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"Who told y'all to invite Tulane Deltas in the first place?? Y'all knew y'all wasn't gon' do shit but fight."
"You did! I believe your exact words were 'Archie, send everybody a message. I want this shit to pop.' You know it wasn't my gotdamn idea."
Chantal turned to look at Zina Archeambeau, then, the club soccer star and university basketball stand-out leaning back against the counter in the kitchen of their rent-to-own camelback, arms folded across the chest of her powder pink AKA line jacket. "I guess that was me, huh?"
The look Zina sent her in return couldn't have said "Duh, bitch" any clearer.
"Don't look at me like that," Chantal laughed. "Fix your face!"
The half-hearted swipe she sent Zina's way was easily ducked, the taller girl grabbing her by the wrist and pulling her flush against her. "You fix your face."
"Tuh. Ain't nothing wrong with my face, and you know it." She was fairly certain that Zina was going to kiss her again, which was fine with her, really. They were best friends with limited benefits, and Zina was a fantastic kisser and cuddle buddy.
The kiss came, as expected, soft like she was asking for permission, and Chantal had wrapped her arms around her neck to deepen the embrace when a throat cleared behind them. She turned sharply, only to be met with a Tulane Delta staring her right in the face.
"Hey. Ah, excuse me. They told me the bathroom was through here?" Said Delta was pretty damn cute, dark brown skin, shoulder-length dreads, tight body under her crimson line jacket, and cargo pants, and mischievous, round eyes that Chantal knew she'd seen before.
"Hey. You Nova, right?"
"Yeah. Nova Bordelon."
"We read your article about the future of blackness under Bush. Dope shit."
"Thank you." Nova ducked her head, blushed a little, which caught Chantal's attention. Of all the things she'd heard about the journalism student, her being shy hadn't been one of them.
"Yeah," Zina chimed in, noticing the blush and the way dark, round eyes lingered on her roommate. "We was riding with you 'til we heard you cheated on Antoinette with the police captain's son. An ROTC white boy at that. Damn.
Nova looked to Chantal for help, but Chantal just shrugged. Nova was cute and all, but the truth was the truth. "I don't see how that's any of your business." Fake-ass Mýa.
"You in our house. We talkin'. It's all good, shawty. Friendly conversation, right?"
"Yeah. Whatever."
"Whatever, nothin'. We all make choices, and now we know where you stand."
"Hey," Chantal interjected when she saw Nova's jaw and fist clench, bumping Zina hard with her hip, then snaking an arm under her jacket to wrap around her waist and snuggle into her side. "Be nice. It's my birthday."
"I'm always nice!" Zina had to laugh when Chantal snorted in disbelief. Then she set her impossibly bright and decidedly unfriendly grin on Nova again. "Did you know it's Chan's birthday today?"
"No, I didn't." The message hadn't said anything about a birthday, just an before-finals bash. "I would've brought a gift." Of course she was a Taurus.
"It's only 10:30. You still got time"
Zina rolled her eyes. Nova laughed, then smirked. Chantal Williams really did expect the world to fall at her feet. So what if Nova found herself wanting to be one of her worshippers? She was fine as hell, with her perfectly pressed and curled jet-black hair, four silver hoops sparkling in each ear, plum lipstick adorning her full lips, silver pendant coming to rest between her full breasts over her Iceberg crop-top sweater, silver belly ring, and hips accentuating by her low-rise jeans.
She wore her royal blue line jacket with the collar popped because, of course, she did. Nova had noticed that she'd taken the effort to have her line name stitched on both sides when she'd walked in on her make-out session, and she didn't need to ask how she'd ended up with "ChariZmatic Leader."
Nova's eyes had been glued to her for a little too long, and Chantal could see the vein in Zina's neck beginning to pulse when the back door opened and another Tulane Delta stepped into the kitchen.
"Nova, girl. You find the bathroom?"
"Yeah, Jina. Just talking with our host here."
"Well, hurry up. I wanna dance with you. DJ got it crunk as fuck out there."
"Aiight. I got you."
Jina headed back out to go around to the living room where most of the festivities were happening, and Nova turned back toward Chantal to excuse herself, only to be interrupted with "You dance?"
"Yeah," Nova couldn't contain her smirk. The future queen of Xavier's campus definitely seemed to be feeling her, too. "I do a lil somethin'."
"You gon do a lil somethin' with me?"
Nova's grin almost split her face, then. "Whatever you want. You're the birthday girl."
"I'll find you later?" Zina was tugging her waist, trying to shuffle her back out into the party, so Chantal figured she go before the vein on the other side of her neck got to throbbing, too.
"Yeah. Definitely."
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Around 11:30, the SGRho that had been spinning a pretty impressive set with an eMachine announced that it was almost time for the last dance of Chantal's big day. As it turned out, she was turning 21, and she'd been celebrating since she'd gotten back out on the floor by downing two glasses of Courvoisier and apple juice and grinding on Zina and all of the other fine and queer Divine Nine girls from the greater NOLA area that had shown up to party with her.
Nova knew because she'd been watching her all night, not that she hadn't been doing some grinding and solo ass-shaking of her own. She'd decided that she liked the way Chantal worked her hips, and had begun to fantasize about her working them in other rooms of the house before she snapped back to reality. Sure, they'd been flirting before, but that didn't mean much. Half the girls in the place wanted to get with Chantal, and she knew it. And Nova was pretty sure that a farmer's daughter who lived on campus, biked or caught rides everywhere she went, and was interning at the Daily News was not at the top of the list of a doctor's daughter with her own place, a royal blue Monte Carlo SS sitting in the driveway, an internship at Peter Mayer, and steady paychecks from local modeling gigs.
Chantal had said that she would be the one to do the finding, right? So Nova was going to wait for her to come to her. If she was really gonna do it.
To Nova's great pleasure, it turned out that Chantal was a woman of her word, and, when it was time for the last dance before midnight, she sauntered over to her and held her hand out for her to take.
Nova could feel all the eyes in that room on them as Chantal led her to the middle, walking backwards and never breaking eye contact. The other girls clapped and whistled and whispered and cat-called, a voice that sounded a lot like Jina's yelling out "Get it, girl!". She kinda liked how it felt to be the center of attention, but you couldn't have told her that she and Chantal weren't the only two people in the place when the DJ put on Donell Jones' "U Know What's Up" and Chantal stepped into her and laced her arms around her neck.
"Listen, I ain't gon' have to fight nobody in here over this am I?" Nova was matching Chantal body roll for body roll and hip shake for hip shake, and the contact was wonderful, and everybody around them seemed to have gone back to minding their own business, but she couldn't shake the feeling of eyes on the back of her head.
"You mean Zina?"
"Yeah. I didn't even know guard dogs came in pink and green."
Chantal laughed a little at that. "We've been friends since freshman year. She's just protective."
"You kiss all your friends like that?"
"Stick around long enough, you might just find out."
Nova couldn't help her smile, and since Chantal was clearly giving her the green light, she decided to just go for it. "I feel like I should be looking over my shoulder if I could manage to take my eyes off of you."
That earned her an eyebrow quirk and a smirk. "Smooth. That what they teach y'all in creative writing over there?"
"C'mon now! That was sincere!"
"Uh huh. Well, look all you want because I'm single."
"Is that right?"
"Yeah. So what about you?"
"What about me?"
"You still tippin' with that white boy?"
"Nah. We broke up."
When Chantal pulled back from her ear to look at her, the look in her eyes had gone from amusement to mischief. "So sorry to hear that."
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By the time 1 o'clock rolled around, Chantal was partied out, half of the guest had gone, and Nova was still by her side, pretty sure she'd fallen irreversibly in love when Chantal had rapped all the words in Left Eye's verse perfectly.
Chantal dismissed the rest of the guest with the customary "you ain't got to go home, but you got to get the hell out of here," accepting her final birthday kisses and hugs by the front door while Nova looked on.
"Guess I should get going," she'd said when it was just the two of them left in the living room.
Chantal took her hand gently, swinging it between them a little bit. "What's the rush? You haven't even had the full tour."
"Smooth." Nova's grin was wide, and the huskiness of her chuckle stoked the desire that their dancing had ignited in Chantal. "Is that what they're teaching y'all in B school over there?"
"How to seal the deal? Yes."
"Oh, so you think I'm easy?"
"I'm just hoping you're interested in working out a merger."
Nova didn't really know how to react to that, but to squeeze Chantal's hand and send her a little sideways glance that she hoped didn't let her know how much she'd turned her on. "Lead the way."
The bandana on doorknob alerted them to the fact that they couldn't cut through Zina's room, so Chantal took her outside and around to the backdoor, where they entered the kitchen and made their way up the steep, narrow staircase to the second master bedroom.
The room was nice - very nice, spacious and stylish, done all in white and black, including a glossy black stereo that Chantal turned on with the click of a remote and popped a CD into.
"So this is where the magic happens."
"I'll let you be the judge of that."
Chantal was a little too smooth for Nova not to wonder how many other girls had stood in the exact same spot she was in, getting wet imagining how soft the ice white comforter and black satin sheets of her queen-sized bed would be against naked skin. But the other part of her wondered why it even mattered; she was horny, and Chantal was fine, and they were both officially grown. Maybe somewhere between the first dance and the last and the conversations yelled over the music, she'd started to hope Chantal would like her for more than the physical attraction that was more than apparent between them. Maybe she wanted her to think that she was special.
"Hey." The sound of Chantal's voice brung her back out of her head. She'd sat down on the side of her bed near the foot and was looking at her with the most adorable frown of concern on her face. "What's wrong?"
Nova just shook her head, eyes trained on the flags hanging on her wall to avoid making eye contact. A Puerto Rican flag with an unusually light field of blue around the star hung next to the Black Liberation flag between her bookshelves. She hadn't been expecting that. She also hadn't expected to find Audre Lorde in her book collection, but there it was.
Nova shook her head again, decided to put her pre- judgments to the side and roll with it.
"Nova."
"I'm good." Then she walked over to show her just how good, coming to stand in between Chantal's legs and letting her untie her line jacket from around her waist. Nova's body reacted instantly to the attention and the brush of Chantal's hands against her zipper. There was no way she couldn't feel her trembling under her touch.
Nova could feel her clit stiffen and every non-sex-related thought fly out of her head when Chantal stopped in the middle of tugging her tank top free from her pants to look up at her, eyes darker and half-lidded, her hands still fisted in the fabric. "Ready?"
Her answer had been to take her shirt in her own hands and tug it off, slowly, over her head, making sure to stretch her body more than was absolutely necessary so Chantal got the full effect.
"Happy birthday to me."
It came out barely above a whisper, but Nova heard it, her pleased grin stretching her cheeks as curious, exploring fingers traced the contours of her abs.
Once her pants were unbelted, unbuttoned, and unzipped with Chantal's eager help, they moved fully onto the bed, Chantal scooting backwards and Nova following right behind her to lie on top her, kicking off shoes and kissing frantically as they went.
She helped Chantal out of her sweater, hand cupping a breast over her bra as soon as she was free of it, then running down her toned stomach to undo her jeans and slip inside, caressing her through the dampened fabric of her panties.
Chantal pressed herself into her touch, grinding down against Nova's fingers with a rhythm that let her know this first round wouldn't last much longer.
Nova wanted to kiss her, but she settled for watching her instead, her head thrown back, eyes shut tight, mouth an "O" of pleasure.
Her free hand found its way into Chantal's hair, and her lips found her neck, Chantal bucking up against her when she came, her thighs clamping around her wrist and a strangled groan escaping her mouth.
At some point after Chantal had caught her breath and wasted no time making Nova come twice with a skilled hand, they'd managed to get out of the rest of their clothes and in between her sheets, the satin just as cool and smooth against Nova's flushed skin as she'd imagined it would be.
Chantal had her arm around Nova, who was snuggled against her, circling a finger around her belly ring while pressing sweet kisses to her cheek, and she'd finally pressed play on her stereo remote, the sounds of Jon B.'s "Pleasures U Like" filling the room as they cuddled.
"More."
"Noooo," Nova whined, nuzzling her way into Chantal's neck like she wouldn't be able to see her if she got deep enough. "I'm comfortable. And you're warm."
"Now, now. Was it or was it not my birthday?"
"It was. It's not now."
"Yet and still, Nova Bordelon. I believe the words that came out of your mouth were 'whatever you want.' Yes or no?"
"You studying business or law?"
"Focus.."
"Yes, ma'am."
"I never got my birthday licks."
"That's what you want?"
Chantal let out a pleased little hum at the satisfaction of getting her way. "Yes."
"Then that's what you'll get." Nova sprang up suddenly then, wiggling her way down under the top sheet to bury her face between Chantal's thighs without hesitation, her lover's laugh quickly dissolving into moans as she alternated between slow licks up and down her clit and tasting the resulting wetness.
They both lost count before Nova made it to twenty- two.