Monroe Drive Apartments

Chapter Six

                          The Leasing Agent

In the early am of the morning Drucilla's cell phone rang loudly, waking her.

Glancing at the clock seeing it read 3:28 am she rolled her eyes pulling her covers over her head to ignore it, however it continued to ring. Sitting up knocking it to the floor she manages to give a half cognizant greeting. Hitting the button as it lay on the hard-wooden floor.

"What...What the fuck .... he ...Hello?" Her voice rang out with a Sleepy Hollow type of dreariness.

"Drew, wake up it's me Jackson."

"Jackson? Do you know what fucking time it is? It's ...past 3am Saturday morning and I'm off work today."

"Wake your ass up chicks... Jackson needs you, it an emergency. I need your assistance pronto.... girlie wake up."

"Jackson...freaking call emergency service please... I'm freaking sleep!"

"No, no don't hang up Dru! I need your help please...I need you to take me to the hospital. They just found my friend Chris in Piedmont Park...listen to me damit Dru.. someone tried to kill him tonight!"

Hearing the word kill, she sprung from her sleep like position.

"What? Oh my gosh, not Chris! The sweet little kid in 4317?"

"Yes, girl Chris, can you believe it? My God who want to hurt a sweet face like that?

"Where'd they find him?" ( She knew the answer in her head before he blurted it out in a tearful voice,)

" You know the crap that's been in the news! They found him on the ground in a wooded part of the park at Piedmont. One of the night guards spotted him lying there helpless and called for help."

"The park? Why on earth would Chris had been there after dark anyway?"

"Oh it's a gay thing honey, now get some clothes on so we can go check on him!"

Drucilla hang up the phone quickly and met Jackson in the deck next to her lime green Miata.

He stopped dramatically and stood back giving her a disagreeable brow.

"Your car is so gay Drew."

"Oh, shut up Jackson, how do you know I'm not gay, gay-racist?"

He laughed and mumbled something she couldn't comprehend. Although he joked with her, she could see the vexed look on his face as he starred out the window.

He and Chris had become close friends and she knew this really was bothering him.

He was silent the entire ten-minute ride to Piedmont Hospital.

"Dam, it's a shame from Piedmont Park to Piedmont Hospital." He said softly as they pulled into the parking garage, as if he was only chattering to himself.

Drucilla gave him an awkward look unsure of how to sympathize with his agony.

She parked and he open the door almost zombie like walking towards the entrance saying nothing at all to her, as they slowly strutted in the ingress marked Emergency Room.

Instantly ... the swift cool breeze smacked her in the face like her momma use to wake her for school.

Drucilla stood erect letting the breeze mixed with medical Pharmacist scents and earthly every day down to earth mixtures hit her nostrils, any obstinate drowsiness she thought she still caressed had promptly disappeared.

It was unbelievably aloof in this place, bringing back a moment in time she'd somehow pressed from her memory.

She had to go to Grady, an inter-city Hospital one night and as sick as she was, she almost left the hospital, being her bed felt a better place to died then Grady Hospital.

It was over crowed and hot. The small expanse of planetary seating and flowing air that billowed through the vents, felt worse than being outside in the heat. After three hours in the emergency room seating, she was pronounced with "Walking Pneumonia and hospitalized for four days. That experience was a nightmare although the doctors were amazing, she was woken up each half hour or so by screams and crazy plebeians as they strolled the hallways.

"So, this how they do it in Midtown, huh?" She rolled her eyes as she looked around thinking of the famous
Movement #BlackLivesMatter.

Just as she whispered that the head nurse Jay Worthington who was also a resident at her current job and living quarters, The Heights @ Monroe Drive walked up to them.

Jackson stood up and embraced him. He gave Drucilla a half smile then continued talking to Jackson.

"Girl, somebody almost killed that boy. He on life support now, I pray he'll make it. I put you down as next to kin so you could see him tonight. His mother's flying in from Denver tomorrow so I'm not sure if I can sneak you in after tonight."

Jackson nodded his head and gave Drucilla a wave to say he'd be back.

Drucilla put her arms inside her shirt and her knees to her chest and dozed off as she waited on Jackson.

She was awakened by Jackie talking loudly to Bob, Chris boyfriend.

"It going to be ok Bob, the police will do their job, find out who did this honey."

Lea and I won't stop until we alert the gay community that there is a maniac out there hurting young gay boys.

Bob continued to cry and swear saying it should have been him.

Drucilla put her head deeper in her shirt in hope Lea nor Jackie recognized her and for that matter Bob either. The two of them were could be liken to two cackling hens going back and forth at each other in a cage.

They were always gossiping and calling into the office with drama. In the two months she'd been employed at The Heights at Peyton Place the couple, Lea and Jackie had been the center of each day's negative attention.

A Lesbian couple married in California, Lea and Jackie Talbot drove around in a Volkswagen beetle that had the colors of the rainbow all over the vehicle. "No mistaking... we aren't gay." Their tag read

Leah would announce as she came through the office to launch a complaint about this person, or that person or their dog or frankly anything she happen to notice. She'd blurt out almost venomously, that she was a stay at home wife.

{As if everyone she thought didn't have it as good as she did, she'd then give you a quirky kind of smile before continuing.}

"Jackie puts the bread and butter on our table."

Drew rolled her eyes at the thought of Lea even noticing she was there and dreaded the thought that although this was a trauma, Lea probably would try to place a work-order for her apartment or make a complaint just because she worked at The Heights @ Peyton Place.

With this thought in tow she quickly grasped her android and tried reaching the Jackson's cell a couple more time, before deciding there were plenty of people from Peyton Place to take him home.

She pulled her hoodie profoundly over her head and headed for the entrance access.

Thinking to herself. " Jackson will have to find a ride with all his buddies here. I'm tired...fuck this I got work in just a few hours and it's really Sunday now!"

Her inner thoughts planned to sleep until her alarm clock went off waking her up for her Monday morning am shift!

Drucilla got up and walked out the almost seemly spotless hospital to retrieve her car from valet.
Something, she notice she wasn't offered at the inner city hospital Grady, the night she crept in there facility sick, almost feeling she'd pass out before she got to the emergency doors.

She took a good look around before the valet returned with her car and somehow felt it was a privilege to go to this hospital. The next time she got ill, which she hadn't want to wish on herself, Piedmont Hospital is where she'd be going... they might be strangling folk in the Piedmont Park but hospital sure it looks mighty fine."
She thought to herself as she drove away from the chaos.