"La nube que no deja ver el sol brillante, no lo dejes que te apague."

MALUMA | 11 PM

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o c t a v i o

"Run away with me," I told her.

Aaliyah smiled and looked up at me with those wide Bambi eyes. "What?"

"Remember that time when I said we could ease into it? I figure that we might as well get to know each other, preferably over a meal."

She rubbed her neck and looked somewhere ahead of me, and I could only assume she was thinking about her date.

"Where are we going?" Aaliyah asked.

"Someplace."

She bit her lip in contemplation, analyzing me through the sweep of her black eyelashes. "No, I'm going to need an actual location before I go hopping around New York with someone I barely know."

"Fair enough. My apartment's in SoHo, though, I'm a little offended that I'm just somebody you barely know."

"If I agree to go with you, then you probably won't be someone I hardly know for long," she said. "Now, tell me." Her eyes flashed with mischief. What's on the menu for this evening?"

"Well." I cleared my throat dramatically. "I was thinking of cooking some seared wagyu beef from Japan with truffle mushroom and gold flakes. Desert would be a raspberry coulis."

"Ooh, yum," Aaliyah laughed. Her laugh carried through the air as light as a feather, as delicate and quirky as she was. "As much as I love the sound of imaginary food, what are we actually eating?"

"Pizza."

Her plush lips perked into a smile that met the corners of her eyes. Suddenly, her expression shifted into something unreadable, as if she were struggling to come to terms with her own thoughts.

"But, I can't just leave Derek," she said with a disheartened sigh. She jerked her thumb to the crowd below us, singling out the exact man she kept referring to. He was tall, All-American with a short array of light brown hair and stubble. So-called Derek wore a suit as expensive as my painting and looked like he walked straight out of the Wall Street Journal.

As I evaluated him for myself, it was difficult to find a single reason why Aaliyah wouldn't be interested in him. He was handsome and successful, judging by his attendance tonight he must've had an interest in culture. Yet, I had that inkling feeling that there was more about her and Derek if I scratched the surface lightly. After all, he was downstairs, and she was up here—with me.

"Were you having fun down there? I mean, if you were, then yeah, you don't have to come," I noted. "But, I have the feeling that you weren't."

Momentarily, she didn't respond and avoided my gaze, pursing her lips.

"Not entirely," she admitted. "Wait, let me just go tell him something first."

"He seems...busy," I said.

Aaliyah looked back, watching him chat up a crowd of fancy men in suits and young, attractive women beside him. Suddenly, a familiar face entered the group below me. A dark brunette, short and petite, with a sliver of black ink on the blade of her shoulder. Mariana.

After what happened three days ago at Sienna's, I arduously tried to burn that memory and avoid the growing guilt that accumulated behind me as I walked anywhere for the past three days. I couldn't believe I had stooped as low as Mariana, after all, only Mariana had behavior like that in her roster. Then again, apparently, so did I. Now, she was here, looking for me.

Fuck.

We snuck out from the back, and it felt like my mischievous college days all over again. As chaotic as this city was, there was nothing more exhilarating than traveling past the concrete buildings and skyscrapers, weaving in and out like a trail of ants. A mass of touristic students approached us, clad in the same white t-shirts with a logo on the front, cameras strung around their necks. Aaliyah squeezed my arm, so she wasn't devoured by the crowd.

I had lived in the same red brick building since my third year in college, and aesthetically, it hadn't changed much either. The eight-story floor building was tucked a few roads away from most of the tourism was situated in front of a hair salon and nondescript stores. My loft wasn't so much of an apartment as it was a safe haven for most of my creative art spawns.

Admittedly, my chest heaved, and my stomach twisted that I had even brought her to my place, knowing the kind of lifestyle she led. It wasn't every day that a woman from such a reputable family chose to run away from her encompassing guilt and sense of responsibility with the poster child of a starving artist. Maybe not starving, I quite enjoyed grocery shopping.

So here I was hoping my normalcy wasn't too big of a turn-off.

I flicked on the lights and let her in. If anything, I was most grateful for the size of the space. It's nearly impossible to find a reasonably priced seven hundred square-foot apartment in New York City. So, she'd at least have to give me some credit for that. Aaliyah's first reaction was ineffable. Her mouth parted, and her brown eyes roamed the room with bewilderment. I couldn't tell if it was a pleasant surprise or a pleasantly disappointing one.

"This place," Aaliyah said, running her fingers along the brick walls as she stepped through the threshold and into my small foyer. Her eyes widened as she stared at one of my pieces hanging on the wall. They were small canvases, each created for every year I had lived in New York. On them, were all the little discoveries I made.

"You have pieces in here from 2009? This is like a time capsule. Did you paint all of these?"  she asked.

"Yeah, but I never thought they were good enough to sell," I said. "I like the idea of a time capsule, though."

She laughed almost. "You don't think these are good enough to sell? Oh, come on."

I dropped my keys on the glass table and hung my jacket and her coat on the coat hanger.

"You should open a gallery and feature all of these paintings. I would buy it," she said. Her eyes never left my abstract deconstruction of the Brooklyn Bridge.

"Thanks." I smiled, trying to be modest, but her compliment really made my heart lodge in my throat. "But, uh, I don't know yet."

"You know, I'm sure if you had a management team—or something like that—maybe you'd feel less apprehensive about it," she said.

"I don't know if that's true."

"You're an art dealer, you of all people know how important it is to get exposure. Sometimes, people need more help than they want to admit," she continued, moving towards me.

Instinctively, I thought of looking away from her face and further down, but I restrained myself, even if the top buttons of her blouse were undone.

"I just haven't met many represented artists that didn't turn into hamsters running on a wheel—overworked and commercialized," I replied.

Her dark eyebrows furrowed, and her lips contorted into a playful, yet dubious smile. "Are hamsters commercialized?"

"I don't know. I guess, maybe, there's an entire movie dedicated to those bastards," I joked.

Aaliyah tossed her head back in a peal of lilting laughter. "Octavio, those are chipmunks. Alvin and the Chipmunks."

"No, that's not it."

"It isn't? Are you sure?" She raised an eyebrow.

"I'm talking about the one with a red shirt and the chubby one with a green shirt."

"Still, Alvin and the chipmunks."

I raised my hands, succumbing to her dominant state. "Alright then, I didn't realize I was going up against a rodent whisperer."

"New York's Finest. You know, you should name your painting of me after that," she snickered, her voice dripped with sarcasm.

"Name? Oh no, I was thinking of something more practical. Like, giving you a tail, some whiskers, and sharp front teeth."

"I'm sure that would be your bestselling piece yet," she giggled.

Aaliyah reached the end of the foyer and looked back at me with wide, dazzling eyes. She looked star-struck as if there was something on the tip of her tongue that she wanted so badly to say, but for some reason, hesitated.

"Have you ever heard of the phrase zeitgeist?" she asked, tentatively wetting her lips. I shook my head. Judging by her pronunciation, it sounded like a foreign word.

"Well, it's a German word, from this German philosophy—'zeit' means time and 'geist' means ghost..." she drifted off, walking through my hallways, her fingers just barely brushed the edge of the frames.

"Spirit of time," she said with the smallest smile I had ever seen. "It's an invisible force that becomes the dominant characteristic of a set of years."

"I've never heard of that word before. It's fitting, I like it. Where'd you read about it?"

"Let's just say in my spare time. I like to google random things," she replied.

She wandered into my living room, and although it wasn't very stylish with pre-planned designs of how everything was going to be laid out, it was functional and organized. The furniture was admittedly eclectic as I wasn't much of the IKEA man. A few of my possessions, such as my light brown coffee table and the dark red carpet was from a flea market. Shockingly enough, I was able to keep some plants alive in the corners of the room, behind the bright yellow plush sofa—which was really the only thing I was proud of.

Aaliyah didn't seem to mind it, or anything for that matter. She dropped her tiny purse on the coffee table and sunk into the sofa.

"You won't believe how long I've been waiting to take these shoes off," she groaned.

"You can take them off, you know? I don't mind," I insisted.

Satisfied with herself, she happily removed her heels and stretched her feet with a dopey smile.

"This place feels very 'you,'" Aaliyah said.

"You think? Then I must be really fuckin' weird," I admitted.

She licked her lips and giggled. "That's an understatement."

Twenty minutes after, I called my favorite pizza place in Broadway, and we somehow found ourselves sitting on the living room floor, backs against the sofa, eating pizza. It was effortless really, all I had to do was eat my bacon pizza and listen to her talk about artichokes as a topping, her eyes glistening with admiration. Frankly, I never understood someone who willingly chose to have olives and mushrooms on pizzas.

Aaliyah pulled loose, cascading curls away from her face.

"First of all, how the hell am I the weird one if you're the one who adds olives, mushrooms, and goddamn artichokes to their pizza?" I questioned.

"You say that now, but I bet you're gonna ask me for a slice, and just because you said that I won't be giving you any."

"I'm not gonna ask for a slice, but I'll ask for a bite without olives and mushrooms, of course."

"No."

"A lick?"

"I won't give you a bite, but I will definitely let you drool all over it," she retorted, ironically.

"I knew you'd come around." I winked as she rolled her eyes.

Shaking her head, yet with a grin hanging on her lips, she held up a slice and flicked off the mushroom so I could freely try the artichoke on the tip of the pizza. I instantly moved closer and took a bite. Letting it sink into my mouth, I flinched at first but was bizarrely amused by the strange flavor.

Aaliyah stretched her arms above her, and her shirt rode up high enough to expose that same scratch-like bruise on her abdomen that I saw the other day at the studio. I never mentioned it before, but at this point, having seen it twice, my curiosity piqued.

"I couldn't help but notice that you have this light brown scratch on your stomach," I said. I didn't want Aaliyah to feel uncomfortable. "Is that a beauty mark?"

She hesitated, and I realized that I caught her off guard. Aaliyah parted her lips but closed them briefly. Who knew what storm could've been brewing in that head of hers.

"Uhm—"

"I don't know why I asked, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable," I interrupted, fumbling like a complete idiot.

Aaliyah shook her head quickly as if to oppose me.

"No, no, it's okay," she reassured me. "It only makes sense that you would ask me that, considering you've seen me topless twice now?"

She lifted the hem of her blouse, just enough to expose an incision on the left side of her torso.

"Not that many people ask because I always try to cover it," Aaliyah said. "But, uhm, it's just a surgical incision."

"Shit," I breathed. "What for?"

She swallowed and wet her lips, casting her eyes to the ground. "Actually, my sister has chronic kidney disease, and three years ago, it worsened." Aaliyah broke into silence, her voice wavering. "She needed a donor, so I donated mine."

Initially, I was speechless. Trying to conjure up my thoughts. It definitely wasn't the response I thought I'd get, but it was almost endearing to know that someone as sensual and vivacious as her could undergo something so unnerving.

"That must've been difficult for you," I said, touching her arm for comfort. "You're brave."

Suddenly, her eyes brightened, and she looked at me, it was apparent she didn't expect that kind of response.

"It didn't work though, the transfer I mean. Rafaela's body rejected my kidney, and there we were, back at square one." She sounded tense, exhausted, and I immediately noticed her quivering bottom lip. Aaliyah bit her lip, suppressing it. "I dunno, it was hard." She shrugged it off.

That's when I realized that she wasn't upset about the surgery, she was hurt that it didn't work. A pressure resided on my chest, pushing against me with secondhand guilt.

"Luckily, she's alive, but it's not because of me," she said, merely a whisper. "Sometimes, you think you're doing the right thing, and you just make it worse."

Only God knows how often I thought that.

"Anyway, I don't know why I told you that I just killed the vibes," she said with a humorless laugh.

"No, she is alive because of you," I said. "Because you literally did what many people don't want to do. I mean, there's nothing you could've done about that—shit happens."

"Yeah, but that kind of thing does wonders to one's self-esteem." There it was again, those same sarcastic remarks and meek smiles that she hid behind, they were her most prized defenses.

I nudged her. "I think you're pretty badass."

She snorted. "Pft. That's sweet."

Aaliyah dropped the pizza box on the coffee table, and when she returned to her spot next to me, I noticed some sauce on the corner of her lip.

"You've got some sauce on your lip," I told her,

"Oh," she laughed curtly, and her ears reddened with embarrassment as they did when she first modeled for me. Aaliyah attempted to wipe it off but missed the spot.

I reached out to her and dragged my thumb across the left corner of her lip. Then, I placed the edge of my thumb into my mouth.

The tension in the room only thickened. It oozed this electrifying energy that I couldn't explain, fuck, I'm going crazy. Aaliyah peered into my eyes and splayed her hand over my knee. She drawled a grin over her lips, biting her lower lip. Her touch left a trail of flames along my skin, and the scent of her burnt vanilla and spice perfume was intoxicating.

A phone vibrated and shrilled with an alert, and she instantly tore her hand away from me. What the hell just happened? She reached for her purse, and Aaliyah's smile faltered as soon as she pressed the phone to her ear. While she spoke, I couldn't even hear her voice, all I heard was the rush in my chest, and all I saw was myself verging on another mistake.

After a few mumblings, she hung up and sighed.

"Thank you so much for the pizza Octavio, I had a blast being criticized for my taste in toppings, only to be proven right anyway," she said with a chuckle. She dusted her skirt off and stood up, slipping her feet back into her shoes with dread.

"No problem, I have a lot more of that up my sleeve," I said, walking her to my front door.

Aaliyah pulled on her coat and tossed her hair back, but before she stepped outside my threshold, she lingered near one of my paintings and smiled.

"I still think you should open up your own gallery," she added. "Now, that'd be pretty badass."

"I'll think about it," I replied, and it felt genuine.

We went in for a goodbye hug, and her arms looped underneath my arms, her head resting on my chest momentarily before we parted. Aaliyah's hands remained on my arms, though, and before I knew it, she planted a lipstick-stained kiss on my cheek.

Pretty girls with bad habits would be the death of me.