Chapter 3
Taleya
“Where is it?” Aasha asks as she barges into my living room.
“Well, hello to you too, hoe,” I scoff playfully.
“Hey,” she says, waving me off. “Where’s the damn box?” she repeats.
“On the table,” I utter, still perplexed. “You want a drink? ’Cause I need a drink.”
“Hell yeah,” she says excitedly. “We need to drink to this.”
Our reactions to the exquisite gold box—and its contents—that was delivered to me last night are vastly different. Whileshe’s excited and anxious, I’m bewildered and just…I don’t know.
Who would send me this and why?
As I venture to my little bar in the corner of my kitchen nook, she plops onto my sofa and examines the box. As she opens it, I grab the bottle of tequila. I’m just a VIP server at Black Diamonds, bartender isn’t on my resume or in my skillset. After opening this box, however, I’m pretty sure I can whip up something strong enough to process this shit.
’Cause what the entire fuck!
Tequila, grenadine, and a splash of pineapple juice mixed and poured over ice has to suffice because it’s all I can come up with. The bonus is that it’s strong enough to untangle my mind and sweet enough to mask its potency. It’s perfection.
“Bitch, Seventh-muthafucking-Heaven. I have wanted to go there forever and you know it, but I could never just get up the nerve to go. But this, this is some baller shit right here,” she says as she pulls out the beautiful red mask, black wristband, and black and gold little electronic device. “Okay, I need every detail, step by step.”
As she listens with her damn ears glued to my every word, I repeat the very words I told her just thirty minutes ago on the phone, the very words that caused her to hop into her car and drive over here.
“When I was downstairs getting my stuff out of the locker, Monae called me into her office. I got my shit and went. She was sitting at her desk with a gold box on it. All she said was that a private courier had dropped it off for me. I grabbed it and came home. It was after three and I was tired as fuck, so I went to sleep. I opened it just now, and boom. This and the letter,” I tell her.
“Where’s the letter?” she asks.
“Oh, right here.” I turn and lift the bag from my floor, pulling the letter out and handing it to her.
“I don’t dream about much but when I do, they all come true. Please join me at Seventh Heaven Saturday evening because my current dream is you. Wear this mask, beautiful, and be there at six. I’ll find you,” she reads aloud, then again in a whisper. “Bitch! This some smooth ass shit,” she says when she looks up.
“I know right,” I admit aloud and sigh because it is smooth as fuck. Hell, all of it is: the private courier, the gold box, the words, all of it. I have to give credit where credit is due. So for a moment, I relish in that and allow myself to fantasize. As many questions as I have, there’s no denying I’m curious as hell and actually contemplating going. So I simply ask, “What if I go?”
“Yes! That’s my bestie. Yes! Go!” she encourages.
“I’ll have on the mask so no one would recognize me, right?” I ask.
“Right and we can put your hair up to help you look different too,” she adds.
“That’s what I’m thinking. And if he’s some creep or I see him and I’m not attracted, I can ditch him and just see what all the hype is about. Hell, maybe get into something else.”
“Exactly. If there’s no attraction, thank his ugly ass for the free ticket and bounce on him,” she says, always with my shits.
“But if he’s fine and I’m feeling him, I?—”
“Wait, and a baller like I suspect. Throw that in there too,” she interjects.
“Okay. If he’s fine, I’m feeling him, and he’s a baller… I can say fuck school, clinicals, and these upcoming exams, and let that man knock my damn head into the mattress,” I say and we both fall out laughing.
“Do they even have mattresses there?” she asks through laughs.
“Bitch, yes. There’s an actual hotel on the top floor and beds on other floors. It’s all on the map.”
“There’s a map?” she asks, intrigued.
