(“Skyline” was a Top in Fiction’s selection for the month of February, 2025)
Elliot Van Alen leaned against the window of his Park Avenue apartment; his forehead pressed to the cold glass. Fifty-four stories below, the city churned—a grid of relentless motion, lights flickering like neurons firing in the collective brain of Manhattan.
But tonight, the view offered no solace. Where he once saw triumphs of steel and ambition, he now saw a fractured landscape, its gleaming towers reduced to crumbling blocks in his mind. His thoughts were fixated on the building he’d spent the last year designing, a sleek, modern tower meant to crown the Midtown skyline. It had been rejected that morning, dismissed with a single, devastating word.
“Derivative,” the client had said, his voice thin with the brittle authority of disappointment. “We wanted something timeless, and this… well, it just isn’t it.”
Elliot hadn’t argued. He’d learned there was no point. Once the industry branded you a has-been, you became invisible—your ideas, no matter how bold or beautiful, drowned out by the hum of younger voices. At forty-three, he was in freefall; his last two projects were scrapped, and his name was whispered with pity at gala dinners.
He closed his eyes and tried to summon a sense of direction, but his thoughts spiraled instead, circling the same nagging truth: maybe they were right. Maybe his best ideas were behind him.
That was when he found Solomon—hunched by the subway grate across the street. He was wrapped in a battered coat; his head tilted slightly upward as though he were listening to the city.
Elliot didn’t know what made him go down there. He didn’t have a history of gestures like that and didn’t drop coins in guitar cases or pause at the sight of cardboard signs. But something about the man held him. Perhaps it was the contrast between his blind eyes, clouded and searching, and the oddly serene expression on his face.
“You need help?” Elliot asked, shoving his hands deep into the pockets of his overcoat.
Solomon turned his head slightly. “Don’t we all?”
Elliot laughed, a sharp, tired sound. “Fair enough. I’m serious, though. What do you need?”
“Coffee would be nice.” Soloman’s voice was gravelly, but there was a lilt to it, almost like a song.
They ended up at the diner around the corner, seated across from each other in a booth. Elliot ordered pancakes and eggs for the man, who introduced himself as Solomon. The name suited him, Elliot thought, regal and ancient.
“You live around here?” Solomon asked, running his fingers lightly over the rim of his coffee cup.
“Park Avenue,” Elliot said, then immediately regretted it. Solomon gave a low chuckle.
“Must be nice,” he said.
“It’s alright,” Elliot replied. He felt ridiculous, sitting in his tailored coat, trying to converse with someone whose life he couldn’t begin to imagine.
But then Solomon said something that stopped him.
“This city,” he murmured, “it’s always talking if you know how to listen. The hum of it, the way the sounds stack on each other, like a rhythm. It’s all structure, you know? A kind of architecture.”
Elliot stared at him. “Architecture,” he repeated.
“Sure. Everything has a shape. Even sound.” Solomon tapped his fingers against the table's edge, a staccato beat. “I might be blind but I can see. If you know what I mean,” Solomon chuckled.
Elliot shifted on his seat, and Solomon sat quietly for the moment, his blind eyes still and unblinking, the faintest hint of a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
“Elliot Van Alen,” Solomon said, as though tasting the name. “That’s you, right?”
Elliot’s brow furrowed. “That’s right,” he said cautiously. “How did you know?”
“You told me,” Solomon replied.
Elliot blinked, searching his memory. “I don’t recall telling you.”
“Maybe you didn’t,” Solomon said, shruggin