Teófila’s Guide to Saving the Sun

by Cynthia A. Rodriguez

  Is it still a kidnapping if you aren’t a kid?

  I think it’s then just an abduction…

  “Mr. Williams,” he answers, his tone one of boredom and his eyes revealing nothing.

  He is either a psychopath or a professional.

  Because my arms are tired of trying to drag my bag and keep my backpack from sliding off my shoulders, I go with professional.

  “I was instructed to take you to the hotel where Mr. Williams will meet you after rehearsal.”

  Rehearsal?

  “You’ll then be attending his album release party.”

  Album release?!

  “So, a designer will be sent up to your room to get you prepared,” he finishes, grabbing my luggage and attempting to pull my backpack from my grip.

  In my shock, I’ve got a hold too tight for him to remove it from my hands.

  This is already too much.

  “Miss?”

  He breaks the spell and, in an attempt to keep from having a nervous breakdown, I go on autopilot and walk with him. We get in the car and sit through city traffic, which includes lots of honking. I roll down my window to get a good look.

  It’s beautiful.

  And gray and muggy.

  The masses of people along the sidewalks make me think that this is where everyone’s decided to end up. That maybe I’ve been in the wrong place all along and this is what’s meant for me.

  We pull into an underground parking garage and the driver offers a nod as he passes me off to another man in another suit.

  At least this one smiles.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Morales. My name is George. I assume Mr. Thomas filled you in on the schedule today?”

  Mr. Thomas?

  I look back on the departing black Mercedes before turning back to George and nodding.

  “Good. I’ll get you set up in the room. You’ll likely have a bit of time to yourself before everything starts to get chaotic.”

  The elevator ride is silent. Even the hallway leading up to the room is, for the most part.

  I can hear people talking in the rooms, muffled voices that make me think my ears have popped like they did on the flight here.

  George pulls my luggage into the room for me. Once I step inside, my lips part and my eyes widen.

  The thing about seeing wonders is that your entire face wants to take it in. Every sense wants part of it.

  I want to see, taste, touch, hear, and feel how beautiful this life is. Starting with the gorgeous room I’m standing in that isn’t quite a room. More like a lavish apartment.

  Everything is smooth and sleek.

  I immediately think of the phone tucked away in my satchel and tell myself that must’ve been a drop in the well if this is how Elijah is living.

  “I’ll leave you to get settled in. Camilla, the designer, should be here within the next few hours.” George steps out of the room and shuts the door with a quiet click.

  But the sound is all I can hear for the next few minutes as I stand there, observing, but not ready to move. Not ready to acknowledge that this is where I am and this is where I might belong.

  Once I’ve gotten the urge to move, I peruse the area, gasping over beautiful things that look like they cost more than what’s currently nestled in my bank account.

  I drag my bags into the bedroom and debate taking a nap, the ornate headboard looking like it was carved from my dreams. But I decide on a shower first.

  The bathroom is dark marble and glass, its modern take on the toilet making me pause.

  Where’s the tank?

  I grab a few of my toiletries and set myself up for what’s likely to be an amazing shower in a spacious glass box with a showerhead bigger than my own head.

  I don’t know if I’ll be able to truly feel comfortable here, so afraid that I’ll spill or drop or break something.

  But I take my clothes off and step in anyway.

  There’s no way to turn it on without getting inside, so I step back to avoid a cold blast of water. After testing it, I stand directly under the spray.

  The warm water hits my worn body and I sigh as I turn to wet my hair, glad that I have time to wash and style it before seeing Elijah.

  I told him we’re strangers and it’s still true to me. I haven’t seen him up close in so long, I forget what his warmth feels like.

  I open my eyes and the sight of him standing in front of the shower has me screaming.

  “Sorry!” he yells over me. “I knocked but I guess you didn’t hear me.”

  My hand is over my pounding heart and it takes me a moment to remember that I’m naked in this shower and he can see all of me. My hands move to block my body from his eyes through the glass.

  “Could you…do you mind…” I don’t want to say it. It tastes wrong to ask him not to look at me while I’m showering.

  “Yeah. Sorry. I’ll be right out here.” He steps out, shutting the door and closing me back into privacy.

  I lean over and press my fingertips into the glass.

  How does he seem taller, larger, more?

  31

  STICK PEOPLE

  M y first thought when I step into the bedroom and see him is that he seems…lighter.

  He’s sitting on the bed, flipping through the channels on the TV, wearing a small smile on his face, as if he’s in a constant state of happiness.

  And who could blame him, with all of these niceties?

  “Hi,” I whisper, feeling the water from my hair drip down my back.

  His eyes find mine and his smile grows larger. “Look at you,” he says. “As beautiful as I remember.”

  I wonder what nearly two years has done for me, physically.

  My hair is longer, my hips are wider, and my eyes have seen a little more of life.

  “You don’t look exactly the same. More like a familiar stranger,” I say.

  His hair is different, but it suits him. The edges are faded near his face, but the top is twisted in locks that nearly bend to touch him.

  He’s wearing athletic gear, and his smile seems so much more practiced, as if he’d stood in front of the mirror for a week, figuring out the most attractive way to show off his features.

  “You look like a woman.”

  That’s what being twenty years old will get you.

  After seeing all that Elijah managed in two years, I’m ashamed that I was still working at the coffee shop, still living with my parents.

  Until I remember.

  “Oh, I have something for you,” I say.

  I reach for the satchel sitting on top of my luggage and grab the sheets of paper folded into my notebook.

  “It’s so stupid, but I wrote something for you,” I tell him, handing over the pages as if they’re an afterthought and not something I put pieces of my heart into.

  “It’s not stupid.” He stands, takes them from my hands and sets them on the bed. “I’ll read them as soon as I have a minute.”

  I don’t want to tell him that I was in the process of finding a way to get them published in an online publication. Not until he’s read them for himself.

  There were a few bites, but one was looking a little more promising than the others.

  Now that we’re standing in front of each other, I remember how tall he is.

  “Did you miss me?” he asks, his voice quieter, deeper.

  “Did you miss me?” I jut my chin out, trying not to think about what else he could’ve been doing with his time.

  We’re in this gorgeous hotel room and there are too many women who would love to be in the position I’m in.

  There’s no room for insecurity here.

  “I’d show you how much, but…”

  A knock at the door interrupts us.

  He holds up his finger. “I was going to tell you she was on her way. You ready?”

  I glance down at my loose shorts and tank top, suddenly wondering what the woman on the other side of the hotel room door is going to make of me.

/>   “I suppose.”

  THIS DRESS COSTS MORE than anything I’ve ever owned.

  The words itch to be released, but we’re around so many people and I don’t want to embarrass Elijah.

  It’s crazy to think I could embarrass him; the same person who used to sneak into my bedroom and watch movies on a DVD player my parents got me.

  I was never one for television. The shows tend to disappoint me.

  But movies were always my thing.

  As I glance around the room, I wonder how many people here have been on TV. And, if I’d bothered watching, how much more prepared I’d feel among the musically elite.

  “Having fun or should we dip?” Elijah’s breath hits the shell of my ear as his hand lands on my lower back.

  The way I’m dressed tonight, I’m happy to have him so close.

  The designer hadn’t been prepared for my ass. Or my hips. Or my breasts.

  It made me wonder if she dressed stick people for a living.

  We ended up having to settle on something a little more formfitting than I felt comfortable with, her having to take advantage of a more flexible material.

  The skirt length of the black dress is modest, but the low neckline mixed with the cutlets she insisted on shoving under my breasts makes me feel like if I stick my tongue out, I could lick my boob.

  At least the hairdresser left my hair curly, smoothing the front back and clipping the mass of it at the base of my neck.

  “We can’t leave,” I inform him. “Everyone’s here for you.”

  “We can do whatever we want,” he tells me and I think he’s going to kiss me for the first time, but someone interrupts us.

  “Congratulations again, Elijah,” a petite brunette says.

  I’d wonder about her, but the conservative dress and man on her arm tell me this is just business.

  The way her ring glitters even under these dims lights has my eyes widening.

  “Thanks. It’s so awesome to be part of the team and to have worked with you.” He glances at me. “This is my girlfriend, Teófila. T, this is the head of the label and one of the producers on the album, Emerson Kingsley-Bailey.”

  She reaches for my hand, a smile that only speaks of kindness on her face. “Lovely to meet you, Teófila.”

  Warmth fills me as she pronounces my name correctly without having to ask to hear it again.

  “This is my husband, Maddox Bailey,” she says.

  The man beside her reaches for my hand, and I’m in awe of their different energies.

  “Nice to meet you guys.” He turns to look around. “Such a great turn out, but man, these events can be a bit stuffy.”

  I watch as Emerson’s eyes widen, and her hand reaches for her husband’s. “Don’t mind him.”

  “No, no,” I tell her. “You two are great.”

  “Anyone want anything to drink?” Maddox asks, oblivious to his wife’s embarrassment.

  “Oh, I’m not…” I look at Elijah, only to catch him looking at me.

  “Shit like that doesn’t matter here,” he tells me, wearing a grin.

  “What he said.” Maddox points at Elijah and I try not to laugh too loudly as I shake my head.

  “No, thank you,” I say.

  Maddox leans in to whisper something in his wife’s ear and she ducks her head to smile as he presses a kiss to her cheek.

  He walks off and Elijah turns to me. “I’m heading to the bathroom. You’ll be okay?”

  I want to tell him that I’ll be okay. But lying is not something I want to make a habit of.

  “I’ll show her around,” Emerson tells him. “See if I can get her a little star-struck.”

  Elijah chuckles. “Just don’t let anyone try to take her from me.”

  I smile as he walks away, and I’m staring at the back of his dress shirt. His arms swing easily, the sleeves rolled up, displaying more tattoos than he left with.

  “All right. Have you ever seen Game of Thrones?” Emerson asks as she tucks her arm into mine.

  32

  HIS BEAUTIFUL AND MASSIVE WORLD

  We’re lying in bed, naked, and he is a different lover.

  And I ask myself where such practiced choreography could come from.

  But I don’t ask him.

  I don’t ask who taught him how to remove clothes as if he’d been doing it far longer than he’s known me. I don’t voice my insecurity at the way his tongue tastes my inner thighs, his body settled with comfort between my knees.

  Elijah has always been good.

  But now he is brilliant.

  “You’re quiet,” he says. “Was it okay?”

  I roll over to face him and place my hands under my head. “It was better than okay.”

  “So, what’s wrong?”

  I thought I didn’t want to make a habit of lying but lying to avoid hearing a truth I’m not prepared for is my best option. “I feel like I don’t know you anymore.”

  Not a total lie.

  “What do you want to know?” he asks.

  I can feel his warmth still, even though the moment we finished, I put space between us.

  Lust is a haze; once the fog lifts, you’re just two naked sweaty people.

  Our first kiss in two years tasted like fries and uncertainty and was confined to an elevator.

  And the sex reminded me of that term I’d coined regarding us: Familiar strangers.

  It wasn’t the way people joked about riding a bike.

  It was more like satiating a hunger I’d forgotten I’d even had. Once I had a taste, I became ravenous. All thoughts of the former familiarity versus the awkwardness we were trying to maneuver around were gone.

  And I filled myself until my needs were met.

  So I ask him the first question that pops into my mind. “Where did you go when you went to the bathroom?”

  He’d been gone so long, I decided to wander off on my own until he found me, eating for the first time all day.

  Then he insisted George take us to grab fast food before heading back to the hotel.

  All before taking my face in his hands, and kissing me, mid-sentence, just before the elevator reached our floor.

  “I just ran into a few friends of mine.”

  I would’ve wanted to meet them.

  “Any other questions?” he asks.

  “Why don’t you like strawberries?” I ask him, curious over the knowledge I’d gained, just from watching him decline them all these years.

  “I hate the seeds,” he says.

  I ponder this, glancing up at the ceiling for a moment before looking back at him.

  “I can’t remember being truly annoyed by the seeds. They’re so small,” I confess.

  He shakes his head, his locks following the movement. “I just don’t like ‘em.”

  “What kind of person hates strawberries?” I ask him.

  The gray sheets beneath us are soft as I run my hands over them, stretching.

  “They’re not that sweet, you know,” he tells me, his grin easy.

  “Do you have strawberries here?” Something tells me to look around, even though I know they aren’t something I’d find in here.

  “No. But I can get some.”

  I pick my head up a little and eye him, head on. “You can?”

  “T, at this point, I can get almost anything.”

  This stops me, shutting the door on the comfort that was mounting.

  “But all that I want is with me right now,” he adds.

  It’s like he’s jammed his foot in that door and pried it open again.

  He pulls me in toward his body and I relax against him.

  “What’s it like?” I ask. “Being able to have that kind of power.”

  “Mostly, I’m tired as hell. But I like to think this is the time to be tired. And maybe in a year or two, I can slow down a little.”

  There’s so much hope in his words, but none in his inflection. All flat sounds and unconvincing notions.

  Still, thi
s is his dream. This is exactly what he wanted.

  “I had no idea it was like this,” I whisper as he presses a kiss into my shoulder. My fingers intertwine with his and I stare at the ceiling again.

  “You thought I just didn’t want to talk to you? Didn’t want to see you or have you around?” he asks.

  My shrug says it all.

  Of course I did.

  “I’ve missed you so much, T.”

  Did you wait for me?

  The question is on my tongue.

  Or did you let others warm what was supposed to be my side of the bed?

  “Promise me you’ll stay?” he asks.

  I hate promises, but I nod because nothing else matters to me. Not the women or the calls and texts I never got.

  What matters is rumpled up sheets and smiles that won’t go away, even while we kiss.

  “I promise,” I tell him, just before I climb over him and show him how much my body missed being his.

  THE NAME of the man I spent the night with is being chanted all around me.

  The lights go dim and a sudden silence rests over the ground.

  And then there are only lights and sounds, and vibrations of mass amounts of energy.

  People behind me scream, and I can hear them, even from my excellent seat.

  This is what Elijah had been doing while I was writing stupid stories and filling my days with cappuccinos and ideas.

  I’d been scribbling in notebooks and sending my words off to people who never really gave a shit. He’d been playing for thousands of people who so clearly adore him.

  And the same thought comes to me again, only a little differently this time; it isn’t anything like I thought it’d be.

  If I could describe Elijah’s life without me, it’s fluorescent lights, shining through the dark, beaming through fans’ fingertips. It’s smoke sliding toward us from the aftereffects of his grand entrance on stage.

  His life without me is too spectacular for someone of my limited wordsmithing skills to even attempt to explain.

  Everyone in here is swaying and singing along.

  I am the only still form in this sea.

  And my tears are not only from admiration, but from witnessing how tumultuous the waves are and knowing I could never master them.