Knowing Her ( Norminah)

--CHAPTER 15--

Hey guys , I just wanted to say for those who couldn't see the past chapters to try and take the story off their library than add it back up again , maybe that will fix it . I don't know what causes it so I'm sorry for that .

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Their university's library was nothing special, really. It was pretty enough to look at, smelled of paper and ink and the fragrant scent of old books, the coffee shop in the basement continually waging a losing war on keeping the sleep-deprived and caffeine-addicted students happy.

But to them, the library was everything.

It was where they first ran into each other, where they stayed up all night quizzing each other for exams, where they found an unlocked door that led to the roof and began sneaking up there to be alone, where Dinah first called Normani her best friend, where Normani first promised that she'd do anything for Dinah, where Dinah felt the urge to admit to Normani that she had fallen in love with her, that she was in love with her. (She had been dressed in her cap and gown, glowing in the excitement of finally graduating, and Normani was waiting in line for coffee, her hair sticking out in odd directions thanks to the cap, a brilliant smile on her face, and Dinah wanted to tell her, tell her everything.)

Wren Library, a fairly forgotten and ignored building on campus, was Dinah and Normani's favorite place in the entire world.

(Naturally, she'd thought when Normani told her it would be the safe word. It makes sense. Now, she said it with anger, demonizing the very place she'd once loved so much.)

"Wren."

The word came out of her like a burst dam, somehow sounding like the vocalization of every ounce of pain she endured, every moment of bitterness she shoved down, every agonizing second of heartbreak she consistently ignored. It was a single word, yet it wasn't. It was Normani and Dinah in a nutshell, and it was the shattering of that connection. "I should never have agreed to be your fake girlfriend in the first place."

"Someone spilled the beans," Barbara said shakily, looking around at John and Andrea's wide-eyed faces, at Ally and Camilla's identical looks of shock (at what, Dinah didn't know), at Normani's (Normani's) still flowing tears, her voice echoing in the silence that followed Dinah's revelation. The now-empty can of beans rolled on the floor, forgotten, Barbara's joke not landing. Because logically, rationally, Dinah knew what Barbara was doing-knew that she was trying to help, knew that had it been any other day at any other moment, it would have worked. But Dinah was rubbed raw, the pain was too much, the wounds still far too fresh.

"You told me," she said, turning to the older woman, "that your faith was restored. That Normani was just projecting." She couldn't help the accusatory tone that seeped into her voice then, couldn't help the way her face contorted in pain, couldn't help but feel sick to the stomach when she saw that pain mirrored on Barbara's face. "I thought of you as family. But you lied to me too." Without bothering to look at any of the others, Dinah rushed out of the kitchen, a single thought on her mind as she practically ran up the stairs and barged into the room she and Normani had shared, immediately reaching for her bags:

She had to go.

She was halfway through packing up her things when she heard the knock on the door, and she groaned, knowing she should have expected it, knowing she should have just locked the door when it opened without her consent.

"Go away, Normani, I'm not in the mood."

"I don't know where Normani is, actually," Andrea said, forcing Dinah to look up in shock, surprised to see the doctor. "She left." Dinah swallowed back her surprise at Normani's flight (Normani), and focused on the woman in front of her.