A Story To Tell | Book 2

.46.

:::CHRIS:::

Jail was nothing how I thought it would be. I thought you'd be sitting in a jail cell with other inmates in this one tiny cell, mugging each other down. But to my surprise, they actually have you sitting in this room that looked more like an auditorium with TVs on each corner of the room.

They have people separated by their gender. The police had me seated with the men and the girls were on the other side of the room in silence. In fact, everyone was seated as if they were attending a class or something. No one was in handcuffs. But if you had to be in handcuffs, they took you to an isolated room. It was just crazy how it seemed so easy for an inmate to just get up on their own and walk out of the door that they came into if it weren't for the guards standing by the door. I didn't say anything to anybody. I just sat in the seat, praying that I'd be released very soon.

I figured I'd be facing some charges due to the fact that when the policeman grabbed me, I just started panicking and trying to fight them off of me. They tried putting me in handcuffs and I just wasn't having that. I don't know what came over me. I'd turned into a maniac, trying to fight them off with every bone in my body.

They pinned my little ass down. It felt like my arms were about to pop from out of their sockets because of how rough they were being with me. Then I had Keira in the background, screaming and hollering, telling them that I never did anything and they were arresting me for nothing.

My neighbors were outside of their apartments staring at me as if I'd lost my mind. I did. And it was embarrassing, humiliating, and just wrong. In the back of that cop car, I just hung my head and closed my eyes the whole ride. When they took me out of the car, they manhandled my ass all the way to the door and pushed me inside. When I was finally inside, they opened another set of doors, which led us into this room where they removed my handcuffs. I had to be fingerprinted and I had to have my picture taken. Once that was over, they manhandled my ass again and another policeman had asked me if I was going to remain calm. When I told him I would, he took me to this room built like an auditorium and put me into a chair and told me to stay there, not even bothering to handcuff me again. It happened just like that.

"Christopher Smith!" I heard a lady call my name from behind me. I turned around and saw a bright skin lady who favored LisaRaye staring into the room with a clipboard in her hand. I stood up and she looked at me. "Come with me." She demanded.

I stood up and did as I was told. She walked me out of the room and into another room where there were police officers standing around just chatting as if they didn't have shit to do. She sat down at this counter with a computer and looked at me.

"Christopher Smith..." she said as if she were talking to herself. "How do you identify?" I looked at her, confused as to what she meant.

"Christopher Smith." I said to her.

"I know that your name is Christopher Smith, but we also have here a Charisma Smith. Is that you?" She asked me. I sighed and wanted to say I didn't know anyone by that name, but I knew better than to lie.

"Yes. Charisma Smith was me. But now, I'm Chris." I say to her, politely.

"Okay, Chris. I'm giving you the opportunity to make a phone call to see if anyone is eligible to bail you out to release you. After you're released, we will talk about your court date in which you will attend, on time, to find out where you go from here." She said all of this without even looking at me. "Call time will be no more than five minutes. Do we understand?"

"Yes, ma'am." I answer.

She picked up a corded telephone and sat it there onto the counter, still not even bothering to look at me. When she saw that I was just standing there, staring at the phone, she looked up at me as if I were stupid.

"Okay." She said, annoyed. I blinked real hard, trying to keep myself sane.

I rolled my eyes and reached for the phone. And I knew that it was going to kill me, but I had to call my mom and dad to let them know what was going on and to let them know that I'm innocent and did nothing wrong.

Dialing my father's phone. Before the phone started to ring, the operator demanded I say my name. So I did as I was told. When I followed the prompts, the phone started to ring. I don't know why, but I sighed, feeling relieved.

"Chris!" My mom said into the phone. I wasn't expecting for her to answer, but I was happy that she did. "Don't worry, son. Bruce called us and told us everything that's happened." I blinked my eyes, wanting to cry, thankful for Bruce.

"Ma, I didn't do anything." I say to her, wanting to cry.

"Trust me, we know this." She said.

"You got a bail yet?" I heard my dad ask.

"I don't know. No one's said anything to me about it yet." I worry about the possibility of not having one due to the fact that I was showing my ass at the time of arrest.

"We'll find out when we get there, Calvin." My mom said to my dad.

"I don't know what you've got going on down there Chris but I know that you're going to have to come on back to Georgia. I don't like having you there and something like this is going on. I think it's best you come back with us." My dad said to me, tearing my heart into shreds at that moment.

"Dad, I can't. I'm fine where I am. I have my job, my friends, a girlfriend. I don't want to just up and leave. I'm okay where I am. I'm okay, dad." I say into the phone about to cry.

"I wasn't asking you if you were okay, Chris. I'm telling you that that's what you're going to do. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. You're coming back home to Georgia and I mean what I say." He sounded too serious and it just made me break down into tears. I covered my face so that the lady couldn't see me crying. Turning away from her, the tears start to flow freely. "Do you hear me?" He asked me.

"But, dad, I didn't do anything. It's not my fault." I whine.

"I told you I don't want to hear it. You're coming back and that's final. I don't give a damn about what you have got there. You're coming back home rather you like it or not. Now, do you hear me?" He spoke through what sounded like gritted teeth.

"Yes, sir." I say to him, not wanting to object and cause an argument.

I ended the call, afraid of what was going to happen next. One of the police officers saw that I'd ended the call and took me back into the room, walking me to another chair and leaving me there, walking back out. This was not how I wanted things to go.

I couldn't believe that my dad wanted me to go back to Georgia. How could he demand something like that? I told him that I'm okay and I'm also old enough to make my own decisions. I'm an adult. I have my own job, own place, friends, Keira, Yasmin...what? I was just confused. I was taking care of myself without their help and now because I got falsely accused by Keira's deranged mother, I still get punished and have to leave town when nothing was even my fault? This was crazy.

All I could do was just hang my head and think to myself about where I went wrong and how things were going to turn out now that I had no choice but to get back to Georgia against my will. I knew that Bruce wasn't going to mind me going back due to the fact that he often visited, but what about Keira? This girl literally had nowhere to go. It wasn't like I could just up and leave and she just end up following behind me. It would be impossible. I knew how my parents were and there was no way they were going to let a girl come back into town with me to live.

I was just going to have to battle it out with my dad because I'm not leaving Keira behind all because he wants me to come back. I don't know how things are going to turn out with all of this, but I just can't leave Keira like this.