Blacks And Blues

1| Lagos Roads and First Day Jitters

Clutching her water bottle in one shaky hand, Gina clicked on her WhatsApp with her other hand and as expected, Madison started the group video call before her.

She shook her head, smiling a bit as she joined the call. She lifted her phone up at chin length and stared at the pale face of her best friend.

"Hey girl!"

How Madison managed to be chirpy at this ungodly hour was beyond Gina. It was just one o'clock in Oklahoma and here she was practically screaming in Gina's face like it was daytime. At least it wasn't over there.

"Oh my God, Madison, how can you be so alive at this time of the day? Well, night."

Gina still felt drowsy and it was six hours later in Lagos. She couldn't appreciate Madison's loudness at the moment with the sleep still clawing at her own eyelids, but who was she to complain? She literally begged her friends to have this video call with her before her first day at her new school. In another state. On an entirely different continent.

Lagos's wide expressway was fairly traffic-free at seven o'clock in the morning but there were already a good number of cars already speeding away to their different locations.

Gina's mom had been so anxious to beat the traffic and get them to school early that she made Gina and her older brother Matt get up at five that morning.

Gina already hated her new school. They'd made it essential for all students to be at school on or before seven thirty. She was horrified at the thought of waking up this early everyday for the rest of the term.

Madison laughed at Gina's sour expression.

"You better get used to this quickly or your gonna be in trouble every single day."

"I know, I know. I'm working on it. But the time difference is still hard to get used to." Gina yawned rubbing her sleepy eyes.

She looked beside her and snorted. "Well, at least I managed to stay awake."

She turned her phone screen to the left so that Madison could also see Matt, passed out cold against the car door and they both laughed.

He'd been stumbling around like a zombie since their mom woke them this morning. She'd had to wake him up a couple more times too or he would have face-planted into his breakfast of hot pap.

Chloe then joined the video chat, yawning as she came.

"I swear to God, I don't know how you'll do this. You fell asleep just an hour before us yesterday night at ten and now you're awake again. Must be hard." Her Mexican accent was slurred with sleep.

"You have no idea," Gina told her sighing.

"If it were me I'd probably sleep in on the first day of school."

Madison laughed at her. "And risk a detention on your very first day?"

"Well, at least it's better than dying of sleep deprivation. Your mom is crazy to force you into this."

Gina's eyes almost popped out of her head and she quickly glanced at the back of her mom's head popping out of the the passengers' seat which was two seats away. Luckily, she was scrolling through her phone and seemed not to notice. It also helped that the radio was blasting Nigerian songs at a very loud volume.

"Chloe!" Both Madison and Gina scolded.

"My mom's in the front seat, you idiot!" Gina whisper-yelled at Chloe. She fished inside her bag for her earphones and plugged it in so her mom won't hear her friends voices. Bringing the microphone to her lips, she whispered to her friend. "Can you not get my phone seized? She doesn't know I brought it."