Imani was riding the bike she bought this year. She’d turned sixteen and gotten her license, but the prospect of really driving on the road was too daunting for her to face, so she bought a sturdy bike. As she rode her dark tresses caught the wind, no doubt making her look like some strange wraith on wheels in the moonlight.
It was around midnight. Her parents were on some long anticipated honeymoon, and she was feeling stifled in that little house with no one to talk to but a drooling mutt. He was following her on the bike. The two of them made quite a pair; a little black biker and a big white dog roaming where the streetlights ended.
She left her phone at the house. No one would call, so there was no point in bringing it. Imani had been doing this since before the dog, Ike, was born. She didn’t have to look at the signs to know which street she was on. The men that sat in lawn chairs on the edge of their property, drinking and singing songs about women, waved when she passed by. In a field of tall grass she heard mumbles and laughter brought to this place to be hidden, but were very loud in the stillness of the countryside. In the barn she stopped at she knew there was someone waiting for her, someone who was always so happy to see her.
At least, she usually was. That night when Imani entered the barn it was dark and empty. She’d already started to go through the worst-case scenarios in her head. Someone found her. Something happened to her when she ventured out.  She got tired of waiting around for Imani to come, so she went to someone else.
She looked to Ike, but of course he had no answers. The girl want to cry out, to scream with all her might, but when she opened her mouth of course nothing came out. She wouldn’t dare make a sound in this place that was no longer a haven. She sank to the ground next to her bike and dog, and looked up at the ceiling. Tears made her dark brown eyes glisten. It was all slipping through her fingers. Nothing mattered besides the girl Imani had come to see; and just like her friends, her grades, and her health, she was losing the only person in the world that understood.  There was an owl appraising her from high up in the rafters. It had stopped preening to watch her from its worn perch. She thought it looked like it wanted to say something.
The next time Imani looked up the owl was gone and golden sunlight streamed through a million hidden holes. Past the massive doors was a world she’d never seen in the light. She made quite a few mistakes on her way home, though she swore she knew those streets better than she knew herself. At every corner there were unfamiliar sights. She didn’t know that so many children lived out in that countryside. She only rode past their homes while they were snug in their beds; when all sensible people were, really.
At home she remained alone with Ike. She let him on her bed when she napped because she remembered all the long days she spent alone in that house, and she didn’t care much for them at all. Sleep didn’t come quickly or easily, but in the end it  overtook her.
When Imani woke there was someone else in the room. Without glasses she couldn’t tell who it was, but she had the presence of mind to keep her eyes closed and pretend she was still asleep. The visitor must have already known she was awake, because they cleared their throat and said, “You came to see me last night.”
She knew that sweet voice. She’d know that voice if she heard it in a crowd of millions. It was the girl she went to see on lonely nights, Aaliyah, who was more beautiful than the sun and stars. Aaliyah, the girl who set hearts aflutter and had eyes only for Imani, the only girl she’d ever love.