Chapter Twelve

Charlie

I make quick work putting everything away so I can sit down to write. I like the quiet of the studio once the kids are gone to think and write. It’s a good time to play and just unwind. I’m thinking about Addy. She has been on my brain a lot since I first heard her sing.

I hear something towards the front door and wonder if she came back for some reason. Going towards the front I don’t see her standing outside. After standing and listening for a minute I chalk it up to my imagination.

Walking through the back and turning off the lights I get the feeling I’m being watched. Once I turn off the last of the lights I stand for a minute to see if I hear the noise again.

A loud crash startles me and glass showers down from the side window as something heavy comes flying through it. One piece sticks into my arm and I feel smaller pieces stick into my face.

“What the hell!” I yell while trying to shield my face from the shards.

Someone laughs in the parking lot and I pull my phone out to call the police. I walk across the floor to look at the object. It’s a brick. There’s a note tied to it that reads, we’ll take everything from you like you’ve taken everything from us.

There’s no doubt in my mind it’s related to my dad. More than likely it’s from the same men who were angry with me before. After I call the police to report the damage I debate on whether I should go outside. I decide to wait for the police because if I had to guess, there are probably at least six or seven of them. I don’t like those odds.

The laughing continues for a little longer and I keep thinking they are going to come inside and destroy everything.

“We’ll be back tonight rich boy, you better sleep here,” a loud voice says as a truck drives by. I look out and see there are at least five men in the back. I was right to wait. They had to have been parked behind the building and ran up with the bricks.

The police show up long after they have already driven away. One officer gets out and comes over to me. She isn’t in a huge hurry. She walks to the front and looks at the broken windows.

“Someone break out your windows?” She asks stepping inside.

“They threw bricks through them,” I tell her and point to one with the note. She picks it up and reads it shaking her head back and forth before putting it right back where she picked it up from.

“These are people you know?” She takes out a little notepad and pen ready to write.

“Not really. I don’t know the actual individuals who did this, but I think I know the group responsible.”

“You do?”

“Yes, just recently my father made several of his workers mad when he fired them. I think for some reason they think they can get at him through me.”

“They can’t?” She looks at me with raised brows.

“No, I don’t have anything to do with my dad’s business. There’s no reason for them to come after me.”

“Besides your dad laying them off from their jobs.” Her tone doesn’t seem helpful. It almost sounds angry.

“Right, but I am only guilty of having him as my dad. After that, I’m not responsible for any of it.”

She makes a noise in her throat and walks forward writing as she goes. I get a feeling she’s not really going to be any help. Something is bothering her about me and my family. I would get the only police officer with a chip on her shoulder.

After she looks in every room she walks back out the front and heads to her car.

“What are you going to do about this?” I say to her back.

“We’ll keep our eye out, but the chances of finding who did this are pretty slim. Here’s my card.”

“What do you mean? I told you who did it.” I need to maintain my cool but this police officer is really getting under my skin. This is my safe place and it’s been tampered with. I have children who come here to learn how can she not see how awful this is?

“You can’t prove it,” she smirks. Once she’s gone I walk back into the studio to try and pick up the glass. I’ll have to deep clean before the students return so no one gets hurt. I turn the card over and look at the name. Deputy O’Neil. I’ll have to figure out if my dad somehow knows her.

I decide to go in the back room and try and write for a little while. If I go home I’ll just end up falling asleep on the couch watching something horrible. The words in my head have congealed into one big blob of nonsense. I wonder if Addy has somehow gotten into my head with her lyric hating ways. After I play a few notes on the guitar some sentences start to form about a high school beauty wanting to grow up too fast. It doesn’t sound terrible in my head.

“Charlie, are you here.” A voice outside the room startles me and I jump upholding the guitar like a weapon above my head.

My friend from high school George Starling is standing in the doorway. He looks tired with large bags beneath his eyes. His green t-shirt is wrinkled and the jeans he’s wearing have large holes in the thighs. They are dirty and his hair is in a huge mess on top of his head.

“You’ve been on a bender,” I say as my heart starts to calm down.

“Just a little one,” he says holding his two fingers close together.

George has an addiction to cocaine. He fends for it in a way that never got me. I would use and be fine, but the second he found it he was hooked. I’d been distancing myself from him bit by bit. I didn’t want to leave a friend in trouble, but there was really no way to help someone who didn’t want to help himself. I still had the coke I’d bought from him for Savannah in my apartment. We hadn’t spoken for two months before that.

“I’ve got a problem, Charlie, I need your help.”

There is usually only one thing Charlie needs from me, it’s money. When someone has an addiction and no steady job, they get in over their head a lot. Charlie is no exception. I’ve never been able to tell him no. I feel like he’s a victim of his circumstances. I moved on to money by a chance inheritance and he remained poor in our old neighborhood.

“Who do you owe money to now, George?”

“Corky, and it’s a lot.” He looks at the ground as he tells me. Corky is a big deal in the drug community and not someone you want to screw over. There was no doubt in my mind if he didn’t get the money he’d hurt George. Knowing my sometimes really stupid friend, he probably told him I’d pay him no problem before he made the trip to my studio.

“Alright, we need to go see Corky. Where’s your car?” I ask as we walk out the front door. No point in locking up. I make a mental note to call someone to replace the glass in the morning.

“I thought we could take yours.” He smiles wearily.

“No, I’m not driving my car through South Side. It will stick out like a sore thumb.” The place we grew up is not known for Lexus SUVs, it’s known for hoopties. “Where is your car, George?”

“It’s at Corky’s. They kept it for collateral. I told them I’d come get you, but it took an hour and a half because I had to walk. Lucky you’re here.”

“Why would you tell him I was going to pay? How much?”

My level of frustration with my friend is rising. He’s done this before and I simply gave him the money, but this time he seems fearful. I know Corky and hopefully, I can defuse the situation before he gets in any deeper.

“Twelve hundred.” He winces as if the admission is painful to him. “He has to have it by tonight Charlie.”

“We’ll take an Uber and I’ll go to the ATM. This is the last time though, you understand me. You’re going to rehab.”

“I will, man. I promise. Get me out of this and I’ll go.”

I have to use more than one card to get all the money out of the ATM and go ahead and get extra to pay the Uber and give George some money to gas up his car. I am proud that I’ve been able to make my own money over the years working for a friend’s construction business. It allows me to take money out without my dad checking up on me. The accounts he’s over are for paying the studio fees and for my apartment.

Once I have the money and we’re on our way I feel a bit of anticipation. It’s been a while since I dealt with Corky. I don’t know how many people he has working for him now and he can be a little hot-headed.

“Rich boy,” he sneers when I walk through the door. I immediately wish I was armed. There are four guys sitting in the back room of Haley’s Bar. The owner is Corky’s aunt and turns a blind eye to his dealings because she gets a kickback.

I know all of this because, before the money, I was one of the people who worked for Corky. He was small time then, a little weed and loan sharking. Now he’s moved onto cocaine and bigger fish, so to speak.

“What’s going on Corky, boys,” I nod at the men standing around him hoping nothing crazy happens. The guy standing closest to the wall pushes back his jacket and I see a gun tucked in his waistband.

“You’ve got to get control of your boy, Charlie. He’s been very, very bad.”

Corky, whose real name is Tuner Conrad, sits behind a table covered in cards and coke. He wears a lot of jewelry these days and I notice some gold crowns when he smiles. It’s a completely different picture of him than I remember.

“He owes you money, I brought it. We’ll get squared and then I’m going to get him cleaned up.” I say and slap George on the back.

“You brought five thousand dollars in cash?”

“He said he owed you twelve hundred.” The little man marching back and forth in my stomach starts taking higher steps. George could have lied, but why would he put me in such a shitty situation?”

“You’re good for it aren’t you Charlie,” George looks at me. His eyes are a mix of terror and remorse. The bastard knows I won’t let him get killed and he brought me here to trap me.

“What the hell. He said he owed you twelve hundred.”

“What he didn’t tell you is I had him sell for me. He skimmed off of the product and then flat out stole money from me. Somehow he thought I wouldn’t notice.”

“George,” I turn to him, blood boiling beneath my skin unable to forgive him for this. I walk forward and put the twelve hundred on the table in front of Corky.

“What’s this shit?”

“It’s the money I brought. Sell the car you kept and then George can pay you back the rest from working. Once he’s clean he won’t need drug money anymore.”

“That’s not how this business works. Charlie, you should know better than anyone.” Corky nods at one of his goons and they produce a knife. “We’ll just cut a finger off and hold that until he can give the money, or maybe we’ll just shoot you.”

The guy pulls the gun from his waistband and I realize things got out of hand quickly. Before I know what’s happening, he’s pulled the trigger. It’s pointed right at George and there is no way I can get to him before it hits. In a split second, I realize I’m about to watch my friend die right beside me.

By some miracle, the gun doesn’t go off. I see the guy’s wide smile turn to frustration. He hits the butt of the gun on his hand at the same time the guy with the knife moves forward. Some strange survival instinct kicks in and I grab George’s shirt pulling him through the door.

My heart beats through my chest as we run. The only place to go is down the back alley. We rush through dark streets, behind dumpsters, and around homeless people. I can hear them yelling as they chase us. I wonder how I found myself in this situation again after I got out.

“If we survive this, George, I’m going to kill you.”

“Why didn’t you just give him the money? You know how he is.”

“Because you are the one who screwed up. How could you steal from a drug dealer and not warn me?” We stop behind an abandoned flower shop and I bend over my knees trying to listen. I know the area like the back of my hand but something tells me the guys following us do too.

“I think we lost them,” George says peeking around the corner of the building.

“For now,” I say thinking this night is going to have some serious consequences. “Stay away from me George, I mean it.”

“Come on Charlie, I didn’t have anywhere to turn.”

I don’t listen to him as I walk away from the building heading towards a more populated area to call another Uber and get the hell out of this part of town. Once I’m safe in the car I let the night’s events playback in my mind. I could have been killed, George still might be killed. My stomach hurts and I just want to make it to my house to go to sleep. Oblivion is the only thing that is going to keep me sane tonight.

When I get home, of course, I can’t sleep. My sanity isn’t as important to my brain as I thought it was. I’m consumed by what just happened by what could have happened. I could have easily died tonight and it really bothers me. I’m not ready to die. Hell, my life is just starting to take off. Why would I want to end it when the possibility of greatness is looming around the corner?

George should have never put me in that position. He did it knowing exactly what was going to happen to me. I’m too trusting. I slug my pillow trying to get it comfortable enough to allow me to drift to sleep. After punching my pillow into more shapes than it ever thought possible, I fix a strong drink so I can at least relax even if I don’t sleep.

Something tells me I’m going to be having nightmares if I do ever pass out. And that pisses me off even more.