*Caution: The spelling errors are there to denote the accent.

Their evening ended with the two taking a Uber back to the hair store and Sorell driving home in her car.

The goodbye was an awkward one for both. As teens, they would give head nods or wave. There, Sorell smiled, said good night, Ravan, and got in her car.

Now Ravan dropped on his bed after his shower. He stared at the ceiling and wondered whether he should send a text or not to see if Sorell got home safely.

He already imagined her ranting in front of her phone.

Ravan knew he came off clingy, but it was a false impression. Sorell didn't see people outside of work. One could say she no longer knew how it was to have a friend or a man courting her. The woman occulted the process.

Ravan wasn't the type to overdo, but Sorell was an exception.

First, they were friends, or at least they used to be. Back in the day, there was no protocol. They texted each other late at night without having second thoughts.

Secondly, it was natural to check if the other got home well. The man would do the same for his siblings. He wondered why he even reflected upon the question. Ravan sat up and texted.

As expected, the woman at the other end of the line sneered at her phone screen.

Sorell rested her head on the pillow. She didn't assess her evening; that was something people did when they hoped for some romantic outcome which was not her case.

Ravan was sure handsome, but Sorell still saw herself in the friendzone, in a similar bench or field. She was the first person Ravan crossed upon his return to Paris, which also made her his first choice for hanging out.

Sorell thought her explanation made sense.

Did he expect her to answer his text? Sorell hoped not. The woman didn't want to get into the habit that ended up with having expectations and making musicals in one's mind Lala land style. She was already in a comfortable position in bed. Her soft silk pillow comforted her head which cooled down from Ravan's interrogation.

Why was he so concerned about her ending up alone?

Sorell already hyped herself to be a rich single aunty. After being everyone's doormat for years, the woman finally had the time and the allowance to focus on herself.

If she were honest, she would have answered my goal is to grow my hair. Some want glutes, and I just want some hair strands to comb. Is it too much to ask?

Sorell slept only to be woken up by her ringing doorbell.

"Shit," Sorell muttered as she saw who stood at her residence's portal on her interphone screen.

Dring, Dring.

Sorell pressed the voice button, "mom, stop it."

"Open up."

Sorell opened, and in came Ms. Nkechi.

"So you do't answer my calls."

"I'm busy, mom."

The woman eyed her up and down before advancing in the corridor, "too busy to answer my calls. I could be dyin'."

"But you're not," Sorell replied as they both entered her living room.

"I am, look at me, Sorell. Your mom got botched. Look at deez dimple on the side of my butt," her mom said while giving Sorell a side view.

Sorell sighed, "mom, who gets a BBL twice. It's like asking for an extra stack of steak on a Big Mac."

Sorell's mom was in that delicate 5.0, aka sweet fifties war zone, where she tried to dodge the landmines of aging and chased every fountain of jouvence. Of course, Sorell paid for every drop of youth she got.

Her mother sneered at her and crossed the living room to walk the corridor that led to Sorell's dressing, "Ehen, I'm goin' to Lagos with Derek. I need some cool outfits."

"So you came to squat my wardrobe at," Sorell looked at the clock on her wall, "at 7: 30, mom are you serious?"

"My flights at two. I need to look bangin'."

Derek was forty-four, he naively believed Sorell's mom was thirty-six, and he could.

MISS Nkechi, as she preferred being addressed as she reinvented her life's story. With her glutathione injections, cat eye lift, she joined the clan of women who played on racial ambiguity.

The white man she dated only saw smoke as she also didn't tell him Sorell was her daughter though she loved to boast about it. Monique did not want to be caught out there with her white lie flag.

Like some black women, Sorell's mother crossed-out black men and advocated for any other.

"You see how this dark skin makes us suffer. I know I'm not the perfect mutter, but if there's one piece of advice I can give you, it's deez. Give your child a chance in life, marry any man than a black man. They don't love us. They like it when we're submissive, cook, clean, and rodeo, but they hate everytin' about us. With a bit of luck, your child will take after her father."

Sorell, who already fought many demons, was crushed by the idea, which basically told her to erase herself.

For Sorell's mother, the only way to succeed was to be fair-skinned. When Sorell began looking for a job, her mom told her to get shots like many American celebrities did to lighten her skin. "Do you tink they'll let a woman as dark as you present the news?"

If Sorell's aunt Mireille weren't there, she would have surrendered, but luckily her aunt's words held her up, "Sorell, hear me. God makes no mistake. You are as he envisioned you, perfect. And God will prove those who doubt his masterpiece wrong."

Sorell believed in her capacities; she wished to prove to her mother it was possible. Her dark mocha skin and features could reach the height of light see white women.

And yes, the legend wasn't a myth. Sorell had to work harder. It strained her mental, but also her body. After her skin, her weight was the biggest hurdle. Channels bought in on diversity, but the weight was another issue. Big girls had it hard knocked too, and for Sorell, it was a double assignment.

How to find a way to fit the standards without losing what defined her identity?

The woman began to cultivate what black social media groups called her white-ish see white-washed lifestyle.

Sorell understood she could not win every battle.

She let social media do its conjuring and focused on her career.

Sorell tried to love white, Asian, Latino; each type of man had their peeve point. And no matter the color, if he wasn't the one, he just wasn't.

Without an example, again, Sorell didn't know what she looked for in a man. She was either fetishized or utilized. Her worst experience was with a guy who lied about working in finance but always found a way to make Sorell pay for expenses. Restaurants, gas, weekends, there was always a moment. In addition to this, the guy kept reminding Sorell how lucky she was to be with a fine man like him.

Sorell quickly caught on to his catfish act. He wasn't who he claimed to be. The man planned to convert her into a sugar mom. When Sorell ditched him, he went on social media and wrote about how she hated people of her race. He sold out her past by showing before pictures that began the plastic surgery rumors about her body.

"Mom, why don't you buy your stuff?"

"Give me dee money, and I will," her mother said with a sarcastic smile before beginning to make the hangers slide.

"Why don't you ask your beau [no pun intended], Derek?"

"I do't want him to think I'm needii."

"So you prefer to wring me dry instead of the man you riㅡ," Sorell swirled her tongue in her mouth. That was a close one, she thought. Frank, the woman without filter, escaped that slap that hit the top of one's head went downwards and could have one's teeth denting the floor.

"Wat, were you saying?"

Sorell crossed her arms and sighed, "nothing."

She watched her mom pick a few shirts, her fav djellabah, three slip-on sandals, three wedges, and two handbags, including her favorite Löewe.

"Mom, all these things are called return. Don't you come telling me you left them because some aunt I don't know cried her eyes out and begged you."

"Yeah, yeah, you're so stingy sometimes. This is only material. You won't be buried with them. Why are you always making a fuss, huh? You kraii about your hair, but you are not gene- ro-us. If you give, God will add jara [give extra]. That's how it werks. Werk on your generosity, you act like you ajebutter [born with a silver spoon] remember where you come frum. You should go to church and give."

Her mother spilled the verse in the infamous lesson-giving-African-mama accent.

"Great, I need to donate to get hair," Sorell touched her forehead and left the room. Her mom had the hack of making her feel like the worst human being. The woman had enough; her mother could take all she wanted. She just wished for the woman to leave ASAP.

Monique packed what she borrowed in her luggage and went to the kitchen, "Sorell, where's the food. There's nothing to eat in this house."

"I live alone, mom. The food is like for one person."

"But where is it?" The woman said as she opened all the cupboards, "there's not even a nut for a squirrel here. What do you eat?"

"I eat, mom."

"I'm hungry. Find me some food."

"Mom, it's 8 AM. The restaurants you like eating in aren't open even on Uber eats."

"Then get me a brunch, and order me a Uber for noon."

This attitude was another thing Sorell disliked about African culture. The parents came to one's house and acted as though it was their's, and you were a Boy [in Francophone African countries, it means servant or house employee].