Erica perked up when Celeste and Mina sat down,
“Good you guys are here now, okay so how does everyone feel about going to a club this weekend!”
Daisy and Mina nodded but Celeste and Nehemie didn’t seem too excited.
Celeste shrugged her shoulders,
“I’m just not a “club” person. Sorry but I think I’m going to pass.”
“Oh come ‘on Neh, just tell your parents you’re staying over at my place.”
“And what will you be telling your parents Aminata?” Nehemie using Mina’s full name made her sound even more like the mother of the group.
“I’ll tell them we’re having a sleepover at your place. It’ll be just like that time we went to New York to see Drake and that turned out fine.”
“Us missing our bus, you losing your money and making us stay at some rent by the hour motel is not my definition of fine.”
“But that won’t happen because Celeste said that she lives on he own, everyone looked at Celeste, so can we stay with you this weekend?”
“Sure but I don’t know if I want to go out.”
“Please Celeste, Mina begged then Erica joined in, we need the whole gang.”
“Okay fine, but I have to ask my roommate.”
“Who’s your roommate?” Daisy asked
“His name is Julien, I found him on craigslist and he hasn’t killed me yet so he’s a pretty good roommate.”
“You live with a guy that you met on craigslist?” Erica shouted
“Is he cute?” Daisy asked
“He is and he is also very, very gay so there’s no need to worry about anything other than him possibly stealing your clothes.”
“Well that settles it, we’ll get ready at Celeste’s, drive over to the club and crash at her place, Erica shrugged her shoulders, as long as it’s okay with your roommate.”
Celeste sighed and nodded,
“I’ll ask him tonight but, Celeste pointed to Erica before she could celebrate, when one of us is ready to leave we all leave together, okay?”
Everyone nodded in agreement.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Later on~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Celeste decided to take a break from her school work and do something that would relax her, paint. She threw on an old t-shirt of hers that was already splattered with paint, a pair of Soffe shorts, also covered in paint, and pulled her hair into a pony tail at the top of her head.
She laid down her white tarp, turned on some music and let her paint brush glide across the blank canvas. Her go to thing to paint was birds or flowers but this time she just started painting lines and dripping paint onto the canvas. Celeste picked up the canvas and slowly rotated it. The pinks and purples swirled together with the blue. She decided to leave the one corner completely free of paint. She dipped a thinner paint brush into some brown paint and painted a bird with its wings spread out. Underneath it she wrote with her fancy paint pen,
Be like a bird, fly forwards not backwards
When Julien came home, Celeste showed him her painting.
“I like the Jackson Pollock vibes, not crazy about the bird, Celeste rolled her eyes, but then again I can barely draw stick figures so who am I too judge. I love it.”
“Thanks, so how was work?”Celeste asked.
“It was okay, clam chowder girl called off again. So I had to stick around until thick ass Tony came in.” Julien smiled and grabbed a plate to warm up the leftover chicken and rice.
“I know why you call Tony, thick ass Tony but why do you call that girl clam chowder girl again?”
“Because it was the first thing she dropped when she started working, Celeste smiled and nodded, oh and how was school today? Did you learn anything?” he popped it in the microwave for 90 seconds.
Celeste shrugged her shoulders ,
“It was okay, oh by the way some of my friends want to go out on Saturday so I told them they can crash here afterwards, is that okay with you.”
Julien jumped up and hugged Celeste,
“Yes of course it’s okay, he flung her back and forth, I’m so happy you’re making friends.”
Celeste laughed and pushed him away,
“JuJu, you act like I’m some shut in who never wants to leave the house and would love nothing more than to lay on the couch and, Celeste stopped and nodded, okay so I guess that is pretty much me.”
“But not anymore, this weekend you’re going out, maybe next weekend you’ll finally get laid.” Julien clapped his hands together.
Celeste sighed and shook her head,
“I don’t need to get laid Julien.”
“Oh really, he walked into the living room and grabbed the remote, let’s check and see what you’ve been watching on Netflix, shall we?”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“When you’re sexually frustrated you watch Marvel movies because you’ve got the hots for the three Chris’s, Evans, Hemsworth and Pratt.”
“No I don’t, Celeste lunged at Julien for the remote, okay you’ve made you’re point. But it still doesn’t matter.”
“Okay, you’re right. I’m sorry I brought it up, he put his arm around her, you can do or not do whoever you want. Besides, one of us in this apartment should be welcomed at the pearly gates.” He winked and nudged his shoulder into hers.
“Nah, I’m already going to hell for laughing at old people falling down in those life alert commercials.”
“Did you ever see the video where someone takes clips from the commercials and adds music to it?”
“Yes, but let’s watch them anyway.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~The next day~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“The feminist voice of Sylvia Plath can be heard in her writing and told through her life, Celeste cleared her throat and looked down at her note cards, an examples of her feminist voice can be found in her poem Lady Lazarus which ends with the words, out of the ash I rise with my red hair and I eat men like air, Celeste looked up from her note cards and saw Ian smiling at her, even at the young age of 17 Sylvia wasn’t interested in the traditional roles that women had during that time. She wrote, I am afraid of getting older. I am afraid of getting married. Spare me from cooking three meals a day, spare me from the relentless cage of routine and rote. I want to be free I want to think, to be omniscient.”
Celeste put her note cards down and used the rest of her time to show images of Sylvia in a PowerPoint.
“Okay thank you Ms. Drummer, that was very informative. Does anyone have any questions, just as she was about to go sit down, a hand shot up in the air, Ian do you have a question for Celeste?”
Celeste clenched her jaw and let out an audible sigh. Ian nodded and leaned forward in his seat,
“Yeah I was wondering why you didn’t mention the fact that she was mentally ill?”
“Well because it doesn’t have anything to do with her being a feminist. If this was a Psych class I would’ve mentioned it. Unless you think they’re connected?”
Everyone turned and looked at Ian. He shook his head,
“I’m not saying they’re connected but maybe there is some truth to the saying, bitches be crazy.”
A few people in the class laughed but the teacher stopped it from going any further,
“Okay let’s keep the questions relevant and stop using terms like bitch to describe women.”
“My apologies Ms. Anderson and Celeste, I should have phrased the question better.”
His apologetic smile was enough for the teacher but Celeste stuck her lip up in disgust and took her seat.
After class the teacher handed Celeste her paper back and the grade she got on her presentation,
“You’re paper was great I just wish you would have brought that in a little more with your presentation but overall you did a good job. Keep it up!”
Celeste smiled and took her paper from the teacher. An A- wasn’t a bad grade but if it weren’t for the presentation part of the assignment she would have gotten higher than a 90%. She walked out of class with her head down reading the comments on her paper. Someone in front of her held the door for her,
“Thanks.” She said without looking up.
“You’re welcome Ms. Drummer.”
Celeste shook her head and turned around to face Ian,
“Don’t say my name like that.” Celeste straightened her back to appear taller and louder than she actually was.
“Like what?” Ian put his hands in his pockets and leaned in.
“Like, Celeste waved her hands in front of his face, that. Like everything you say has some hidden motive. It’s creepy and weird.”
“Whatever you say, he looked down at her paper then up to her face, good job by the way.” He winked and brushed past her.
IanJReyes0716: “The night I lost my keys, broke into a car and realized it wasn’t my car.”
KingStephen009:”You never did get that jacket back from that tattooed chick, did you?”
IanJReyes0716: “Nope but it was worth it.”
