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Shanti nodded grimly. “Babe, that sounds so shit.”
I swallowed as truth and realization began to unpick the discomfort I’d compressed. “It was kind of fucked.”
Shanti’s eyes were soft now. “Itwasfucked. Not your fault for not seeing it. It’s so easy with him. One second, you’re flirting and the next it’s something else you’re not sure of.”
Chioma rubbed my arm. “Right. He’s a dick, I mean, even without the whole debate thing he’s doing with the Whitewell Knights.” Her normally sweet, placid face grew hard. “I wanna figure out a hex for him. How does he even get away with this?”
“He’s rich, light-skinned, and looks like a Calvin Klein model,” Shanti said, procuring a handful of lollies from her pocket and sticking one into her mouth, before offering them to the rest of us.
Aminah nodded as she tugged the wrapper off a strawberry sphere. “Says ‘diverse people’ instead of ‘Black people.’ He never spoke to any of the Black boys in school. They made an effort to, as well. Did a Mandem 101 course the summer before uni with a couple of cousins and decided to do a rebrand that suited him.”
I smiled as I popped one of Shanti’s lollies in my mouth. “Did you know he once referred to himself as ‘perfectly blended’?”
The girls snorted. Shanti screeched, “Like a fuckingsmoothie?”
Aminah grinned. “Kind of perfect since his brain has no solidity.”
As the girls took turns in delightfully roasting Zack, my phone buzzed and I slipped it out the zipper of my gym leggings.
Kai:Aite. A couple things.
Kai:I tried to make jollof rice for dinner, but I burned it. I think the missing ingredient was a special breed of Scotch bonnet only found in the suburbs of east London. May make your eyes water but the payoff is worth it. Will you come over tomorrow and watch me make it? I feel like your judgmental gaze will force me to be better (as well as you literally being a chef’s daughter).
Kai:In case this wasn’t clear this is a formal invitation for you to have dinner with me tomorrow.
Kai:I just remembered you’re working out with Aminah right now. Tell her hi from me and to accept my ProntoPic request. She’s hurting my feelings. It’s been like a week and a half since I sent it, man. Last week I literally saw her scroll past my request in front of me when we went to the movies with her and Kofi.
I made a sound that was too close to a giggle for comfort.
Shanti’s brow popped up. “That was Malakai wasn’t it?”
I cleared my throat awkwardly. “Yeah, sorry.”
Chioma’s smile was dry. “Why you apologizing? You know what the worst thing about Malakai Korede is? You can’t hate him. Believe me, I tried. I wanted to hate him so bad. But I never had an issue with who heis.I like his aura. Lots of light green in it. He’s sweet. It’s just that he always had a guard up.”
Shanti affirmed that with a rueful nod. “Super thoughtful and attentive, but as soon as you ask something personal his shoulders would get all high and he’d get shifty and itchy and change the subject. I never knew what he was thinking. Every day it was like tryna do some kind of romance sudoku. A peng puzzle. Who has the time? Okay, well, I did, I guess.”
It had been three or so weeks and I’d never once really felt like I had to work to know what was going on in Malakai’s mind, but I still felt a form of the block the girls spoke about, the way he veered away if I asked questions about before he got here, aboutwhyhe was here.
Shanti nodded at Aminah and me as she rubbed the arms of her black bodysuit. Fur gilets looked sexy but weren’t exactly practical when you were straddling the cusp of autumn and winter in an English town.“Look, what you girls doing now? Chi-Chi and I were going to this new dim sum place in town—obviously they have a vegan option—and they’re doing a student discount tonight. Wanna come? Split a cab?”
To my surprise, Aminah jumped in immediately. “Why not? This workout has tired me out and I actually want to hear more about your makeup routine because your beat is immaculate.” She flicked her eyes across Shanti’s face, an everyday look that somehow shimmered,a pretty face that was shaped and pressed in a way that somehow unlocked even more beauty. “Also, I want to know if Chioma can really work out a way to hex Zack.”
I quirked a brow at Aminah and in response she twitched a shoulder and winked. Despite her earlier prickliness, I knew the girls had won her over by their dragging of Zack and their lack of judgment to my hooking up with him.
I smiled as we got up and headed toward the campus gates. “I’m down too. But could we please keep the origin of my and Malakai’s kiss to ourselves? And the whole Zack thing—”
Shanti wrapped her gilet around her and looked me in the eye. “Say less, sis. Secret’s safe with us. Besides, what matters is that what you guys have is real.”
I coughed and made a general sound of assent. My conception of real was growing more confused by the day. I didn’t know what real was anymore.
