Numbers (Laurmani)

five.

"You really did a number on that girl, Mani."

"I had to, you know I don't get physical unless-"

"I know, Normani."

Normani sighed into the phone, glancing out of the viewing window towards the waiting area of the dance studio. Empty, the last families had gone home after her final jazz funk class of the night. She rolled her shoulders to release some of the tension that had settled in her muscles throughout the day. It had been a long day. Granted, she always had long days because the studio was the entirety of her existence, but the lingering thoughts of Lauren, and Camila, and LaurenandCamila had only served as an additional stressor. She was overthinking again.

"Keith, I just want to thank you for going over there." Normani said gratefully. "I know you had to take time out of your patrol shift and all it's just..." Normani trailed off as she shut off the bluetooth stereo system, preparing to close up for the night. It had been a long day. Her  mind had been elsewhere. She was fixated on thoughts of green eyes and pale skin.

"It's no problem. Don't worry about it." Officer Powers laughed lightly. "Just pay me back by letting me take you on a date." He laughed richly now, and Normani nearly cracked a smile at the noise. She'd missed it. It had been so long since the warm cadence wrapped around her. Instead, she scoffed and rolled her eyes as she shut off the lights to the dance room, exiting into the larger studio space.

"This is not the time. We've been over  that, Keith." She said, her voice laced with exasperation.

"You gotta admit, we had a good little thing going on." The officer said softly. "I don't regret any of it." Normani sighed as she peered into the second dance room where Sean had been finishing up a hip hop number. He flashed her a quick "five minutes" gesture as he began his own close-down routine.

"Me neither. I do miss you. Five years is a long time for two people to be together. A year is a long time to not speak." Normani admitted. "But it's just something in the past now." Normani felt a twinge of pain in her chest, reminiscing on high school days, college days. Better days, in many ways. 

"Is it, Mani?" Keith countered. "Is there really no chance left for us? You knew I couldn't be around a lot, I knew you'd be at the studio all day too—"

"I got tired of coming home to an empty apartment, waiting up for you because I didn't know if you'd come home okay."

"But I always came home, didn't I?" The police officer argued. "That's selfish Mani. " Normani's heart sank at his words. He was right. But she had to be selfish. She'd spent too much of her youth wondering if things would be okay for someone else, when she'd spend night after night pulling a pillow over her head to keep from hearing the screaming going on outside of her bedroom door. Too much time worrying. She had no choice but to be selfish.

At the time, it was too much for her to continue worrying into her adulthood. She had to take flight. She left him after a long drawn out conversation one night when he had come home with a gaunt look on his face, tears in his eyes, and blood on his uniform with a simple, 'I had to do it, baby.' By then, enough was enough. She couldn't worry anymore. And yet here she was, worrying yet again over some-

Normani was pulled from her reverie when the man on the other end of the line cleared his throat.

"I know, and I'm sorry." And really, she was. Maybe if she had been the woman she was now, at twenty three, she would have stayed and comforted him that night. But she was nineteen and scared and only just established a life with her high school sweetheart and it wasn't as ideal as it had seemed when she was eighteen throwing her things into her 21 year old boyfriend's beat up Nissan Altima in the middle of the night, praying to God she didn't wake her father.