Si was always talking about some hot boy that everyone liked. Ona noticed cute boys but they were never really her thing.
Since she stayed in a university residence, she was much more plugged into res life and all the first year hot gossip. She never had nice things to say about the gaggle of girls she spent time with and sometimes Ona wondered what she had to say about her during conversations with her other friends. Was she as cutting in her comments about Ona, and what kinds of things and intimate pieces of information was she sharing about her to her other friends.
Ona recalled one time when Si explained how one of the girls was in an open relationship (but she did not know that it was open). Her boyfriend swore up and down that he was faithful to her but it was apparent that this was not the case because she was constantly getting sexually transmitted infections (STI's) from him. One time this same girl wanted to borrow tights from Si and she recalls Si telling her, " and then I just gave her the tights because I did not want to catch whatever STI she was harbouring in her vagina!"
Although hilarious at the time, she reflected on how unkind that was. Was Si the type to trade embarrassing stories amongst her inner circle for the amusement of others? Or did she have the discretion to keep certain things to herself?
On that particular day Si spoke about this boy she was seeing whose initials were MM. Within minutes, they ran into him as if God was listening to their conversation and sought to make things interesting. The pair saw him across the courtyard coming towards them, from the Engineering Building.
She called out to Mo and waved. Ona recognised his caramel complexion and purposeful stride. This was surprising because she never could put a face to all the boys Si was always obsessing about) knew him from primary school. When Ona and Si ran into him on campus one day, he looked at her with big eyes as if he had something he wanted to say but couldn't. She brushed it off if he had something to say, he would have said it. Something about the way Si acted like she knew him more than her rubbed Ona the wrong way. Yes, she mentioned that they were vibing at some stage and he was studying engineering in lieu of not getting high enough marks for medicine, but Mo existed before Si acted like she met him first.
Ona recalled the last time she shared a communal area with Mo. She wore a tartan skirt which was mostly maroon and a golf shirt, he wore green denim shorts with the matching golf shirt signalling their allegiance to their private school. She can't remember if they were in the same class or not but she remembered him asking her to be his girlfriend in grade six.
She was terrified since she was so young, terrified of boys and hyper-vigilant due to the game the boys in her grade were playing where they would ask girls out in their grade who were perceived as less desirable than the others. After the girls would agree, they would turn around and taunt them- stating they were only joking. It had happened to two of the girls in her grade, one of which was her close friend.
The build-up to the question was pre-empted by Mo asking Ona if she thought he looked like Pharrell Williams, stating that everyone around him said that he did.
The global obsession with Pharrell at this stage, when he embarked on his solo career dropping hits with trailblazers like Snoop Dogg and Gwen Stefani, meant that any and every girl wanted to be with a guy who looked like him. She couldn't remember what she answered back but she remembered him asking her out and her saying no, because she did not want to be embarrassed. She really liked him, but she would not allow herself to be humiliated on that day. Sometimes she wondered, what if she said yes to dating him? Would it be her walking around campus making it her whole personality that she was attached to him.
Si was always so estranged when it came to boys. As she got older, she realised that Si was deeply insecure and intimidated by Ona, but because Ona always placed her on a pedestal as her beautiful and more experienced friend, she never thought of herself as superior to Ona in any way. For some reason, when she paraded her proximity to Mo in her face, Ona was annoyed as if she had not known him in her childhood, way before she could even spell Sinovuyo. Si always wanted to establish domination over Ona, and Ona let her at the time because she was still deeply insecure about her place in relation to people around her and did not perceive Si's behaviour as a problem because: she thought they were friends; did not think that Si's confidence had any bearing on her self worth; and deep down, she did see Si as superior to her. The dynamic was fine, while Ona still had a relatively low self-esteem and was still growing into her own, but what would happen if this changed?
Si based too much of her worth on how men perceived her anyways- and it showed. Once again Ona asked herself if Si was here to get a BA Degree or her MRS degree.
***
Mo's gawking at Ona stopped long enough for him to greet Si and give her that satisfaction that she was craving. While Ona observed she smiled politely while her friend took this opportunity to assert her dominance. During this brief exchange she could not help but notice Mo's unease and how aware he was of Ona without acknowledging their history. Was he shocked to see her? Surprised or was he transported back in time 7 years prior to the day his crush turned him down with no explanation. She felt something change that day, while Si fussed and continued trying to capture his attention he was fixated on Ona. It was so weird. Why didn't he speak and what was he thinking?
Si pranced away from him with a sense of satisfaction while Ona strolled beside her. Once again, she had found a way to pretend that she was better than her but what was the prize and who cared when Mo was so distracted by Ona, it seemed he forgot how to speak. She wondered if he still listened to Pharrell...