5. Clarissa

5

CLARISSA

M y tote bag was considerably lighter as I slung it over my shoulder. Kyle was right, I could leave half of everything I carried back and forth everyday. The water bottle got heavy, and I didn't even start drinking it until I finished my coffee.

I eyed it thoughtfully. It might have been heavy, but we were about to take a long walk on a hot day. I snagged it.

"I thought I convinced you to leave that here?" Kyle chuckled.

"You had, but we're about to go for a walk. I want my water. You should consider getting some too."

"If I get thirsty, I'll stop and buy something," he said.

Why was it that men never seemed to be prepared and women were always over prepared? I had my bag and water, whereas he was literally walking out of the building as he was, unburdened by any extras. It wasn't fair.

I wasn't a fast walker and felt very self-conscious as Kyle strode next to me.

"Where to first?" he asked.

I knew where I wanted to start, and why. Kyle's offices were located in an old industrial building, converted to office spaces during the previous century. We weren't terribly far from where I wanted to be. But it was going to be a walk. Once outside, I headed east, toward the lake.

"Do you know where you're going?" Kyle asked after a few blocks.

"I do. Aren't you up for a walk? This was your idea."

I couldn't see his eyes behind the reflective aviator sunglasses he slipped on, but I imagined he rolled his eyes at me. There was plenty to see of architectural interest, but nothing that I considered worthy of a tour, at least not yet.

A few blocks, and the nature of the buildings surrounding us changed. Skyscrapers began reaching into the sky like a garden of glass and steel. None were quite as tall as Willis Tower, but that was the beauty of the building.

Kyle flipped his hand and pointed in the direction of the tower. "You aren't going to say anything about Willis?"

I shrugged. "No, should I? It's tall. Come on."

We crossed the river, and I kept walking. I tried to hide the fact that I was struggling, huffing and taking overly deep breaths. I should have called a car or flagged a taxi. But Kyle had said walking tour. I was overthinking everything again.

We reached the first location I wanted to show Kyle. I stopped at the corner of East Wacker and North Wabash. "The Jewelers Building. It has these classic revival temples at the top. Fun fact, the ones on the four corners are to hide water tanks. Chicago is full of these rooftop temples. I simply adore them."

I pointed down the street, where the next building I wanted to show Kyle was clearly visible. "And there's the Tribune Tower. The top of it looks like a Gothic cathedral complete with flying buttresses."

I continued down Wacker and turned onto the bridge before stopping.

"You wanted to show me the DuSable Bridge?" he asked.

"No, I wanted to show you that." I gestured to the buildings we could see more comfortably from where we stood than if we had stopped by their front doors. We stood about halfway over the river on the bridge. "It's the juxtaposition of classical revival next to something some people consider the very definition of modern architecture."

I gestured with my right hand again. "London House, more specifically, the cupola on the roof. It's one of my favorite little gems hidden in the city."

"Have you ever been up there?"

"I've been to the bar, but the cupola is pretty exclusive and in high demand for things like wedding photos and proposals. Every time I'm there, it's closed for a private event," I said.

"Maybe you should reserve it for yourself?" he suggested.

I looked over at him. His head was tipped back as he looked at the roof line. It was just enough to show off the slope of his neck and the bump of his Adam's apple. Dark beard stubble covered the edges of his sharp jaw and neck. I could have stared at him for hours.

I decided that a tour of my favorite view in Chicago would have required handing him a mirror. It wasn't fair how good-looking he was. It felt almost cruel for him to be so funny, nice, and flirty around me.

It took me a long moment of staring at my own reflection in his sunglasses before I clued in that he was looking at me and no longer glancing up at the building.

I cleared my throat and glanced away. "And of course, One Illinois Center," I said as I gestured at the other building.

"Interesting," Kyle said.

"What?"

"That in the midst of your pointing out your love for the revival temples, you also include this one. Now I'm wondering, what is your aesthetic for these choices?"

I grimaced. "Romance versus expectation?"

He returned his gaze back up to the skyscraper. "Okay. Tell me more about expectations."

I let out a bitter laugh. "I'm an architecture student in Chicago. I'm supposed to be enamored with modernism and ‘form follows function.'"

"Bauhaus, good," he muttered and nodded.

"Beauty in simplicity, machinery, speed for speed."

"You might be confusing some Futurist concepts in there, but okay." He kept nodding.

I let out a sigh. "Look, I get it. When this style showed up on the scene, it was hot and new, and if I spent my entire life being inundated with the over-the-top ginger-breading of Victorian architecture, I might get giddy looking at the clean lines and functionality of brutalism. You said earlier not to overthink and to show you what I liked and not worry whether you were going to judge me, right?"

He nodded.

"It's a very unpopular opinion to have, and even more so in this field. I'd be laughed out of some classes for not aspiring to be as lean and clean as Mies van der Rohe. But I've grown up with the cheap knock-offs of modern architecture that have bastardized the concepts from something sleek and sexy in design to boring and uninteresting because why bother having visual interest when it just needs to have a door, some interior space, and a roof? I understand the importance of the design of this building, its designer, and its place in time. I can understand that and still find it to be architecturally uninteresting."

"Even in context?" Kyle asked.

"Which context? Nineteen thirty-eight Germany? This would have been unimaginable. Nineteen sixties Chicago, the latest newest , a feat of engineering and design. Here, now? It's a big glass box."

I pointed at the four glass and concrete buildings next to it. "So are those." I pointed back to the cupola on top of London House. "And that building has an ancient temple on top of it."

I watched him as he stared at the buildings for a while longer. I knew he had seen them a million times before. He had to have studied them. Hell, he might even be in the school of thought that form follows function was the basis of his designs. He ran his hand over his jaw.

"And the fifth one?" he asked.

I looked around to reorient myself. Looking up at the tops of the buildings had me twisted around. We headed north on Michigan Avenue and then turned west on Superior. I kept walking for blocks, taking sips of my water as we went. We passed apartment buildings and hotels, and then I stopped in front of a small mustard colored row house wedged between apartment high-rises.

Kyle started laughing.

"What?" I asked.

"I should have figured you would have picked this place."

"Why do you say that?" I put my hands on my hips and glared at him. The house was cute. I would have loved to have seen this street when it was full of the old homes.

Kyle held out his hand. "Let me see your sketches."

"You made me leave my sketchbook back at the office, remember?" I tried to be sassy.

"Yeah, but you have your tablet. And that's where you put the sketches you like."

"How do you know that?" I asked. My words came slowly as I fished the tablet out of my bag. I clicked it on, input my password, and then handed it over to him.

I stood next to him and watched over his arm as he scrolled through the gallery of images. He made humming affirmative noises as he scrolled through my sketches.

"This one," he said, holding up something I had redrawn.

It was a cleaned-up version of something I had based on a drawing Steve had done after getting feedback from Kyle. At the time, I felt that Steve had given it good bones, but it needed a little oomph .

"You like little gems. Visual surprises. Like this house. Unless you knew it was here, driving down the street, it would completely catch you off guard. And the temples, they are visual gifts, rewarding you for looking up the length of repetitive building fa?ades."

"Nothing wrong with that. There is no visual payoff on half the buildings out there. They are all knock-offs. Exoskeletons aren't new. Glass towers aren't new. Sometimes, it feels like no one is even trying to make new buildings visually interesting."

I shifted my gaze from the tablet to his face. I didn't realize he was so close. He had been looking at me, and now our eyes locked.

"You make things interesting." His voice was low.

When his gaze shifted to my lips, my body tingled like I had been touched. I closed my eyes. His lips against mine were soft, seeking.

"Dangerous," I said with a sigh when he ended the kiss.