An art exhibit. The sign on the door said - private event. It was incomprehensibly hot inside. I was sweating severely, practically melting, raining saltwater onto the floor. I walked in, turned, and she was there. I touched her and she jumped. I smiled, we kissed. I'm trying to figure out what it says, she said. I was trying, too. We walked around in a square and stared at the art on each of the four walls. Da Vinci believed that visual art was the highest form of art because there's no barrier to entry; assuming, of course, that you aren't blind. Unlike literature, one doesn't need to know how to read, one needs only to see. Seeing is a form of feeling, it's presence unfolding in realtime. It's all in the eyes.
Hers were discerning, mysterious and warm.
We left and walked the street briefly. There was the possibility of graffiti. When she stepped, the metal ball inside the spray-paint can swayed, giving her footfalls a lilting, percussive quality. We waited for our Uber driver, Juan, to arrive. We fell out of step with time and altered reality as we walked toward his car.
A heavy fog, set low in the sky, caught fire from the soon to be setting sun as we passed the Palace of Fine Arts. Juan seemed lost so we told him to let us out. Walking, alone but together, into the mist, we stumbled upon a Lion King boneyard. We glided through the misty whiteness, floating like phantoms, laughing, whispering, brushing against each other's arms. The air was sweating around us, painting the beach in an eerie fog. The sun reflected softly against the water. A dog ran into the waves. Silhouetted children chased after. People beside us laughed. Hungry seagulls pursued the outline of a running woman. Waves crashed slowly against the shore. Distant hills were encased in a ghostly mist which rose up out of the ocean. It steamed up off the water and drifted through tall trees. We talked and laughed. And laughed. And kissed. Sand got into our mouths. It crunched, and we kissed with exfoliated lips.
A persistent wind carried in more fog and the sun became a pale sphere. It looked like a smooth, brightly glowing craterless moon. Was it day or night? Where's the line in the sand? She was intoxicating. I felt stoned. We kissed. I said something and she called me an idiot and I wanted to kiss her again. I smiled. Her eyes were wet with laughter.
We stared at the sky, interpreting rows of raked clouds.
Our hands danced as we lay in the sand. The sun was setting. It was swallowed by a hissing sea, bubbling in the places where the light had touched it. Steam and cotton-colored smoke strangled the blue. I sought her elusive eyes under darkened sunglasses. The temperature dropped. She lost circulation in her arm. We got up and walked and watched the glow of the smoldering horizon. Colorful cotton candy clouds.
A bar. A drink. A kiss. Goodbye.
Walking home, a big, silly grin.
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