Life of Jiji

[41]

Life Of Jiji

All Rights Reserved

©2021 Tena Ifiemi

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baby, you make me crazy - sam smith ♪

baby riddim - fave ♪

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"Jiji! Time isn't waiting for you dear." Mom called out and I groaned at my reflection in the mirror.

I never spend this much time in front of the mirror. I barely even look at it at all but here I am. After the third failed attempt, I just sighed and brushed my baby hairs back.

"I'm almost done!" I yelled back as I tried to decide between Airforce 1s and sandals, unsure whether she'd even hear me.

When I finally got downstairs, I didn't see mom but TJ was there. He had a suspicious look on his face as he told me that mom was waiting in the car. I nodded nervously and hurried out, tucking my phone into my bag. Mom had told everyone that she was taking me for a get together with my friends but she hadn't mentioned which friend. So why was my brother looking at me like that?

It's probably not that deep.

"I was about to leave you." My mom said as I got into the front seat. She was tapping at her phone so I wasn't sure whether she was pissed at me or not but I hope not.

"I'm the reason you're going out, mom." I laughed nervously, toying with my bag.

Mom looked at me and smiled, "Right."

I smiled back.

Mom and I had talked later that night and of course she was worried. She had walked in on me randomly crying and I had blamed it on onions that weren't even there.

I'm your mother, Ji. You can tell me anything.

That statement hurt every time I heard it because I couldn't believe it. She said it four times that night. Wasn't dad my father? I refuse to believe that dropping my issues on anybody would be a sensible thing to do...that I could tell anyone anything. What help was it going to provide anyway? It wasn't going to rewind time or somehow end the random nightmares. All it was going to do was cause problems.

So I lied; it seems I'm getting quite good at that because I'd like to believe it didn't even sound like a lie. It just kind of flowed through me. I started by saying that it wasn't anything serious and that it was stupid but of course she said to tell her anyway so I went on to tell her that I don't have friends and nobody talks to me at school.

I might have gone too far with that but it was the first thing I thought of.

She said that she's sure that people want to be friends with me but I'm just really quiet and they're probably scared that I'd snub them if they try to talk to me. Her opinion made sense but the story was just a cover up and I consider myself to be friends with a few people like Khadijah, Mide, Mitchel, Zainab and well, Damian and even Dianne.

After we got that part settled, I decided to make my request. I've never asked my mom to drop me off for an outing before so it's safe to say that I was nervous. Plus, it was quite contradicting considering I had just said that I didn't have friends.

"Mummy, remember that boy that you met on one of my visiting days?" I finally say after making my mom wait in anticipation for what I wanted to say. I had been stuttering for the past five minutes so her patience was commendable.

She scrunched up her face in an attempt to remember, "Umm... Can you maybe describe him?"

I hoped she didn't see me blush at her request. She literally told me to describe the boy I like!