Two days after my revelation, I nervously paced the floor of Aisha's apartment. Every attempt at calling Jibri had failed; I couldn't bring myself to hit the call button. So I settled for a short, concise text message and asked if he would meet me for coffee. Not that I needed anymore energy coursing through me.
"Relax Za." Aisha groaned as she massaged her temples, "I hope you know what you're doing."
I stopped in my tracks and sighed, "I do, it's just a talk for now A."
It was true, I wasn't an idiot- I couldn't fall back into old habits with him, no matter how tempting it may have been to sweep everything under the rug. My goal for our conversation was to get some things off of my chest, I also wanted to listen to what he had to say without anger and alcohol clouding my judgement.
"Remember to take your time, express yourself properly and leave if it doesn't go anywhere within the first thirty minutes." My sister coached me, "Now chill out so that I can do something with your hair, I can't believe you took those twists out."
Aisha had scolded me as soon as she opened her front door, immensely irritated that I'd gotten rid of the style already. When I was just about done with my nervous pacing, she took me into her beauty room and insisted on doing something simple to my hair "while she learned to trust me again", then settled on enhancing the hairstyle that I showed up with by adding extensions.
I chuckled as she continued to mumble as she did my hair, "I was stressed out A, it won't happen again." I assured her while she worked.
"So you say, just sit still." Aisha told me, "Okay, let's go through it again, what are you going to do when you see him?"
I bit the inside of my cheek as I thought about it, "I'm gonna be calm and I'm gonna talk everything through with him. If it doesn't seem to be going anywhere, I'll leave."
"Good girl! Your hair is done, I'll beat your ass if you mess this up Zana." Aisha swung the chair around so that I was facing her.
I waved her off, "I would love to see you try, can you take my picture? I feel pretty today."
Admittedly, I'd put on more makeup than I'd word in a while, but I wanted to look put together. Despite how miserable I was without him, Jibri didn't need to know about it- at least not by just looking at me.
"I wasn't gonna say anything, but you're looking like a model. Even more so now that your hair is done." She couldn't help but add in the last comment.
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"Remember what I said Zana, good luck!" She kissed me on the cheek and walked me to the door. "I'm only a text away if you need an excuse to leave." Aisha winked, then closed the door.
Unlike Mari and Jericho, Aisha wasn't sold on Jibri and I getting back together. Though, I couldn't blame her given the state that I was in after we broke up; I only hoped that Jibri and I would be able to be better together than we were the first time. From what I was able to figure out in our time apart, our relationship had two main issues; alcohol and my impulsivity.
