Page 36 of You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty

“Four thirty,” she replied, with a damned smile and a traitorous chill burning through her veins.

• • •

By the time the sun rose the next morning, Feyi was standing at the mountain’s peak, her dark skin glowing and damp with sweat. The sky was bursting apart with tender light and pale color, the air was full of dew and birds, and it felt like she and Alim were the only two people in the world. He was standing just behind her shoulder, watching the sunrise with her, and she could smell him— the salt from their walk, a touch of orange she’d caught when he knocked on her door earlier. Waking up that early had been more brutal than she expected, like fighting through a blanket of air, and it had taken all her willpower to drag herself out of the house, grab a beef patty, and hit the hiking trail with Alim. Thankfully, he hadn’t talked much, just led the way as she followed. It had taken maybe half an hour before she felt awake, and she’d been too tired to even think about her crush on him. None of it had felt reckless then, just exhausting.

But now, with the cool air folding around her arms and Alim’s body so loud and close, Feyi needed him to take a step back, just far enough so she wouldn’t be tempted to turn and pull his head down and kiss him. No one but the mountain would see. Secretly, she cursed Joy’s optimism that the crush would go away, or even that this had anything to do with Nasir, who clearly trusted her so much that he thought nothing of sending her to watch a gorgeous romantic-ass sunrise with his obnoxiously handsome father. And why would he? Most people would be maintaining some boundaries in their heads, not letting fantasies erode all the lines that marked common sense.

“This is one of my favorite moments,” Alim said softly, gazing out. “Thank you for sharing it with me.”

“Thank you for inviting me,” Feyi replied, plopping down on the grass and wiping her forehead. “It’s worth the hike.”

It really was, too. The view was spectacular, delicate pink and gold sunlight pulling across the hills like a veil, as billowing blue clouds hung in the sky and a layer of fog rolled over the deep green rain forest. “I’ve never seen colors like these.”

Alim sat down next to her and passed over a bottle of water. His fingernails were painted an iridescent pearl. “I used to try to capture it in a camera when I was younger. It was … so futile.” He laughed. “Some things are only meant to exist in our eyes, I think.”

She glanced over at him. “I know what you mean.”

They sat there for a long time as the sun climbed and climbed. Feyi took slow deep breaths, feeling warmth crawl over her skin as the light hit her. Her mind felt blessedly blank, catching up to her sore muscles. Alim pulled out a thermos of hibiscus tea and slices of upside-down pineapple cake wrapped in thin cloth. They ate together in silence, passing the thermos cup between them. Feyi’s attraction to him was still there, at a low and consistent hum but under control. When Alim finally spoke, it took her utterly by surprise.

“I wasn’t honest with you the other night,” he said. “In the garden.”

Feyi turned her head just enough to see the slope of his nose, the curve of his mouth, the damp dark of his skin, and waited for him to continue.

“You asked me if I’d loved since Marisol, and I told you I didn’t know.”

She watched his mouth twist again, just as it had in the garden. “You did love someone,” she said, shifting so she could see all of his face.

An old melancholy drifted through Alim’s eyes and his jaw tightened. “I did,” he said, the words sounding creaky and rusted. He cleared his throat and ran a hand over his hair. “A long time ago.”

Feyi wasn’t sure why he was telling her, but it felt like something he needed to say, and it was something she wanted to hear—what it was like to fall in love again after your heart had been shattered. She could feel Jonah’s presence on the mountain peak, gentle and curious.

“What happened?” she asked.

Alim pulled a hand across his mouth. “I had to choose,” he said, and Feyi could hear a faint fracture in his voice. He cleared his throat again and stitched the break together. “I chose my children.”

Feyi couldn’t stop herself from reaching out and touching his arm. He always felt so alone, and sometimes she wanted to change that, even just for a moment. His skin was warm, dusted with hair.

“Why did you have to choose at all?” It sounded wrong, to have to sacrifice that, to lose it again but this time by choice. “Why couldn’t you have both?”

Alim looked at her, and she could see storms and calculations running through his gray eyes. He took her hand in his, and her heart staggered at his touch, but she kept her face still. Alim wasn’t looking at her like he felt how she did; he was looking at her like he couldn’t decide if he could trust her, if he could tell her the truth. Feyi squeezed his hand tightly. There was a hurt in him, and she could feel the edges of it, how sharply they cut.

“I told you about Jonah,” she reminded him softly. “You can tell me anything.” The air around them was filled with leaves rustling and birdsong.

Alim sighed and gave her a sad smile. “Devon,” he said. “He was a painter. Loved coming up here.” He shook his head, catching himself. “He’s still a painter, somewhere out there.”

Several things clicked together in Feyi’s head at once—Nasir’s raised voice at the airport, his insistence that Alim wasn’t gay, his mention of the tabloids, even Alim’s reluctance to tell her about this lost love of his. She kept hold of his hand and met his eyes, showing him that she wasn’t pulling away in the slightest, that she was listening.

“Nasir was in college,” Alim continued. “He came home for the summer, and I introduced Devon to him and Lorraine. It … didn’t go well.” A muscle in his jaw spasmed, and Feyi tightened her fingers around his.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered.

“I thought they knew,” he said, a shadow of confusion resurrecting within the memory. “I thought they already knew about me. I’d never hidden who I was from them or Marisol. And maybe they did, but …” Alim shrugged. “They were so young. It was difficult.”

“And you had to choose.”

Pain spread like the tendrils of pigment through the whites of his eyes. “And I had to choose.” Alim smiled at her, and it was sad, yet so terribly genuine. “I chose well. They are the lights of my life.”

Before she could think about it, Feyi leaned over and hugged him, throwing her arms around his neck. “You shouldn’t have had to choose,” she said, her voice thick with feeling.