Return to Flint

by Treasure Hernandez

  Tiana released her bite on the first man’s wrist and blood covered her mouth. She struggled to get up, but the man she had kicked in the balls recovered and moved toward her.

  “You fucking bitch!” he hissed, obviously still reeling from the pain.

  Tiana squirmed helplessly. She had no more tricks left. Both men were well aware of what they were dealing with now. In pain and a little dazed, Tiana tried to roll as far away from them as she could. She was too slow and there was nowhere for her to run. The man she had bitten kneeled over her and slammed his gun against her right temple.

  Bam! Tiana felt the pressure from the hit and everything immediately faded to black.

  Chapter 23

  When Tiana came into consciousness she heard the muffled sound of voices surrounding her. When she opened her eyes, she realized she couldn’t see anything because the bag had been placed back on her. The pounding in her head was so bad even her teeth hurt.

  “Mmm,” she groaned, trying in vain to lift her head.

  “She’s awake!” a man announced loudly.

  “Good. Bring her over here so she can see the mess she’s made,” a familiar voice echoed loudly through the hollow room.

  “Ahh.” Tiana winced. Pain shot through her rib cage as she was handled roughly. She was dragged to another part of the expansive warehouse. Before she could see it, the smell hit her like a kick to the chest and she gagged. It was a mixture of raw meat gone bad, burning flesh, shit, and piss. The bag was lifted off of her and she was finally able to see where she was. Standing right in front of her was Silam.

  “Silam! What the fuck is going on?” she asked him.

  “Please allow me to introduce myself,” he said with a sinister smirk on his face. “I am Silam Gates.”

  Tiana’s heart dropped and she felt like the oxygen had just been taken out of the room.

  “What’s the matter, baby? Cat got you tongue?” he asked her rhetorically. “That’s right, you’ve been sleeping with the enemy this whole time. Talk about keeping your friends close and your enemies closer. You just took that phrase to a whole new level!” He erupted with laughter.

  Tiana let her head drop low and just stared at the ground.

  “Speaking of friends, you know him?” S. Gates asked, grabbing a handful of Tiana’s hair and forcing her downturned head to look upward.

  “Drake!” she rasped. “No. No.” Tiana shook her head as painful tears danced down her bruised cheeks. She couldn’t even look at Drake’s naked and bleeding body suspended by chains from a metal rafter. There was a piece of metal that resembled a horse bit forced with wires hanging from it between Drake’s lips.

  “Ohh, so you do know him,” Gates said, amused. He nodded at his henchmen. One of them walked over to a small box that contained three levers. He flipped on the switches and pulled down the first lever.

  “Grrrr! Grrrr! Agh!” Drake’s body jerked and curled in response to the high jolts of electricity that hit him. Tiana heard some kind of liquid splashing on the floor and knew it was coming from Drake’s body.

  “Please! No! Stop!” Tiana begged, closing her eyes.

  S. Gates let out a raucous, maniacal laugh. Tiana kept her eyes closed and her head down. Gates signaled his men to cut the electricity. Drake’s body finally relaxed, but it swung limp and lifeless above Tiana’s head.

  “One more round of that and he won’t make it,” S. Gates said, smiling evilly at Tiana. “He rushed here like a hero to save you. Isn’t that sweet? All of those months I was searching for you he tried to act like he didn’t know who you were. Then, just like that, I find out you were hiding out with him right under my nose,” he continued cruelly.

  “Let him go,” Tiana croaked through her battered lips. “It’s me you want. Not him. I’m here. I’m not scared to die. Just let him go and kill me.”

  “I’ll get to that but, first, I want you to see what it feels like to have those close to you suffer and die for no reason,” S. Gates said through gritted teeth. “Now, open your fucking eyes and look at him before I gut him like a pig just like I did your godmother!”

  Tiana slowly lifted her head with fire flashing in her eyes. Her hands involuntarily curled into fists. She looked up at Drake’s limp and badly abused body.

  “I’m sorry, Drake. I love you,” she whispered. With that, the electricity was turned on again for what seemed like an eternity. When they turned it off, Drake’s body continued to buck fiercely until the body stopped making a single sound. At first she thought he was dead but then Tiana heard low growling coming from his mouth.

  “Wait! Stop!” Tiana yelled out just as they were about to turn the electricity on again. “I have some information about your son and your brother and your wife,” Tiana screamed out. “You can kill me after, but let Drake go!”

  S. Gates laughed again. “There is nothing you can tell me about my son and my brother except you that you decided you wanted to play with fire and kill them,” he growled, getting close to her and grabbing a fistful of her hair.

  “He wasn’t your son,” Tiana blurted out.

  “What?” S. Gates hissed.

  “In my bag there’s a disc. Teema, she was fucking him and the baby was his,” Tiana told him.

  S. Gates released his grasp on her hair with a shove. She fell forward and hit her face on the concrete floor. It sent a bolt of pain through Tiana’s entire body. She got up onto her knees and fell back down from her legs being so weak. Tiana refused to stay down. She was not about to give up. She pushed herself up again.

  “Your brother was raping patients at the ward. And Teema was helping him. She participated in the rapes. He hated you and she said she only married you because she had to,” Tiana said, still struggling to get to her feet.

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” S. Gates snarled, his nostrils flaring. He could feel the gazes of his men baring down on him.

  “Your wife, Teema Gates, who worked at the hospital under Teema Chambers, was fucking your brother and they had a baby. The boy wasn’t yours anyway. They were planning on doing your ass dirty and running away together. All of the proof you need are on the discs in my bag,” Tiana growled. She got to her feet. She swayed unsteadily, but at least she was able to look him in the eyes.

  Within ten minutes, Blaine had a laptop with the discs playing in front of S. Gates. They were alone. S. Gates had swallowed hard more than once as he watched his wife and his brother perform ungodly acts on young girls. Then, he had cracked his knuckles over and over when he heard his wife admitting that she never loved him and saw the sight of his half brother fucking her brains out in his office. But, it was listening to her say over and over again that Silam Gates Jr. wasn’t his son that sent S. Gates over the top.

  “Argh!” he howled, sending the computer crashing to the floor. His chest rose and fell like a wild animal’s. “Go get my wife and bring her to me,” S. Gates said.

  Blaine looked at him sympathetically. “Boss, um, maybe you should calm—” Blaine started.

  “Bring her to me now!” he roared so loud Blaine had to plug his left ear with his pointer finger to keep it from ringing.

  “What about the girl? What do you want us to do with her?” Blaine asked.

  “Don’t worry about her right now. Just go get me my wife,” S. Gates said, calmly now. Blaine rushed out of the room without saying another word.

  Once Gates was left alone to himself, he began kicking over chairs and tables, and roaring loudly. He was a man possessed. He had been crossed in the ultimate way and he was going to stop at nothing until his anger was satisfied.

  * * *

  “Please, Silam, you have to believe me. This girl is lying,” Teema begged. She still looked beautiful and completely put together with not one hair out of place.

  Tiana eyed Teema’s perfectly coiffed hair, her expertly applied makeup, and the huge, sparkly canary diamond shining on her finger. She didn’t even need to work at Rollins. She has everything, which means
she just did it to be a sick, twisted, nasty bitch.

  “I have the proof, you lying bitch!” Gates barked. He rushed over and slapped Teema across her face so hard, blood and spit shot from her mouth.

  “Agh! Silam! Please!” she screamed. Teema knew all too well how abusive he could be when he was angry. She’d taken more than one ass whooping from him over the years.

  Tiana smirked. She loved seeing Teema in pain. Even if he killed her after this, Tiana was ready to die now that she knew everyone who had wronged her was dead. She was going to die in peace.

  “He was my half brother, you disloyal bitch. You told me you wanted to work there just so you could get out of the house. The whole time you were fucking him. You fucking piece-of-shit liar!” Gates spat.

  Teema hung her head and sobbed. She knew there was no way out of this so she figured she might as well just tell the truth. “I never loved you! I hated my father for forcing me to marry you! He forced me so he could stay in your father’s good graces in the drug business! I never wanted a man like you, like my own father!” Teema screamed cruelly.

  As Tiana stood there she started to feel sorry for Teema. No! This bitch did some disgusting things to us, Tiana reminded herself.

  “Kill her,” Gates yelled at Blaine. “Kill her!” His voice rose.

  “Please, Silam, don’t do this. We both made mistakes. Let’s just forget about all of this and move on together,” Teema begged.

  Blaine walked over to Teema and put his gun to her head. Teema closed her eyes and took her last breath.

  “Blaine, wait.” Silam put his hand up. “I have a better idea,” he said as he walked over and took the gun out of Blaine’s hand.

  “Oh, thank God,” Teema said, sounding relieved.

  “Tiana!” he said as he walked over toward her and placed Blaine’s gun in her hand. “You kill her.”

  “What?” Teema said with the same scared expression back on her face as she looked back and forth between Tiana, Silam, and Blaine.

  Tiana gripped the gun in her hand and pointed it right at Teema. She couldn’t keep her hands from shaking.

  “Kill her now!” Gates screamed again. He rushed into Tiana like a bulldozer. Startled, Tiana stumbled a little bit.

  “First, tell me why you didn’t kill me at the club. Or at the headstone place. Or when I went away with you,” Tiana said.

  Gates looked at her pitifully. He shook his head from left to right.

  “Why didn’t you kill me all those times you had the opportunity to? You could have just killed me and moved on.”

  “Because I wanted to fuck with your head first. I wanted to make sure you saw your godmother and best friend die. I wanted to make you suffer,” he said with fury and hatred in his voice. “Now kill her before I kill you,” S. Gates whispered. He was trying to hold on to his composure. He lifted his gun and leveled it at Tiana.

  Tiana leveled her gun at Teema.

  “Please! I’m begging—” Teema started.

  Bam! Bam! Two bullets to the temple silenced her. Then, within the blink of a second, she fired the gun again. Bam! Bam! Bam! Silam’s body fell to the floor with two bullets to the chest and smack in the middle of his head. Blaine tried to run to Silam and pry the gun from his dead hand but Tiana shot him down before he could get to it.

  Tiana dropped the gun and fell to her knees. It was all over now. She had survived and was still alive to tell the story. She knew her father and godmother would have been proud of her.

  “Tiana,” she heard her friend calling from a distance.

  “Oh my God, Drake!” she yelled as she ran toward him. Drake could barely move and he was drooling and bleeding from his mouth. She could smell his burned flesh and she couldn’t believe he was still alive.

  “Drake, hold on! You’re going to be okay!” she reassured him as she knelt down beside him.

  “Tiana,” he said again as he struggled to breath.

  “Yes, I’m here, Drake. Just hold on. You have to stay awake, Drake,” Tiana said as she took him into her arms.

  “Tiana,” he said as he looked up at her. “I love yo . . .” Before he could get the last word out, his eyes rolled to the back of his head and he took his last breath.

  “Drake! No! You can’t leave me!” Tiana cried out. “Don’t you fucking die on me! Wake up!” she screamed as she pounded her fists onto his chest. “Wake up! Wake up!” she kept saying as she rocked his body back and forth.

  William P. Rollins Psychiatric Hospital

  Detroit, Michigan

  * * *

  “Wake up! Tiana! Wake up!” Celeste cried.

  “She looks dead!” Izzy said in a panic.

  “Tiana! Wake up! Please wake up!” Celeste cried, and this time she gently shook Tiana’s badly injured head.

  “How could he do this to her and just dump her in here like this? She’s unconscious,” Izzy said, exasperated. “I want this motherfucker to die, I swear.”

  “We have to take turns sitting up and watching her until she wakes up,” Celeste said. She grabbed Tiana’s hand and gave it a soft squeeze. “Just make it through this, Tiana. You have to push through. We need you here. Just wake up and I swear we will get our revenge on this bastard Dr. Syed. We will figure out how to get the fuck out of here and blow his car up. We’ll get all the stuff so you can build a bomb. We’ll do it just like you’ve always wanted. And then we will go after everyone in our lives who has ever hurt us, but you have to make it through this,” Celeste spoke to Tiana softly.

  She looked over at Izzy, who was sitting at the desk across from where Tiana lay. She was slumped over the desk with a pen and a legal notepad. Celeste looked over at Izzy like she was crazy.

  “Our friend is in a fucking coma with no way to get her real help and you’re writing a story?” Celeste snapped.

  “What else do you expect me to do?” Izzy asked as she looked up at her roommate.

  “I don’t know, talk to her, tell her something that might get her to wake up.”

  “Oh, you mean you want me sit there and tell her lies like what you’re doing right now?” Izzy asked.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m not lying to her,” Celeste said, getting defensive.

  “Yes, you are. You’re sitting there telling her we’re going to do all this shit that we’re not ever gonna do in real life. You and I both know we’re not getting out of here and killing anybody,” Elizabeth said.

  Celeste stayed quiet and looked down at her hands. “Call me a liar or whatever you want, but right now I’ll say anything to her if it might get her to wake up.”

  “Look, Celeste, the reality is there’s nothing we can do about any of this right now,” Elizabeth said evenly. “We can complain, scream, and talk all the shit we want, but you and I both know they are not going to come and help her or us. If anything, they’re gonna come and pump us with drugs if we start flipping out, so we might as well just sit quietly and hope and pray that she wakes up,” Elizabeth said as she went back to writing whatever it was that she was writing.

  “Fuck!” she yelled out as she grabbed the book and threw it to ground. “I’m scared, Cee Cee. What if this time she doesn’t wake up?” she asked as the tears streamed down her face.

  “She will fucking wake up,” Celeste said with feeling. “She will wake up!”

  * * *

  Celeste and Elizabeth were forced out of their rooms four times before Tiana awoke. Celeste had just been returned from a “session” with Dr. Syed when she walked into the room and saw Tiana sitting up in her bed.

  “Tiana! You’re awake.” Celeste rushed over to her excitedly.

  Tiana parted a small smile.

  “You have no idea how happy I am to see you up. What have you been dreaming about this whole time? That must’ve been some fucking awesome dream. I thought you would never come out of it,” Celeste asked and answered all in one breath.

  “He has to die,” was the first thing that came out of Tiana’
s mouth.

  “Who? What? How?” Celeste asked, her face folded into a deep frown.

  “Dr. Syed. All of them will die. We will kill them all,” Tiana said with confidence.

  “Listen, your ass been out of it for days. I know we always talk about it, but c’mon, Tiana.” Celeste smiled. “You know there’s nothing we can do. We’re stuck in this ward until they decide to let us back out into the real world.”

  “I’m serious, though! I know how to get us out of here,” Tiana said to her. “It all came to me in a dream. It was a fucked-up dream because you and Izzy both died in it, but the beauty of it is we can change all of that.” Tiana looked over at her friend who just stared blankly at her and didn’t say a word. She knew she sounded a little bit crazy, but she didn’t care.

  “It was all a dream, Celeste; but, trust me, one day it will be a reality. I am going to make sure of that,” Tiana vowed.