Lelani was sick and tired of being a Good Girl.. while contemplating on changing her "image", she meets 20 year old, Damari Thomas. Will he make it easier for Lelani to be herself? Or will he bring out the side that no one ever expected to see?
I bob my head to the music blasting through my headphones as i walked home from school. I can't believe that I'm finally a senior, i thought to myself. I've honestly been waiting for this since 9th grade.
I loved school, but I didn't have time for all of the drama that came along with it. Girls arguing and fighting at 7 am? Get me the fuck up outta here.
As soon as i walked into my house, I heard laughing coming from upstairs. Milan was still out doing who knows what, and JJ was at work, so it had to be Alana.
Ever since our mother died of cancer 5 years ago, Alana has been like a mother figure to all of us.
She worked her ass off and now she's in Spelman's pre med program. Along with her love for the medical field, Alana is a bomb ass MUA and hairstylist. When i say SCALPEDDD, what lace?
I walked upstairs to her room to find her and Dawayne swapping blunts, just dying. Dawayne was her gay best friend. He let her do absolutely anything to him, and this is where most of their high escapades led them.
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One of them looking like a damn fool.
They were always weirdos, ever since high school. They met in 9th grade and were inseparable ever since.
Dawayne was majoring in civil engineering at Morehouse, and he did a little photography on the side.
I stood looking at them smiling, hoping that one day I'd have an awesome friendship like theirs.
"You smilin at me like you wanna turn me or sum" , Dawayne chuckled, looking up at me and then back down at the blunt in his hand. "Ooooh, na. You want some of this preshaaaa."
This nigga could never be serious.
"Boy don't even waste the weed like dat. You know good and damn well my little angel ain't hitting it." Alana spoke slowly while giggling.
I was a little offended by it, but i shrugged it off cause she was right. I was not hitting that shit. These mfs were outta their minds right now, and I never wanted to feel like i wasn't in control of myself.
Never got drunk, never got high. Lame right? I don't give a fuck.
I started to walk out of the room, but Dawayne began to speak again calling me back.
"So remember how i told y'all my mama got 2 other kids?" Me and Alana nodded. "Well my older sister, Damani, told me that she was moving down here and bringing my little brother with her. We all gone be living together."
He said, with this big ass smile on his face. I gave him a huge hug, telling him how happy i was for him and how major this is.
Dawayne lived with his father for majority of his life. His mother was a white woman who grew up in Northern Georgia. She had abandoned him when he was 7 years old.
"You're getting too dark for me and my family won't support you anymore so you have to go live with your nigger ass daddy. And stop putting on my fucking heels you little faggot!"She slapped him so hard that he could taste blood in his mouth.
Dawayne was very much shocked. He wondered how his mom knew he went through her clothes. A million thoughts ran through his mind, like bitch why are you fucking black men if you hate us so much, definitely a personal problem, hejoked to himself. No matter how bad things got, he always kept himself laughing.
He moved with his father and life itself was good, but he grew up hating the skin that he was in. His older sister held a fair complexion and so did his baby brother, so why did God have to curse him?
He started having suicidal thoughts at around 11, hallucinations that white people were coming to kill him because of his skin.
His father found him curled up in a ball one night under his bed. Dawayne let out his feelings, bawling. His father was lost for words but the next day, he told Dawayne a piece of a famous poem.
"Cut through the years was my black skin Running with tears was my black skin I hold you dear my black skin .
My black skin till the day I die Will lead my people beyond the cries For a world that's true and a time that right On bended knee I'll win my fight"
- paul trotter
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"Son, people will hate you until you die. They won't think about what your favorite thing to do is, how smart you are.. they'll put you in this category and stomp on your face just because they feel like they can. Fuck them. We as people came too far for you to be hating your skin. You are beautiful. Inside and out. Your skin is the reason that the sun shines so bright. Because it knows that you can harbor it's light and shine even brighter. I love you. And I don't give a fuck about you being gay. If you like niggas, i love em."
His father let out a big, hearty laugh.
This very moment is exactly why Dawayne is what he is today. Proud and unbothered af.
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