Chapter 3
3
2013
T he night air had that in-between feel—warm enough for short sleeves, but cool enough to raise goosebumps if you stood still too long. Early spring in Pittsburgh was like that. Moody. Soft winds that teased through open car windows, mixing the scent of new grass with leftover winter grit. I had the windows cracked, speakers low, the backseat packed with my controller and crates. Fresh lineup, my best hoodie on, already thinking about the set I was supposed to be playing in Hazelwood.
Brielle had called twice already, texting you coming or nah? in between. She wasn’t slick. The girl throwing the party had been making it known I could do more than DJ if I showed up. And I’d been down before. She was fine. Easy.
But right as I hit the light at Second and Greenfield, my phone lit up.
I paused, staring at Amaya’s name for a second before I picked up.
“A?”
There was no hello. Just a sharp breath, like she was trying not to fall apart.
“Maya… what’s wrong?”
Then it hit—her voice cracking through the phone like a split in glass.
“He cheated on me. That asshole cheated on me.”
I pulled the car to the curb hard, heart kicking in my chest.
“Where you at?” I asked. “I’ll come get you right now.”
“I’m at my cousin’s,” she sniffled. “Outside.”
She gave me the address. I didn’t even think. Just flipped a U-turn and gunned it across the bridge.
Brielle’s third call came in. I let it ring.
When I pulled up, I spotted her immediately—perched on the low stone ledge at the end of the walkway, long brown legs crossed, arms wrapped tight around her bare shoulders. She had on cutoff jean shorts and a cropped tank top that clung to her body like second skin, skin that was warm and glowing in the streetlight, even with her face red and eyes puffy.
Her curls were pulled into a frizzy puff that looked like she’d thrown it up quick. Gold hoops in her ears. Glitter on her cheekbones. But her shoulders slumped like the whole night had collapsed on top of her.
My heart sank.
I parked and got out without saying a word. Just held the passenger door open and nodded.
She got in slowly, quiet.
I slid in beside her and started driving with no destination. Just motion. Just space to breathe.
Neither of us spoke for the first few minutes.
Then she spoke, her voice soft but raw.
“I went to Terrence’s house. The one he shares with his boys off campus.”
I didn’t say a word. Just tightened my grip on the wheel and waited.
“His roommate—Jared, I think—let me in. Said he was upstairs with the door closed. I figured he was studying or messing with his little beats.”
She looked down at her hands, fingers curled in the sleeves of my hoodie like she was trying to disappear inside it.
“But when I got to his room…”
Her throat bobbed.
“‘Adorn’ was playing.”
I didn’t even need her to finish. My stomach turned just hearing that. Miguel’s voice was smooth, seductive—everybody and their mama had that track on repeat back then. Terrence wasn’t just with someone. He’d curated a whole mood for it.
“I opened the door,” she said. “He was on top of her. Shirt off. Kissing her neck, moving between her thighs like I never existed.”
She blinked slowly, but a tear slipped out anyway.
“I didn’t say anything. Didn’t slam the door. Didn’t break his shit. Just… closed it. Got in my car. Came to Tia’s.”
She finally looked at me, eyes so vacant it made my chest ache.
“And the worst part is, I wasn’t even surprised.”
Something inside me twisted. I parked at the spot I went to when I need to think. A spot that was nothing but city and freedom in my view.
This time, I went with her, hoping she could find peace here, the way I had found the beats to songs I worked on. But peace might not find her any time soon. Heartbreak was a motherfucka.
I’d hurt girls before. Not like that —not dirty, not reckless—but I’d left a few of them with wide eyes and broken expectations. I never promised more than I could give. Never said you’re the only one when I didn’t mean it. But I also knew what it felt like to see the same girl you kissed last week walking past you like she never knew you.
They always wanted more than I was ready for. And when they caught me at somebody else’s house, at somebody else’s party…
That pain in their faces…Yeah. I’d seen it.
But this— seeing her like this—it was different. Because Maya wasn’t just any girl.
She wasn’t one of the ones I flirted with after sets or texted late just to see if they’d come through. She wasn’t an accessory to the lifestyle. She was the standard. And watching her sit there trying to hold herself together after a boy made her feel disposable?
That shit nearly undid me.
I didn’t say anything. Just reached behind the seat and grabbed my hoodie—the one I’d taken off earlier when the car still held the last breath of daylight warmth.
I held it out.
She looked at it, then back at me, confused. “What?”
“You’re cold, A.”
She hesitated. Then she slipped her arms into the sleeves, slow, like the weight of the night had finally settled on her shoulders. The hem of it hit her mid-thigh, swallowing her frame. She tucked her knees up in the seat and pulled the hood over her curls.
It was the kind of thing I’d seen in movies—where some guy offers a girl his jacket like a silent vow. But this wasn’t performative. This was instinct. A quiet need to cover her. Shelter her. Wrap her in something that smelled like comfort.
She leaned her head against the window, staring out at the spread of city lights glowing just beyond the edge of the hill. I watched her reflection in the glass, soft and unfocused.
“I don’t think I can do this again,” she said after a while.
“Do what?”
“Try,” she whispered. “Believe.”
I nodded slowly. I didn’t have some rehearsed answer. Just truth.
“You don’t have to right now.”
That made her look at me again. Fully. Like she was seeing me—not as the friend who always had a slick comment or the boy who floated from girl to girl like flipping tracks on a playlist. But as me.
Her eyes—sable brown, glinting with tears and moonlight—locked on mine, and for a second, the whole car went quiet.
Not silent. Still. Like even the engine knew to give us space.
And in that space, something shifted. Something honest. Her pain didn’t scare me off. It pulled me in. Not with lust, but with longing. I wanted to tell her that one day, someone was going to see her and never look away.
That she didn’t have to shrink to be kept. Didn’t have to be perfect to be chosen. Didn’t have to beg to be adored.
I didn’t say any of that. Not out loud.
But I reached for her—just my hand—and brushed the back of my fingers along her cheek. Her skin was warm. Damp. Real.
Her breath caught.
And then our eyes locked again. Closer this time.
Her lashes were wet. Her lips parted. The hoodie swallowed her small frame, but nothing could dull the light she carried, even dimmed like this.
My thumb moved, soft, pressing first to the gentle cleft in her chin, then brushing the corner of her mouth. Not a kiss. Just a graze. Just a question I didn’t know how to ask.
She didn’t lean in. Neither did I but we both stayed there, suspended.
Her eyes softened, and she whispered, “Why are you looking at me like that?”
I blinked. “Because I hate seeing you like this.”
Her face shifted—like maybe she understood more than I meant to say. Like maybe a part of her heart already knew.
But instead of pressing, she leaned into the back of the seat and closed her eyes, breathing in deep.
She tugged at the hoodie’s hem and murmured, “I’ll give this back.”
“No,” I said, quiet but firm. “Keep it.”
She didn’t argue. Just clutched it tighter around herself like she already knew it meant something more.
And I sat there beside her, still and silent, trying to forget how badly I wanted to hold her again.
But not tonight. Tonight, she just needed someone to stay. And I told myself—again—if I ever got the chance to love her,
I’d never let her wonder if she was enough.