Ch. 16: Tea, Tea, and More Tea

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"Dinah!  Get closer to Normani!", Ally exclaimed while holding Normani's phone, trying to get a picture-perfect photo of the two women.

Dinah huffed and shifted an inch closer to Normani.  It's not like she hated Normani or anything, it was quite the opposite actually.  However, Ally has been taking pictures of her and Normani for the past hour, and it's been irking her nerves. 

"Is it better now?", Dinah asked with an attitude.

Ally nodded her head frantically, while zooming in to mostly get the upper halves of the women's bodies.  She didn't want the fans to go into cardiac arrest by including the lower halves of their bodies in the picture as well, so she figured this will do for now.   

"Okay, now put on a big smile!", Ally chirped in an overly excited tone.  Dinah rolled her eyes so far in her head that she could see her brain, slowly loosing its cells being around Ally and her kindergartner level photo-taking skills.  'Why couldn't we just get a professional photographer who actually knows the difference between flash and brightness?', was the only thought running through her mind that entire afternoon. 

Unlike Dinah, Normani found the whole hour spent posing with Dinah and Ally trying to take good-quality photos with her iPhone X, quite amusing.  So when Ally told Dinah to get closer to Normani after the 150th attempt to take a photo, Normani chuckled, earning a death glare from Dinah.  Clearly not phased by Dinah's glare, Normani chuckled louder, making Dinah narrow her eyes at her even more.  Normani's soft hand reached up to Dinah's cheek and gave it a light squeeze.  She then wiggled it back and forth like a grandma would do to her grand-child, while saying, "Awwww is wittle Dinah upset because she has to pose for a photo?"

"You're annoying", Dinah deadpanned.

Ignoring Dinah's statement, Normani smiled brightly and turned towards the camera.  "And you have a picture to take.  So, put on a big smile, Dinah!"

Dinah groaned loudly and put her arm on Normani's.  She pulled her closer so that her head was a good two to three inches away from hers.  Her nose suddenly became filled with the sweet smell of mangos as she inched her head closer to Normani's curly black hair.  She deeply inhaled, letting her eyes flutter shut as she got a stronger whiff the sweet, yet tangy smell of what she assumed was Normani's mango shampoo.  The smell reminded her of when her mother used to make Mango Otai for her everyday so that she could get her daily dosage of vitamins and minerals, as well as have an immune system stronger than an ox.  A smile etched across her face as she remembered her mom telling her if she didn't drink the Otai she, "Won't be strong enough to beat up them ole scraggy bitches who take her lunch money because she had "W.B.S."  According to Milika, "W.B.S., or weak-bitch syndrome" is when you have a cold, or lack of enough nutrients to "whoop these hoes asses whenever they try you".  Despite Milika's colorful description of W.B.S., the signs one exhibit's when they suffer from W.B.S., and the effects of it, Dinah still didn't fully understand what "W.B.S." was or its seriousness.  Being the hard-headed ten-year-old she was, she never finished the otai.  As a result, not only was her lunch money taken, but she would also get drenched in the cafeteria's soup of the day from time to time.  By the time 6th grade rolled around, Dinah drank a full glass of Mango Otai everyday.  On the last day of school, she finally worked up enough courage to deliver a Poly beat down to her bullies in the school parking lot.  Ever since then, Dinah promised herself to drink otai everyday, and she did.   Letting the powerful otai build up in her system, she got stronger and stronger.  And by senior year of high school, Dinah "The Hulk" Hansen was born.  

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