Titi Iku: Until Death (Sequel To Irikuri)

13-Until Alliance

"Ow! Bitch tug any harder and you'll rip the naps up out my scalp!" I winced as Lola pulled my box braids into a half up bun, carelessly swaying her hips to the music blasting from her speakers.

"Okay okay don't be a pussy about it. I'm almost done, all that's left is your edges."

"Hurry up."

"Hey! Don't be ungrateful. First of all, I'm jealous because I can never keep box braids in for more than a week or two before my scalp starts attacking me."

"Well, I mean...Aren't you white- ow!" I laughed as Lola smacked my forehead with the brush she was holding and evaded my attempts to hit her back. I knew she couldn't be fully white, I was just teasing.

"Jesus Christ no! Please no. Well I mean I am half white - Spanish to be exact - but lord even if I was fully white I would not be out here appropriating. Gross as fuck. Them bitches just asking for all their hair to fall out. I'm actually half black, my mom was Moroccan. A very dark skinned black Moroccan with 4c hair - which actually isn't rare as people think. My mom was a Haratin from the Maghreb, a region in North Africa including Morocco. Maghrebis have their own type of traditional braids we wear, and they look similar to box braids. They actually aren't nearly as heavy for some reason, at least to me. My mom used to do them for me all the time when I was little, but when I made the mistake of doing them here...Jesus them motherfuckers were heavy. My edges almost died. Never doing it again. I hate dealing with my hair but those braids almost made me cry. Yours don't seem nearly as bad."

"You might have just gotten the wrong person to be honest. There was a braider I used to go to when I was younger that would snatch up the tiniest sections with the heaviest ass amount of extensions and make them so tight I was edgeless for a year. When people do your hair like that, it's bound to fall out. If you get someone who knows how to do it properly, I don't see why you should have a problem, your hair is at least 3b in the back and 4a in the front. It should be fine. I can hook you up with my salon if you want."

"Oh my god, thank you! That would be a life saver. See, and you say you don't like me. Look how well we get along." 

"Yeah yeah whatever. Why do you hate doing your hair anyways? It's so beautiful." 

"Well..." she cleared her throat "Not to kill the mood or anything, but my mother died when I was pretty young. My dad's white and of course he didn't understand my hair- nor did he try to. So there I am in Spain, surrounded by these white kids. Every now and again I'd find another Moroccan but most of the time they'd be light skinned with straight hair. Sometimes they would even purposely avoid me because they could pass for a Spaniard and I couldn't. Um...so I guess all that on top of everything made me hate it for a while, but I'm getting over it. Y'know it's a process...like everything else...I'm sorry you didn't need to know all that. You're just really easy to talk to."

"You don't need to apologize. I like to listen. I'm all ears whenever you need it." I didn't understand why it was so easy to be nice to her and so hard not to like her. 

"You'll regret telling me that" she chuckled. I knew I would already. "Anyways you're all done. Fuck, you are so beautiful."

"As are you." I smiled. I rose from my seat and reached under my bed, pulling out a bottle of cognac. "I was saving this for a special occasion, but fuck it. Wanna drive the boat?" she smiled and opened wide as I poured the contents into her mouth straight from the bottle before I handed it to her and she did the same for me. 

About an hour and two shots of cognac later, Lola and I approached the frat house where the party was being held. I could already hear the vibrations from the bass booming under my feet all the way down the street. I rolled my eyes at Lola's choice to walk to the party. I was wearing canvas sneakers, but Jesus my feet were still killing me. Finally, we arrived. Lola and I were in our element. It was truly killing me how well we worked as friends. For a good hour or two we tore up the dance floor with a good number of eyes on us. We moved in sync and even threw in a little grinding once the drinks really started flowing. By 1 am, I was officially drunk off my ass. Lola left for a second to get a drink and I began drunkenly flirting with some of the guys that kept approaching me. It was fun for a while, but pretty soon I got bored and went to search for Lola. I looked in the kitchen, the bathrooms, and finally the bedrooms, but she was nowhere to be found. After asking around a bit, I found out she was supposedly out back. 

I crept outside into the dark night cautiously, extremely aware of the knife strapped to my thigh. I sighed when I didn't see anything and decided to head back inside when all of a sudden I was shoved against a wall. I vaguely recognized my attacker as a dude I had rejected earlier. I smelled the beer on his breath and prayed I wouldn't have to kill another man tonight, but when he touched my thigh he really began testing me. My body moved automatically, shoving him off of me, but even with my extensive training the liquor weighed me down. My movements were uncoordinated and sloppy. Better than the average untrained person could do, male or female, but awful for me. Especially when the man in front of me was built like a linebacker. 

"Bro what the fuck do you want? Get off of me!"

"Just shhh...It'll make it easier." He began lifting my dress and I began hyperventilating, beginning to have a panic attack. It wasn't the idea of him raping me that triggered me. It was bracing to have more blood on my hands. I began calming myself down, taking deep breaths and bracing to grab my knife before a bottle crashed over his head and he staggered to the side. Behind him stood Lola, in all her five foot three glory, and for the first time ever I was glad to see her. He tried to swing at her, but I was quickly sobering up and grabbed his arm - using his weight against him- and flipped him onto the ground like a pancake. He groaned on the floor, but attempted to get up and reach for us again. It seemed like he really wanted to get his shit rocked. Lola threw the first kick to his side with her high heeled boots, and soon after when he tried to yank her leg I joined her. Every time we struck him he tried to hit us harder, and most of the time he failed. Soon, we were just jumping him. Both of us, blow after blow, and cussing him out in three different languages to boot. Finally, Lola crushed her boot into his groin, grinning when she seemingly felt nothing.

"Who the fuck did you think you were about to violate with this? Fucking shrimp. Let me make this clear - she's rich, and I'm rich. Not only that, but we're both bat shit crazy. You have two choices: you can take this L, go home, nurse your wounds, and just tell people you got into a drunken fight." Lola nodded to me as if to hand over the baton, knowing I would make option two sound even more painful.

"Or, you can be a little bitch and snitch to everyone that you got your shit rocked by two freshmen girls. Even if you don't mention it, we'll make sure that the fact that you tried to rape me - and failed - is included in the story. Not only will you look like a rapist, pussy, and all around piece of shit - which you are- we'll ruin your life. Did she mention we're rich? Sweetie you know that means power too, and we've got a shit ton. Try it, piss us off. You'll dream of this night and reminisce of the good old days when a thorough ass beating was your worst problem. If we want to, we can make sure you can never get a good job or make anything of yourself as long as you live. We're choosing, out of the goodness of our hearts, to let you off with a warning. But, if you ever dare to mention anything of this in a way that could negatively impact us, if you ever touch anyone else without consent, if you ever even think of doing anything that could remotely piss us off, we will do everything I just mentioned. And then, guess what? We'll come back and beat your ass again just for daring to try us and wasting our time. Pathetic ass bitch. Come on girl let's go ." I tugged Lola's arm and gestured for her to stop crushing his balls. She gave one final kick before moving away. 

"Choose wisely, and have a nice evening." she smiled sweetly. We walked off, arms linked, chatting and cackling drunkenly the whole way home. Over the past month she had slowly been growing on me, but that night solidified how I saw Lola . I saw how every kick and punch satisfied her. Her form wasn't perfect, she clearly wasn't trained in martial arts, but it definitely looked like she had learned to defend herself before out of necessity. Further, when she looked in that man's eyes she saw something different. That shit was personal. Not necessarily meaning that she hated or knew him specifically, but that what he had done brought out a personal grudge in her. The girl clearly had issues.

But I fucked with it.

As sick as it sounds, I think that night was the most fun I've ever had.