Whirlwind

3 - Fall 2009

[Lamarr]

"Yo Cole, I don't think this is a good idea man..."

My heavy eyes were glued on the soundboard ahead of me as I paid not an ample amount of attention to the conversation these niggas were having. Their words were literally falling on deaf ears and only mattered to themselves as they blathered them back and forth between each other. Although the conversation concerned me, the root of it all, I didn't think it was any of their business or necessary for them to give all this extra input that was useless to begin with. They didn't know her like I did, so how could they tell me how to be while I was with her?

After meeting O's cousin Riley a few months ago the two of us hit it off pretty nicely. Everything about her was a breath of fresh air, so it took no time for us to grow close and for her to become one of the people I consider a friend. Even with the constant reiteration to these niggas that she was in fact just my friend, I found myself defending our relationship in some type of hope they'd shut the fuck up. They never did though, and they never would.

If any of them made some kind of sense though it was bound to be Ibrahim. He was like this voice of reasoning when he wasn't being irrational himself. I had my moments where I wouldn't give a damn what others had to say and just did what instinctively felt right, but he would be sure to somehow get me thinking before I acted. Most of the time he only interfered when it came to the music and this label we were currently getting up and running, but today, just as these other guys did, he gave his opinion on my personal life. It wasn't nothing too personal or complicated about this shit though. Riley and I were just friends.

"I thought you knew better than to tag team me with these niggas about something that shouldn't even be a discussion?" I finally budged into all the commotion to rhetorically ask. Ib cut his eyes in my direction and pursed his lips together, right before he fixed them to argue against me.

"Come on fam, you know damn well you don't have any business kicking it this hard with a woman who ain't Mel," He said while leaning against the soundboard, tossing his half empty Gatorade bottle up. "That's a set up, plain and simple."

"But I kick it with Camille and Yoli this heavy,"

"Nah bro, you don't." I squinted my eyes over towards Ced who felt that this was the perfect time to add his two cents. He kept his attention fixated on his piece of shit ass Lenovo that none of us were ever sure what he was always doing on that thing, but I put five on it that he was watching porn all day.

"Dawg, who even asked you?" I mumbled as I stopped the track that was currently playing. All I wanted to do was spend my time making some beats and writing new lyrics, but I couldn't catch any type of break. Now that Ib brought up Melanie, I knew this conversation would be prolonged, I just knew it.

"Ced is right though - for once in his life," Ib joked, causing everyone in the room to laugh. That only caused Ced to finally look up and flick us all off. "Better yet, how about we ask Omen what he thinks when he comes back. I'm sure what he has to say is way better than what we got."

"Man, you niggas buggin'. O doesn't care because there is no reason to."

"He don't know that y'all been hanging with each other this heavy, huh?" Ib's question lingered into complete silence as he titled his head and stared back at me. Discomfort began to swallow me whole, and had me answering with awkward body language; me literally removing my fitted cap to uneasily rub by freshly cut fade. "Cole..."

"What?" I shot back. "He doesn't know and there's no reason to because we–"

"We're just friends!" They all sang in unison like they were a choir or some shit. I just stood up from my seat, pushing it behind me and glared back at them wildly. They were really in here ganging up on me.