“Send it to me, too. Lord knows I need to give up on trying to squeeze my ass in stuff from three years ago.” Cheyla groaned. Do we have to have a ticket for the gala?”
“I believe so, but I’ll double-check.”
“Okay. Have you talked to Najee?”
Cheyla’s question caught Orielle so off guard, she choked on the orange slice she’d just popped into her mouth. Coughing, she cleared her throat.
“What? Where did that come from?”
“I mean, he’s single now. You can shoot that shot from back in the day again,” Cheyla suggested.
Orielle shook her head. “No. I’m good. I don’t think it’s the right time in my life to get distracted, especially not by him.”
“Plus, he’s going through a heartbreak,” Zoey added.
“Which is the perfect time to be there for him,” Cheyla claimed.
They looked at her like she was crazy, before they all laughed.
“What? It is. You act like I said, settle down with the man and give him babies. I mean, he’d probably give you some since ol’ girl didn’t want to. You did say you always wanted kids, Ori.”
Zoey sputtered a laugh. “You really have no sense.”
“None at all,” Orielle agreed, chuckling. “How’d we go from shooting my shot to having his kids?”
“It was just a thought. Ol’ girl gave her lil’ baby wings, and it wasn’t even ready to fly. Didn’t even give the man an opportunity to play stepdaddy,” she said with a shake of her head.
Orielle and Zoey had tears in their eyes from laughing so hard.
“Cheyla... please shut the hell up. That’s not funny,” Orielle said.
“I’m not trying to be funny. I’m just saying. For real, though... Najee had more restraint than a lot of men would have.”
“Mhm,” Orielle and Zoey hummed, agreeing.
While she had mixed feelings at first about the way he handled Renae’s cheating, Orielle didn’t judge him. She or anyone else in attendance had no room to tell him how to handle disrespect, disloyalty, and betrayal. She’d been in his shoes, and getting hurt by the one who claimed to love you wasn’t a feeling you told someone how to deal with. Had she not already been on her healing journey when she saw Bobby at the yoga studio, Orielle would’ve acted out of character, too.
“The way I would’ve bing bopped her in the head,” Cheyla said, throwing her fist at the screen.
“Seriously!” Zoey laughed. “Would’ve popped her right in the forehead with the mic.”
“Never knew y’all to be so violent,” Orielle joked.
“Girl, yes, you did. The way we were about to jump Bobby’s ass that night. They would’ve had to bail us all out,” Cheyla reminded her.
Orielle smirked. Now that it was in the past, she couldn’t help but laugh when she thought about them going upside his head with their purses. One thing was for sure: her girls always had her back.
“Thank goodness they didn’t,” Orielle said. “But yeah. I’m not trying to get into all that. Y’all know the first situationship after a breakup is really just a rebound.”
“According to who?” Zoey wanted to know. “I swear, people make stuff up just to go against the natural flow of things. So what things didn’t work out, it doesn’t mean things with the next person won’t. Having that attitude will make the relationship feel like you’re a rebound.”
Orielle was quiet. She loved when her friends checked her, reminding her that her outlook on some things was a bit jaded. It didn’t mean that she was incapable of starting over; it was that her perspective had been clouded by disappointment, which is a part of life. It got foggy sometimes, but she had to see it through.
“Oop,” Cheyla chirped, instigating. “I heard that.”
“I heard you, too. I’m just... I don’t know.” Orielle sighed. “I can see myself getting caught up so deeply with him. In him.”
“And there’s nothing wrong with that. Now, I will say to be cautious but not guarded. There’s a difference. Some things and people in life are meant to be felt and experienced on a deeper level. Shallow interactions aren’t for everybody,” Zoey stated.
