"Oh..." her chapped lips parted. "It's you."
At that moment, all words had left my mouth because the person standing before me looked worse than a homeless vagabond.
With her hair in a lumpy mess, Princess stood in the open space, wearing a large Lacoste t-shirt and clutching a grimy frying pan. Her eyes were bloodshot, hosting two saggy bags underneath them and a white smear of powder on her left cheek.
"If you're just gonna stare, then you should leave." She stepped back, sending the door my way until I stopped it with a hand. She arched an eyebrow.
"Can I..." I cleared my throat. "Can I come in? We need to talk."
For a minute, I thought she wouldn't let me, but she soon moved away from the open door, tossing the dirty frying pan onto the floor.
I took a cautious step in, trying to suppress my reactions as my eyes flitted over the place.
Geez, no wonder her roommate moved out, my subconscious remarked. This place is literally a junkyard.
I had to agree. My nose was currently wrinkling from the faint smell of alcohol and burnt food wafting in the rectangular room. The sooty pan sitting on the table-top stove still held black chunks of whatever Princess tried to cook before deciding to live off fast food. White take-out packs along with piles of laundry littered the floor and the two beds. Books were scattered all over the study table, some with burnt edges, others had traces of white powder on the cover. I moved closer to examine it and found more of the white powder in a half-filled ziplock bag, hiding in the corner of a slanted stack of books.
"Princess." I pulled out the bag. "Please don't tell me you've be-"
"Don't touch that!" She yelled, snatching the bag from me with frightening speed.
Ok...I guess Akweley wasn't exaggerating after all, I thought. To resort to drugs, that meant Princess had completely lost it.
"What do you want, Akwasi?" She quizzed, after successfully hiding the powdery stuff. Grabbing a can of Gulder beer, Princess snapped it open, but before she could even take a sip of the alcoholic beverage, I snatched the can from her.
"No. You've had enough alcohol," I said, emptying out the beer in a nearby flower pot and tossing the can into a bin, which was already overflowing with similar cans.
Princess shot me a glare of a thousand daggers then sighed, plummeting on her rumpled bed. "What do you want from me?"
"It's simple. I want you to get out of this gunk," I replied, carefully brushing away a pair of lacey underwear from the only available chair in the room. Turning it, I finally settled down, facing Princess on her bed. "You can't keep missing swim practice. Amina has threatened to tell Coach to take us both off the Regional line up if you don't show up for practice on Friday."
Princess blew a sloppy raspberry. "No surprise there. Amina has always hated my guts ever since I stole her breaststroke title during last year's Annual Swimming Competition. She pretends to like me, but I know she only does that to stay in Ethan's good books. What I don't get though is, why she's dragging you into it." Princess angled her body to the side. "This has nothing to do with you."
"Actually, it does. It does because..." I heaved out a breath. "I told a lie to cover up for you."
"You covered up for me?" She sat up, surprise soaking into her features. "Why?"
"Well because I think it's hypocritical of Amina and everyone in school to judge you and call you names when half of them are secretly doing the same thing you did."
"Hm."
"And because..." I rubbed both hands against my jean cladded thighs. "Apart from Ethan, you're the first friend I made on the swim team, and as my friend it hurts me to see you like this, living like some hopeless junkie all because of him." My eyes drifted up, catching the emotional turmoil churning inside her. "It's not cool, Princess. You're acting as if this is the first time Ethan has broken up with you when it's not."
"You're right, it's not. But it's the longest," she admitted, brushing away a stray tear. "Usually when something happens and we break up, two or three days later, we have hot sex then everything goes back to normal, we become a couple again. But this time...this time it's not like that." A loud sob left her mouth, as she collected her legs into a hug. "It's been a week, Akwasi, a week! And Ethan hasn't come by or even tried to contact me." She sobbed again. "It's like he has erased me completely from his life."
"If that's the case, then it's only fair that you do same."
"No!" Princess shook her head with so much vigour. "No! I can't do that. Ethan is my rock; I can't survive here without him. I need him."
Now it was my turn to shake my head. "No, Princess, you don't."
"Yes, I do!" she fired back.
"No, you don't."
"Yes, I do!"
"No, you don't!" I yelled, startling her into silence. "This is your life, Princess.Your life! Not Ethan and Princess' life. You can't shut yourself down because Ethan dumped you!"
"B-but I love him." Her face scrunched up, making way for another stream of salt tears.
Love.
A sigh seeped past my lips. It's always love. Every couple thinks they're swimming in a pool of red hearty love until something bad happens. They’ll try to fight to stay together, but in the end, one person always goes away, leaving the other with nothing but heartache. My mother flashed in my head, sending a jolt of remorse through my heart.
"When my father left us for his sugar mama, my mother used to cry her heart out," I paused. "I didn't think she'd find love again, that's until she met my stepfather, Mensah."
Princess's sobs had reduced to sniffles now.
"They got married, had my sisters and for a couple of years everything seemed fine. Then Mensah also left us. He left us to become a drug lord."
When I looked up, Princess's bloodshot eyes were wide with surprise.
"The point I'm making here is that, people will definitely enter your life and you will fall for them, give them everything you have, including your heart... and they'll break it." My gaze locked on hers. "They will leave your heart in a thousand pieces, but that shouldn't be your end. In fact, that should be your beginning, a beginning of a new chapter in your life without them."
I slowly pushed myself off the chair, kneeling against the bed beside Princess who still hugged her legs tightly. "Just because Ethan dropped you doesn't mean you should stay on the ground. It's time for you to get back up."
"But I don't know if I can," she cried, burying her face in her arms. "I don't know if I can continue living without him."
"Yeah, I agree it's not gonna be easy forgetting someone who has been so influential in your life but, you have to at least give it a try," I pressed on. "Time isn't sitting down waiting for you, you know. You need to step up, let go off everything that has happened these past days."
"I don't think that's possible."
"And you'll continue to think that way if you don't give it a try. That's your keyword right there, try, and you can start with this." Digging a hand into my back pocket, I pulled out the two short strips of paper I had bought before coming here.
Princess took them from me, examining them with furrowed brows. "A Night of a Hundred Laughs and Music," she read from the paper. "You got us tickets to a comedy show?"
"They say laughter is the best medicine to cure a broken heart."
"No one says that," she snorted with a chuckle
"Yeah, but it made you smile." I pushed myself off the floor. "C'mon, get dressed and let's go."
Princess sat still, glued to the spot.
"I'm not taking no for an answer, you know."
"Fine," she groaned then scooched off the bed.