Brown Sugar

8

Finally, a taste of freedom. My car privileges had been returned and I was allowed to go to the mall with my girls. We needed to go homecoming dress shopping.

I still unfortunately hadn't received my electronics. I wanted my phone, I just wanted to talk to Xabrien. I wanted to let him know I was okay, and I wanted to hear about how his days were going.

I missed him.

"Nadia you should pick find two dresses, just in case Xabrien ask you to their homecoming," Raven suggested.

"He won't ask me to their homecoming. He probably isn't interested in my anymore. We haven't talked in like a week," I shook off the thought of Xabrien even wanting to be bothered with me anymore.

He was probably talking to some other girl by now. One monkey don't stop the show. I was well aware of that after Brandon got a new girlfriend the day we broke up. Even though everyone insisted that they'd been talking while Brandon and I were together. I was just too accustomed to men moving on from me quicker than I expected them to. I wasn't that significant to him.

"That's not your fault though. Things happen, and you can talk to him. I He might be understanding," Janelle assured me.

"Well if he asks me, I'm going to their homecoming. And not ours," I said with a shrug.

"Damn, you just gone leave us hanging?" Janelle asked, her face dropped a little.

"I don't have the money to buy two dresses. I'm on a budget. And I'm on probation," I reminded them. "If I had the opportunity to be with him, and be shown off, I'd jump at it. I think we match each other."

"What color are you thinking on?" Raven asked brushing off my last statement and returning to the rack.

"I kinda wanna wear black, but I also really wanna wear red or something like that," I said as I followed suit and returned to the rack, looking behind the larger sizes for potential hidden gems.

"We should all do a certain color. I'll be white. Cause I really wanna wear white or a nude color," Janelle said picking up a beige dress. I hated when she tried to be pushy and make decisions for the rest of the group, we often never agreed with the things she wanted.

"Well, I don't know what color I wanna wear. I just wanna wear whatever looks good on me," I said, rethinking my previous statement when my hand ran across a beautiful white and gold accented dress.

"Same," Raven added her opinion, causing Janelle to turn her nose up at us.

"So, what, it doesn't matter if we wear the same color?" Janelle asked, obviously irritated that we didn't want to follow her suit.

"No girl. We'd be popping in the same color. Long as we don't wear the same dress," Raven laughed at her annoyance while holding up an all black dress.

I scrunched my nose up at it and she pushed it back on the shelf. Dress shopping was hard and irritating. I ultimately walked out of the store with a glittery gold dress that had the sides cut out and white strips. I went with a pair glittery gold heels to match it. I used Raven's phone to send my parents a picture of my selection to avoid having to hear any unwanted opinions they might give when it was too late.

I was exhausted, and tired of being around my friends. We stopped in the food court, then headed outside to my car. I loved them to death but at times it got annoying being their ride everywhere they wanted to go. I felt like their personal uber at times.

We all got into the car and I plugged my phone into the aux, playing some Jhene Aiko. Low enough so that we can still have a conversation if anyone wanted to, but loud enough that the music could still be enjoyed.