Coffee finished my makeup and stepped back.
“There,” she said. “You look perfect.”
I looked in the mirror, smiling at my reflection. “Only because it was done by the baddest,” I said.
She smirked. “Damn right.”
I slipped into my dress while she packed up her makeup brushes.
“What time is Kennedi supposed to be ready?” she asked.
“About an hour,” I said. “She booked her own hair stylist and makeup artist before telling everyone that she didn’t want to be seen until her grand entrance.”
Coffee laughed. “Oh she’s fully in her main character era.”
“She’s downstairs in the guest suite with her team,” I said, adjusting my earrings. “I’m apparently not allowed near her.”
Right on cue, the doorbell rang downstairs.
Coffee raised a brow. “Who is that?”
“That’s Niv,” I said, excited. “Good. I can finally introduce y’all properly. I just texted her to come upstairs.”
Coffee started talking again, but I turned quickly toward her.
“Wait,” I said. “When she comes in… please don’t say anything about Stacks. She doesn’t know.”
Coffee smacked her lips. “I won’t say nothing about you fucking on Stacks girl.”
The bedroom door opened and Niv stepped inside mid-sentence, stopping dead in her tracks.
Her eyes widened slowly as she looked between both of us. “…who the fuck,” she said, “is fucking on Stacks?”
I froze. Coffee froze. And for a solid three seconds, nobody breathed.
Then Coffee slowly turned toward me with the calm of someone who absolutely was not about to save me.
“Well,” she said, folding her arms, “looks like the universe wanted total transparency today.”
I looked exactly like a child who’d just been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.
Niv crossed her arms slowly, staring at me like she was actively fighting the urge to shake answers out of my body.
“Don’t do that,” she said with her hands on her hips. “Don’t look at me with those puppy dog eyes. What the fuck is going on?”
I sighed and sat down on the edge of the bed, suddenly feeling tired. I looked between her and Coffee and knew there was no point trying to dance around it anymore.
So I told her everything. How it started. The first meetup. The conversations. The music. I made it my point to leave out the feelings I never meant to develop. And when I finished, I rubbed my hands together nervously.
“The reason I didn’t tell you is because I know you told me not to do it.”
Coffee rolled her eyes dramatically.
“Yeah,” she said. “And I’m glad I’m no longer the only one carrying this damn secret because she my girl, and I’ma stick beside her… but this shit stressful.”
Niv’s face stayed hard for a moment then suddenly she laughed. It wasn’t an amused laugh, it was more likeI cannot believe this shitlaughter.
“I seen that nigga last week in GunHill when I went to visit my mom,” she said. “And he ain’t say shit.”
