September 17, 2008 @ 2:52 pm

Barely There

Shanel Odum

Read the excerpt from VIBE’s October cover story

50 and I are just cool. He’s a cool person, very cool person. Really cool person…

Ciara is blistering hot. The kind of hot that makes paint bubble up and peel off the walls. Sprawled on her back, breath escapes her lips in short exhales.

She gazes upward with lazy lids. Reflective. Layers of hair are pasted against her cheeks —a perfect, feathery frame. She’s glistening; looks delicious and sweet, like a freshly glazed Krispy Kreme. Pearl sized droplets of sweat bead against the smooth bronze of her rib cage, glide down the valley between her abs, and slip from sight.

Finally.

Ci Ci’s ready to let you in. Tempting with a glimpse of the goodies she’s been so cautious with—the treats she’s been hiding under extra extra large sweats. Finally, she’s willing to reveal the woman she’s kept caged behind that stoic pout and those titanium pop-locks.

“I’m in a free-flowing place,” she says, brushing damp locks from her face. “If you wanna get me to try something, this is the time to do it. I’m gonna let go. On a fantasy ride, anything could happen.”

Ease up. She’s talking about her upcoming third album, Fantasy Ride (LaFace/Zomba). But more on that later. Reclining on a slick wooden bench in Body By Brooklyn, a lofty Clinton Hill spa that’s plush without being overly posh, Ciara dabs her upper lip with a fluffy, ivory towel. The scent of vanilla candles disguises the chlorine of the nearby dipping pool. It’s an oppressive 145 degrees, but Ciara seems relaxed, blanketed by the heavy atmosphere, unaffected by the overly aggressive heat.

Steam whispers delicately as it dissipates into the sauna’s humid expanse. A giggle erupts from her lips and cascades into the mist.

She’s such a tease…

And yes, she’s legal. But you won’t catch Ciara, 22, hitting the bottle on the reg. “I had a Malibu for my 21st birthday,” she says, “but I’m not a drinker. I get naturally crazy, so I don’t know what a drink would do to me. I take the sober route.”

One wonders, though, where all that natural craziness is. The truth is, as much as you hope she’s simply being coy, it’s more likely she’s just being honest. Anyone who admits to drinking the syrupy coconut flavored rum—let alone nursing a single cocktail the first time they don’t have to flash a fake ID—probably isn’t much of a partyer.

“It’s draining,” she says. “I can last an hour. I’m really a 30-minute girl, to tell you the truth…but honestly, I’ve been working on it. I told myself, this is the year for me to have a bit more fun.”

Really? ! Then there’s that giggle. If it weren’t for the hysterics, the full-on handsover-face, rosy-cheeked fits, you might think she was only attempting to cast herself as the gracious goodie two-shoes. But she’s not flexing her budding acting skills—Ciara stars in this month’s straight-to-DVD drama Mama I Want To Sing! (Codeblack).

She’s sincere in her desire to bare it all This is a girl who tosses around phrases like, “Teamwork makes a dream work” and “There’s no ‘I’ in team.” With a straight face. This is a girl who was the captain of her high school cheerleading squad.

But this is also the Ciara who was bent over a chair in the video for 2006’s “Promise” —like a flashdancing Jennifer Beals. The same pleather-clad vixen who squatted spread-eagle over Chris Brown during their “With You”/“Take You Down” duet at this summer’s BET Awards ’08.

The same naked chick who went chestto-chest with 50 Cent in the video for the 2007 hit “Can’t Leave ’Em Alone”—Ciara caressing his broad, brown shoulders. Fiddy wearing nothing but a baseball cap and a smirk.

“It was important to do whatever needed to be done to get the emotion across,” she says of their steamy video, unable to stifle a grin. “It wasn’t super-tough.”

It’s been rumored that she and the tatted and toned Curtis Jackson’s on-screen chemistry was more than just a video concept. “50 and I are just cool,” Ciara says, after recovering from another giggle fit. “He’s a cool person, very cool person. Really cool person…” Her sudden lack of eloquence speaks volumes.

But to hear Ciara tell it, her dating life is just that tame. “You don’t have to sell yourself out,” she says. “Take your time and get to know somebody before you involve the physical aspect, even down to kissing.

I don’t think it’s cool to be talking to different people and kissing all of them. It’s just not the way to start off. It creates confusion. When you subtract those things, it allows you to focus more on who the person is.”

She says she’s “definitely open to getting to know someone,” but Bow Wow’s ex insists she’s single. So what does a beautiful bachelorette do when she has a scratch that needs itching? “Just know,” she says, “that as a young woman there are other ways to…” And that’s all she’ll say.

Then snickers — more giggles—ensue. She appears embarrassed, guilty at the mere thought of admitting—no, barely suggesting—that she can get herself off.
Wanna know what it feels like to hold a postcoital pop princess in your arms? Be patient.

Ciara’s not the kind of chick who comes hopping out of hollow cakes. She’s mastered the art of keeping you insatiable. She’s not the type to leave a lover wanting, but she’s not a cock tease either. You won’t catch her naked, panties at her ankles, promising something she’s not ready to give up. She’d rather postpone the finale. Strip down, piece by piece. Agonizingly slow.

“I’m definitely at a phase where I feel like everything is getting better,” she says of her love life. “[Intimacy] is about the way you express yourself to a person. I’m very shy, but I’m more vocal, more firm about what I like and what I don’t like—what I want and what I don’t want.

There are no limits, no boundaries to what I would do for a person I love. I go hard. I give 100 percent, and I expect that in return. I make the best of every moment.”

Article tags: Ciara, 50 Cent, Bow Wow, B2K, Chris Stokes