Minding (Y)our Business

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By the time dinner rolled around, my attitude towards Cam had long subsided. It was time for me to go hang out with Tracey. Cam was back now, so I asked if she was going over there, too. "What?" she asked me, with a look of confusion. Her looking at me like that, confused me. "Trae's gonna order in and have movie night. She invited me. She ain't text you?" I ask. Cam smiles kind of weirdly, like... in an uncomfortable manner. "Oh, yeah. Yeah, she did. Told her I couldn't make it. I got plans an' shit." she says. My brows rose in surprise. I couldn't remember the last time she gave up the chance to harass Alexis. "Oh, alright. I'm out." I say, heading to Trae's room.

An hour into the movie, they introduce a character who was in jail. She looked exactly like Tiana. I softly chuckled. She was never too far off my mind, these days. At the very least we talked weekly; but I'd hit her at least three times this week. She heard I was sick through the grapevine back home and wanted to make sure I was alright. Considering she had been around me during this ridiculous part of my life so many years, it was kind of fun talking to her to help me get through it. It really wasn't the same these days, though. It made me a little sad.

Like, how were we so madly in love with each other at one second, and broken up at the next? Our relationship and our friendship had went to shit in, not even a whole year. I smacked my teeth. I started to think about what I had going on with KP— what if our little situation ended badly? That was one of my main hang ups with going calling our situation a fling— the fear that I'd fall hard for her, and then it comes to an end. She insists on becoming something more. I like seeing her and everything, but I know she has deep feelings for me. I just had the sinking feeling that I probably wouldn't feel as serious about her as she seems to be, about me. I don't think I'm going to accept her 'proposal'— it wouldn't be fair to her. Tracey furrows her eyebrows at me. "What's wrong, girl?" she asks me.
I must've been grumbling out loud. I go back and forth with myself on whether I should tell her or not. I hadn't yet told her about the fact my ex is in jail, or what she's in there for. I sigh and decide to tell her the most basic version of the truth that I could think of.

"It's just...that girl, the one in jail reminds me so much of my ex-girlfriend. It just made me think of some stuff, that's all."
"You wanna talk about it?" she asks, softly.
I shake my head silently.

At some point, Alexis strolls into the room. "Hey, Tracey. Hey, Gwen." she says.
"Hey, Alexis. What's up?" I ask.

"Oh, nothing. Just getting back from my date with Kevin." she brags. I furrowed my eyebrow. "You talkin' about Kevin, Kevin?" I ask. She confirms it. I snicker as I realize that Alexis could be worn down into giving someone a chance. She said Kevin had been all in her face, even during the Summer Program days. Hey, maybe Cam had a chance, after all. I didn't know how she'd get Alexis to get over the girl thing, but if she could, she was in there!

As Alexis continues to happily share details about what went down with Kevin, I whipped my head around to Tracey. It had just dawned on me that she hadn't mentioned Cam's name even once. I squinted my eyes at her to see if I could somehow see any expression of tension on her face. She was a very emotive person so in most cases you could tell what she was thinking. I tried to think of what must have happened between the two. Luckily for me, she didn't catch me staring at her 'cause she was too preoccupied with her phone. I was gonna find out what was going between them even if it was the last thing I did. When I turned my attention back to Alexis, I was genuinely shocked that she was still raving about Kevin.  That's when I figured she probably just wanted somebody to listen, and not really talk. 'Cause ain't no way in Hell she wouldn't know that I ignored her ass for a smooth two minutes. I felt kind of bad for her 'cause I knew this bliss was probably gonna be short lived. Hell, we were in college. Long-lasting, real relationships were not going to pop off freshman year. I learned that from my brother. He said that the male's whore gene went from dormant to active literally as soon as they hit their college campus. He says that they will say or do almost anything to get you to drop your drawers. I didn't know if the same was true for women, but it was true for me. Reggie actually predicted this would happen to me, 'cause, let him tell it, I'm basically a feminine dude. Whatever that means.

Either way, I did trust my brother's intel, so I figured Kevin was probably not as cool as Alexis is saying he is. I hoped she wouldn't let him convince her to stray away from her morals-- 'cause she was saving herself for marriage. If Kevin got a piece of her, it would probably make him a legend amongst him and his dumb ass friends.
"I'm so happy for you." I tell her, and we chatter away some more, until we hear a notification on Tracey's phone go off. "Ugh, thank you God." she says, hopping up. "Pizza's here. I'll go get it. When I come back up with this pizza, I trust that you'll both be done with talking about their baes." she winked, purposely exaggerating it to show her annoyance with hearing about our love lives.
I furrowed my brows and did a fake vicious meow at Tracey. She then walks out. I turn back to Alexis, commenting on how irritated Tracey seemed.
"Have you been noticing anything weird with Tracey? She seems... different."
"Yeah, she's been really bummed out lately, so I think something might've happened."
"Well, what happened?"  I asked.
"I don't know, I didn't ask her. Whenever she'd come into the room I would be heading out to go meet up with my man."
"I think something happened with her and Cam. I mean... she hasn't said her name once." I point out.
"Maybe she's not interested, anymore. She met somebody else, right?" Alexis asked.
"Yeah, but think about it. You said Trae has been looking sad. Cam has been ... stressed... I guess. When I told her there would be pizza over here, she said she had something else to do. You know she is in love with you and even more in love with pizza."
Alexis chuckles softly. "It is kinda weird that she hasn't been over to harass me in a few days. I've enjoyed the break, but I don't want it to be because she's down in the dumps."
"We gotta get 'em to tell us what happened. I'll work on Cam, you work on Trae. Then we'll compare notes and piece together what really happened. And we'll come up with something to get them to talk to each other, again."
"Sounds like a plan." Alexis says. Just then, Tracey walks back into the room, with a large pizza box in her hand.
"And that's how I got a scar on my boob." I say, pretending to end a story. "Wanna see it?" I ask Alexis. She was clearly caught off guard by two things— how quickly I can think on my feet, and how committed I was to get Tracey to think we were actually discussing something like that.
Tracey furrows her eyes. "I'm sure she'll pass on the showing of the Scar Titty." she comments.
"She's right." said Alexis, trying her best to hold back a laugh.
"Oh, okay. It's pretty great, though."
Just then, me and Alexis both burst out laughing.

Then we all ate pizza and watched more crime TV.

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