Imagining Us

Ch.12

Before the train came to a stop, Esi had already packed away her laptop and binders. She grabbed her weekender bag, ready to disembark and take the short walk to catch the N train to Astoria where her friends lived.

She would reach their apartment by at least 10:00 am.

Alicia had to go into work, but she knew that Lauren would be waiting for her. She had opted to take a bus then walk to the apartment instead of Lauren coming to pick her up.
She knew the woes of parking in New York.

By some unknown strength along the journey, she'd manage to avoid responding to Porte. She hoped that he wouldn't notice that she was online and think that she was avoiding him.

Esi did plan to respond, but she just needed to give her heart a small break—to let it come back to terms with her more logical mind.
She did respond to other messages, especially from her ever insistent family.

Her brother Kofi, who had a rare day off from working at the hospital, teased her with a video of a steaming plate of jollof rice. She replied with an emoji showing a drooling expression and the word 'so jealous'. 

As soon as he sent her that video, a text came in from her cousin Afia with a picture of most of her father's side of the family at lunch. Her grandmother was visiting them in England from Ghana, and she knew that the in-law's had to be up to their necks with her.

As much as she loved her grandmother Abena, she knew that sometimes, she could be a lot, and as the matriarch, she sometimes got away with doing and saying what she wanted. Her food made up for her behavior, and right now Esi wished that she was there with them.

She was pulled out of her musings by the jostling of passengers entering and leaving the bus. She clutched her bag to her lap to avoid it being in anyone's way.

There was just one more stop before she reached the Crescent Street apartment block. Then, she would take a short walk down to the brownstone building.

The bus came to that final stop, and she excused her way out.

The trip had made her a bit tired, but she tried to muster up some energy since she knew that her friends would be excited to see her.
~~~~

"I told Lo that you were going to be knocked out."

Esi's eyelids fluttered open to the bleary image of someone leaning over her. She rubbed her eyes and stretched as her eyes adjusted to the light. A smug-faced Alicia, still wearing her work suit, stood over her.

"Hello to you too," Esi replied huskily, her voice still laden with sleep.

"Alicia, let her rest. She's been up since the crack of dawn." Lauren quickly came to her defense. Esi sat up on the pull out couch to prepare herself for what was coming next. Alicia launched herself on Esi with a big hug.

"Ooof,"Esi groaned as she felt the impact of Alicia's hug. Her friend had always been like this. Such a force of nature with so much life and energy. Ever since she realized that Esi wasn't much of a hugger, she'd made it her life's mission to "ease" her into the act.

Launching one's self at someone constantly is not how you ease someone into hugging, but Alicia's experiment seemed to be working.

She tapped her hand on the bed to indicate to Alicia to get off of her.

"Ok. Okayyyy." Esi wheezed out.

Alicia reared up her head and looked down at Esi. She brought her left hand up to squeeze her cheeks. Esi tried to bat away her hands.

"It's as if you don't learn," Alicia mused. "The quicker you hug me...the quicker I get off of you."

Esi turned her head slightly towards the kitchen where Lauren stood. She pleaded for help with her eyes, and Lauren shrugged and shook her head helplessly.

"You know how she is."

So, Esi acquiesced and hugged Alicia.

"There she is," her friend crooned and began to pat her head approvingly.

"Oh get off me!" Esi rolled over and pushed Alicia off the side of the couch. Her athletic limbs flailing in the descent.

"How rude," Alicia huffed.

She picked herself off of the ground and settled in the corner of the couch. Lauren came over and they sat for over an hour catching up on the past year, and gossiping about old college classmates.

She knew that Alicia recently started dating Jamie, a chef originally from Georgia, and the new relationship seemed to be going well from Alicia's perspective. She told Esi that they would meet him at the comedy club after dinner tomorrow.

A strange look came over Lauren's face as she listened to Alicia speak about Jamie.

Did she think that the relationship was moving too fast?

Or did she think that Jamie wasn't good enough for Alicia.

Esi often wondered about Lauren and the significant change that she made in her life moving to New York. She was originally from the South, and grew up in a fairly traditional household.
The bond between Lauren and Alicia surprised her because not only were their personalities on completely opposite ends of the spectrum, their backgrounds were also completely opposite.

She remembered how Lauren used to hang on to Alicia's every word and that culminated in them moving in together.But even now, Esi could sense that something was botheringLauren, and she made a mental note to  make some time to ask her this weekend.

She turned to the girls. "So, what do you have planned for me tonight?"

Alicia leaned forward. "We thought that we'd just hang inside. Binge a show or a movie. And of course, if you don't mind...I want to tackle that hair."
Esi frowned and  consciously touched her hair. "Tackle? What's wrong with my hair?" The attention to her hair reminded her of Porte's attention to it.
"I didn't say that anything was wrong with it...I just miss playing with it, and coming up with fun styles."

Esi knew that already. When they used to live together, on some weekends, they used to have movie nights on Fridays where Alicia would braid their hair while they watched some crazy rom-com or action movie.

It was a time to debrief about their week and share in their struggles.

Esi knew that those times together were what strengthened their friendship, and she was glad that they were able to still hold on to and continue those moments.