New Year's Midnight

A wolf, whose fur was black, brown and beige, and whose clothes seemed a jacket and black pants, walked into the softly-lit space. He set down a glass and a half-filled bottle on a rounded table. He turned around for a moment, looking at a panther standing against the frame of the EXIT door and patted his chest where his heart would've been. The dark feline nodded back and went away.

"Who was that, Shuraim?"

His throat swallowed, and he smiled small and sadly.

"An old, old friend."

The wolf took off his jacket, being now clad in a sleeveless red vest, embroidered with the design of an Eastern dragon. He laid the jacket over the back of a restaurant chair, before sitting down and stretching himself out.

"I thought it was HT."

"No, he wasn't. We go... way back. Andy's over at the bridge, with the Merlionites."

Shuraim smiled and made a gesture to a large, strapping bear as he walked past, with a somewhat handsome creature by his side and arm-in-arm. Shuraim received a touch on his back and a whisper at his ear, and he patted the side of the ursine's arm.

"Singaporeans, you mean?"

"Huh?"

"You meant the Singapore furs?"

Shuraim let out a half-baked chuckle. "Okay."

"Where's Kai? Saw him here..."

"He went out, with his main squeeze."

Shuraim thought about and knew where they were going, and why, and raised his glass a bit above the table with a slight tilt. A small toast for a big thing, with a prayer for a snow-pelted boy... no, a young man now.

The sour aperitif disappeared into his lips.

"I thought you didn't drink."

"Well... this isn't champagne."

"It's... not?"

He twisted the bottle, so its label was in his acquaintance's sight. Indeed, it had sparkle, but it was not wine.

He chuckled along with his friend.

Nearby, under a gentle amber light and tucked into the velvet of a so-called loveseat sofa, a brown-furred jackal and blue-scaled dragon held hands. Under the shadow of the dragon's hair was a smile rarely made, rarely seen, that found life in this time when it was neither today nor tomorrow. Here where all seemed possible

Shuraim took another drink from the glass, as he heard the kiss.

A dog, possibly doberman, strummed a guitar on the platform. Someone walked up and wrapped arms around his waist. Shuraim remembered to ask him for Goethe the day after, or maybe some Schopenhauer.

The band left two hours ago. A buff, serpentine guest had been waiting for them to finish their shift, so he could be with his lupine lover as they watch the fireworks searing into the sky of the Outside, through images fed into this world with hi-resolution hardware. Together, even if they were separated by the lands that held their presence apart.

"Separated, we all are...  yet we're here, and we're all in it together."

"Hmm?"

Shuraim's light, almost amber, eyes laid once again onto the one who he'd been talking to.

"Kay... thanks for dancing with me tonight."

"You're welcome... but that was last year."

A toothy snicker, as Shuraim's finger traced the wet rim of the glass.

"It was great."

"Still, I can't dance."

"Hel-lo? Neither could I."

A pink goat, a yellow cat and a green dragon with broken horns (the scene of indeed a sight that cannot be seen Outside) traded what seemed to be artwork made from the dance of mind and hand, floating like figments of a dream in front of them. One of the images shrunk, and the dragon slipped it into his shirt pocket, where it was then presumably downloaded to his computer.

Shuraim pulled out a small plastic strip from his vest pocket, and glanced upon an image of a dark canine, a jackal, with small codes etched on it; a form of encoded poetry that only his system could read. He would read it, when the dreamsleep is gone from his eyes.

"It's getting late..." he said, as he stood up and slung his jacket over his shoulder. "I have work tomorrow."

"You do?"

"Johor doesn't get the day off."

"I see."

Shuraim sighed, smiled. He bent down and hugged Kay, nuzzling into the blonde hair and light fur. It was a bit hard letting go, but not impossible, and they both did.

"It'll happen, Kay. Someday... no cybers, no nothing."

"Take care, Shuraim."

Shuraim logged out, with a warmth in mind and in heart, as the world drew away into simple colours and lines, as Kay was but a figure waving at him with a dark-furred hand. Soon the system brought him to semi-wakefulness, and he chose to sleep through the rest of the night.

When the day began, it was already a new year, complete with new promises and new ways to break them. Yet... Shuraim was glad for one simple fact:

Things were still able to change.