Chapter Two
Harshal
“Why are we going to this party again?” I ask.
“Because we’re new to this college and we want to make ourselves known.” My best friend, Brunelle, replies.
“Can’t we just wait until school starts, I’m a little tired.” I state.
We moved from Los Angeles, California, to a city in Arizona, close to Prescott to attend university while my grandfather went back to his home country, Nigeria.
My father is Nigerian and my mother is Black American but since my father is in jail for domestic abuse and the murder of my mother my Nigerian grandfather was left to take care of me until I was able to get here.
I’m very grateful for him if I’m being honest, and was sad to see him board the plane back to Nigeria.
I don’t have the beautiful African accent like my father and grandfather does, unfortunately, but I did inherit their grey eyes that sometimes look like a baby blue color.
I don’t really call myself Nigerian because I don’t really know too much about my roots and the country like I do about my Black American heritage and the struggle Black Americans have been through with racism, slavery, and things of that sort in America.
My grandfather also never talked about his childhood in Nigeria and the culture the country holds because it’s all tied to bad memories for him. Though either way I’m a young black man in America but the two ancestry trees I descend from do have their differences.
“You can rest after the party.” Brunelle said, putting earrings in her ear.
She enters my room and pulls me into the living room. Brunelle is my best friend/roommate. We met in high school when she moved to California from Louisiana and we’ve been inseparable ever since.
“Ah, you look good.” She says.
“Thanks.”
“Now lets go party.” She begins to drag me to the door but stops abruptly.
“Ooh, wait I need to put on some perfume, you never know what cute guy I’m going to meet there.” She says, running into her room.
I watch her bathe in the perfume before she puts the top on the bottle and runs back to me.
We head out the door and make our way down to the lobby of our apartment building.
She calls for a cab and we make our way to the party.
I watch as the city goes by through the window, people dressed for a night out teens, couples, friend groups, and families.
Brunelle bounces her leg in excitement the entire ride.
When we get to the party my jaw drops at all the motorcycles in the front of the club.
“Is this a party for bikers?” I ask.
Brunelle giggles.
“No, it’s for anyone who was invited.” She says.
“And how did you get an invite?” I ask as she gets out the car.
“I have my ways.” She smiles.
I step out of the cab, still gawking at the bikes.
“They’re just bikes they’re not going to eat you alive or anything.” Brunelle states.
She then pulls me to the entrance of the club. Music makes its way to my ears as we get closer and enter the building. Bodies are everywhere, dancing, drinking, standing, talking, and more. Some dressed as a typical biker while others dressed in casual street clothes.
“Ooh!” Brunelle said, leaving me already.
I would follow her but I see an empty table in the corner and decide to sit down there. I watch as people pass me, dance, talk loudly, and overall enjoy themselves. I don’t see Brunelle anywhere the entire time. A girl plops down in front of me after a while.
“Hey handsome.” She said, twirling her blonde hair.
I smile politely.
“Hello.” I greet her back.
“I can be your white chocolate to your chocolate bar.” She smiles, devilishly.
No, just no! Shaking my head I politely let her down.
“Oh, no thanks.” I say.
Her hand slides across the table to brush along my fingers. I jerk back and stand up to make my way to the bar.
“What can I get you?” the bartender asks.
At first I was going to say I didn’t want anything but then thought against it.
“Water, please.” I order.
He nods before filling a glass with water and sliding it to me.
“Thank you.” I nod.
Taking a sip of water, I finally spot Brunelle dancing with some hot tattooed dude.
The guy is behind Brunelle while there’s another hot guy behind him.
The tattooed guy leans back and kisses the guy behind him before leaning forward to kiss Brunelle.
Smiling I shake my head. Like a guy needs two girls to make out to have a good time, Brunelle needs to have two guys to make out to have fun.
She’s hardly ever having sex with just one man, every time needs to let off a little steam she most likely has two men behind her.
Most of those men are bisexual because they fuck each other while fucking and kissing on her.
Brunelle spots me and smiles brightly at me while waving.
The two guys look at me and smirk. The tattooed man smirks at me and leans down to kiss Brunelle again, his pretty eyes never leaving mine.
Brunelle bites his bottom lip and pulls on it and he doesn’t even flinch.
If I’m seeing correctly I think his eyes dilated even more to where his eyes are completely black but I’m not entirely sure with the lighting in here.
The other guy begins to walk over to me.
“Come join us.” He says when he’s close enough.
I shake my head.
“It seems like you guys are having fun without me.” I say.
“But we can have more fun if you join.” He says. “No pressure though.”
“No thanks, go enjoy her, she’s worth it.” I say.
The guy shrugs. “Okay.”
When he returns to Brunelle and the other guy, he kisses the other guy while the man’s penis pokes a tent in his pants.
They whisper something to one another before they whisper something in Brunelle’s ear.
She escapes them but not before Tattoos smacks her ass.
She squeals before rubbing her butt as she makes her way to me.
“Sorry for ditching you but these guys know how to make a cry replenish a dry river.” She says.
I smile. “It’s all good.”
“So safety check, we are still sharing location, I have my safety keychain, and I’m completely sober, I just had two drinks so this is all consensual.” She says. “If I don’t make it home by nine tomorrow morning with no check ins call the police, got it?”
I nod. “Got it.”
She smiles excitedly.
“See you later alligator.” She says before making her way back to the hot hunks.
I watch them make their way to the exit.
I sit my glass on the bar and make my way to the exit when some movement catches my eye.
A bunch of men run out a side door. They’re stealthy but I caught them somehow.
I should just walk away but my curiosity holds me hostage.
I divert my feet to walk towards the door.
Cracking it open it’s dark but I can see there’s stairs that lead down, like this is an entrance to a basement.
At the bottom of the stairs, however, there is a light and I hear voices.
“What should we do with him?”
“How the fuck did he get invited?”
“He wasn’t.”
“If we kill him that may open up a can of worms we don’t want.”
Kill him? These people are murderers! Run!
Run! My instincts tell me to run but I’m rooted in place.
Someone’s shadow appears and they are walking to the stairs which makes my heart begin to drum in my chest. With labored breathing I stagger backwards and sit at an empty table as a giant man exits the door and disappears into the crowd of partygoers.
What the hell is going on here? I’m itching to go back to the door to listen to the conversation but as soon as I make a move to stand a young woman exits the door.
She looks at me and I quickly advert my eyes somewhere else. She slowly walks past me, eyeing me before the giant man catches her attention. I sigh in relief when she attends his needs. I watch them talk before heading back through the door. Waiting a couple seconds I stand and go back to the door.
When I crack it open I see a pair of jeans in my face. I jump and quickly blend in with the partygoers. The door opens and I see a couple of strong men carry something out the club. I keep my distance I follow them out. They walk around a corner and down a path in the woods.
I learn that they aren’t carrying a something, they’re carrying someone. That someone looks out of it, if not entirely put to sleep. They sit the body down, leaning it against a tree.
“Wake him up.” The giant man said.
A young man lights a lighter and places the flame on the fingertips of the unconscious man. The man wakes up with a yelp while the guy with the lighter laughs.
“Tie him up.” The giant man demands.
The other people around tie the man up with chains. The giant man walks over to the man tied up.
“Now I’m going to ask you this and I’m going to ask you once, who are you?” he says, his voice low and gravelly.
It’s silent for a moment before the captured man says,
“I’m not telling you shit, kill me if you must.”
“Nah, no, no, no killing is a wimps way out. How about some torture play?” The giant man says. “Flit.”
Flit lights his lighter again and sets the mans beard on fire. The fire is slow unlike one would imagine.
“He can put the fire out whenever if you tell me what I want to know, if not then the fire will hungrily eat that silky beard of yours before cooking your flesh to where you’d most likely taste like grilled meat to the wolves I leave you to.”
The Captive stays silent. My heart races in my chest as I continue to watch the scene unfold in front of me.
Flit walks up to the man and strategically punches the man, avoiding burning his hand.
The Captives head flies to the side, he spits out blood, and I try to hide myself deeper in the shadows.
“Answer him!” Flit grits out.
The Captive smiles and shakes his head.
The giant man gestures at the young woman I saw in the club. She has bright colors in her hair and, if I’m not mistaken, she has some facial features that resemble the giant man. The young woman walks up the Captive and begins to search the man’s pockets.
“Feel free to pleasure my buddy down there, he’s rather excited a pretty girl is touching my body.” The Captive said.
The young woman pulls a gun out of her thigh strap and holds it to the man’s head.
“You nasty fuck!” she grinds out.
Her disgust morphs into something expressionless.
“You’d like me to get you off? You’d like me to get your dick off?” she asks, using her sexy voice.
The Captive nods and I frown in disgust. The Young Woman pulls the gun from his head and points it at the mans crotch.
“How about I shoot it off.” She adds. “That’ll get it off.”
The Captive shakes a little as he eyes the gun aimed at his dick. He chuckles nervously.
“You wouldn’t dare.” He says, the nervousness clear in his voice.
She cocks the gun and presses it right at the base of his penis.
“Try me motherfucker.” She says through gritted teeth.
Silence fills the air before the young woman speaks again.
“Nothing on him, Prez.” She says to the giant man.
She backs away from the Captive with a look of disgust on her face. Prez grunts and the Captive begins to whimper. The fire has burned ninety-five percent of his beard and the hungry flames are soon to feast on his flesh.
“You have zero point five of a millisecond to start talking or I will let my best buddy skin you almost to your last breath before burying you alive.”
Flit grins from ear to ear before taking the Captives hand and skinning one of his fingers slowly with his pocketknife.
The Captive begins to yell in pain. I frown in displeasure as I close my eyes.
When I open my eyes I make eye contact with a young man.
A young beautiful man. He looks that of an Asian descent with jet black hair, a chiseled jaw, and muscles that make him seem like a mighty hero.
His lips turn up in a cruel smirk before his eyes dart back to his task at hand.
“Are you going to talk?” Prez asks.
“Fuck you!” the man struggles to spit out.
Blood runs down his hand as Flit continues to cut a fairly thin piece of the man’s skin up his forearm, literally skinning him like an apple.
“Alright, Flit you know what to do, and if you need help, again... you know what to do.” Prez said.
This is my cue to leave. I turn around and stop short when I nearly bump into the Asian I made eye contact with. He’s staring at me as if he is some realistic statue. I gulp as my back presses against the tree behind me.
“Who are you?” he asks.
I stay silent.
“Assuming you’ll know what’ll happen to you if you don’t answer me since you saw some things you weren’t supposed to see, I suggest you talk.” He threatens.
I feel myself becoming sweaty. Fucking, fuck, fuck, fuck!
“I, um...”
“What’s the matter cat has your tongue?”
He grips my face and squishes my cheeks, forcing my tongue out of my mouth. He looks at my tongue before pulling out his own pocketknife.
He’s not seriously going to cut my tongue off is he? He wouldn’t! Given the fact that I don’t know him I honestly don’t know what he’ll actually do.
“I didn’t see anything.” I lie.
“You fucking liar, I stood here for a moment and watch you watch Flit begin the skin the man.” He says.
Speaking of the man he screams behind me. My palms become sweaty as my pulse thrums in my ears.
“I’m no one, I stumbled out here for some fresh air and came here.” I struggle to say.
He eyes me, his eyes slowly going up and down and repeating that step a few times. It almost feels as if he’s... checking me out. I squirm underneath his gaze.
“Wrath!” a voice calls out.
His head jerks to the side before his gaze returns to me.
“I’ll see you around, lair.” He said, releasing my face. “And if you speak of anything you saw, I’ll hunt you down and kill you with my bare fucking hands, got that my friend?”
I nod.
“Won’t say a word.” I say.
He winks at me before disappearing into the night.
I struggle to bring air into my lungs before I run back to the front of the club and call a cab to take me back to the apartment.
Tonight was not fun at all. I just hope not all the college parties are like this and I hope I don’t ever see the Asian guy again!
***