10. Passing Notes #2
Still, I had to admit, the banter seemed easier now because we were remembering how to swipe without drawing blood. Her shoulders dropped half an inch, saw the way her grip on her phone loosened. This was the Romi from the balcony—sharp, but not cutting. Present, instead of performing.
"You know," I said, testing the waters, "I keep expecting someone to jump out with cameras. 'Gotcha! You were civil to each other for thirty seconds!'"
"They'd probably spin it as us plotting each other's downfall," she said. "Secret meeting in corporate lobby. Very sus."
"Developing: 'Sources say they were seen breathing the same air. Feud escalating.'"
Romi bit down on a smile, physically trying to stop herself from laughing. "Don't give them ideas. Next thing you know, we'll be banned from being in the same zip code."
"That would actually solve a lot of problems," I said, pretending to consider it. "No more awkward industry events."
"Speak for yourself. I look good at industry events."
"You look good everywhere. It's annoying."
The words slipped out before I could form them into something that didn't make me cringe. I froze.
Glossy bow lips parted, then closed, and my eyes followed the movement again.
Romi blinked, and for a second something shifted in her expression—surprise, maybe.
She looked away, blinking quickly, and when she looked back her face had gone carefully neutral again.
But for just that heartbeat, she'd looked…
wait, was this mutual flirting? Is this what this was?
The moment stretched between us, balanced on the edge of something.
Might've stepped closer. It reminded me of playing some PS5 game, like there was some sequence of words I could say that would make us forget we were supposed to be enemies, but I kept second-guessing every word before it left my mouth.
I could talk a woman out of her panties with the right drawl and half a smirk.
But Romi made me work for a smile, nevermind anything else, and somehow that had me out here saying shit raw, with no filter, like I'd never run a line in my life.
That's when Stacks pulled up beside us, probably having watched this whole awkward dance from across the lobby. "Should I leave y'all alone or call security?" She grinned as she said it.
The joke landed like a bucket of ice water. Romi's expression immediately shifted back to polite, that real smile vanishing as fast as it had appeared.
Stacks looked over her shoulder and raised her coffee cup at someone.
"Actually, yeah, I really do need to go," she said, and just like that, everything changed. Her whole vibe shifted. A switch flipped and the slow smile vanished, shoulders went rigid, and suddenly she was looking at me like I was a stranger who'd wandered into her meeting.
Watching it happen in real time was wild. The way her eyes went flat, how she gripped her phone tighter, that distance sliding back into place. She glanced at Stacks, then back at me, but it was different now. Professional. Cold, as if the last five minutes had been a glitch in her programming.
"Good seeing you both."
The words hit different too. Polite, sure, but hollow. Reading from a script.
Something twisted in my stomach. One second we were almost…I don't know, connecting? And the next, I was back to being another face in the lobby she had to navigate around.
"Anyway, good luck with the collab and the tour," she said, each syllable measured to the microliter. "Can't wait to see it."
Stacks, seeing the icicle form but refusing to let it freeze her, waved back. "Don't worry, we'll keep it cute. Promise."
Romi's mouth moved, but her eyes were a million miles away. "Have a great day. Bye, Cam."
"Later, Romi."
She walked off, heels eating up the marble, leaving a ring of oxygen-debt in her wake. I watched her go, shoulders rigid. Mine sank. For a heartbeat I wanted to say: sorry, my friend is an idiot, please come back. But it was too late. The window had closed.
Stacks let the silence stretch for exactly one second before filling it. "Oh my God, you had her blushing. I have never seen Romi so off her game. And you, twirling your lil happy ass right around her finger."
I shot her a look that could've melted ice. "Bree."
"Yeah, yeah, I know. But we had company.
" She nodded toward the café entrance where some guy in an expensive suit was pretending to scroll through his phone while his ears were obviously tuned to our frequency.
"Homeboy's been clocking every word since you walked over there.
Had to break it up before he got somethin' juicy to sell, cause it really did look like you had her fighting for her life over there. "
"She wasn't blushing," I said, way too quick. "She doesn't blush."
"She was, though." Stacks insisted. "Y'all were two seconds away from passing notes in class like my mama used to."
"Come on, you're making it weird now."
Stacks faked like she was writing a note on a piece of paper. "Do you like me, Romi? Check yes or no."
I felt the afterimage of Romi's voice, how it had sounded for that one instant. Open, almost fond. Then it was gone, smothered by the presence of a third party, by the performance, by the need to never look vulnerable in public.
"Seriously," I said, trying to play it cool. "I think we were just…I don't know. Vibing. Having a normal conversation for once instead of this weird tension thing we always do."
Stacks nodded, lips pursed. "Normal for you, maybe. For everyone else, it was giving two cats circling a tuna steak. Very high stakes, very tense, kind of hot, honestly. Don't think I ain't clock you applying pressure to that lady."
"Friendly." Stacks raised an eyebrow. "That what we calling it now?"
"It is what it is."
"Mm." She took a long sip and let it sit.
"You know ole girl from the Fader shoot still like everything I post?
Every single thing. Been two years. She don't know me.
She DM'd me happy birthday." Stacks pointed her cup at me.
"That's what your 'friendly' does to people.
They be maintaining a whole relationship with me on the off chance it gets 'em back in a room with you. "
"That's not—"
"Mmhm." Stacks nodded . "You be out here looking at people like they the only one in the building, then you go home and forget about it, and they don't. Not saying you do it on purpose, Cammie, I'm saying you do it."
I tried again. "But that's not what this is—"
"Then what is it?"