Sunlight slipped through the balcony doors, tracing a pale line on the floor.
Maya stretched and wandered into the kitchen, where Rina stood with a mug of coffee, her focus sharp, the kind of alertness born from hours awake before dawn.
"Good morning," Maya said.
Rina didn't look up. "You're glowing."
Maya reached for the kettle. "I always glow in the morning."
"No," Rina said. "That's surely not caffeine. That's something else. Did you win the client, or did you fall in love?"
"I got the project," Maya replied.
Rina finally lifted her eyes. "And?"
"And," Maya added, softer, "I met someone."
Rina's mouth curved into a slow smile. "Ah."
"On the jeepney," Maya said quickly, as if preemptively defending herself.
"Of course," Rina said. "Where else do lives intersect in this city?"
"He's a street musician," Maya continued. "He plays in underpasses. By fountains. Anywhere the sound lingers."
"That already sounds like a poem."
"He is one," Maya said, then frowned. "Annoying, though."
"Poets often are."
Maya poured her coffee and leaned against the counter. "His name's Julian."
Rina raised her mug. "To Julian, then."
"To detours," Maya replied.
The memory came back to her without warning. She had seen Julian again the night before, near Fuente Osmeña, his guitar resting against his chest as if it belonged there. She hadn't planned to stop. She never tried to interfere. But the city seemed to pause around him, and she paused too.
"Back for the encore?" he'd asked, smiling as if they were already something familiar.
"I had questions about your setlist," she'd said.
"I take requests."
"Do you know Buwan?"
"Only if you sing with me."
"I design buildings," she'd replied. "Not songs."
"Then I'll sing for both of us."
His voice rose steadily into the night, weaving through conversations, rising above traffic, and resonating within her as a quiet yearning. For a moment, the city grew calm enough to hear itself.
Afterward, they'd sat beside the fountain, water misting their skin. "I saw your neighborhood today," Maya had said. "The company wants to tear it down."
Julian had nodded. "They always do."
"They call it progress."
"For them," he'd said. "Not for the people who already live there."
She didn't answer. After all, silence was her profession. But Julian looked at her then—not accusing, not bitter. Just searching.
"You're not like them," he said. "You somehow look like the one who listens."
"Really? I don't think I am. Perhaps I'm just trying to."
"Then come see it," he'd replied. "Before it becomes a drawing that doesn't remember us."
"Alright. I have free time tomorrow afternoon." She finally got up to leave, seeing that it's getting late.
"Well then, I will be waiting for you at the Robinsons Fuente."
"Sure." She agreed, smiling. "Oh, here's my ride."
"See you then."
The next afternoon, Maya followed Julian through alleys she had always passed but never entered. Behind the old cinema in Lahug, the city seemed to fold in on itself, showing layers of paint, laughter, and memory.
Murals covered the walls: sunsets bursting with color, dancers frozen in mid-step, and verses in Bisaya that looked like prayers hidden as graffiti. Children played patintero in chalked squares, some played badminton with peers, while others were chit-chatting at a nearby sari-sari store that meant nothing to developers but everything to the kids and residents who guarded them.
"This is where I grew up," Julian said. "My father taught music here. My mother sold candies and instant noodles from a wooden shelf."
He stopped for a moment. "They're gone now. But the sound stayed."
People greeted him as they passed, calling his name, asking when he would play again, and teasing him about unfinished songs. Maya watched as he crouched to their level, fitting in so entirely that it made her ache. She realized then that the neighborhood was not informal housing, not a redevelopment site. It was a living archive.
After a few more walks, they went inside a run-down concrete building and climbed the stairs. With each step, Maya was also silently observing. Later, they arrived at his unit. His apartment was narrow and looked dilapidated, just above a repair shop. Inside, egg trays lined the walls to absorb echoes. A microphone stood like a guard next to his desk. Lyrics and sketches were scattered everywhere, with words looking for form and drawings searching for meaning.
"I record here," Julian said. "It's small."
"It's full," Maya replied, observing.
"I know," He smiled. "I just tell stories."
"So do I," she said, looking at him. "I just use blueprints and concrete."
He met her gaze. "Then tell this one right."
That night, Maya sat alone on her balcony, the city humming below her. The official blueprint lay unopened at her side, crisp and merciless. Instead, she filled her notebook with something else. Buildings that rose without erasing shadows. Courtyards that preserved murals as foundations, not decorations. A community center reborn from the old cinema, its stage returned to the people who had never stopped singing.
Rina leaned over her shoulder. "Hmm. That's not what the firm asked for."
She paused and looked at her prying friend. "It's what the city needs," Maya replied, then continued what she was doing.
Rina smiled gently. "Careful. That kind of thinking costs careers."
Maya's pencil didn't stop moving. "So does silence."
She kept drawing, not just buildings but also an argument, a refusal, and a promise.
Below her, a guitar began to play somewhere in the night. She kept drawing. And for the first time, Maya let herself believe that love, like cities, could be designed not to dominate but to last.