Eli felt like, these days, he had to try to pull out any good memories when they used to flood into his mind unwarranted. He knew the world was far too big to care to aim for his throat, but he found himself antagonizing it for its cruel constriction nonetheless. The way event after event grabbed his throat and bled him dry today exhausted his energy entirely until he was nothing but a husk of a man who was, at once, maybe even the remote idea of a full soul. But things change, Eli considered with a sigh. A reservoir is only as full as its desiccated environment will permit it to be.

Eli was on a steady trajectory to promotion until last evening when, in a sort of sorrow that can only be brought on by the silence of the night, his mind drifted to another location. He ground his teeth when he could remember neither the dreams of Malibu, Maldives, or Hell nor the reality which such dreams had hidden in its back pocket because he figured that if he hadn’t existed in either the false world or the real one, he couldn’t have existed at all at that moment. Whether his transgression had happened or not, he received a fair scolding from his telemetrics director this morning who claimed that his misinputs and mistakes had caused more problems than they solved. It was enough to set the team a couple of weeks of work back, and it was enough to set Eli’s chances at promotion back, too. If anything, he wished that he could be set back a couple of weeks to face Aaliyah’s divorce proposal differently.

The wind in Chicago swept the dust off the street like a nocturnal janitor paying his dues to the city, a sort of recompense for its cruelty during the unusually frigid June weekday not three hours before Eli had left the office. The trains rattled and sang like screeching sirens, mocking the man for meandering home on foot. He’d have taken the brown line to save him the trouble if it weren’t under maintenance, but it was like a cute cherry on top of a far cuter sundae he could never be allowed to eat from. With great tension in his arms and hands, He thought about how he spilled his coffee on the carpet at home earlier that morning, and though his parents always used to instruct him not to cry over spilled milk, they never delved into the specific intricacies of the clause’s application to coffee. So he felt a tear coming on, and he hoped it would be the last thing that would ever come out of his eye. With pursed lips, he continued through the wide streets, alone but not lonely.

Along the way, Eli knew he hadn’t made a wrong turn to veer off course, but he ended up on a different block than before while he was so deeply absorbed in his thoughts. The change in scenery wasn’t unwelcome to him, however. Subtle lights on the upper floors of the surrounding skyscrapers dwindled in the distant night, dying like stars at dawn as time weakly saunters by his side. A couple of neon signs beg for customers with their vibrant blues and reds, flickering as his eyes drowsily blinked. 

At the intersection of a particular alley and its mouth into the adjacent road, a vintage silver Corvette rolls down and freezes in front of him, inadvertently halting him. Typically, these kinds of vehicles are the preferred choice of narcissistic scumbags, or so Eli thought; but inside, there sat a bright-looking man with aviators and a tan blazer. His hair was kempt and his skin clear, and he relaxedly rested his right hand on the steering wheel, waiting like an eagle for an opening in the streets to make his move. Eli immediately wondered what kind of fantasy land had produced such a figure as he looked into the canyon of buildings at a bright yellow sign resembling a crown. 

Then, the Corvette rolled away, leaving Eli stunned in near silence. Through the cloudy mist in his head, a lone voice shoots through, swallowing up the haze and snapping him back to reality. Under it, instruments. It came softly from the end of the hall, shooting waves up the shady staircase and off the slanted ceiling, weaving through a line of some six or seven cars ranging between luxury cars and cheap SUVs. He walked into the darkness of the building’s empty spacing carefully with his arms crossed over his work satchel. With every step, the lone voice became louder and louder, and he was drawn to its source like a ship to a siren. 

He shyly approaches the opening in the wall, a concrete mine that splits the corresponding building’s belly wide open. By now, the music had gotten so imposing as to almost shroud the name of the place Eli was so determined to explore, even if it was written on the wall. On his way down the stairs, he came to a stop on the second step, his flat-soled shoes slamming on the wooden floorboards to complement the kick drum in the room. He saw the painted decal: a minimalistic yellow circle on the wall that tapered off into a crown shape, all with the word “Kings” written in the middle. 

Eli was suddenly made aware of what he had done. He thought about how, for what must’ve been the fifteenth time this month, he was roped into something that’ll make him late coming home. He was roped into something that’d inevitably become another reason for his wife to be angry. He thought he’d rather not squander his recent successes in changing her mind with his devotion, but, as he considered this, he wasn’t sure if there was any such success in recent times after all.

A young couple, perhaps only in high school, waltzed up the stairs, laughing at each other’s faces and joyfully holding hands. The girl had on a gray Chicago Academy for the Arts hoodie, and he understood precisely why such children would find satisfaction in a profound and mature place as this. He could imagine himself similarly finding satisfaction again at the bar here, taking in the dusky atmosphere he could already sense wafting its way up the stairs. 

“Sorry,” Eli apologized as he stepped close to the wall so as to allow them up the narrow stairway, but the occult phantoms didn’t say a word in return. He got a good look at the wonder in their eyes. His face turned rather red with vicarious happiness, but once they were out of view, he sighed with a reminder of what he had lost over the years. 

So, determined and self-serving, Eli made an impulsive decision again for his own sake, taking his foot down to the third and then the fourth creaky step of the club. Here, the siren’s angelic voice seemed to reach its resonant frequency, and it became all that Eli could hear like a soloed track on a DAW. His heart skipped a beat to the transcendent sound of the jazz waltz. A saxophone came through in the few moments between vocals like a friendly dialogue between man and wind. 

Nervously, he slowly took his next step until he could see the band under the ceiling above the stairs. A crowd had gathered, perhaps only fifty-something people, but the tables and bar were more than packed. 

Over the sea of people, a sole figure in sapphire stood as a rich iris drowned in a field of empty lilies. Eli glanced at what he supposed was the shape’s face, making out deep streaks of eyeliner broken by the unlimited reach of soft blush, her cheeks seeming naturally pink over her pale, shimmering skin. She had a long black wolf cut with a hazelnut finish at the ends that reached her upper belly as they rolled down the front. Her straight bangs stopped so near to her eyes that it was as if she had told them to do so. 

Eli had imagined many, many faces to match such a natural yet effervescent voice, but he was shocked to find something far beyond his imagination atop that stage. He stood still and smiled at the lady as she closed her eyes and swayed with the tune. However, as the bridge of the song approached, she looked up to the stairwell where Eli must’ve been in the same position of sublime superiority to her as she was to him. When Eli smirked and nodded in approval, the singer stopped dead as if suddenly lifted and suspended in the air. With an inaudible laugh, she turned her head and faced the floor before picking up the mic and returning to her lyrics.

Eli had rushed through the waves of patrons to emerge at the foot of the platform where he took a seat at the bar at stage left. Between his first and second sips of the dry martini, the band had played two different songs—a funk tune and a swing standard, both from somewhere in the late 1900s such that Eli would never have known, being a nostalgic 20s and 30s fan— wherein they relaxedly performed as if this were their hundredth run-through of the selection.

At around a quarter past 10 PM, however, the band had diminished their volume and energy as the last song of the night began.

“Thanks for coming out tonight,” the woman began in her oddly mid-range voice that differed greatly from her soprano pitches when singing. “This gig’s a real special one for us all, seeing that this could be our last Chicago performance for a while.” The crowd starts chatting amongst themselves as if she’d spouted a high school rumor. Even Eli is taken aback, but she continues nonetheless. “The Honeydipper’s making plans to debut nationally, so we’ll be touring the east coast for a while. We couldn’t have done this without your support,” she mentions jovially. 

Eli watches the crowd clap maturely, but he’s far too absorbed in that incredible fact to even lift a finger.

“Anyway, for our last song of the night, we’ve prepped a song that embodies all our feelings for our beautiful city that’s given us a home for the past eight years of our activity,” the singer explains. However, Eli is shocked when, with a coy grin, she turns her eyes to him for what must’ve been only four seconds but what felt like an eternity. She adds, “But even more so than the city, this goes out to its beautiful people.”

With a cymbal roll and a long, droning tone in the keys and saxophone, a love ballad had opened like a storybook to a room of children. Couples giggled playfully, singles stared deeply at their nearly empty drinks, and Eli placed his chin in his cupped hands, staring longingly at the lead singer as she kindly looks back at him every so often. Her voice pierced through the smokescreen of the club, riding atop the assortment of sounds from the remainder of the band; their unspoken conversation spoke volumes to Eli, volumes that might never be known to anyone but himself.

In his heart, he felt a sort of palpitation that may have meant love, but there was something more profound in the depths of his soul that could never truly be touched by mere adoration. Alternatively, the purity of her song had brought to life new considerations of the arts, something that had been drowned so profusely in its own self-wallowing and hatred amid neglect. Now, Eli was opening the door again into that dark, dark basement, and he said hello to the lonely heart for the first time in so long that he could’ve sworn she was sobbing. However, even in her salvation, she shone like an indomitable diamond, and he embraced her in shame of his earlier ignorance.

After the band had said their goodbyes and while they packed up their equipment, the lady took slow steps down the stage and instantly strutted over to Eli, knocking him off guard with her powerful aura as she walked. Her skinny knee popped out from her azure dress slit as broken bone pokes through one’s skin. Her unusual height, a quality only apparent now that she’d been so close and the bright white spotlights cast a terrifying silhouette on the ground, made Eli fear the angel of death until she stepped out from the screen. Then, at last, she was human.

“What’s your name, then?”

“I…” Eli stuttered and paused. “Elijah Williams. But you can call me Eli.” He sticks his hand out in hopes of receiving a handshake, but the woman still stands idly with her hands on her hips. Awkwardly, he drops his hand.

“Elijah. Eli, Elijah, that’s biblical, isn’t it?”

“About as biblical as you can get.”

“That’s sweet. I like it,” she mentions with a faint smile, rubbing her forearm. “I pray that you’re just like the prophet whose name you assume in being a miracle maker?” 

Elijah shakes his head, disappointedly. “If I were a miracle maker through the Lord, I’d have done so much more when my preacher of a father first let me in on the history of my name.”

“Well, a woman can dream,” she says with a chuckle before she, inexplicably astounded, stops herself and knocks her temple with the palm of her hand so as to shake some internal cobwebs loose. “Sorry, I guess you must’ve missed our introduction. Sonia’s my name.”

She stood silently with an empty grin as they stared into each other’s eyes. Then, a man with long, dirty blonde hair snuck up behind her before squeezing her upper abdomen with a tight hug. She brushed him off and turned to see his face, surprisedly blurting, “Hey, hun.”

“Nia, what’s up? We’re gonna go home.”

“I’ll catch up, Jimmy, just give me a few minutes, ‘kay?”

Eli eventually recognized the man, allegedly named Jimmy, as the band’s bassist. He certainly had skill, Eli had to admit, as he recalled his technique during the funk chart, incomparable to Eli’s classical style on the viola. However, Jimmy’s rugged face and already undone suit would never suggest as much. 

“What are you doing, anyway?” Jimmy now questioned, condescendingly glaring at Eli with a light squint. “Hope you enjoyed the show, sir. Don’t let me hold you too long.”

“Actually, you’re not holding him at all,” Nia corrected, “I was talking to him. His name’s Elijah.”

Eli stood up and shook Jimmy’s hand formally, his tight grip nearly blowing up Jimmy’s weak, lanky, and lazy hand. Within a second, Eli corrected his energy to reciprocate his energy as he remembered not to put up a business-y facade out of habit. “The show was fantastic,” he complimented, “I’m sure you’ll find infinite success wherever The Honeydipper goes.”

“Thanks, I’m sure we will too,” Jimmy snarkily affirms. With that comment, he turns back to Nia as if Eli were nothing but a hallucination that had just vanished. “Nia, we’re supposed to go to that rave club with the others. Raul’s already got the van running. Don’t take forever.” Then, he’s slowly swept away into the crowd.

However, when his head becomes the sole object visible above the abyssal wall of people, Nia calls out to him, shouting, “You know what? Go ahead, Jim. I’ll make it there one way or another, promise.” 

Jimmy glances backward, sighing. Regardless, he continues on his way, now with a more confident gait as he evidently becomes rather excited to go.

“Sorry about him,” Nia apologizes, now laughing under her breath out of embarrassment.

“Don’t be.”
“No, no, you don’t understand. He can be such a child, sometimes.”

Hesitantly, Eli asserts, “Really? I didn’t sense that at all,” while truly perceiving that Jimmy was quite the man-baby after all.

A moment of silence fell over the club as the population dwindled to half its size. Nia had taken a seat next to Eli, the barstools so near that Eli occasionally felt her thigh rub against his or such that their elbows clicked together as they swung their arms up for a swig.

Dissatisfied with the emptiness of their togetherness, Eli must’ve opened his mouth thrice before a sound was emitted. Casually, he queries, “So, Nia, then?”

Nia laughs gently, pulling lipstick out of her purse. “That’s what he’s called me since we met in our senior year. Said he thought Sonia was an old lady’s name,” she elucidates with a despondent sigh that seemed to eat up her earlier snickers. Rather hopefully, she added, “Funny that we both have such short nicknames, no? You’re more than welcome to call me that, too.” 

Eli nods but admits, “Nia it is, but, for the record, I think Sonia is a beautiful name.”

Nia turns away to finish applying her lipstick, but Eli could make out her face’s slightly red discoloration at his comment that suggested that she might’ve turned for other purposes. Almost inaudibly, she blurts, “Thanks, I guess.”

“Speaking of Jimmy, are you sure you want to let the rest of them go without you, though?” Eli questions, suddenly ashamed. “I hope I’m not the one holding you back after all.”

She quickly snaps back to face Eli again, waving her arms like a drowning swimmer in the Pacific. “No, you’re fine! I… you know, I actually wanted to talk to you,” she admits. “What made you come in today?”

“Nothing in particular. I just… heard your wonderful voice from outside, and I wanted to hear more,” Eli nonchalantly mentioned. 

“Please, enough of the flattery,” Nia begged, tightening her posture until she was compacted into half her original size, “I don’t think I can take much more!”

“But really,” Eli insisted as he adjusted his position, straightening his navy blue blazer like a calming shoreline on the ocean. “You really have a gift. It’s almost like you can rock a town or wash away someone’s fears in the same verse. If you’ve done anything tonight, you’ve inspired me to return to playing music.
Excited, Nia grabs Eli’s free hand with both of hers, her long painted nails pricking him like a soothing form of acupuncture. His hand was warm to the touch, but when she brushed over Eli’s chilly gold wedding ring, she immediately set it down. Still, she cheers, “Oh, you’re a musician? Well, that changes things. I knew you held yourself a little differently from everyone else.” 

“I guess it’s all the rehearsals I’ve done from a young age, hah,” Eli jested. “I play the viola, but I haven’t touched the poor thing in about five years by now. I’ve written a few original pieces, too. Maybe, if I picked her up again, I’d sound just as fine as you.”

She leans in toward his face as a child stares at a TV. “The way you sat here tonight… you’re like one of the few people who actually seemed to actively listen to the music. I’ve, um, I’ve met a lot of people over the years who’ve watched our performances, but when we come to bars and restaurants and the streets, it’s like people just want the background noise.” Nia stuffs the lipstick back in her bag and dives into her drink, a simple daiquiri, once more. After swallowing, she continues, “I feel like sometimes, when we get signed for a gig, it brings people rushing into the venues because they look at us and the instruments and think, ‘Wow, they’re really playing music!’ as if that fact fundamentally is impressive. I feel like they’ll come just because we’re there, you know?”

Eli nods as he silently places his elbow on the bar table and his cheek in his palm. Though he appeared bored, the truth was that his position was helping him focus on her hazel eyes as she spoke, drowning out the sound of a Wham! song on the club radio.

“But you were looking at us from the second you walked into the room. And so I wanted to look at you like two people in verbal communication. It was like trying to explain something to a group of fifty people, making eye contact with everyone but receiving nothing close in return, until, at the end of the line, there you were with a smile, telling me you’d heard every word.”

He bent backward so as to maintain the distance between the two of them, but, truthfully, he knew he was just more or less diffident to admit that she’d hit the nail on the head in her explanation, and he was leaning away as if it would give him a chance to escape. He laughed awkwardly as a sonic signal for her to back off, which she responded to with a resigned, upright pose in her chair.

“You must’ve been waiting to tell someone that,” Eli joked.

“Yeah, maybe,” Nia responded with a giggle. “Was I right, though?”
“Sure,” Eli said without hesitation but shrugging nonetheless. He was taken aback partially because of her incredible fervor; as far as he was concerned at the moment, someone so passionate for something so frivolous as music hadn’t existed. However, he had to concede that he, too, had felt the same once. He thought about how he begged his mother for a viola when his father, frugally, wouldn’t so much as drop a penny on his aspirations. But here was a woman, perhaps even older and smarter than he, who had made her way on such aspirations when, conversely, his white collar had leashed him for years. 

“And the rest of the band?” Eli wondered aloud.

“And the rest, what?”

“Well, if you’ve been waiting to say such profundities, don’t you think you’re surrounded by the right kind of people to freely feel that way?” Eli clarified, sipping on his drink as his sepia eyes point into Nia’s soul. “You’re a member of a dying species, you musicians.”

Nia shyly looks down at her legs, responding, “They have fun, I’m sure, but it feels like each day, it becomes more and more about the business and less about the music. And Jimmy… well, he’s… he really hasn’t changed much at all since we got together at UIC as a duo. Only then, it was about virality as a guitar-vocal indie band on all socials whereas, now, it’s about holding together a successful-enough cover band to cram our apartment with superficial garbage and our schedules with parties.”

She gestures into the dissipating throng of people longingly with a deep exhale. Perhaps only fifteen to twenty people remained in that room that was a little too cold for this season, each seeming to don a different apparel from a decade unknowable to Eli. Either way, it seemed less like she was pointing at the crowd but, rather, the absence of something else. The spotlights over the stage had shut off, and the aesthetic became rather warm and cozy despite the chill in the air. “We’re supposed to head down to Memphis by July for our first performance,” she adds. “If it’s going to be more of this—the wild rote of performing, partying, and pressing on—then I don’t really want any part in it… but what choice do I have as a singer? I just want to sing, and maybe that’s enough for me. So maybe I’ll find an agent who wants me to perform solo on my journey. That’s the hope, anyway.” 

Eli fell silent as he glanced at the fallen angel who seemed disappointed and hopeless, seeking her wings to return to the skies. The feel in the room seemed to settle in as he downed the last drops of his drink which, he realized, must’ve been his second by now. When was the last time I drank, he contemplated, almost proud but somewhat perplexed at the thought of his incredible sobriety in all rights—ignoring his insatiable addiction to dark roast.

Lingering hints of bitter, fruity vermouth seemed to whisper some romantic sense into him as he forgot the pain behind his regretfully rescinded chances at promotion, his wife’s incessant fury, and even his spilled coffee. All he could feel, rather than any agonizing feeling life would feel to spring upon him, was truly what he felt and that alone. And as he opened his heart, he opened his mouth.

“If it’s any consolation, my wife isn’t exactly the most mature woman, either,” he confesses. “We’ve been back and forth for about a month, now, after she showed me her plans for divorce once after work. I sense the tension between you and Jimmy because it’s not unlike how I have to face her each night, but it’s not my place to assume as much.”
“No, you’d be right to say so,” Nia confirmed, now rising from her seat so as to project a monologue. “Seems we’re in the same boat, yeah? Stuck with our lovers not by love but by circumstance.” 

She glances delightfully at Eli’s ring that she so humiliatingly sent out of sight not long ago. She fixes her hair and the flounce on her dress before crossing her arms, bashfully inquiring, “So, what’s your wife like, then?”

Eli swept through hundreds of thoughts of his dearest like the time they laughed about the vase they accidentally broke at a house party, or the time she accidentally broke his nose on a stair rail while pushing him aside in a fit of excitement, or the time she wanted to fight him over a sandwich because he neglected her hate for pickles. He considered good and bad alike before devising such a neutral, generic explanation that it could be featured as a scientific study: “Her name’s Aaliyah, and she’s a little bit of everything. Maybe too much of some things and not enough of others. Either way, it comes up just short of someone I can find myself loving much longer. Perhaps she’s a square of chocolate far too sweet for my tongue, or a drop of vinegar that rubs you the wrong way, but that means that enough work could turn her into something edible. Probably. And so I’ve been trying to change things.”

Nia shakes her head, noticing Eli with a reserved closed-mouth smile. He was awfully sheepish talking about someone he should be confident to love, and he knew it. To be frank, he hadn’t talked to anyone about the situation so in-depth as he had now, and he was even penitent for having relied on a complete stranger for such needs. However, he had to admit that hearing his own speech rerendered his thoughts with a foreign voice that made his beliefs seem rather absurd, and he was enlightened with a new consideration that, startlingly, would be compounded by Nia’s own words.

“Well, when I went to UIC,” Nia explained, “I rode on my parent’s hard-earned money to earn a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering. I graduated with a 3.9 GPA, worked an internship with an engineering firm my entire time there, and had even more businesses lining up to have my hand in their operations. So, imagine the look on my poor mother’s face when I told them I’d be devoting myself to a cover band instead.”

Nia pauses for a moment as if to allow Eli a moment to literally imagine such a look, and he didn’t imagine it being particularly pretty. Eli couldn’t tell if this made him respect Nia more or led him to see her as reckless and determined as himself. Before he could come to a conclusive answer, she continued, “But here I am, playing the music I want to play, singing the melodies I want to sing, even if the world doesn’t see what goes on behind the scenes. Mom and I haven’t talked in a couple of years because, the last time we tried, she blew up in my face again. I never tell Jimmy that I’m not happy with the way he acts, and I might have to spend the next full year with him if The Honeydipper goes national.” 

Nia inches closer with an intense look in her eyes. Even though she was something like six inches shorter than him, her posture as she stood in front of Eli made him feel quite minuscule as a rural boy in the middle of a cityscape. Her clear, round face became even more apparent to Eli as she neared, each detail coming into focus slowly and gorgeously. 

Finally, she contended, “But I left what I knew best to do what I wanted most. If achieving that meant uncertainty and rough times ahead, I wouldn’t bat an eye. Really, Eli, I’d… I’d hate to see someone as great as you miss out on anything like that just because you were too nervous to let go. I’d hate to see you get absorbed into a woman who won’t do the same for you.”

By now, the two of them were so deeply interlocked that, should one move, the other might trip. However, Eli was so ensnared by Nia’s surprising way with words that seemed to transcend singing. Even natural speech was strangely poetic to him in her nervous pauses, honest emphasis in her intonation, and the high pitch of her overall voice. He found himself fascinated by her every feature. What he found most appealing, however, was how deeply into him she appeared.

In his head, Eli imagined Nia affixing to the end of her statement, “Let me be the girl to meet you eye to eye like you did that moment you walked into the room.” 

He felt ashamed of his provocative thoughts when he could’ve been home to his wife over an hour ago. But Nia was right; what good was it, being earnest to someone who won’t match his commitment? He felt his heart race at the thought of this paradox; he found more comfort in a stranger than he’d found in his wife in the past year, and this was all too much for him to take in.

With his mind blank, Nia leaned in closer. She shut her eyes, leaving only ashen streaks of eyeliner splashed across her face. He failed to process at all what was happening, but his emotions guided him nonetheless. He brought his long, dark arm up and around Nia’s slender waist, running his fingers up her dress as her hair brushed it from behind. He placed his broad hand up around the nape of her tender neck and drew her in. He felt himself screaming from the inside to deny her, but he desperately sought ways to justify his acts until, eventually, he could accept his emotions fully. Thus, with full confidence, Eli floated above his seat with his loafers squeezing against the base of the barstool. 

Then, their lips touched, pressed, then merged. 

The moisture of each sample of skin that met the others was not physical but visceral like a twisted enigma. However, its surrealness meant only that Eli had no shame in committing. Warmth swept over Eli in a heatwave and, had the kiss lasted any longer than it did, he might’ve had a stroke.

Then, regretfully, Eli was saved by a ring on his phone. He instantly came away from the temptress as she gasped for air with an open-mouthed grin. Eli, on the other hand, was not so immediately satisfied as he checked the caller’s name: Aaliyah.

Anxiously, he answered the call and was instantly met with his wife shouting, “Where you been?! I’ve been waiting for you for three hours!”

Out of fear, Eli explains, “H- hey, baby. I was caught up at work today and I missed the train an-”

“Oh, shut up with the work, you say that every time! Just get here! Now!” 

Aaliyah continued to indignantly ramble on and on as Eli tried to interject with a word for every eight she said. Gradually growing more and more desperate and frustrated, his voice gets more intense with time. 

In the middle of his anger, though, he notices Nia writing something on a small card she pulled from her bag, leaning over the table off to his side. Her simple action soothes him minimally, but he’s dazed when she stands upright, waltzes over to him, and pins the top of his phone with her thumb, dropping the phone into his lap as Aaliyah’s voice vanishes into the peace and quiet of the jazz club. Then, understanding his assignment, he remorselessly hangs up the phone, remembering his place among the world and its people in the relaxing maroon walls of the bar, adorned with glass bottles on shelves and glass display cases in wood. 

With a tiny chuckle, Nia hands Eli the little card she was writing on. He scans the front, a description of the band with an email and social tags printed beneath their simplistic logo reading “The Honeydipper.” Upending the slip, he reads an elegant signature in scarlet-red pen: “Love, Sonia Izumi.” In place of the tittle on the final I in her name stands a little heart. Finally, at the base of the paper, a phone number is hastily scrawled.

“My Uber is here now, Elijah,” Nia mentions. “The card’s number is my own. If you choose to go back into music after all, call me. I’ve been waiting for a solo break, but… if you ever want to call me for more ‘personal’ reasons, I’m more than happy to pick up!”

Then, gleefully, she grabs her purse and begins strutting toward the exit, her blue dress like a receding day sky at sunset. Eli placidly stares at her as she leaves, reluctant to say anything. Instead, he cherishes the moment and giggles to himself before rereading the card countless times. 

Eli, at this point, didn’t care that Aaliyah had scolded him yet again. He remained fixed in his seat for another half hour, soaking in the atmosphere of loneliness in a lonely place other than his typical cubicle. 

Finally, Eli realized, the bar was empty. The tables were losing customers by the minute, and Eli figured he should take his leave sooner or later now that his second dry martini was already deep in his system. The bartender, wiping the counters, nodded at Eli as a respectable gesture. Something so simple made him feel a tad bit more human. 

He considered how the little things he considered trivialities had become rather vital, and the big things he viewed with such consequentiality had diminished in importance. The barriers of rival and friend, stranger and familiar, blended like the undefined meeting grade of a spray paint dabble’s edges and a canvas. Eli didn’t mind the shift because, for once, he saw that life and opportunity stood in his midst if he only had the eyes to seek them. Scrubbing his face profusely to remove Nia’s heavy lipstick from his face, Eli stood from his seat and made his way out onto the streets.

The lights that once adorned the city like jewels had passed and disappeared into the night, now leaving Eli in an alien landscape at the mouth of the alleyway. He smelled the oddly fresh and slightly metallic breath of the night city, now changing in aesthetic as it scoots slowly towards midnight. With the new nature of the world in rose, just as Edith Piaf promised it, he shuffled his way home humming the tune of the ballad the band had ended with tonight. On top of all this, he found himself thinking about Nia’s advice, and he took it to heart as he re-evaluated all that he had known to be true before. 

He considered that, if he had half her skill, he might have half her mind. But every time he came back to this reflection, he couldn’t help but think that he wanted all of her.