Love Me (Normani)

Chapter 6

Normani stretched out in her bed and checked her phone as usual. She had a text from the girl she had met the day previous.

Dinah: hey dawg, this seems forward i know, but I'm free today if you wanna hang out?
Normani: sorry, not today.
Dinah: oh, well, that's okay. maybe next time?
Normani: maybe.

Normani didn't feel like hanging out with anyone today. She just wasn't in the mood. "Normani?" Her father knocked on the door. "Come in Dad!" "Hey, breakfast is ready. How are you today?" Normani smiled sleepily. "I'm fine." "You did really well Friday night at the show babygirl, your Mom and I are so proud of you." "Thanks Dad." "So are you coming down?" "Yeah just give me a minute to brush my teeth. I'll be down in a bit." Her father ruffled her already messy hair and smiled. "Alright then." He promptly went downstairs, and Normani pulled herself out of bed.  She wasn't as fatigued as she had been, but still a little. "Honey, you've barely touched anything on your plate." "I'm just not feeling too well." Normani mumbled, staring into space. "May I be excused please?" "Sure." Her mother said before taking a bite of her eggs. "Just make sure you eat something later." Her father said, taking a large bite of his toast. "Thanks." Normani got up and went to her room. Normani, no matter how tired she felt, wanted to do something. Then she remembered Dinah had texted her.

Normani: don't suppose you're still free to meet up?
She waited a few minutes for a reply.
Dinah: I am actually, meet you at the park in 30 mins?
Normani: alright.

Normani was in sweats, but she didn't think it mattered. She was comfortable, and they were only going to the park. It wasn't like they were that different to her dance clothes. Almost the same actually. Normani decided to leave the house early, she could use a walk. "You off out?" Her father asked, lifting his eyes from his book when he saw movement. "Yeah. I'm going to meet a friend." "Who?" Her mother asked. "I just met her yesterday, her name is Dinah." "Only yesterday?" Her father questioned. "Derrick, let the girl have some fun." Her mother said stiffly, and suddenly the atmosphere was uncomfortable. Normani noticed especially. "Alright." The man said begrudgingly. "Have fun, be careful." "Yeah, see you later." The girl said cautiously. Her mother smiled. "Oh! What time will you be home?" She called out to her hurriedly. Normani only shrugged her shoulders and shut the door behind her. She inhaled slowly and looked up at the sky. It was bright blue with nearly no clouds, and silent. She started walking, taking the long route and bumped into someone, hard, she was distracted, but apologised to the person profusely. "It's alright." The woman reassured before moving along to wherever she was heading. Normani sat on the bench, waiting. She was on her phone, doing nothing in particular before she saw Dinah up ahead. The girl smiled widely and sat next to her new friend. "Hi!" She beamed. "Hi." Normani smiled gently. Dinah's smile turned to a frown. "What's up with you?" She meant it in a friendly way, but it probably didn't come out as such. "Nothing." Normani said defensively. "Right, well, what do you want to do?" Dinah asked. "Is it weird to ask to just sit here? For a bit." Normani asked in a soft, almost scared voice. Dinah wrapped an arm over her shoulders, which Normani allowed the girl to do as she leaned into her side. "No, we can do that." The two didn't do much while they sat there, Normani was resting, leaning on Dinah, her eyes closed, and Dinah was just watching her. Normani could feel eyes on her, but she didn't care. In fact, it was quite flattering. "Thank you." Normani mumbled. "For what?" Dinah asked her, a little taken aback Normani had spoken. "Meeting me, and being so nice." "That's what friends are for." Dinah said sweetly. Normani looked up and smiled. "Yeah, yeah I guess so." "I don't have a time I gotta be home. So I can stay with you however long. I am kinda hungry though." Normani looked up and smiled shyly at the girl. "We can get food if you want." "Okay, uh, what about that cafe over there?" Normani's eyes followed over to where Dinah was pointing and she shrugged. Wherever worked. "Sure." Normani didn't feel hungry enough to eat, so she just got a bottle of water. Dinah noticed this, but she didn't say anything about it. It was too early to assume anything. She'd just met the girl for God's sake. "You wanna talk about anything?" Normani looked up and shook her head awkwardly. "I don't feel well today." "I can take you home again if you want." Normani shook her head. "It's fine. I want to be out." "Well okay." Dinah said, clearly bewildered, but she didn't question it. She had no right, yet at least. "You did really great in the show the other night. No way I could have done that stuff, but you aced it." Dinah said, trying to lift her spirits. I could have done so much better. "Thanks." Normani replied instead. "What's wrong?" Dinah asked, reaching over the table, putting a hand over Normani's instinctively. Normani looked at their hands and pulled back. The action hurt Dinah, but she sat up and acted like it hadn't. "Can I ask a favour?" Normani asked. "Of course." She wanted to ask without hurting the girl, but she wasn't sure there was a way around it. "If you don't mind, will you take me to see Lauren?" "She's not home right now, she's still at softball practice." "Please Dinah I need to see her." Normani said seriously. I need to hug her. Dinah nodded reluctantly and held her hand out for her to take. Normani looked at her hand and took it hesitantly as she lead them both out. Minutes later, the girls were at the school field and Dinah said her goodbye. "Thanks for today." Normani said awkwardly. "I didn't do anything much Mani." Dinah chuckled nervously. "You did, you were there. So thank you." Dinah smiled gently and squeezed her hand. "You're more than welcome. Heads up! Laurenza!" Lauren looked up at the nickname and smiled. "Back in 5 guys! Keep practicing your batting, it needs some more work!" Due to Lauren being the captain of the softball team, no one took offence. "Hey. What's up Dinah?" "Sorry to interrupt practice, Mani asked me to meet up and then to bring her here to see you." Lauren looked behind her to see Normani looking at her feet. "Oh. Well is she okay?" Lauren furrowed her eyebrows with worry. "Honestly, I don't know." "Why? What do you mean?" "I don't know her, but she's not acting like I would imagine she normally would." Lauren looked back at her friend and nodded to Dinah. "Okay, I'll take care of it. Thank you for bringing her here." "I was hesitant cause I know you were doing softball today." "No it's alright. I can see this is important, you did the right thing." Dinah smiled and nodded. "Okay, see you later." "Uh huh, later Dinah." Dinah left and Normani looked up when the tall, caramel skinned girl walked past her. Lauren walked over and smiled warmly. "Hey Mans." The dark skinned girl looked at Lauren but she couldn't pin point what she was thinking. "I know it seems stupid, the fact I came all this way for it, but can I have a hug?" Lauren found it strange, but wrapped her arms around the girl's waist nevertheless. She felt Normani slowly nestle her head into her neck as she wrapped her arms around Lauren's shoulders. "Sorry." Normani whispered, no specific meaning behind her apology. "Why? What's the matter?" "I'm scared." Lauren frowned at the way her voice shook and moved her hand up to stroke her hair soothingly. "Why are you scared babe?" "Can I stay with you tonight? I don't want to be by myself." "Sure. Of course you can. Why don't you go home, grab some stuff, tell your parents while I finish up here." Normani swallowed and nodded. Lauren watched her for a minutes, rubbed her shoulders and smiled gently. "I'll pick you up after practice, okay?" "Okay." "See you in an hour." "Okay." Normani repeated shakily. Lauren went back to her team, distracted as she thought of her friend. Something was off with her, she just didn't know what. "Okay uh, sorry..guys." She recovered herself to some degree. "Rogers!" "Yeah!" The boy turned around "Pitch to Thomas, lemme see how you've all been doing!" Lauren looked back to check and Normani was gone, presumably going to pack her things. "Yo Captain, you good?" Her teammate and friend Lucy asked. "Yeah, I'm fine." Lauren smiled to cover up her anxiousness. Normani went inside and looked around for her parents, but it seemed they weren't in. At least that's what she thought until she saw something fly across the room and smash. She ducked down and tried to avoid any smashed glass. Normani decided it was best to simply leave her presence in the house unknown to the two and just sneak upstairs. Normani gathered all of her clothes and things together and decided after she heard some arguing downstairs, to climb out the window. Camila had bought her a rope ladder and she kept it under bed, she had no other alternative but to hide it in a bush. It's not like anyone would or wouldn't notice it anyway. Lauren appeared on the road and stopped her friend by the arm as she ran away from her house. "Hey, Normani, where are you going?" Normani turned around to look at Lauren and sighed. "Nowhere, can we go to yours?" Lauren nodded. "Of course. Listen I'm starving, practice took it out of me. You mind if we grab something to eat on the way?" Normani shrugged and followed Lauren. "You're quiet." Lauren spoke. "I'm not. Hungry I suppose, I'm fine Lo." Normani said. Lauren smiled and giggled. "At least we can get food in our systems now." "Yep. Can't wait." Normani said, hiding the uneasiness in her tone. She felt hungry and yet sick to her stomach at the same time. Was that normal? "Mani." "Huh? What did you say?" "You zoned out on me, I said what do you want to eat?" "I don't mind." Normani said. Lauren saw the nearest place that sold food and pulled the girl into it. While Lauren scanned the food items on the menu, Normani found herself scanning the calories in each item. "Mani, you know your order?" "Uhm, no. Just order for me." Lauren nodded and told her to take a seat since she'd had a long few weeks. Normani thought she'd be fine with anything put in front of her, but she saw the tray of food and froze. How many calories are in that load? How much sugar in Coca Cola? "Normani? You said you were hungry, it's gonna get cold if you don't start eating now." Normani looked at her burger and just picked it up, examining it unusually. As if it were a foreign object, or a foreign food. Lauren watched her curiously. She watched her friend take a small bite and then continue to eat the burger with a satisfied smile on her face. Lauren was reassured. She smiled too. Normani was fine. She was just being stupid. Everyone always told her she worried too much. "Is your food good?" Normani nodded as she drank some of her drink. "I'm finished." Normani announced, her tray empty and her cup the same. "Okay, back to mine we go." Back at Lauren's, the two girls were in Lauren's room watching a movie. But Normani couldn't shake the thoughts in her head. Her father's past words and notes about calories, she looked at her stomach hesitantly. Was it always this..plump? It looked bigger than she remembered the last time she saw it. But then she didn't tend to look at her body, now that she did. She felt rather uneasy about it. Oh god, imagine all the calories in that last meal. She felt sick. That was it. All she had to do was throw up. Normani got up and Lauren watched her walk to the bathroom. She locked the door. She figured she hadn't peed in a while and ignored her movements as Coraline came on the screen again. Normani had never done this before. What did she do? She knelt there on the floor, puzzled. How did people do this? She tried to reach her fingers down her throat, but it wasn't working. She searched through the cupboard under the sink on a mission, and victoriously dug out a new, spare toothbrush. She resumed her position back by the toilet and tried again, this time with the toothbrush. It tickled at the back of her throat and she gagged. A couple more times and her food was coming up her throat, and out into the toilet. Normani was breathing heavily and looked into the bowl, grimacing at the sight and smell. But it was relieving at the same time. She had never felt this way before, but as wrong as it was, it felt right. She looked down at the toothbrush and bit her lip, she'd need to keep this toothbrush. She rinsed her mouth, flushed the toilet and rinsed the toothbrush after brushing her teeth so her breath didn't smell like vomit. She sprayed some canister of whatever it was to disguise the smell and opened the door. She smiled at Lauren who was watching the movie, oblivious to what had happened. "Hey, I forgot my toothbrush at home, mind if I keep this one?" "Nah, take it." Lauren said before patting the space next to her. Normani put the toothbrush away in her backpack and sat next to Lauren, feeling happier than she had that whole day. "You look happy." Lauren smiled. "Yeah, guess I needed this." Lauren assumed she was referring to a night with her, but oh how wrong she was.