#morroco

She adored gold in the way some people adore validation — excessively and without apology. Not plated, not dipped, not hollow, but real gold, heavy enough to leave faint impressions on her skin by the end of the night, bangles stacked thick along her wrists so that every lift of her hand created a quiet metallic applause, necklaces layered confidently across her collarbone like decorative armor, rings catching light like tiny suns. Stylists had once suggested she “simplify,” to which she responded with complete sincerity, “Why would I ration joy?” Her natural hair fell long down her back, sometimes soft waves, sometimes curls depending on humidity and patience, and she refused to flatten it into sleek submission because she had spent her childhood watching women oil their hair with care, braid it with intention, treat it like something sacred rather than something to be controlled. She was feminine, yes — deeply so — but not in a fragile way; hers was the kind of femininity that could feed you, outdance you, and correct you politely in the same breath.

She was also, unfortunately for certain men, very funny.

The morning the headline appeared, she was sitting cross-legged on her cream-colored couch in Los Angeles wearing a pale blush kaftan that pooled dramatically around her like she had accidentally wandered off a palace balcony and into her own living room, gold bangles clinking as she reached for her mint tea, when her assistant slid a tablet toward her with the kind of caution normally reserved for delivering medical results. “Just… read it calmly,” her assistant said.

Iman raised an eyebrow and took the tablet.

Her name.

His name.

Bad Bunny’s.

The headline screamed in dramatic uppercase:

HER SONGS ARE LITERALLY MEANT FOR CAFÉS, NOT TO INSPIRE PEOPLE.

She blinked once. Then her upper lip curled slowly, not in hurt, but in mild disgust, like someone who had just witnessed a man confidently misuse a word in public.

“Cafés?” she repeated thoughtfully. “Does he think cafés are emotionally irrelevant? Has he never cried over espresso? That feels like a him problem.”

Her assistant tried very hard not to laugh. Iman tapped the video clip and watched him — sunglasses indoors, chains layered like he was preparing to negotiate with nuance and losing — laughing as he described her music as ambiance.She paused the video mid-smirk and leaned closer to the screen.

“Is this his intellectual face?” she asked calmly. “Or is that just permanent?”

Her assistant collapsed into a chair.

Iman resumed watching, her expression shifting from amused to analytically entertained.

“With how frequently he discusses sleeping with women,” she said slowly, almost academically, “one might wonder whether he has ever actually remained in the presence of one long enough to understand her beyond a chorus.”

Her assistant froze mid-breath.

“You have to say that,” she whispered.

Iman nodded. “Obviously.”

But first — research, She opened another tab and began reading his lyrics aloud with the seriousness of a scholar examining historical artifacts. “Women. Women. Money. Women. Flexing. Women.”She looked up thoughtfully.

“Is there a deluxe edition where he discovers emotional nuance, or are we committing to the bit?”

Her assistant wheezed. Iman kept scrolling. “Ah,” she murmured. “We are firmly in the Hormonal Teen Boy Cinematic Universe.”

She set the tablet down gently. “He called me café music,” she said with a small smile. “That’s adorable.”

The interview two days later felt less like damage control and more like sport. Iman arrived wearing deep emerald silk embroidered in gold thread that shimmered under studio lights, long sleeves grazing her wrists, her waist defined elegantly beneath structured fabric, gold layered thick and unapologetic, her natural hair cascading freely down her back. She looked radiant, entertained, and extremely prepared.“So,” the interviewer began cautiously, “Bad Bunny’s recently described your music as more café ambiance than inspiration. How do you respond?”

Iman smiled sweetly.

“First of all,” she said, “I love cafés. Some of the most life-changing conversations of my life happened in cafés. So if that’s the insult, I’ll take it.”

The audience laughed.

“But do you agree with him?”

“Oh absolutely,” she replied smoothly. “If you’re a hormonal teenage boy.”

The audience gasped and then erupted into laughter.

“I think his music is perfect for that demographic,” she continued calmly. “It’s loud, it’s dramatic, it’s very ‘I just discovered desire and now it’s my entire personality.’”

The host visibly struggled not to laugh.

“And what happens when they grow up?”

“They realize it’s not literature,” Iman said gently. “It’s cardio.”

The room lost it.

“And you don’t think his music has depth?”

She leaned forward slightly, bangles chiming softly.

“With how frequently he discusses sleeping with women, one might wonder whether he has ever actually remained in the presence of one long enough to understand her beyond a chorus.”

Silence.

Then absolute chaos.

The desert at noon was unforgiving in a way that made tempers shorter than anyone liked to admit. The stage metal burned under the sun, cables coiled across the floor like snakes absorbing heat, and the air itself felt thick enough to chew. Rehearsals were never glamorous — no smoke machines, no dramatic lighting, no forgiving shadows — just exposed scaffolding, exposed mistakes, and in this case, exposed ego. Iman stood center stage in a lighter rehearsal kaftan, still long, still modest, still structured at the waist but made of breathable fabric that moved when she moved. Her hair was loosely tied back now, strands sticking to the side of her neck from the heat, thin gold bangles resting at her wrist because she refused to rehearse without at least something that felt like her. Around her, sound engineers hovered, stage managers barked cues, dancers shifted nervously, and somewhere behind the speakers, producers watched with the particular intensity of people who believed tension was marketable.

Bad Bunny’s stepped up from stage right with his team trailing behind him, sunglasses off but still in hand, sweat glistening faintly at his temples. He stretched his shoulders once and nodded toward the DJ booth. “Let’s try again,” he said, voice carrying unevenly across the stage.

The track began — her percussion first, steady, layered, controlled. Iman moved through the steps slowly, hips shifting in restrained rhythm, hands carving the air with deliberate softness. The choreography was designed to build — her rhythm leading, his beat sliding underneath gradually before he crossed toward her for the shared center segment. On paper, it worked.

In practice, his bass dropped too early.

It swallowed her rhythm whole. She stopped mid-step. The music cut. Everyone froze. Iman closed her eyes briefly, then opened them slowly. “No.” From the other side of the stage he frowned slightly. “What?”

“It’s too early,” she said, trying to keep her voice even despite the heat pressing into her skull. “It drowns the transition.” He walked a few steps closer, gesturing loosely with his hands. “It has to hit.”

“It can hit later.”

“It loses energy if it waits.”

“It loses structure if it doesn’t.” The sound engineer looked between them nervously. He ran a hand over his face. “You want soft-soft-soft and then boom. I want boom with you.”Iman blinked. “Boom with me is not the problem. Boom on top of me is.” A dancer coughed to hide a laugh. He looked briefly confused, then shook his head. “You know what I mean.”

“I know exactly what you mean,” she replied, adjusting her earpiece. “And I’m telling you the layering is wrong.” He muttered under his breath in Spanish, low but not low enough. “Siempre complicado…”

Her head snapped slightly toward him. “Excuse me?”

“I said it’s complicated.”

“No,” she said calmly, “you said I’m complicated.”

He hesitated. “Maybe both.”

She exhaled sharply, looking toward the sound booth. “Lower his entry. Four counts later. And don’t let the bass override the drum line.”

He shook his head. “No, no, no, you cut my energy.”

She turned fully toward him now, sun hitting the gold at her wrist, sweat catching lightly along her collarbone. “Your energy is not fragile. It can survive four counts.”

The crew went silent again.

He stepped closer, not aggressively, but too close for the heat. “You don’t feel it,” he said, tapping his chest. “It needs to feel like—” He struggled for the word. “Explosion.”

“And I need it to feel like build,” she shot back. “Not like someone slammed a door in the middle of a sentence.”

He looked frustrated now, English slipping around the edges. “You want control every second.”

“Yes.”

“You don’t let it breathe.”

“It is breathing,” she said, gesturing to the track. “You are hyperventilating.”

A few crew members visibly turned away to avoid reacting.

He laughed once, incredulous. “You’re funny.”

“I’m tired,” she corrected.

And she was. The heat was oppressive, the repetition exhausting, and the fact that twenty people were watching them argue about counts and volume was beginning to itch under her skin. She hated being observed mid-frustration. It felt messy.

“Okay,” he said, spreading his hands. “Show me. Show me what you want.” She stepped back into position, nodded to the booth. “Run it.” The track restarted. Her percussion flowed again, steady, layered. She moved through the counts slowly, signaling with her hand for when the bass should enters

“One, two, three, four—now.”

The bass entered

He crossed toward her this time as rehearsed, their movements overlapping in the shared choreography — his sharper, heavier steps contrasting her controlled sway. They were close now, too close for comfort under the sun, sweat and rhythm and tension blending.

“See?” she said quietly without breaking step. “It breathes.”

He didn’t respond immediately, They finished the segment. The music cut again. He looked at her, eyes narrowed not in anger but in concentration. “It feels slower.”

“It feels intentional.”

He exhaled, wiping his forehead again. “You hate when I’m loud.”

“I hate when you don’t listen.” He stared at her for a long moment, then muttered something again in Spanish. “Dios, eres intensa…” Her eyebrow rose despite herself. “You’re doing that on purpose now.”

He smirked faintly. “You look mad every time.”

“I look focused.”

“You look like you want to fight.”

“Maybe I do.”

That surprised him.

“You’re serious?”

She stepped closer this time, closing the gap deliberately. “You came into my section like it was your stage. You drowned my transition. And now you’re confused that I’m correcting you.”

He opened his mouth, then closed it.

“You think I’m trying to disrespect you,” he said finally.

“Aren’t you?”

“No.”

“Then act like it.” That landed harder than the previous insults.

The sun pressed down.

Finally, he nodded once toward the booth. “Run it again. Her way.”

Her way.

The engineer restarted the track.

They ran it again. This time, he held back slightly at the entrance, watching her cue, adjusting instinctively instead of overpowering. The bass slid under her rhythm instead of crushing it. It felt… balanced.

They reached center again, Closer. Heat radiating between them.

“You get overstimulated?” he asked suddenly, low enough that the crew couldn’t hear.

She blinked, thrown by the shift. “What?”

“You look like you’re about to explode when too many people talk.”

She hesitated.

“I don’t like chaos I didn’t design,” she said quietly. He nodded once, like that made sense. They finished the sequence. The track ended. No one clapped. Everyone was waiting, Iman looked toward the booth. “Again,” she said, but softer this time.

He glanced at her. “You’re stubborn.”