I was sitting in my nine thirty class, totally spaced out. I was having a difficult time getting last night's dinner off of my mind. It went horrible. Absolutely horrible. The images of Makay and my mother arguing were glued in my memory. Never have I seen Makayla so angry, hurt, and passionate.

It broke my heart, honestly. You never want to see your little sister in that state of pain especially with your mother. My mother had to stop being stubborn and fix it. I sighed, playing with the ring on my finger. Things were changing, drastically. I can't say that I didn't see it coming.

"Ms. King? Are you with us today?" Dr. Sanders called.

I snapped out of my thoughts quickly, looking up and nodding my head. "Yes, sir."

"Good." He flashed a quick smile. Taking General Psychology and Abnormal Psychology under him, became overwhelming. However, the class was never boring. He stepped to the board, pausing for a second. Then, he wrote boldly, underlining it as many times as his heart desired.

"Let's talk about gender roles." He said excitedly as he went to sit on his desk. He glanced at his watch. "We have about fifty minutes so who wants to go first?"

No one raised their hand causing him to chuckle. "Don't you all hold your hands up at one time." He glanced around the room. "We're grown here. Soon, you all will see the effects of gender roles if you aren't now. So, what's your opinion?"

One of the girls raised her hands and he called on her to speak.

"Personally, I think we should just accept it. We have natural roles, it's life."

Coming from a female, I was disappointed in her answer. Where was her feminism? She couldn't possibly think like that. I raised my hand to speak.

"Yes?" Dr. Sanders looked at me.

"I disagree. Gender roles shouldn't even be a thing. We are not living in the eighteenth century where the female species can't think for themselves."

He nodded. "That's excellent. Anyone else agree?"

"What's wrong with staying at home and being a housewife?" One boy chimed in.

I shrugged. "Maybe I'm too independent to depend on a man to take care of me. I have a mind of my own. You should want a woman like that anyway. Solely being dependent on a man isn't smart. What if he leaves her? She has nothing then."

He shook his head seemingly disappointed.

"Cue the 'strong, independent black woman' mantra." He said, rolling his eyes.

I shook my head, slightly chuckling. "We're talking about gender roles. This has nothing to do with race."

Dr. Sanders didn't intervene. He just allowed to debate to continue.

"Well, I don't know Malia. White women are more open to do the things that women should do. Yet, black women aren't."

I narrowed my eyes at him. I didn't understand his issue. What did he have against black women? After all, he's black. Well, from what I can tell.

"What's that?" I asked.

"White women don't complain about cooking, cleaning, doing laundry. Things like that." He formed his lips into a tight smirk.

My eyebrows crinkled up in confusion. "Sounds like you want a maid."

"That's just things a woman should do. I should come to a clean home and food on the table. Y'all make it so hard when we make it easy."

"That's bull." I heard a familiar voice interrupt. Both of our heads snapped in Khari's direction.

I had forgotten that he had taken this class with me. I frowned at his appearance. He wasn't stylish, but he'd keep himself up well. However, today he looked as if he had a rough night. He still looked good despite the lack of sleep. I didn't understand my attraction to him. The guy isn't good.

"How? Bro you know that's true." The guy said to Khari.

Khari shook his head in disagreement. He had a slight mug on his face like he had been disrespected. Licking his lips instinctively, he began to speak.

"The idea that there are natural gender roles pushes people into specific boxes. There are females out here who aspire to be scientists, judges, corporate executives. Should they be told that they aren't suited for these positions because they are female?" He lifted his eyebrow up. "Because they should stay home, have your babies, and do your laundry?"

The boy didn't say anything which gave Khari the cue to continue.

"Women are just as qualified to do what men do, if not more. Would you be a stay at home dad?" He looked at him.

The guy scoffed. "Hell no."

"Exactly."

"This is good, very good." Dr. Sanders said in approval.

"Also, cue the 'black women are unfit because white women do this and that' mantra." Khari added, mocking the guy's statement. If he didn't have me hanging on his every word before, he definitely did now. The frustration on his face showed that the guy's statement about black women had ticked him off. I fully turned around in my seat because I was interested in his viewpoint about this specific topic.

"The black woman is the most disrespected person in America." He said glaring at the guy. "And it's not by the white man, but by their own men."

"What's your point? Is it a problem that I just prefer white women?" The guy challenged.

"It sad, but ain't nobody knocking you on your preference. By all means, date who you want. It shouldn't be all about color anyway. Just don't degrade our women in the process. You can praise a white woman without talking down on your own. Do you see a white man who dates a black woman degrading white women? No."

Look at this strong black man defending his Queens. Lord, hammercy.

I started fanning myself. It suddenly got warm in the room maybe because of Khari's passion about this topic. It radiated off him.

"It's not that deep. Black women degrade us all the time, man. You forgot that?"

Where?!

"Man." Khari shook his head. "Excuse my language Dr. Sanders, but, these sistas love our ain't shit asses to death."

Okay, now he had all of the black women in the room hanging on his every word. A few of them were even making googly eyes at him.

"We get killed everyday. Who's always at the forefront of these protests? Black women. Don't you know that 'Blacklivesmatter' was created by black women? They support us with no questions."

"Okay you're right about that. Not gonna change my preference, though. Black women are too argumentative, loud, and have too much attitude. Nobody got time for that."

"Your choice." Khari shrugged. "I just think it's amazing that despite them being aware that they're undesirable by many black men, they still do everything they can to uplift, support and advocate for us. There's no other group of women who are for their men as black women are for black men."

"America teaches us to hate them and ourselves. They teach us that kinky hair isn't 'fine' or 'good' hair. Somehow, we're taught that white is beautiful while women of color aren't." He continued. "So, no one is going to disrespect a black woman as long as I'm nearby. They go through enough as it is."

He glanced over at me before returning his attention back to Dr. Sanders, who had a pleased look on his face. Khari received handclaps except from the guy he was debating with, of course.

"Wow, inspiring point of view, Mr. Valentine. I agree wholeheartedly. We got off topic, but I enjoyed the discussion." Dr. Franks exclaimed.

Me too, Dr. Sanders. Me too.

I think I had misjudged Khari. Maya was right, he didn't make a great first impression. However, he redeemed himself with the second one. Now, I was intrigued.

"Class is dismissed." Dr. Sanders announced.

Everyone quickly gathered their things to leave. I watched as Khari swiftly walked out of the room so I hurried to catch him.

"Khari?" I called behind him.

He turned around meeting my eyes. His eyes eventually wandered before looking back down at me. "Yes?"

I finally caught up with him, standing before him. I moved my hair out my face, clutching my books.

"I just want to say thank you. What you said in there was—shocking." I admitted.

The once desired look on his face disappeared.

"I know you didn't expect to hear that from the asshole. But." He shrugged his shoulders. "That's normal for me now."

I grimaced. "Khari, I—I didn't mean it like that."

He didn't seem to believe me, though.

"I got a class to go to. Was that all?" He looked elsewhere before looking back at me with a blank expression.

I pulled away from his cold gaze, nodding my head. He turned, walking away without acknowledging me any further.

Great job, Malia.

Glancing at my watch, I sighed heavily and headed for my next class.

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