Eyes Wide Open

Chapter Two

Knock Knock Knock

Morayo had just finished applying the second coat of blue polish to her toenails when someone started to pound on her door. She sighed in exasperation and sat the bottle on her nightstand. Standing up, she carefully balanced on the heels of her feet as she padded over to answer it. She was curious as to who it could be because she knew she wouldn't be seeing Reggie until after her evening class, and Danielle was out with her friends. 

"Yo-Yo, you better be in there! Answer the door!" flowed a dramatic voice, followed by 3 more knocks. Morayo came to a halt in the middle of the room. It had been three days since she had any type of contact with her cousin, and the sound of her voice was causing visuals of her and the man she was with to assault her mind. She may have ruled the chance of it being Reggie out, but that still didn't stop the memory of the images from churning her stomach. I have to delete that fucking video. No sense in keeping it now.

"Hold on, I'm coming," Morayo yelled back, continuing her small trek and snatching the door open. Ayana looked down at her with frustration and rolled her eyes as she pushed her way into the room and commenced her search. Morayo shut the door and stood near it with her hand on her hip as she watched Ayana go into the bathroom and look into the shower and the cabinet beneath the sink, then walk out and wade through her wardrobe. She couldn't hold her tongue anymore as Ayana got on her knees to look beneath her bed.

"Uh, excuse me. What the hell are you doing?" Morayo snapped, staring at her cousin like she was missing a screw. Ayana climbed to her feet, wiping invisible dirt off her black skinny jeans. 

"I was looking for your abductor," she revealed. Morayo laughed, thinking it was a joke but the way Ayana's chestnut brown eyes were staring back unblinkingly let her know she was serious. Her amusement dried up and an incredulous expression replaced it. 

"See," Ayana began, unzipping her bomber jack and sitting down on Morayo's twin sized bed after tossing it to the side. "The only valid explanation I could come up with for your ass going M.I.A. was you being kidnapped. Cause I know, oh, I know that my cousin would not just blatantly ignore my ass for 3 long days and 2 long nights," she finished. 

Despite Ayana's theatrical flare, guilt manifested itself in Morayo as she thought back over her actions. She had isolated herself from Ayana just as much as she did with Reggie those first two days, but what made it even worse was that even after her and Reggie reconciled, Morayo still made no attempt to contact Ayana. Her full lips twitched into a smile and she directed it at her slender cousin, hoping to quell her agitation with it. Ayana only blinked and folded her arms, awaiting clarity. 

"I didn't purposely set out to ignore you, Aya. I just had a lot on my mind that I—" 

"Yeah, yeah. You had a lot on your mind that you needed to sort out. Reggie already gave me that tired excuse. You gotta come better than that," Ayana drawled with a wave of her hand. Morayo's grin lost a bit of it's luster. 

"Reggie? When did you see him?" she questioned, confused as she peeped a fleeting look of unease swirl through Ayana's gaze.

"Oh, Dana had asked me to go over to the Frat house to return a book she borrowed from one of the guys there, and Reggie was coming in on my way out." Morayo recognized the name as one of the girl's pledging for the same sorority Ayana was. 

"Why couldn't she do it herself?" She pushed the suspicion that tried to climb it's way up back down and focused on Ayana as she picked at the fabric of the purple comforter Morayo had on her bed.