"Finally," Imani breathed as they pulled into their parking spot on campus. It was nearing 4 in the afternoon and they were just arriving. The drive was okay, just filled with traffic that added at least half an hour onto the trip. Mani slept through the first half as planned, so when it was her turn to drive she felt better. The girls had stopped at a Walmart on the way, as well as gotten food at a Mexican restaurant 2 hours into the drive.
"Oh my god, my baby!" India yelled, practically jumping out of the car and running to her Volvo that was sitting a couple of spots down from them. Imani rolled her eyes, texting the group chat that they had arrived. Since the boys had gotten to campus hours before the girls, they had agreed to help them settle in. 'Settling in' meant carrying all of their heavy boxes up the stairs for them though.
gang 😜🤞💗
: were hereee
princey 👑: Finally bruh
keke🙄🧍🏽: Tf took y'all so damn long
ari 👩❤️💋👩🤙🏽 : where y'all at? hev and i in our dorm
: we're in the parking lot of easton hall
jj 🏀: Aight we finna come in a second to help y'all
hev🤞😚: i oughta beat yo fucking ass jj. why yall aint come help us?
jj🏀: We gon help yall after girl, relax
Imani laughed and put her phone away, glancing over at Didi who was in her car, turning it on for some odd reason.
"Didi what the hell?" She called out.
"Bitch I haven't seen this damn car in months. I missed him!" She exclaimed.
"Him?" Mani asked, confused, "You gave your car a gender?"
"Yes! This Mendeecees," India smiled, petting her steering wheel and Mani rolled her eyes, walking back to her own car. She got her purse from the backseat and glanced at a bottle of her medication that was sticking out of it, sucking her teeth when she realized her mother must have shoved an extra one in there before she left. She zipped up her purse, closed the car door, and opened the trunk, where all of their stuff was. Just as she was about to reach to get one of her heavy suitcases, she heard someone yell at her and looked up, meeting Jamal's eyes.
"Mani what the fuck is you doing? I told you we were coming, why you tryna lift this heavy ass shit? You gon' hurt yourself," He fussed, gently pushing her out of the way and going to reach for her suitcase.
"I'm not a baby Jamal, it's not even that heavy," She insisted and he raised his eyebrows at her.
"Really?" He asked, handing her the suitcase, and she immediately dropped it since it was so heavy. "That's what I thought," He said smugly and she glared at him. Prince appeared a moment later, grabbing one of the boxes in her backseat while Keon was fussing at India who was still in her car.
"The hell y'all pack in here man?" Prince asked her as he grabbed another heavy box, "Rocks?"
"No PP," She laughed and he sucked his teeth at her.
"I told yo' ass to stop calling me that shit," He whined while Mani continued laughing. When Prince met India's little brother, Bryson, he was just a baby and couldn't pronounce Prince's name at all, so he settled for calling him "PP". Prince despised it, but everyone thought it was hilarious so the name stuck.
"No," Imani giggled, picking up a small box. "We're on floor 3, and our room is 3G, you guys can take it up if you want," She told them and they nodded, beginning to venture into the building.
Heaven and Ariana joined them a couple of minutes later since Ariana insisted on helping them decorate. Heaven and Ariana were rooming together, and they'd gotten there a little bit before them, so they'd already gotten a good chunk of decorating done, so they had some time to help Mani and India out.
"Keon! Stop messing around and hand me the damn scissors!" India yelled at Keon.
"She so mean to be bruh," He mumbled, handing her the scissors which she snatched out of his hands. The group was now upstairs with Prince and Jamal helping bring the rest of their things up to the room, while the girls were beginning to unpack and decorate. Keon was rotating between both since he wanted to be with India.
"Where y'all want this?" Jamal appeared with a box in his hands and sweat glistening on his forehead.
"Over there," India pointed to an empty corner and Jamal nodded, setting it down. Mani thought that Jamal looked really good today. He was wearing a wife-beater with some green shorts and his usual gold chains plus some Yeezy slides. He grabbed his shirt and lifted it up, wiping the sweat off his forehead and Mani almost drooled at the sight of his rock-hard abs that also had sweat dripping down them. He didn't notice her staring, too busy talking to Keon about something, but almost everyone else did.
"Imani!" Heaven snapped her fingers in her face and Imani was brought out of her thoughts, embarrassed that she'd been caught. She looked around to see the girls staring at her with smirks on their faces, with Prince as well.
"When you gon' tell that man you like him? This has been going on for too long," Heaven whispered as Jamal left the room, going back to the car to grab the last of their things.
"I told you Hev, I'm never telling him that. He would laugh in my face!" She insisted, turning around to grab something out of a box.
"You don't know that girl," Ariana jumped in, "What if he feels the same way?"
"He doesn't," Imani shrugged, certain with what she felt.
"We going out tonight?" India asked her as they finished throwing away the last of the boxes. It was 8 pm and everyone had already left since they needed to do their own dorm rooms. Imani was exhausted, they'd been traveling for half of the day and been unpacking for hours.
"If you want," Imani shrugged.
"I'on even think anyone's throwing any parties tonight," India sighed, plopping down on her bed.
Imani was a little relieved, she didn't have much energy to go to a party anyways. She enjoyed going to parties occasionally, but some parties tended to get overwhelming for her, or her social battery just ran out and she was ready to go home while everyone was still having fun.
"You wanna get food?" India sat up suddenly and Mani eagerly nodded. They hadn't eaten a full meal since their stop at the Mexican restaurant. "Lemme text the group chat then," India pulled out her phone and Imani became excited. She loved eating, it was probably one of her favorite things to do besides sleeping. Good food automatically got her excited.
gang😜🤞💗
didi👯♀️❣️: y'all wanna get food?
ari👩❤️💋👩🤙🏽: yessirrrr
princey👑: Where?
hev🤞😚: let's go to kentmorr
keke🙄🧍🏽: You wanna get that nasty ass seafood?
didi👯♀️❣️: keon shut the hell up
jj 🏀: That nigga don't have tastebuds fr
princey👑: swear, he think ranch on fuckin pizza taste good
: ranch on pizza is good....
jj🏀: Here she go with her dumbass food opinions
: it is! 😭😭
hev🤞😚: let's go to kentmorr in 3o minutes. Keon you can get a drink or some shit idk
Everyone liked Heaven's message and agreed to meet at Mani and Didi's dorm at 8:30. Luckily, the girls had a bathroom attached to their dorm and didn't have a communal shower, since they lived in the newer dorm buildings. Mani stood up, telling India she was going to take a quick shower and India nodded, telling her she'd get in when she was done. Mani quickly grabbed her towel and shut the bathroom door behind her and placing her phone on the counter. She shuffled one of her playlists and "Beware" by Big Sean began playing. She stripped and threw her clothes into the new hamper they had gotten, stepping into the shower and washing the day off of her.
The group arrived at Kentmorr, which was a seafood restaurant about 25 minutes from campus. Their campus was in the middle of nowhere, but there were restaurants and other stores in the next town over, which most students drove to when they wanted good food. There was only a Chick Fil A on campus and most people got sick of that after a while.
Mani and India stepped out of India's car along with Ariana and Heaven who had rode with them. The boys rode in Prince's car and had arrived a couple of minutes before them so they were waiting inside at a table. The girls piled out of the car and Imani immediately fanned herself, rushing to get inside of the air conditioned building. She had thrown on some shorts and a random crop top in her closet since she hadn't fully unpacked yet, along with her crocs, but she was still sweating.
"It is hot as a bitch bruh," Heaven said aloud, voicing her thoughts for her.
"Deadass," Ariana cosigned.
"We should go to the beach this weekend," Didi suggested while closing the door the restaurant behind her, "Before classes start and we get too busy,"
Ocean City was one of the most famous beach towns in the country, and since it was only about an hour drive from campus, so some students liked to go during the summer, or right when school started and it got too hot. The town had a boardwalk which consisted of some carnival rides, shops along hte board walk, The group went last year and actually stayed for a couple of days during spring break and Imani enjoyed herself. She loved going to the beach–especially with her friends because there was never a dull moment with them.
Last year, Keon had decided to bury India in the sand while she was asleep since she was a deep sleeper. When she woke up she was furious that they had gotten sand in her hair and chased him around the beach for at least 10 minutes while the rest of them died of laughter.
"I'm down, I'm sure the boys will wanna go too," Ariana put her phone in her back pocket as they approached the table the guys were sitting at, "Matter of fact, let's ask them," She slid into the booth and the girls followed.
"Ask us what?" Keon stopped his conversation with Prince and turned to ask.
"Y'all wanna go to the beach this weekend?" Imani repeated Didi's question while still standing, waiting for Hev to slide into the bench.
"Fo' sure, it's too hot ta' just be sitting around bruh," Prince exclaimed. Keon and Jamal murmured their agreement and Imani became excited knowing they were going. When Hev finally slid into the booth, she realized there was no more space left on that side and the only seat left was next to Jamal on the other side. She chewed on her lip and stood there for a second, trying to find a way to cut into the conversation to ask him to move over a bit but she was struggling.
They had begun discussing who would drive and the discussion was of course turning into an argument between Keon and India. Even though they were dating, the two lived to aggravate each other and they were always bickering about something stupid. Now they were arguing about who was going to drive and the group rolled their eyes, watching the two go back and forth.
"Keon you get on my nerves! I'm a good ass driver," She rolled her eyes, "You the one that drives like a blind man, didn't you run over a stop sign last week? How the fuck you even run over a stop sign?" She shook her head and he gave her a dirty look.
"I ain't even run over it," He sucked his teeth.
While the two continued arguing, Jamal looked over at Imani and gave her a puzzled look.
"Mani why you standin' over there lookin' stupid? Come sit down," He scooted over and she huffed, choosing to stay silent and just sit down next to him. India and Keon finally ended their argument, so the group began discussing when they wanted to go. It was Thursday night so they had 3 days to go before classes started on Monday. They decided on Saturday since no one wanted to go on a Sunday and they wanted Friday to relax after unpacking all of their things and getting their dorms organized.
After they decided on the day, they took turns going up to the register to order their food. When it was Imani's turn, she stood up from the booth and waited for Heaven but she stayed seated, making her frown.
"Hev come on, we gotta go order," She urged her but Heaven looked at her with a wicked smile on her face.
"Nah, I'ma go in a second, y'all can go," She pointed between Imani and Jamal and Mani's eyes widened while Jamal didn't seem to care.
"Aight let's go," He got out of the booth and began walking to the register, leaving Imani at the table. Mani gave Heaven a deadly glare which Hev laughed at and simply shooed her away while whispering "Good luck,"
Mani was surprisingly good at hiding her feelings for Jamal. After years of having a crush on him, she'd come to the conclusion that he'd never reciprocate her feelings, so instead of trying she just hid her feelings. She still didn't like being alone with him though, since she knew she was bound to get nervous in certain situations and make a fool out of herself.
She reluctantly walked over to the cashier where Jamal was already ordering his food and stared at the menu, even though she knew exactly what she was going to get. Whenever they came to Kentmorr she ordered the exact same thing; New Orleans Style Crawfish. Even though she was born and raised in Maryland, she wasn't the biggest fan of crab. She would eat it, but it would never be her first choice–even though her friends always clowned her for it.
After Jamal finished ordering her food she went ahead and ordered her own, along with some water since she was still hot. After they ordered, they waited at the counter where you picked up your phone in a comfortable silence. Jamal was a man of many words, which was one of the many things Imani appreciated about him. Sometimes it was nice to sit in silence for a little bit. She hated forcing unnecessary conversation because it was always awkward, so she tended to avoid it.
"Who you got for Spanish this year?" Jamal spoke without looking up from his phone and Imani glanced up at him, zoning back into the real world. She tended to zone out a lot, which was a bad habit she was trying to break.
"Uh I think her name is Señora Calvente? I don't remember,"
"Aye I think I have her too. Dat' nigga Davion said she easy as hell, she don't even take attendance like that," He told her and she nodded, "When you have her?"
"Monday's and Thursday's," She replied, trying to remember what it said on her email. She had hoped she was done with taking Spanish since she'd taken it since high school, but unfortunately she needed one more year. She was tired of taking the language since she mostly already knew what was being taught. She wasn't fluent, but after years of taking it she could understand it and hold a decent conversation. Imani's mother–Amia was Dominican on her mother's side, so whenever Mani visited her grandmother's on her mother's side of the family she picked up a little bit.
"Bet, I'm finna make you help me," Jamal smirked and she rolled her eyes.
"JJ I'm not helping you, last time you distracted me the entire 2 hours and we got no work done," She laughed. Jamal took Spanish last year as well and constantly harassed her for help on his work. The one time she finally agreed to help him, he spent most of their time playing around and she vowed to never help him with schoolwork again.
"We'll see bruh, you gon' be helping me whether you like it or not," He replied and went to pick up his food right as it was placed on the counter. Her food was ready a moment later and they walked back to the table together, taking a seat while Ariana and Prince stood up as soon as they got back.
"Finally bruh, the fuck took y'all so damn long? The rest of us hungry too," Prince fussed at them as they took a seat.
"Shut the fuck up," Jamal sucked his teeth while cracking one of his crab legs, "Go get yo' food then fat ass, the hell you waiting fo'?" He replied.
Prince only sucked his teeth and told Ariana to get up to go order their food with them while Mani sat down next to Jamal and immediately dug into her food. She hadn't eaten in hours and she was starving.
While she ate she periodically zoned in and out of the conversation the rest of the group was having.
***
finally decided to update this damn book 😭 i'm trying to finish adf while thinking of ideas for this book lol so i apologize if updates are slow. hope y'all enjoyed tho! don't forget to vote and comment 😚