Naomi Harris wanted what all healthy, normal, ambitions Americans wanted. Success. She was raised in a family of winners. Her father being a successful Pediatrician, her mother running a classy boutique in downtown DC. Even her baby sister was successful, having just pledged Delta Sigma Phi with every expectation of getting in seeing that Naomi herself was a Delta and held much clout with the Greek sistahs. Now at age 24, Naomi was an up and rising star at J n R Enterprises where she worked as Product Management Administrator, meaning, she had her hand in EVERYTHING the company had to offer, from webdesign to proposals/bids/tenders, you name it Naomi did it, and was slowly making herself indispensable at J n R. One thing she knew that was vital to her progress and position though was keeping her eyes open, and watching the others around her too, not that she was a backstabber, but she was NO fool, and Naomi knew that big eyes and ears and a willingness to do whatever it took would get where she wanted to go. That is, straight to the top.

The sun was shining brightly thru her office window. Naomi thought about her conversation with Maggie 15 minutes prior as she sipped her hot herbal rasberry tea. Maggie. She couldn’t help but laugh thinking about her gaul. Maggie was pissed at her because she, Naomi, had informed Mr. Peters of Maggie’s frequent tardiness. As far as Naomi was concerned she had done ol’ Maggie a favor. If she had of continued to be late all the time sooner or later she would of been canned, so she should to be thankful, Naomi thought to herself.

"Why do you feel it was YOUR place to tell Mr. Peters anything about me Naomi?!" Maggie had screamed.

"I really truly think you are overreacting. I mean it’s not like I sat out to hurt you or anything. He asked where you were and I told him, simply put. Now if you want to trip on this and get all ugly you can take it somewhere else ok?"

Maggie stood there looking at her, shooting arrows of hate with her eyes. Her face was as white as a sheet, mostly because of the white pancake makeup she always insisted on wearing, and black lipstick to match her jet-black shoulder lenght hair. Black is all Maggie ever seemed to wear every since she became a vampire, or GOTHIC is what she liked to called it. "You don’t know who you are fucking with Naomi Harris! And I thought you were a friend all this time."

"Oh my gosh, now she’s cussing me out..," Naomi said to herself, looking up in at the ceiling as if no one else was there. "Hmm..I wonder what Mr. Peters will have to say about THIS? I think i’m gonna have to let him know that SOMEBODY came into my office using profanity and threatening me."

Maggie started heading out the door. "Oh don’t worry, i’m gone, but I won’t forget this, be sure of that."

"Oh so whatcha gonna do Miss Witch put a HEX on me?" Naomi laughed sarcastically.

"Actually...that’s not a bad ideal..." At that Maggie had turned on her black heels, and with her black hair and black pantsuit, made like a ghost and slammed out of Naomi’s office.

"You really are a trip you know that?" said a voice, bringing her back to the present.

Naomi looked up to see Allison Jennings, one of her very bestfriends, glowering at her. "What?!" she laughed at Allison.

"I can not believe you Naomi, you my girl and all but you do some dirty stuff sometimes I swear."

"Ok are you planning on telling me what you’re talking about or will you continue skirting around because i’m enjoying my tea and I need to answer some emails so whats gives?" Naoma questioned.

Taking a seat in the comfortable leather chair in front of Naomi’s desk Allison said, "What made you tell on Maggie like that? Do you have ANY ideal how upset she is with you right now?"

"Well she should be thankful, girlfriend was late every damn day, it was getting a little more then ridiculous." Naomi started self-consciously moving things around on her desk. "You should of seen her earlier though, she was in here seriously trippin’, talking about how she’s gonna put a hex on me, I was like puhleazze get outta here! You know she into that Gothic stuff, with all that black she wears, and that ogly dark make-up."

"A hex? You have got to be kiddin’?"

"Nope, she a crazy looney for real. Anyhow I watch out for myself Allison, you know this, and with that supervisor’s promotion coming up..."

"Wait a minute..," Allison said, raising her hand up in a stop sign fashion. "Please tell me you didn’t do what you did over that position?"

Naomi thought long and hard before she answered. Really she HAD done it for the position. That position was what she had been coventing for over 6 months now, and she had no intentions of letting it go to some Gothic witch bitch who didn’t know how to set her clock right at night. She, Naomi Harris was the right person for the job, and everybody knew it, and yet because of company ETHICS..meaning, because Maggie was WHITE, chances were the job might would of gone to her irregardless of how inept and tardy she was, and that being the case Naomi felt she had to keep her eyes open and make sure that Mr. Peters saw Maggie without the rose colored glasses. No Maggie had never done anything to her personally and had only ever been good to her, but she wasn’t good to her a short while ago, talking about doing witch stuff on her. Hmph! Naomi thought to herself.

"Well so if I did?" Naomi said, in a low tone of voice as if the walls could somehow hear her. "Look, it wasn’t personal, it was business, you know how it is." she smirked.

"Uh..huh, whateva," Allison laughed. Just then both saw a shadowy figure go pass the half opened door, Allison jumped up quickly to see who it was turning to glance at Naomi. "Naomi that was Maggie! What if she heard our whole convo and gets her vampires after us?"

"Ahhhhhhhhhhh!" they both screamed, laughing hysterically.

"Look I got to finish up these emails, i’ll holla at you later girl," Naomi said, still laughing.

"Later girlfriend!" Allison sung as she bounced out of the room.

Vampires..witches. The very thought was too wild to even comprehend, and right now Ms. Maggie was the LAST thing Naomi was gonna worry about, she had things to do, a deadline to meet, and these damn emails!

The rest of the date went by without much drama, and Naomi had almost forgotten about the little scene with Maggie as she packed up to go home for the day when just as she was buttoning up to hit the DC traffic Maggie came out of her office, gave her a wicked smirk, and brushed past her without so much as a word. For some reason it left Naomi with a eery feel, and a spooky premonition. Maggie’s hazel-green eyes seemed to kinda GLOW at her.

"Do-do-do-do-do-do," Naomi hummed, pretending to be in a horror flick. "People are nuts," she smiled to herself as she walked out the door.

***

Naomi decided to spend the evening at home relaxing, and canceled her date with her boyfriend Kevin. Sometimes a lady needs quiet time she thought to herself as she purged into her rosepetal scented Calgon bath, reaching for the novel she was reading by this maryland brotha Van Whitfield called Something’s Wrong with Your Scale! She was cracking up thru-out the whole book, it was just TOO stupid and she couldn’t decide if she liked it or not, but definitely felt she wanted to support black authors, and had always done so. As she found herself becoming once again engulfed in her book, the doorbell rang bringing her back to the real world. She started to ignore it, but the ringing was kinda persistant, so she quickly grabbed her bathrobe, and made way for the door.

Opening the front door to her condo she suspiciously saw no one there, but as she looked down, noticed a large bouquet of red roses parked in front of her door. "Kevin..," she said to herself with a smile, he is just TOO sweet, i’m gonna have to call him up and tell him to come on over so I can give him a lil sumpin’ sumpin’, she giggled.

She breathed the rose scent in deeply, feeling the pleasure of it from her head to her toes, and could almost swear they had her tiggling. Opening the little card that came with them, Naomi was a more then a little surprised to see that they actually were not from Kevin, but instead from MAGGIE.

"Now what is that wacko up to now?" she said to herself. Still she took the roses and card to her bedroom, thinking that she just may would call Maggie up and appolize for tattling on her. The damage was actually done now, and she was all but certain that Mr. Peters would pick her for the supervisor’s job, so there was no need in keeping an enemy in Maggie, it had just been BUSINESS.

Naomi couldn’t help but wonder again what would of made Maggie send her roses, and such beautiful roses at that. She smelled them again, looking down once more to read the card. It read...Just a little something to aid you in keeping your EYES open in the future. Maggie.

Just then she felt the tingling sensation that she had thought was pleasure from the roses again, but this time it was mixed with a itching feeling. She opened her robe, thinking that maybe the Calgon bath salt hadn’t agreed with her sensitive skin. What she saw caused a horrific scream to explode from deep within her. Little hazel-green eyeballs where popping up all over her body, blinking at her with eyelashes and all! As she screamed and horror filled her, all Naoma could think about was one person. Maggieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!