Alliyah

She looked into her marvelous brown eyes, and smiled but bit the inside of her own cheek and resumed walking, and soon, the two reached Rayne’s house.

“Well… This is me…” Rayne vaguely waved towards the building behind her.

“You live here? I always love looking at this building, I love black architecture.”

“Oh, me too. It’s a rather stupendous building. Makes moving out suck even more.”

Alliyah found the variation of vocabulary amusing. All of a sudden, she didn’t understand what or why, but something in Rayne changed:

“Well, I have work to do. Bye.”

Rayne went inside and shut the door before Alliyah could say a word. She looked at the architecture for a few seconds; appreciating the door, the window frames, the roof, and something inside of her sparked.

That night she worked on Cliona Pierce's house for hours, until approximately 4 am when she fell asleep on the couch.

“Hey.” She felt a hand on her shoulder, shaking her. “Alliyah, go to bed.”

Was the child she was raising being more responsible than her?

“It’s morning?” She fluttered her eyes open, wincing at the sunlight.

“Yeah.” He replied through a mouthful of cookies.

“Ah, I have work to do.” She got up and stretched her upper body.

“Didn’t you work all night, dude?”

“One of my deadlines ends this week, and I finally feel inspired again.”

Her phone rang somewhere in the house. They both peered around but didn’t spot it.

“Help me find it, it may be a client.”

“What the heck? Where did you put your phone?”

“I don’t remember anything after like 11 pm.”

The phone kept ringing as Alliyah wandered to the kitchen and Lamar to the bathroom.

“It’s here!” He laughed. “It’s just the guy who always rips his clothes, though.” Lamar said before throwing the phone at Alliyah, who barely caught it:

“Hey, Ocean.”

“Are you coming or what?”

“Coming… For what?”

“You forgot.” Ocean sighed, and she heard him crack his neck. “We planned on playing basketball… Everyone’s here.”

“Little, do you wanna go play basketball with the guys?”

“Heck, yeah!”

“Okay, I’m sending Lamar on my behalf.”

“All right, I’ll pick him up halfway. But what are you up to? Why can’t you come?”

“Some of us work during the day, son.”

She didn’t mind missing out on the basketball game and sending Lamar in her place because that way she had some hours alone that she could use to further work on the designs at hand.

Lamar still hadn’t returned when Alliyah paced around the living room, arguing on the phone with Cliona Pierce:

“I know... I know what you said! But I’ve been doing this for some years. Can you please trust my gut? This is gonna look so much better.”

Maybe it was all the coffee she had on an almost empty stomach, but something inside her snapped:

“Listen, MS. Pierce.”

The lawyer tried to interrupt her:

"Your gut? We're talking about my-"

But she persisted:

“Listen. I’m going to give you the best house you will ever see. If you want to, you can fire me afterward, okay?”

“Alliyah, just give me what I’m asking for.”

“No!”

I’m so getting fired, Alliyah thought after hanging up the phone. She let her body slump on the couch and ran her fingers through her defined, thin, afro curls, but quickly got back up again.

“If I’m giving her something she doesn’t want, I better do the best I can. She’s going to love it whether she likes it or not.”

Approximately forty-five minutes thereafter…

“Alliyah?”

“Open space kitchen!” She jolted awake.

“Great idea, but you fell asleep in the living room.” Ocean stood before her, basketball in hand.

“Again.” Lamar added.

“Get off my case - I have a stuck-up client to please.”

Alliyah got up and went to the bathroom. She took plenty of water to her face and rubbed her eyes. She looked at herself in the mirror, flashes of her younger self coming to vision, then closed her eyes.

“Get it together.” She told herself, using the hem of her grey tank top to dry off, then looked at herself in the mirror again and touched the single hoop earring she wore on her left ear.

The woman walked to the kitchen and started making more coffee.

“Ocean, you staying?”

“Was going to, but I’ll let you work.”

“Thanks. I promise when I get it all under control, I’ll invite everyone over for something.”

He simply gave a quick hug to Alliyah before leaving.

She and Lamar ordered Thai takeout for lunch, and she went straight back to work, still feeling the inspiration.