Second Chances Page 3

  “Well, when you come tomorrow, make sure it’s earlier,” he said. “We close at six.” Then he disappeared down the sidewalk in the other direction.

  Lakeisha stood there for a few minutes, feeling a headache pulse in the back of her head. She was annoyed and frustrated, but it was hard to focus her thoughts. She began feeling nauseous and weak, the pain in her sides and chest growing worse. Dizziness crept in as well, and the world was veering lazily in a circle.

  She had to get home. She turned and walked back the way she had come, but it was hard to clear her thoughts. Her vision was blurry and the pain made it difficult to think straight. Something was wrong. She took a step and fell sideways, barely catching herself before falling down.

  Something was very wrong.

  She staggered forward, leaning against the wall. The pain in her abdomen built in waves, reaching a crescendo that sent her careening to the ground. She rolled sideways and felt something sticky on her chin. She wiped her hand on it and saw blood on her fingers.

  “Help,” she mumbled, trying to stand up.

  The streets were empty and she couldn’t see anyone. She fell back down and pain shot through her body. She cried out, clutching her sides.

  Agony became her existence as seconds ticked past. She crawled forward, trying to find someone, anyone, who could help her. She needed to get to a doctor and find out what was wrong.

  It felt like hours later, and she felt hands on her.

  “Help…” she said, her words barely audible.

  There was no answer. Rough hands began patting her down. She felt things being pulled out of her pockets. She tried to fight back, but she was too weak. The pain was overwhelming.

  She felt those hands on her purse, pulling. She held onto the strap, refusing to let go. They grabbed her fingers, pulling and prying until the strap slipped free. The purse was gone.

  And then the hands were gone.

  She lay there, gasping, finding it difficult to get air. The world felt empty, hopeless. It was an eternity before she heard anything else. Sirens, voices, all of them distant and muted. Her entire world was pain and despair.

  Lakeisha felt her body lifted like a ragdoll onto a gurney. She tried to tell them to call her family, that she’d been robbed, that something was wrong and she wasn’t healthy. She tried to tell them that she needed help, and that she was scared, but the words wouldn’t come out.

  She felt the world spinning, light coming through pinpricks.

  She felt the world tune out, replaced with a peaceful serenity as her existence detached.

  And then she felt nothing at all.

  Chapter 4

  Four months later

  Nichole

  “Come on! You’re going to be late for school.”

  It was the fourth time Nichole had shouted up the stairs at her younger sister. Kenni hated being woken up early, especially when it meant she would have to go to the dreaded middle school she hated so much. Anything before noon was too early for the twelve year old girl.

  Which meant mornings were always hard. Rico left early, usually with only a bowl of oatmeal in his stomach but often nothing at all, which meant it fell to Nichole to get their younger siblings ready for the day.

  For Tyler, that was easy. Tyler sat at the counter eating a bowl of mushy cereal and playing with a toy truck. He was the exact opposite of Kenni, up every morning before Nichole called for him and in bed by nine o’clock every night with little fuss. Easy to take care of, friendly like his older brother, and always happy. He was in kindergarten and still loved school because it meant going to play with his friends.

  For Kenni, on the other hand, it was no small task to get her awake and ready in the morning. More than once Nichole was forced to drag Kenni out of bed, kicking and screaming.

  Nichole stuffed Tyler’s coloring books back into his bag. “You have your lunch?”

  He held up the bag with his free hand. “Yep. What is in it?”

  “Peanut Butter and Jelly,” she said.

  He frowned. “I don’t like peanut butter.”

  “But you’re going to eat it,” she said. “There’s an apple too.”

  Tyler perked up. “Cool. I love apples!”

  “I know,” Nichole said. “Where is your damn sister?”

  Nichole made her way over to the stairs, listening to any sound from her younger sibling. She heard rustling, and a thump, but not much else.

  “Kenni!” Nichole shouted. “Come on! The bus is almost here.”

  “Can I watch TV after school?” Tyler asked from the kitchen.

  “Maybe,” Nichole said. “If you don’t have any homework.”

  “They never give me homework,” Tyler said, scrunching up his nose. “I’m only six!”

  “Kenni!”

  “I’m coming!” Kenni shouted from upstairs. She finally came staggering down, leaning heavily against the railing and bleary eyed. “It’s too early,” she said, pouting.

  “It’s always too early for you.”

  “Why can’t we just go to school in the afternoon?”

  “You never had this much trouble when you were going to Northmont,” Nichole said. “And you had to get up two hours earlier.”

  “I liked going there,” Kenni said. “And I could sleep on the bus.”

  “You still have to go.”

  “Is Rico here?”

  “He’s at work,” Nichole replied.

  Rico was their eldest brother, having just passed his twenty-third birthday a few weeks earlier. He’d moved back home in the last few months to help take care of them and pay the bills.

  “Will he be back when we get home?”

  “I think so,” Nichole said. Rico usually worked late, putting in long hours, so Nichole never really knew. She handed her sister a piece of toast. “Eat.”

  Kenni munched on the toast, eyes half shut. Her hair was a mess, but there wasn’t time to fix it. “I don’t want to go.”

  “No one does.”

  “I hate it there,” Kenni said. “Why can’t I go back to Northmont?”

  Nichole let out a sigh. “Kenni…”

  “It isn’t fair. All of my friends are at Northmont.”

  It was true. Kenni had gone to Northmont middle for an entire year, and after an initial period of getting used to the school she’d developed some very solid friendships. A few girls invited Kenni to birthday parties and pool parties and genuinely loved having her around. None of them even treated her like she was different because she didn’t live near the school.

  They still received calls from those friends, asking her why she wasn’t in school and what had happened. But those calls had become less and less frequent as time went by, and Kenni was worried her friends were forgetting about her.

  Now, after four months back at her old school, Kenni was starting to shut down. She hated everything about it; the teachers were underpaid and underappreciated, so they put very little effort into the school. A lot of them cared, or at least wanted to care, but they didn’t get any support from the administration or the state to do their jobs.

  And, to make matters worse, the transfer back from Northmont had taken place around the same time their mother went missing. Lakeisha had gone out one night and never come home, leaving only a note on the counter and a lot of questions.

  They had still heard nothing from or about her in the last four months, and they were beginning to lose hope that she would ever come home.

  But, there was nothing Nichole could do about either situation right now.

  “You just need to make new friends.”

  Kenni was hesitant. “No one here likes me. They don’t like me because I went to Northmont last year. They say mean things about me: that I sold out and went to a white school.”

  The words hit Nichole hard. She felt a hole in the pit of her stomach. All she wanted to do was cry.

  Instead, she said:

  “You just need to focus on your school work. Don’t worry wh
at anyone says. Just have thick skin. Now come on or you’re going to miss the bus.”

  Tyler bounced off the stool and ran for the door. Kenni watched him go and turned to Nichole for one last plea: “Do I have to go?”

  “Yes, you do,” Nichole said.

  “Can’t I just stay with you?”

  “I have work today.”

  “At the law office?”

  “I don’t think so. I think just work today.”

  “Oh.”

  “I won’t be home when you get here, but I won’t be too late either. Make sure Tyler gets here safe and do your homework. Okay?”

  Kenni frowned. “Okay.”

  Then they followed their little brother outside. Nichole went with them, walking them to their bus stop. They lived in the city center in a rent controlled apartment complex. It wasn’t necessarily dangerous, but she wouldn’t have said it was safe either.

  Their apartment was a two story unit with three bedrooms. It was listed under their mother’s name, but she hadn’t lived there in the four months. Something had happened to her, they were sure, but they’d never found out one way or another. She just went out one night and never came home.

  Nichole stood with her siblings at the bus stop. It was a chilly morning with a biting wind, but she knew it would warm up by the time they made it inside the school bus.

  Tyler looked up at her. “Do you think Mom will come home today?”

  It was the same question he asked her every morning. Ever since their Mom didn’t return that night. They had filed a missing person’s report the following morning and called the police at least once a day for updates. But, Tyler didn’t really understand what was going on or why Mom never came back.

  He wasn’t crying about it anymore. He thought she didn’t love him anymore, and it had taken Rico and Nichole a long time to convince him that wasn’t the case. He seemed more curious than worried now, since so much time had passed. Nichole didn’t know if that was good or bad.

  “I don’t know,” Nichole said. “I don’t think so.”

  “Oh,” Tyler said. “Okay.”

  The bus pulled up to the curb. It was faded with age and the driver looked exhausted. Nichole gave each of them a hug as the other children piled on.

  “You both have a good day,” she said to her brother and sister as they climbed aboard. “I love you.”

  “I love you too!” Tyler shouted, bounding up the steps onto the bus. Moping and sad, Kenni followed.

  Nichole watched them disappear into their seats, and then watched the bus shudder its way down the road. She hated how depressed Kenni was, and she feared that it wouldn’t be long before Tyler was in the same position.

  By the time she made it back home she was running low on time. She lived close to the law firm where she worked, but it was still a fifteen minute walk. She gathered her law books off the table and put them into her bag, and then headed for the door.

  But, when she reached it, she hesitated.

  She called Rico. He answered right away.

  “Hey, sis. I’m on break. What do you need?”

  “Are you busy?”

  He worked for a pizza joint up the road, Johnny’s, in the mornings and then went to work at a car dealership in the afternoon. The pizza place was a new job, something he’d picked up in the last month to help cover bills.

  “Nah,” he said. It was never really busy until the afternoon, so his job was mostly prep work. “And it won’t be too busy tonight either so we aren’t rolling a lot of dough. Did they head off?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “Just got on the bus.”

  “How was Kenni?”

  “The same,” Nichole said. “She hates the entire situation, but she’s still dealing with it for now.”

  “You heading in to the office?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, biting her lip. “I don’t think so. There isn’t any real reason for me to go, is there?”

  “You said you thought Richard could help with the paperwork.”

  “He can,” she said. “At least I know he could, if he wanted to. I’m just not sure he will.”

  “He will,” Rico said.

  “Not if he knows the truth,” she said. “Enrollment was last week and I should be starting classes this week.”

  “So you aren’t in school for now. Big deal.”

  “It is a big deal, because my internship is dependent on it. If he finds out I didn’t enroll in any college courses this semester, then there’s no way he’ll help us out.”

  “He still will,” Rico said. “You said he’s a good guy, right?”

  “Most of the time,” she replied. “He has his moments.”

  “Then trust that he’ll help,” Rico said. “Kenni needs this. You didn’t tell her, right?”

  “No,” Nichole said. “I didn’t want to get her hopes up until I know if there’s something we can do.”

  “Good,” Rico said. “We can surprise her with it later.”

  Nichole let out a sigh. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll go in.”

  Chapter 5

  Richard

  “Good morning, sir.”

  Richard nodded at the gentleman holding the main door of the office and strode past into the enormous ground floor lobby. The chamber was full of men and women in well-tailored business suits, talking amongst themselves as they planned out their day.

  It was just after eight in the morning and the place was thrumming with activity. Richard strode across the lobby floor to the elevators. The weather was nice out in early autumn and he felt that it was going to be a good day.

  A short day for most of his staff, who were only working half-days today. He climbed into one of the elevators and rode up to the twentieth floor. The bell chimed as it reached his office and opened to show the double glass doors of his floor: the offices of Franklin and Greenwood, attorneys at law.

  It made him proud each time he saw his name emblazoned on those glass doors greeting all visitors: Richard Greenwood. He’d really built something for himself, climbed his way to the top.

  “Hello, Richard,” Meghan said as he stepped through the door into the office. She was wearing a headset over her auburn hair and a cheerful smile.

  “Good morning, Meghan,” he said. She was overworked with three young children at home, but she was also the best damn receptionist he’d ever met. “Anything up for today?”

  “You’ve got a few meetings this morning and afternoon but I pinged them to your calendar already. The only one you can’t miss is your two o’clock. It’s with Angstrom.”

  “Got it.”

  “Did you already eat breakfast?”

  “A bagel,” he said. “But I could do with some coffee.”

  “Stacy is out at Starbucks. I’ll have her add your order to the list. Just coffee?”

  “Yeah, the bitterest she can find, and then as much cream and sugar as they can stuff into the cup.”

  “You got it.”

  “Is the intern here?”

  “Nichole is out with Stacy helping carry the food. Did you need her for something?”

  “I told her to work on those filings this morning. I have to submit them by noon.”

  “She finished those last night.”

  “Really?”

  “Stayed late, but she got it all done.”

  “Wow, Richard said, scratching his chin. “I’ll need to find some more work for her then.”

  “Don’t keep her too busy. I’m sure she’s got a lot of stuff to do with college courses.”

  “Oh, did they start back already? I knew it was soon, but I didn’t realize it was that time again.”

  “I think they start back today. I told her she can leave early if she has classes to go too, but she said she should be fine.”

  “I remember how terrible it was,” Richard mused.

  “Really? I loved college.”

  “You didn’t have to go to law school,” Richard said. “The Socratic method was pretty muc
h my least favorite part. They always seemed to focus on me, and my teachers always knew when I hadn’t studied.”

  “They always picked on you when you didn’t do your homework, huh?”

  “Yeah, and that was basically every day.”

  Meghan laughed. “I just went to parties and hung out with friends.”

  “One of the popular kids?”

  “Of course! I was a wild child. I’m sure Nichole is, too.”

  “Most likely. This is just her undergraduate degree, though, so I’m sure it’s really easy for her. Which semester is this for her?”

  “It’s her second one. I think, but I’m not completely sure.”

  “I’m sure she will ace this one like the last.”

  “She should. She’s brilliant.”

  “I know,” Richard said, rubbing his chin. “She’s barely started taking courses, but she could have her law degree already with how much she reads.”

  “She’ll have your job soon,” Meghan said with a smile.

  Richard laughed. “Yeah, I’m sure she will. I’ll have to make her a partner as soon as she graduates, if she sticks with us that long. Send her in when you see her.”

  “Will do, boss.”

  Richard headed into his office, setting his suitcase on the couch and relaxing into his executive chair. The office was impeccably clean, the desk empty of clutter or paperwork. He couldn’t stand when he had to sift through stacks to find things.

  Ever since bringing Nichole in as intern, he hadn’t really had a lot of paperwork getting in the way.

  He’d been skeptical, at first. It was generally good practice to hire interns, getting either free or cheap labor to handle paperwork and copyedit, but he didn’t like them on principal—anyone under the age of thirty was still a child, as far as he was concerned—so it was nice finding someone who was reliable and talented.

  And Nichole was definitely brilliant, one of the smartest and most talented people he’d ever met. During her first few days she was already as competent as some lawyers he had hired with six years of education. He had great faith that she would go far in the business.

  He clicked onto his computer and started checking his email. Bills, spam, advertisements; he filed and deleted.