Part 2: Every Damn Time
After that, Brain started seeing Kenya everywhere.
The mailboxes. The parking lot. The corner store next to the apartment complex where Ms. Patricia sold single cigarettes and lottery tickets. Each time, he had prepared this whole speech in his head. Something smooth. Something that would make her give him her number without him looking like “Oh that’s the guy from the elevator.”
But every single time,the words would go missing somewhere between his brain and his mouth.
One time, he saw her getting out of her car—a Honda with the nice rims and a “Coexist” sticker—and he rehearsed it all the way across the parking lot.
Brain: “Hey Kenya, I know this is random, but could I text you sometime? Maybe we could grab lunch or…”
But when he got close enough for her to see him, she smiled and waved, and all he can say is “Hey” and a salute like he the captain of the army.
Another time, they passed each other in the stairwell because the elevator was broken again. He had his phone literally in his hand.
All he had to do was open it, start a new contact, hand it to her. Simple. Easy. The kind of thing he’d done a hundred times before.
Instead, he said
Brain: “What’s good” and kept walking.
Marcus, his best friend since middle school, called him a professional fumbler.
Marcus: “Bro, you complimented this woman’s whole existence in an elevator. You already broke the ice. You damn near broke the whole arctic. Just ask for her number.”
Brain: “I know. It’s just… every time I see her, I freeze up. What if she don’t wanna be bothered? What if she think I’m weird? What if—”
Marcus: “What if you never got that chance to be with possibly your soulmate and die alone with seventeen cats and a X account?” “Ask. The. Woman.”
Brain nodded. Marcus was right. Tomorrow.
Tomorrow he’d do it.
Tomorrow came and went.
Then next week came and went.
Then it was a whole month later, and Brain had seen Kenya exactly seventeen times (he counted, which is weird), and he still hadn’t asked for her number.
For part 1: Took You Long Enough, The Girl From The Fifth Floor