Her painted purple nails almost blared against the quiet of her black blazer as her fingers grabbed her folded arms. She had forgotten to remove the color before she went to bed last night.
Shit.
Her client, a conservative Southern CEO of a multi-million dollar corporation would surely disprove.
He was already upset he had to work with her, the only woman—Black woman at that—on the team. He wouldn’t care about her Stanford education or wealthy parents. He didn’t care about her impeccable work record or indestructible resolve. He would only see those damn nails, in party purple, and curse the agency that hooked him up with the ghetto, token Negro at the firm--a recipient of the Obama hand-out, he would think.
Her heels clacked heavily as she walked reluctantly to the glass boardroom, shoulder drooping from her weighty laptop bag, purple nails clutching. His head raised as the squeak of the door announced her arrival.
Eyes searching up and down paused; “Nice nails,” he said.
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Khadijah Ali-Coleman is a playwright and performance artist. She is editor of the anthology Liberated Muse Volume I: How I Freed My Soul and will debut her play Running: AMOK this year in the Capital Fringe Fest this summer in Washington DC. She owns the online artist communitywww.LiberatedMuse.com. Learn more at http://www.KhadijahOnline.com.
1 comment:
Vividly written! I can see her and feel her anxiety...and her ultimate relief!
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