The last crackle of applause still echoed from behind the double doors behind the stage as we nudged our way through back into the hallway. The doors latched shut behind us, our shoes tapping and clicking against the pearly floors as we emerged into the hall, but something about the atmosphere was strangely airy and light, almost like I walked in a trance.

It was just about ten after noon after we had just now completed the yearly Initiation event, and wow, had it been the most successful one I'd ever witnessed with my own two eyes. That was saying something—With Lyle's immense skills in organizing and propelling the event, I had yet to see what would have been considered a failure. But the hope in every spoken word shimmered each sentence, and evidently, the audience had seen it, as well. Today was the first day in the history of the HHDA that we had ever received something as impressive as a standing ovation. I'd had a tingle in the back of my mind telling me that something memorable was about to occur today, but that hadn't been something I was expecting. But maybe that wasn't it. Even now, the instinct tugged at me, screaming at me to look out for a blessing like it had just passed me by entirely.

Together, the three of us slowed to a halt in the middle of the hallway. The applause had died down behind us, leaving the muffled rustling of hundreds of animals gathering their belongings to leave.

"Great work out there. Both of you," Lyle told Lottie and me. "I've never seen that much of a response before. You both have gone above and beyond in your work and they can see that, maybe as clearly as I do. Let's all go have some lunch from the cafeteria and get back to work."

When Lyle started off shuffling down the hallway again, Lottie and I followed the movement. None of us quite made it to the turn, though, as Lyle jolted to a stop just a few more steps down.

"Oh, wait a minute, I just remembered something," he added, turning back to face us again. "What day is it again?"

"Sunday," Lottie told him. "May thirteenth."

It was then, as Lottie recounted the current date, that it struck me that scheduling the yearly initiation in May was a bit odd. When I had first begun my employment, anything past the second week of March would have been deemed late from the usual. At the same time, March was notorious lately for carrying freezing and relentless rain. Bumping the event down to May was a recent thing of last year, which was likely a choice made in harmony with the shifting seasons.

"Right." Lyle ran his paw over his face in a brief motion of contemplation before he dropped it back to his side. "Well, it just so happens that tonight's the night where they're shooting a live concert right near our house, Lottie. It starts at six thirty and even if you're home by then, it'll still be tremendously loud. I'm worried that it's going to bother your ears. Why don't you stay here a bit later than usual tonight? Just until the concert ends, at least. I'll give your office a call once you're safe to leave, but I think it goes until nine at night or something like that."

"Oh, sure," Lottie replied with a short nod. "I can manage that. I agree, it would be better to be safe."

"Exactly," Lyle said before he turned his focus to me. "You can stay and keep her company until she leaves, if you'd like. I know you two have been close recently."

The words would have tumbled out of my mouth before he had even said it. With the same short nod, I accepted the task.

"Yes, of course I can do that," I told him. "I wouldn't have it any other way."

"Good. I appreciate the effort, Digby. But no funny business while you're here alone, do you understand?" Lyle answered, regaining his stride as the three of us carried on down the hallway. The words may have been rather abrupt, but he wasn't upset. Over the years of our friendship, I had familiarized myself with his particular style of emotionless humor. "Now, let's grab something to eat. I don't know about you two, but I could definitely use a bite right now."

Together, we ascended the steps to the second floor on our way to the cafeteria. On the way, my hollow stomach whined in hunger. I could definitely have used a bite, as well. We clustered around the dining table and enjoyed a warm, hefty meal as the clock hanging from the wall ticked closer and closer to twelve thirty. Once the meal ended, we dispersed. Lyle had reminded us that since today was initiation day, the building was closed to the public today, so it wasn't of any use returning to our daily schedule. Lottie and Lyle disappeared around the corner of the hall, likely to return to their offices. I instead made a stop at the break room, poured myself my second cup of coffee for the morning, and carried it back to my own office to settle in for a day's work.

As I sat myself down in my office again, the handle of my mug in paw, the soft sunlight of morning pooled across the polished floors. The atmosphere was warm and forgiving, almost like a breath of hope. I was familiar with this kind of vibe. It was almost like the final day of school, the only day of flexibility and a lack of responsibility, before summer break began. It might have been the most peaceful sensation to come across. With nothing else directly planned, I only sat in it for a while, sipping at my coffee in the tranquility of the day.

With the exception of traveling to and from the break room for either another cup of coffee or simply a movement break, I kept myself locked up in my office for the remainder of the day. It wasn't much of a slow day, either, as I quickly found myself favorably productive, like there was a tiny motor running and shuffling me onward to finish as much work as I could. I had just been given a brand new set of lessons to glance over that would begin tomorrow, so I scanned through those pages. It was nearly a quarter past three when I arrived at the very last page, which I decided earned me the time to grab myself a third cup of coffee, and so I shifted my focus to the progress report I had begun to draft during the first half of the month.

The tapping of my computer keyboard delivered me further and further into the swelling afternoon. I picked up the phone to answer a few calls as they rolled in. This was what reminded me of the task to contact my parents, to let them know that I would have been home late, so I briefly called home and spoke with Dad. I only kept an eye on the clock for about the first hour, my eyes flicking upward every so often to find the time creeping towards four thirty, before I had completely absorbed myself in my work. The next thing that I registered, a knock rapped against the glass and snapped me back to reality, raising my eyes to find that fifteen past six had come around. Lyle ducked his head into the room to announce that he was on his way out, reminded me that the concert would end around nine, and thanked me again for keeping Lottie company before he vanished once again.

I set aside my work, packing up my belongings until I had tidied up the area on my desk once again. After all, given that my shift had ended and I would have been sticking around for three more hours, I might as well have spent some time unwinding. I abandoned my office, instead heading off to make my way to the break room. It was a bit late for another cup of coffee, not to mention what another cup could have done to my stomach, so I prepared myself a warm mug of hot chocolate instead. I seated myself down in one of the velvet chairs, cupping the mug between my paws as the pinching heat swarmed my palms and steam wafted into the air. What a wonderful evening.

Lottie pushed her way through the door nearly twenty minutes after I had first sat down. Miraculously, my drink had yet to cool even after so long, still biting the tip of my tongue in its heat. Lottie greeted me, took notice of the mug between my paws, and dismissed herself to the counter to make one for herself. After she had prepared herself her hot beverage, she joined me at the chair next to mine. We talked for a little while about construction that had been taking place near her house, bothering her sleep, and memorable things that visitors have said to us, whether pleasant or unpleasant. It was a hint past ten after seven when Lottie took her leave once more, excusing herself back to her office to complete some last work, and left me with my cooling mug of hot chocolate in my isolation.

I returned to my office as well, though I held a looser grip on the discipline to finish more work. I already had a tremendous amount of work behind me, and besides, I wasn't entirely certain that I could have contained a single line of focus in the late hour. On any other day, I would have been home already, scarfing down a warm and satisfying meal with Mom and Dad. The lights beaming down onto the milky walls and floors seemed all the more intense in the late hour, throbbing against my eyes that had begun to grow sore. I couldn't remember if I had ever been inside the building this late. It was genuinely a whole different world than what it had been during the daylight hours.

The sky was alight with vibrant colors stretched across the horizon in sunset when I nudged through the door to my office. It must have been closer to the end, though, given the subdued touch that overshadowed it all. A dimmed glow sat between the corners of the room like a lantern, welcoming me into the shadows of a life or lack thereof that I had yet to witness. I sat myself back down at my computer once again, gulped down what was left of my chilled drink, and reclined as far as my chair would allow me to watch the sun settle beneath the horizon.

When the sun vanished and took its reliable rays of light with it, I noticed a particular resonance even in myself. In the bleakness of the opening night, the breath of hope that had blessed me in the soft lights of the afternoon had shriveled into void. I couldn't accurately name what it was that I felt now. Dejected, perhaps, in a pitted sort of way. Unhappy, for sure. But for what reason? There was no telling where it had come from, only that it was there. Just this morning, I had been congratulated and applauded in a real standing ovation at my work and performance here at the HHDA, reflexively beaming for every pair of eyes to see. But maybe that was just it. They liked me, loved me even, but they didn't know me. And I would never have known a single one of them. I was an image to them, nothing more.

By this point, the sky outside of my window had completely darkened in the arrival of night with a million dots of illuminated stars sprinkled across. It was the first chance I'd ever gotten to see the stars from here, right at my second-floor office window. I had stood to gaze up at them for a while, propping open the window and perching my paws on the edge as a brisk breeze swept in from the late hour. For that moment and that moment only, it was just me alone with the sky.

"Wow, would you look at that beautiful sight?" Mom would have said. "Absolutely stunning. You know, I think of that as one of life's biggest miracles. The stars are like the universe's gift to us, lighting the way even when the night is dark. Doesn't that just warm your heart?"

No. I felt nothing. Why did I still feel nothing?

I blinked and realized that the bleak night breeze was no longer only dragging its fingers across my cheeks, but swallowed me whole. The door behind me had already latched shut after I had dropped it, submerging me into the ruffled figures of the towering hedge walls bordering the garden. Pounding music in the distance proved of the concert that Lyle had been mentioning earlier tonight. I guided my way through the shadowed area that my eyes hadn't yet managed to adjust to, tottering clumsily into a seat on the bench positioned against the wall of the building before I allowed myself a breath.

I raised my eyes to the sky, hanging an arm over the arm of the bench, expecting my vision to be flushed with a sight that snatched my breath away, that flooded me with the beauty of life, something to tear me away from the numbness that had carried me here. Nothing. Just the wide skies that stretched around me, enhanced with starlight like someone had tossed glitter across the blackness, and the hedge archways reaching above and obstructing strips of the sight.

I couldn't deny that something about it was indeed peaceful, though. A radiant sight, lit up with the thin brilliance of night. It was an image one could have only dreamed of, like the sky had put out its best display for tonight only. Peaceful, for sure, but the existential dread wriggled into place almost as abruptly as the peace itself did. I wasn't a stranger to the acknowledgment that life was infinitely larger than I ever would have known, but I hadn't yet cracked the darker side of it until this very moment.

In a universe, maybe even multiverse, of experience and possibility, the eye could only reach so far. Just like the countless stars glistening above, there were faces that I would never lay eyes on, and even if I did, I could never have known for sure everything that hid behind them. Exactly how it was arranged in that regard, it worked the other way around. It was just like what I had been considering earlier with the visitors that commended me but didn't know me, really know me. Nobody really knew me, not nearly as well as my own mind knew itself. There was so much of a blockage from truly knowing someone I cared about that I had never once recognized. And because I knew that, there was a fair chance that I was among the loneliest animals in the world.

I eased myself forward with my elbows digging into my knees, passing my paws through my unkempt hair and setting my forehead in their pads. The wind whistled in the distance, flitting softly past me in a crisp breeze. As tranquil as the lull that nightfall blessed me with, a deadened sensation gouged out my chest.

I didn't understand it. I didn't understand. I practically had everything. I had sources of support nearly everywhere I looked. As surreal as it sounded to admit to myself, I floated on the surface of a level of fame I hadn't dared to dream of as a puppy, and most of that response was kept positive as well. I held my head in my paws, sinking into my own thoughts and tuning out the world around me. The past events of this afternoon still flaunted through my mind. The thunderous applause. The spirited encouragement. The deep bow before hundreds of watching animals. I had so much in this life. And still this stupid, sour-tasting, gut-wrenching desolation kept coming back again and again and again. Why?

The door to the garden unlatched, letting out a high-pitched whine as it swung open. With a frazzled brain, I raised my head in the direction to figure out what was happening. Lottie had stepped out into the garden, propping open the door with a single paw as her dimmed figure scanned the area. Instantly, I straightened up the full way to welcome her, a refreshing surge of comfort washing over me like cool water. Only seconds after emerging through the doorway did Lottie spot me on the bench, her eyes falling upon me before she spoke.

"Oh, there you are," Lottie realized aloud. "I was looking for you. I wanted to let you know that I'm considering heading home soon. I checked for you in your office, but you weren't there."

"You're heading home? How late is it?" I asked.

"Well, not yet," Lottie corrected, ducking out of the doorway to gently shut the door behind her, breaking our gaze for only a moment before she turned back to face me. A sweeping breeze fiddled with tiny wisps of her hair that had managed to free themselves from her tight-fit bun. "Soon, though. And it's about a quarter to nine."

Wow. It was later than I had presumed. I dropped my head again, running my paws over my face again to massage out the tiredness imprinting across it. As my head was lowered, I heard the crunching of her heeled shoes across the grass as she walked to join me, lowering herself into a seat beside me.

"It's a beautiful night," Lottie began as I lifted my head, but the topic only lasted for the single sentence before she interjected herself. "Wait. You seem tense. What's on your mind?"

Such an unmistakable innocence shimmered in her dark eyes as they stared up into mine. Something deep in the mesmerizing colors carried something so genuine, a glimmer of serenity. I couldn't burden those eyes with the thoughts that had overtaken my head.

"Nothing important," I said.

"Digby," Lottie whispered softly. Something softened in her eyes, a hint of understanding and ease. "I know you better than that. I know when something is bothering you. Please tell me what it is."

Well, I couldn't have hid the truth forever. Still, the words hesitated to come loose, barred behind the wall of the unknown. I stared down at my paws in my lap, making a point to fidget with them to keep my silence and sustain the atmosphere in the fleeting moments where it wasn't poisoned by the truth. The music from the distant concert still throbbed, nearly rattling the ground at my feet as I refused to peel my eyes from my paws, at least until I remembered that my arms still had function. I untangled my paws from each other and draped an arm around Lottie beside me, drawing her close to rest the side of my head on hers.

"You know, I..." I spoke up at last. "I think I might be dealing with an undiagnosed depression."

My heart clobbered restlessly in my chest, anticipating the response before I had even finished speaking. I was sure there would have been immediate questions, and if I stumbled into the worst case scenario, a blow of distress. I was wrong. Lottie didn't utter a single word, sitting still and silent close at my side as if she hadn't heard me at all. After a lengthy pause, she stirred in her seat, shifting to escape my hold. When I withdrew my arm, she climbed to her feet, taking in a deep and trembling breath. I pushed myself up as well, half-expecting her to walk away without another word, but she didn't move.

Lottie seemed to be struggling to look me in the eyes now, loosely tying her arms around herself as her gaze, cold with worry, strayed nearby. It was only after an extensive stretch of silence between us, accompanied by the distant pounding music, did she speak up again.

"All right," Lottie mumbled, acknowledging the news with an almost choked-up shake etched into her soft and unsteady voice. "What makes you say that? Did something happen? Are you okay? Do I need to get my uncle involved?"

"No, it's not that serious," I assured her. Finally, she turned to look at me again at these words. The stars above shimmered in the depths of her dark eyes. Guilt wrenched my stomach into knots. "It's not like that. I'm okay. I'm going to be okay. It wasn't anything specific that happened. It's something that I've been dealing with for several years now, since I was about seventeen or something like that. But I just kind of put a label on it now."

"Since you were seventeen," Lottie echoed delicately. "Since you started your work here at Happy Home?"

I knew the answer was yes, but there were far more layers behind it than the single word could have interpreted. It wasn't Happy Home that made me this way. Initially, it had been the realization that I couldn't efficiently keep up with the work and the question of what kind of a lazy, irresponsible animal that made me. It had all just spiraled from there. I gulped, trying to calm myself as a twinge of tension flicked my chest.

"It's not like that," I told her.

"Then what is it like?" Lottie urged to know.

"It's like that no matter what I do, no matter how happy I am or how good my life is, I will always go back to being miserable at some point," I confessed. Suddenly, I struggled to look Lottie in the face, and so I turned my own away. "Life just always ends up the same way no matter what I do to try and avoid it. It's just really hard to convince myself that I deserve good things when all I can do is ruin them. Like what happened before I was suspended. I even lost you for a while when I had no idea what I was doing wrong or how to fix it. I'm just causing problems unknowingly at this point. It's a vicious cycle and I can't escape it. No matter how far I come from it, I'm just going to be brought right back here again. I'm so sorry. I really am. I'm not trying to burden you with this while you're having such a good day. I just thought it was time for you to know."

My eyes ached, threatening to pull up tears as my throat began to squeeze. A soft, almost soundless gasp escaped from Lottie in front of me, drawing my focus back to her only to realize that she had broken past that threshold far sooner than I had neared it. Tears shone distinctly across her eyes as they still locked upon me, so evident that it was a wonder how they hadn't already fallen. My words faltered.

"And you've felt that way for five years?" Lottie whispered weakly.

There were no more words. I forced a silent nod. Lottie's tears finally spilled over with a strained whimper, sending her paw flying to press firmly against her mouth as she began to cry. I could only watch her as she struggled to regain her composure, silently sobbing into her paw clamped over her mouth for a few seconds before she sniffled loudly and attempted to brush away her dripping tears from her cheeks with the sides of her paws.

"It's not always going to be like this, Digby," Lottie insisted faintly, still wiping at her face. "There are things that can help you. There are so many animals around you that are here for you and want to see you succeed. I'm here for you. Uncle Lyle is here for you. Always."

Lottie's words died out to offer me the chance to respond, a chance I didn't take. She sniffled again, dropping her paws back to her sides as her composure steadied again. She had brushed away her tears, but left streaks of mascara underneath the bottom rim of her eyes.

"Do you want to talk about it?" she asked me. "You can talk to me. You can talk with my uncle, as well. He studied psychology back in university. Or I can have him set you up with a professional. Whatever you need."

"I hate talking about it," I admitted. "I thought it was best to tell you what was going on in my head despite that. And I hate the idea of therapy. I always have. I hate the thought of someone fussing over me and reminding me that there's something wrong with me to make me be there in the first place."

Lottie nodded slightly, drawing in a calmer breath as she tried to soothe herself. My heart had relaxed and the urge to cry had receded once again. Quietness swelled between us. I tucked my paws into my pockets to keep them warm, allowing my thoughts to stray for the first time and my face to turn back up to the stars. The far music still hammered against the air, the wind still whistling softly in the late hour, and the stars glimmered on as usual.

I realized that this wasn't the first time that I had been out here, despite the surreal atmosphere still plaguing my mind, but the first occasion of this time at night. If my recollections proved true, I had sat here twice before. The first was in Lottie's company as I was tonight, my very first day working at Happy Home. It was a frigid February morning and we both took off from the cafeteria to hang out here during lunch. The second time, I had been with Lyle, and though I failed to recall just when it had been, I remembered the stale summertime heat stretching out the thin air. It had been somewhere right smack in the middle with all of the Redd troubles and most definitely one of the worst days of my life. This place was memorable, that was for sure.

Someone shouted in the distance, shortly followed by what sounded like an abrupt whistle. A gentle breeze fluttered the nipped leaves of the hedge walls. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Lottie remove her gaze from me to study her paws. For a couple of minutes, the absence of words between us endured, and the two of us stood in silence.

"I never really got along too well with my parents," Lottie confessed after a generous pause. The shock that struck me very nearly jerked my heart up into my throat as my focus snapped back towards her as she refused to raise her eyes from her paws. She never talked about that. "It's been long enough that I can forgive them now, but I think I'll never quite forget everything they said to me."

Lottie fell quiet, permitting me time to respond as she hesitantly met my gaze again. I chose not to respond, instead looking her right in the face and waiting for her to continue. After a short stretch of silence, she seemed to realize that I wouldn't speak and went on.

"I think that they sometimes forgot that I lived a life, just like they did," Lottie told me. "Well, do, I suppose. And I think I can't really blame them for that. It's just nature to not consider that kind of thing. But I think they both had some sort of unresolved and repressed anger, which is what led them to fight with me and with each other so often. According to them, I was just always in the way, and that's why they kept getting upset and yelling at me. Even as a little girl, I always found it unfair for them to say something like that to my face, but I can understand it a little bit better now that I'm older. If something inconveniences you, you're bound to get a little bit frustrated, especially if you struggle to contain your anger and if it's something that can't respond, at least in your mind. But I still stand firm to the truth that it's not okay, what they did."

The same rotten, sour feeling had begun to pool into my stomach again. The moment that she had finished her sentence, my paws shot out, taking hold of her own to comfort her and allow her the strength to continue. Lottie snuck a glance down at our paws latched together, and though I didn't say a word, I gently squeezed her paws enclosed in my own to remind her that I was there for her and wouldn't judge her for anything she needed to say.

"I don't think a single day passed where I didn't get screamed at for something I didn't even know I was doing wrong," Lottie murmured, staring down at our joined paws. "I think it really started to mess me up after a while. Every time they got mad about something, even if it had nothing to do with me, or as much as expressed disapproval of something, my first instinct became to question what I had done wrong that time and the punishment I would be given for it. I stopped wanting to be around them just in case something would make one or both of them mad. And that's not even talking about the teasing and the taunting that brought the nightmares about... Well, you know who. They used his name against me if I didn't do something quick enough or was doing something they didn't like, threatening that he was going to come and find me if I didn't listen to them because they knew he scared me. I was seven years old when Uncle Lyle came around to rescue me and I'm so grateful that he did."

The same tears from before had resurfaced, glistening within the colors in her eyes. She sniffled softly, clearly battling to keep them from falling, before she raised her tearful eyes to meet mine again. As if our gaze had been stuck together by the strongest glue, I suddenly found that nothing else was as remotely important to hold my eyes on than her own.

"I'm not saying this just to say this, or even just to let you know what happened throughout my kithood that I don't really talk about," Lottie confessed after a pause. "I'm saying this because there's a couple of messages I want to get across from this. The first is that I understand how it feels and that with the right support, you can heal. You can. The second is that Uncle Lyle was that support for me. He taught me to love myself even on the days when I couldn't find a reason why. He would and did set aside everything for me when I needed him to, just to show me how it felt to be genuinely loved when my mother and father couldn't care less to show me themselves. He was the animal that helped me reclaim my life, grow from my pain, and in time, heal from it. I want to be that animal for you. I hear that you're struggling, but I don't think there's enough words in any language to express how much I care about you and what I would do for you. I want to teach you how to love yourself and prove to you that you truly are loved. I want to be that support for you."

The same exact airy, weightless, soaring feeling had submerged my entire body, leaving me standing in a silent trance. Every inch of my insides had just turned to mush with every word that struck the air—Not in a sickened way, but more a pleasant softness like diving headfirst into a fluffy cloud. I sunk deep into the dim colors of her eyes, spellbound to the shimmering vision. I knew what I wanted to say this time, but the question of whether I could even manage to get the first of three out sealed my mouth shut. Instead, I listened as they screamed out in my mind, hammering against the walls of my headspace to be noticed, and gazed unmovedly into the beautiful face before me.

I hadn't yet convinced myself to open my mouth and speak when Lottie appeared to take notice that I wasn't about to say something any time soon. She slipped her paws out from my grasp, instead reaching her arms up and around my neck to enfold me in an almost crushing hug. Instantly, I cradled her in my arms, holding her close against me, clinging as snugly as she held me in return. After that, all we did was stand together, sinking deeply into the weight and warmth of each other's arms in the dead hour.

Somewhere in the distance, the wind kept on whistling. Even farther than the wind, the roaring music battered on. A faint breeze flitted past us. The pale moonlight high above our heads bathed the space in a fragile glow. After the first minute, I had forgotten how to sense the seconds ticking by, drowning in a timeless, immortal moment. My arms wound around her waist, hers around my neck. Her face was sheltered in my shoulder, my cheek resting against the side of her head.

Lottie shifted within my arms with each passing breath. I wondered if she could have felt my heartbeat, if only slightly, a hurried rhythm as if I were rushing to get someplace else and was only trapped in this moment. A droopy relaxation had stripped me of my strength, quite like the relief of sinking into bed at the end of a tragically lengthy day. The distant music faded out, followed by the rumble of what must have been cheering in response. A different sound of music struck the air. It was slower than the former, a deeper resonance within the soul with powerful strands and chords of elongated sounds. I recognized the tune—Well, I was pretty sure that I did—But the recognition was nothing more than a tingle on the tip of my tongue. I knew the song, predicting each note as they blasted in the distance, but how I knew it was beyond me.

The vibration of Lottie's soft voice close to my ear told me that she had begun to hum along with the leisurely tune, recalling it just as I did. It was only then that I remembered what it was: It was a melody with a profound name that had escaped me but a sound that echoed in my memory, one that I hadn't particularly listened to for years but we had once shared an agreement on the knowledge of its existence. I followed the steady advancement of the tune, humming gently in an unbroken unity with Lottie's own voice, enhancing the familiar song with a hint that belonged only to the moment.

We started out humming in flawless unison, and then we were moving, our feet shifting and crunching over the grass beneath us as we lightly swayed to the music together. The distant notes became our lullaby as we settled lower and lower into a dreamlike trance, allowing the rest of the world to slip away and our only worry to become where we would next set down our foot. Under the thin light of the moon and all of the glistening stars that surrounded it, we danced as one like there was nothing else in the world that mattered so much as the way we clung to each other, humming our way through the motions.

It wasn't our first dance, but perhaps the most magical. The last time we had done this had been our second date, right in the midst of the HHDA's downfall. We had spun throughout the room as one, ignoring each and every prying eye that turned in our direction. In that moment, nothing else had mattered, just like right now. As the memories flashed through my mind, I kept my arms wrapped closely around Lottie's waist, embracing her in the delicate steps of our wordless dance. The night was ours and I wouldn't have traded it for the world.

It took me a moment to realize that not only had we both ceased to hum, but we had also ceased to move. As we stood, captured in the stillness of before the dance had been initiated, Lottie had pulled away at some point, though not completely. Her paws still settled at the back of my neck, mine still nestled around her waist. Her face was hardly inches from mine, staring up into my eyes with her own that shimmered under the starlight. The distant music still thundered on from somewhere out there, but the only thing we followed was the decidedly close sight buried in each other's eyes.

Without a word—And without diverting her gaze for even a blink—Lottie withdrew her paws from my neck. My stomach dropped in disappointment at the feeling of her touch vanishing, but only until she readjusted her paws to instead slide them beneath my floppy ears, setting them on the sides of my face. My heart clobbered in my chest, seeming to stumble over itself at every uneven thump. The atmosphere was breathless with uncertainty, a moment fixed in place as we looked into each other's eyes.

Until she looked away. Lottie blinked, her thick eyelashes fluttering as she sunk back into reality and she hastily averted her gaze from mine, though her paws didn't budge from my face. I watched as her eyes flicked here and there to examine the grass at our feet, refusing to look into mine for another second, at least at first. She pushed out a faint sigh, her dark eyes snapping up to meet mine once again, immersing us back into the sensation of the eye contact for nothing longer for a few seconds before she was pulling my face in by her paws resting on the sides.

Lottie's kiss was softer than I would have anticipated. She pulled me in with as long as a blink, but our faces met with a gentleness like a patient whisper. The world around me diminished immediately as my eyes flitted shut, submerging myself in utter darkness as her warmth enveloped me, directly in presence as she held herself so close to me, but my thoughts fired relentlessly.

Was this actually happening? Was this actually real? Why had she gone and done such a thing? It was for the same reason that she had begun to ask me on dates in the first place. It had to be. She knew and understood that I was hurting, so she experimented with her options to comfort me. One of them, evidently, being a kiss. A kiss. There I stood, buried in the darkness of my shut eyes, embraced in a kiss with Lottie herself. The thought itself was riveting, just about sending a shiver shooting down my spine as the moment reflected itself back and forth in my mind before it had even ended, and yet so questionable. Was this allowed? How many company rules were I breaking, welcoming and savoring a kiss from my manager?

Who cares?

I adjusted my hold on her, shifting from the wrapped-arms of a hug to instead lay my paws on her waist to better accept the kiss. I had completely and utterly plunged into the moment, neglecting every single other aspect of my reality outside of my love between my paws. I surrendered to her warmth, leaning into the embrace as each lovely moment crept by. I might not have ever experienced something quite like this before in all of my life, but it didn't matter. I held her close just as she did and together, we kissed under the thin moonlight.

The first second that I registered reality, abruptly at that, was the second that Lottie detached from me. She pulled away again, withdrawing her paws from my face, though I hesitated to do the same. The same airy sensation had overrun me for another time as our eyes met, reaching into the colors as if there were messages there to find. In the breathless atmosphere, those three words practically hung from the air—In my mind, at least. Even the hammering music of the distant concert had silenced, leaving nothing but the distant rustling of the wind and the delicate whirring of crickets from deep in the shadows.

"I didn't ask to do that," Lottie said as if suddenly realizing for herself.

"What?" I blurted. After all of the pleasant words that could have been exchanged after a first kiss, these were not any of them. The unanticipated change of tone rattled me and involuntarily slipped the word out.

"I didn't ask to do that," Lottie echoed, stepping away and easing herself from my hold. She wasn't hesitant, but perhaps apologetic. "I just kissed you and didn't even ask if you were okay with that."

"Oh, no, that's definitely okay," I told her. "I loved it, Lottie."

"No, it's not okay. I'm sorry about that," Lottie replied. Her paw hastily found its way to her hair, smoothing it down in a restless fidget as her eyes strayed the shadows further down the garden. Her eyes flicked across the dimness for a lengthy pause as if to make a point to avoid looking me in the eyes or to investigate the area for something lurking there. "I don't hear the music anymore. The concert must have ended. What time is it? If the concert is done already, it must be past nine. My uncle's waiting for me at home. I should be going. I don't want him to get worried."

Lottie was already scrambling to leave before I could even open my mouth to respond, clumsily spinning around on her heel and hustling back across the grass the way she had come. I noticed her profile, dimmed in the pale light, duck sharply as she caught her foot on the leg of the bench, hastily regaining her balance and pushing on back to the door. She snagged a hold of the doorknob, prepared to fling open the door and disappear back inside, but she paused, turning her face back to sneak a glance back at me.

"I'll see you tomorrow," Lottie exchanged her goodbye, sheepishly as if in a way to make up for what she seemed to consider an embarrassing mistake. She yanked open the door and vanished through, abandoning the door to swing shut in her rushed absence.

If Lottie was leaving, then it was about time that I head out as well. Unfortunately, I didn't run into her at all taking the journey back to my office to lock up, almost like she had vanished the moment she emerged into the building again. The past events that had unfolded had already engraved themselves into my mind, burning through my memory as if reliving the moment again and again and again. I was still stumbling over myself to realize that I had just had my first kiss—And with Lottie. Though it wouldn't have been quite so easy to forget, I was sure from the start, maybe it wasn't something that should reach anyone else's ears just yet.

This string of thoughts still shuffled through my mind like a rolling train as I nudged back through the main doors and back into the outside world in the bleak hour. I locked the door behind me, given that I was the last present designer in the building now that Lottie had already taken off, jiggled the doorknob to ensure that it was indeed locked, and started off on my way strolling down the salmon-pink path to return home.

A brisk breeze swept across the area, rustling with the leaves on the hedge blocks bordering the pathways. I tucked my paws away into my pockets, turning my face up to examine the darkened sky stretching above me as I shuffled down the path. It was nearly half-past now, and evidently, the stars at the highest points had only rounded up a more conspicuous illumination over time. They sprinkled across the black dome in tiny dots of light, the sky cloudless and striking in their wake. I drifted along the main path, my paws still tucked snugly into my pockets, but my eyes were turned up to the infinity of constellations.

Just half an hour ago, I had gazed up at the same stars. I had considered life in its fullest meaning, realizing all of the elements that isolated me from others and how lonely it made me. But now, my mind was cleared of that unhealthy thought, leaving only the truth to stand alone. That way of thinking was the coward's life—No disrespect to my past self, of course, as I just hadn't yet seen the truth for myself. The truth was that we adapted. Sure, we could never have accurately predicted who someone else was or the emotions that crossed their conscience in a day. But we made do. We sought out the animals worth knowing and made an effort to learn more. In that sense, I supposed everyone was a bit of the same. And if that was the case, I was among the least loneliest animals in the world.

Face turned up to the sky, eyes blessed with a thousand lights, a genuine smile creeping its way into place. Right then I knew, right at that very second, that I was on the road to a good future.