Gears of Harmony

Episode 23 - An ordinary night

The sun has just started to set. I followed Gale as he led me out of the school grounds and into the city. The street lights have begun to cast its lights, though the tall shopping centres with big windows all around easily outshone them. Some of them also had big electric signs showcasing beauty products of many kinds. The open entrances allowed light to escape from their doors, allowing people to see the bustling atmosphere inside. Though the sky has gotten dark, so many people flocked the streets, walking to and fro. Some were in business attires, though the others were in casual clothes. A number of cars have zoomed past, before they stopped at the red lights. The green pedestrian sign began to glow and let out a loud tapping noise as it counted down its time before fading away to black, and replaced by the red lights.

I've never been around at night... I thought, I've always wondered if it's gonna be scary, but... turns out there's still a lot of people around.

"This way," he said and pointed at a nearby building's entrance.

The building had a narrow open entrance but high ceilings. A lit-up neon sign saying "Victoria's Place" was hung on the wall. However, red tori gates were placed along the entrance. Much to my surprise too, some lanterns were hung inside and I could spot some Japanese-style restaurants and capsule machines on my left and right.

How come this place is called 'Victoria's Place', then? I thought.

"Do you go here a lot?" I asked.

"Sometimes," he said, shrugging his shoulders, "sometimes I got tired of the basic plain food they sell around school. You only really get variety in the city - they got everything, including supermarkets selling the western region specialties as well as overseas food,"

"I could see that," I said as I kept looking around.

The young man then lead me down an escalator, then to a right turn. Unexpectedly, a dollar store was hiding at the end of the path. The two of us went in and navigated ourselves to the cold drinks section.

"I like these when I was younger - my dad introduced me to it," said Gale as he took two bottles out of the chiller and handed one to me, "when I was younger he always got me to try different food. Unlike mum who just stuck to the most basic food and refused to try anything new,"

Oh, I thought, this is... the first time he talked about his dad.

I looked at the cold drink on my hand. It was a fizzy lychee drink. The bottle had a white label with a picture of lychee in the middle, accompanied by some foreign writing that I could not read.

Callie would have been able to read this, I thought immediately.

"Looks interesting. I'll give it a go," I said as we walked to the check out.

After buying them, I let the cloudy liquid trickled down my throat. It was sweet and fizzy, and the sugar boost quickly lifted up my spirit which continuous essay-writing drained not too long ago.

"You like it?" he asked.

"Yeah, it's really nice," I said and drank some more.

This feels really random, though. What's gotten to him so suddenly? I thought.

The two of us stopped as we reached the exit, watching the passersby with shopping bags in tow or chatting merrily. Just outside the building, stood a familiar-looking young woman in her 20s with ashy dark brown hair holding a mic as she danced to the music. Her lovely voice rang out in the air,

"That lovely, pale shade, which your skin always takes
That smile won't break, not a care within its shape
While nothing else changed, I'm begging, don't change
I'm afraid that this is only for today