embarrassed him the way people acted over his basketball skills. He was often compared to Earl “the Goat” Manigault because of his extraordinary leaping skills on the court.
For him it was just something he did. He loved the sport. It was second nature for him, as it had been for his brother Randi. But for Harlem he was an Earl “the Goat” reincarnation. The community loved its own stars.
Even his Mom flipped out over his skills at times, the same as she had with Randi. He sometimes played on the same court the Goat used to play on, and the crowds came in great numbers at the sound of his name.
It saddened him that he would never be able to play with his brother anymore. He and Randi used to put on quite a show for the neighborhood over on the 135
th
Street courts. The crowd went wild because they were brothers.
Afterward they would always go to Sylvia's Restaurant to eat barbecue ribs, macaroni and cheese, and collard greens, to replenish their energy.
Tracie turned to look at him. “Good. Never neglect being on the court. Because you, baby, are going to be the greatest rebounder basketball has seen for a long time. But they already know it,” Tracie said with pride lilting in her voice.
She turned to Dre, careful to keep the fear that was creeping up and down her spine out of her voice. She said casually, “Dre, I think you should still leave for L.A. You've got your ticket. I don't want this to—”
“I ain't going right now, Tracie. I ain't leaving you. That's all there is to it.”
Michael jumped into the conversation. “Dre's right. Now isn't the time for anybody to be going anywhere.”
Tracie hesitated before speaking, keeping her tone cool and nonchalant. “Actually, I think it's the perfect time. Michael, you can go to that basketball training camp we were talking about. Dre can go to L.A., where he can shoot sunsets and mountains. There aren't any mountains in Harlem. Rashod. Rashod needs to go somewhere, too . . . ” her voice trailed off.
A soft click invaded the silence. Tracie turned toward the sound to see that the red dot was lit on Dre's camcorder. The boy videotaped and recorded everything. He was a fanatic.
Tracie was annoyed, but she decided now was not the time. One day he was going to videotape something that shouldn't be taped. He needed to learn some discretion. She was proud of him, but she didn't like the idea of him always recording things at random in the house.
Dre looked at Tracie. He stood up, looking down at her from his great height. He was mad as hell. He knew what she was trying to do. It wasn't going to work. Things were not normal. He wasn't going for her playing hide-and-seek, pretending, that they were.
Randi was dead. His death was not an accident. It was murder. As much as he couldn't stand that toy detective Monica, he had to admit she had some real points. Somebody was throwing shade. Something was wrong. Who would want to murder his baby brother? So, in his opinion no one needed to go anywhere until they knew what the hell was going on.
Determinedly he said, “Ain't nobody leaving you right now, Tracie, so forget it.”
Tracie knew he was angry, because that was the only time he called her by her first name.
“I mean it,” he said. He turned his focus on Michael. “Michael, get in touch with Rashod. Tell his dumb ass I wanna see him.”
Dre stormed across the room, intent on leaving, when Tracie jumped up from the sofa.
In a pained whisper she said, “Expired. They . . . told me Randi expired. How the hell does one do that, damn it? He's not a canned good. I mean, he wasn't . . .” Tracie looked off to a faraway place that only she could see.
 
 
The vision insinuated itself right in her face, the memory so painful it cut off her breath. It wouldn't budge. There was no avoiding it. She saw herself when she was younger. She leaned over a man's broken body. Her eyes roamed the man's body, stopping when they reached his feet.
There were no shoes on his feet. And there was no blood on the ground. But there he lay, broken and dead. A scream erupted from her throat, shattering the memory.
 
 
The pain of Randi's loss swelled in her heart. Tracie's eyes swam with unshed tears. “When a woman has a baby, it's her job to protect him. Do you know what I'm saying?” Michael and Dre exchanged looks.
Suddenly she saw Rashod sweeping a low bow in front of her and saying, “I also pay my respects to the Destroyer.”
She blinked away the image, struggling to bring herself back into focus. Dre and Michael exchanged confused looks this time.
“Ma,” Dre said.
“Ma,” Michael parroted him.
Tracie didn't acknowledge them. Instead she began to sing a lullaby “ ‘Rock-a-bye, baby, on a treetop; when the wind blows, the cradle will rock. When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall . . .' ”
Dre ran over to her. He gripped her by her shaking shoulders. “Stop it.”
Tracie hiccupped. “Randi . . . rock-a-bye, baby . . . Randi . . . rock-a-bye, baby,” she repeated over and over again.
She was like a scratched record that was stuck in a groove. In a flash she pulled out of Dre's grip and grabbed the poker from the fireplace, smashing the glass table sitting in front of the sofa. She sent glass raining clear across the room.
“ ‘Rock-a-bye, baby . . . rock-a-bye, baby,' ” she sang as she smashed the glass to smithereens, hitting the pieces over and over again with the poker.
Dre and Michael were stunned. They had never before seen their stylish, classy, sophisticated mother out of control. Her eyes looked wild; her hair was disheveled—that definitely never happened—and makeup streamed down her tear-stained face.
They witnessed her breakdown with pain in their hearts. It was not a pretty sight to behold. They both wished they had not been present to witness such private grief. Dre was about to stop her again, but Michael held him back.
He shook his head. He knew it was better to let her vent than to stop her. It couldn't do anybody any good just letting her rage build up inside. Better she got rid of it. Although the sound of her calling Randi's name in connection with the song she had always sung to them when they were babies and little kids was not only eerie but was causing an internal meltdown inside him.
Later, after she was settled down, he would cruise the village to get his nerves under control. He would slip into his second life just as a ballerina slipped into her slippers before a performance.
Tracie continued to sing and bang on the smashed glass with the poker.
 
 
In his tiny, dark room saturated with the spirit and gifts of Ms. Virginia and the others, Me's body shook with the raucous voices, which were acting out Tracie's rage.
The patchwork quilt floated before his eyes, grabbing him, trying to smother him. He had to fight his way out. He struggled out of the army jacket, to free his biceps. He needed the wisdom of the faces.
It was the newest of the lot, the spirit of Ms. Virginia, that came to his rescue and spoke. Her eyes were keen behind the bifocals bulging from his biceps. “Don't be afraid, Me. Soon she will be here, and you won't have to be frightened anymore. There, there,” she soothed.
Me calmed down a bit. He had known she would be a good addition, an old woman with a wise head. His breathing was shallow, but he began to calm as he curled up into a tight ball in the small, dark closet space in his room.
Anita, who was stretched out on her sofa and sipping from a cup of Celestial Seasonings lemon tea, looked out her window to see a patchwork quilt floating in the wind. One of the black patches detached itself and floated free of the others.
The black patch was a seeker in a state of discovery. Seek, and it would find. It was being hunted. The hunter was right behind it. Anita closed her eyes. She moaned at the sight of it. She knew, if the hunter caught up with the one who was represented by the black patch, that he would be the next one to die.
 
 
Tracie Burlingame, spent from her rampage, sat in the corner of the living room, weeping, with her sons huddled close beside her.
14
L
ater that night, after they had finally managed to get Tracie settled down in bed, Dre and Michael went off on their separate ways. Before Dre went in his room, he said, “Michael, call Rashod and tell him to meet me at The Lenox Avenue Lounge in an hour. That fool is gonna have to get in line; I'm sick of him.”
“Sure thing. But you know what, Dre? Don't be too hard on him. This is a lot on him, too. You know how sensitive Rashod is.”
Dre snorted. “Yeah, well, he's got a funny way of showing it, son.”
“People are different. But still he's our brother, so you've got to respect his boundaries,” Michael said.
“Aw, I'm gonna give him some boundaries, all right, and if he crosses any of them, I'm gonna smack him around like I'm the new Ali.”
“Come on, Dre, hitting people ain't ever solved a thing.”
“Maybe not, but it sure as hell will make me feel a lot better.” Dre took off down the hallway. He'd call Souljah Boy and tell him he'd meet him after he squared things away with Rashod.
Michael shook his head at the futility of it all. Rashod was the black sheep of the family, self-designated. There was always some sort of feud brewing about him.
Michael actually got sick of it sometimes. But Tracie and Dre wouldn't leave him alone. Whenever he stuck his head out of the hole for a minute, they were on top of him, starting the crap all over again. Michael knew that no matter how many recriminations they threw at Rashod, it didn't matter. A man was what he was.
Only that man could change it.
Sighing, he went to his room. He called Rashod with the information, then set out for his own charted territory. He dug down in the bottom of his drawer, removed the false bottom, and selected several hot, black pieces of leather-and-chain clothing. He threw them in his duffel bag and headed off for Chelsea.
Normally, he would go on down to the village, but he had changed his mind. He was in the mood for something new. He would cruise Eighth Avenue and see what he could get into.
He jumped on the C train, got off at Fourteenth Street, and headed down Eighth Avenue. The moment he hit Eighth, he was in his stride. He hadn't gone two blocks before he was hit on. He found himself sitting at a corner table in the bar with a gorgeous light-skinned woman, with the clearest brown eyes and longest natural eyelashes he had ever seen.
She was a bodybuilder, toned and well muscled. After one drink they both knew they had scored for the night. The only thing left was where things were going to take place.
The light-skinned, brown-eyed wonder knew just the spot, so that worked for Michael just fine. The instant he was suited up in the black leather and chains, two things happened. The first was a delicious thrill of anticipation that coursed its way through his body, leaving a trail of sweet sensations.
The second was dark, black despair. What was he doing? He felt as though he were entering the dungeons of hell.
Yet he couldn't stop himself. He was drawn to this world like a fish to water. Maybe that was why he needed the punishment. He was dancing with darkness. He needed to feel the pain.
An unrecognizable voice rose up and cried out of Michael's mouth as the first lash landed across his flesh. “Oh, yes.” Then Michael was tunneling—spiraling, actually—down into a deep, dark well.
Randi was dead, and the well was there. It was a huge, gaping black hole waiting to swallow him. It was waiting for them, his family. It was waiting for all of them, the offspring of Tracie Burlingame.
There was a strange twist inside Michael, and something happened that certainly had never happened before.
Michael awoke as though from a slumber. He hovered outside his body in the black leather and chains, and he watched the light-skinned, brown-eyed wonder salivating at the next strike.
Before he knew what was happening, he heard the following words fly out of his mouth: “Lord, forgive me, for I know not what I do.” He backed away, stunned, into a corner of the room. He watched his own body sag at the weight of the pain on the bed.
The light-skinned, brown-eyed wonder was startled at the words, and the whip literally flew out of her hand at the sound of them. The chains slid from Michael's shoulders and from around his neck, onto the bed.
Red, bloody teardrops began to fall from the ceiling, landing on top of Michael's head and dripping down the sides of his face. That was all the brown-eyed wonder needed. She backed out of the room in stunned fear, leaving the door open behind her.
The spot where Michael was huddled in the corner, watching, shook. Before he knew it, he was back in the aching body on the bed. “Lord!” he called out again. “Lord, forgive me, for I know not what I do.” He collapsed weeping onto the bed. A wind swept through the room. The door closed.
Michael looked at the door. Down on the floor he noticed a black ashlike substance being sucked underneath the door. Silver crystals sealed the opening.
A feeling of peace permeated the room. Michael lay down on the bed, exhausted. He fell asleep, but not before he noticed one lone, red teardrop on the back of his hand.
 
 
In her bed, Tracie Burlingame tossed restlessly from side to side. Unseen hands were grabbing at her, pulling at her. She was fighting them, but she couldn't get away. In front of her was a big, black, gaping hole trying to suck her in.
She fought against the currents that pulled her body toward the hole at warp speed. Up in front of her were her sons, and the current was sucking them toward the hole, too. Randi was dead, and she couldn't see him. She sobbed out loud, but she never awoke.

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