Something about you (Norminah)

Chapter Twenty

"You jumped off a cliff unprovoked?"

I giggled, "some people do stupid things for fun. I am some people."

"How did that go? I bet you belly flopped."

"Worse, I somehow hit the water sitting. My ass and the back of my legs were in pain for days."

"See this is why you don't go cliff diving."

I stopped walking and turned to face Normani. I already knew when I started giving her my signature, "Baby do me a favor," eyes that she would say yes to whatever I wanted to ask her for.

"What?" she asked, rolling her eyes when my smile widened. "Dinah don't ask me to—"

"–pretty please go cliff diving with me?"

I pulled her a little closer and batted her eyes a little as she smiled. She was laying it on a little too thick, especially because I would have done it anyway without her giving me the puppy dog eyes.

"If I die I'm haunting your ass."

"You're not going to die and you're going to love it and me for making you do it babe."

Normani rolled her eyes, "yeah we'll see."

We picked up our rental for the next few days and Normani drove (I insisted because she had gotten me used to being driven around all the time, to which she responded with something I won't repeat).

Hey, hey, hey!
Ba-dee-ya, say do you remember
Ba-dee-ya, dancin' in September
Ba-dee-ya, never was a cloudy day

I rolled my eyes and pretended to be irritated, but I couldn't help the smile and eventually the laughter that took over my face. Happy and carefree Normani was my favorite out of all the versions that she had allowed me to see. She let go of the steering wheel briefly to the dorkiest dance and after a while I just joined in and we dueted until she stopped at the first drive through that she saw.

"Okay that was fun, you were a little pitchy though babe."

"I was not pitchy," I protested, slapped her arm.

She probably would have said something had it not ended up being her turn to order. Once she had paid, she restarted the song and started dancing again.

"Babe what is it with you and this song?"

"I'm messing with you babe. This is one of the first songs that I can vividly remember dancing to with my grandma in her living room. There was this one, and What a Wonderful World. I loved that song. I remember Dad would even imitate Louis Armstrong's voice just to get me to sleep."

"What other songs did you dance to?"

She smiled nostalgically. "These one direction girls think they're the original boy band groupies, but I was obsessed with New Edition and I loved Michael Jackson. Like I dressed up as him in thriller during one Halloween."

"I love when you talk about your childhood."

"I don't talk about my childhood often."

"Which is exactly why I love it. Knowing that in the midst of everything, you had moments of pure joy and happiness is comforting."

She shrugged, "you know I think I was happiest on stage? Even now, I still enjoy dancing."

"I know, I can tell babe. You're really good at it too."

"Of course I'm good at it babe."

Once we got our food, we got back onto the road and Normani let me choose the music.