𝕞𝕠𝕞𝕖𝕟𝕥𝕤 𝕚𝕟 𝕓𝕖𝕥𝕨𝕖𝕖𝕟 || 𝚅𝚒𝚗𝚗𝚒𝚎 𝙷𝚊𝚌𝚔𝚎𝚛

42. 'i'm not ready to say goodbye.'

Vinnie and I sing, chat and laugh the whole way to the airport. We already spent the last week reminding ourselves to have fun because soon I'll be gone. We were super tragic about it, but we had an awesome week. We spent every day together since I bought my ticket last week. He drove me to the salon and chose to stay with me even when I told him he could leave.

"K, bye." I greeted him as I was about to open the passenger door.

"No, I'm coming with you." Vinnie replied with no hint of irony in his voice.

"What?" I laughed, looking back at him, not understanding if he was serious or not.

"Yeah, I want to stay with you." Vinnie shrugged, like it's not a big deal. I looked at him for a couple of seconds, trying to understand if he's just fucking with me. Vinnie raised a brow at me and that's when I understood he was actually serious.

"Vinnie. I'm going to be there for 5 hours minimum." I told him, almost laughing because I thought about the fact that Vinnie has no idea how different salon days for white girls are from salon days for black girls.

"Why that long?" Vinnie frowned, confused. I couldn't help but laugh as I fell a little bit more for him in that moment.

"It takes time to get braids done, Vinnie." I smiled as I explained to Vinnie. "Plus, I'm getting them really long, so chances are I might be there for even more than 5 hours."

"Well, I still want to be there." Vinnie said.

"I'm sure you have better things to do that sit for that long." I replied. The thought of having Vinnie there with me brought the butterflies in my stomach to life, but I didn't want to feel guilty when he gets bored.

"Well, at three I have to get something in my car changed, but let me stay till then." Vinnie asked. I looked at the time. It was midday.

"You're going to get bored," I warned him as I gave in. "But okay." I sighed and started opening the door.

"Don't act like you don't want me there." Vinnie scoffed as he came out of the vehicle. I didn't turn to look at him because I didn't want him to see the silly smile threatening to spread across my face. Vinnie met me on my side of the vehicle and he wrapped his arm around my shoulder before crossing the street. I looked down so he wouldn't see the silly smile that was definitely now on my face.

He opened the door for me and when I looked up at him to thank him, he ended up seeing the silly smile on my face.

I took a look at the salon Vinnie was somehow able to recommend me and I loved it instantly. It reminded me a lot of my favourite salon back in England. It was small, but there were a lot of workers and the atmosphere was so friendly. A nice young lady met me at the entrance and warmly welcomed me into the salon. She led us to another area of the salon where the hairdressers got the clients' hair done. The young lady showed Vinnie were he could take a seat, which was far but behind the seat she assigned me, so Vinnie and I could see each other through the mirror in front of me. A few minutes after I got my hairdresser, we settled on the hairstyle I wanted, the length and the price and the hairdresser began. I couldn't help but silently giggle every time I lifted my head and my eyes crossed with Vinnie's, who was just watching me like he was in awe. The hairdresser eventually noticed and she chuckled.

"Is he feeding you pasta and lobster?" She asked, sure enough he couldn't hear us.

I laughed. "He's not really my boyfriend."

"Girl," The lady made a face. "What does that mean? Don't let no white man use you."

"It's not like that. He's a good guy, I promise." I said, still laughing as I kept looking at Vinnie in the mirror. "I'm going back to England very soon and I don't want the first period of our relationship to be long distance. So I want to be back before we put a label on it." I was sure if I was white, I would have been blushing by then.