It was Lilac. In her hands were two coffees, one in a standard glass and one in the black mug. It now had two white-lacquered cracks, but otherwise looked the same as before Proto had broken it.

  “Ah, welcome back. We’ve missed your coffee. And you,” Mayger greeted her. “I’ll take the broken black cup, since I’m now flat broke.”

  Her black gaze fell on the pile of Breath Tokens in front of Mayger, then flicked to the empty space in front of Proto. “It looks like he’s the broke one.” She gave the black mug to Proto and set the other in front of Mayger.

  As the pale woman did so, her eyes briefly met Proto’s.

  He opened his mouth but couldn’t think of anything to say—at least, not with everyone sitting here.

  “He’s hiding two in his pocket!” protested Mayger.

  “I don’t care what Proto’s hiding,” Lilac replied calmly, turning and gliding away. Her black hair swished behind her.

  “As I said,” grumbled Mayger to Proto. He sipped his coffee without elaborating further.

  “So, are we all ready to play again? Sufficiently coffeed up, you two?” Dahlia asked Proto and Mayger.

  “Start shuffling and maybe I’ll be ready,” yawned Mayger.

  “Always ready, never sufficiently coffeed,” replied Proto.

  “Good philosophy!” praised Dahlia. “Why aren’t you my partner?”

  “Let’s win, Partner.” Jet fistbumped Proto.

  “I’ll help you carry those home.” Proto pointed at Jet’s Breath Tokens. “I’ve been lifting.”

  “Enough of this cock-a-hoop showboating!” chided Dahlia. “Get dealing, Pinkie.”

  “I don’t respond to that name,” said Mayger.

  “You’ll get a new name when you win, you bohemian clothes dummy!” she retorted.

  Eying his black leather jacket and turtleneck, Mayger nodded grimly and started dealing.

  Team Glorious Victory did better this game. They soon were one point away from winning at 9, with Team Jet-Jag three points behind at 6.

  At this point, Mayger needed a bathroom break after that coffee. The others decided to avail themselves of the opportunity too, except Dahlia.

  “They say woman was made by taking a rib from man,” she noted. “Myself, I think she took half his bladder. I swear, you’re like cheap water balloons. Always ready to pop at inconvenient times.”

  “At least we can laugh and stay continent at the same time,” observed Proto, walking away.

  “Inappropriate!” averred Dahlia with righteous indignation. “Harassment even!”

  Proto laughed and stayed continent, at least until reaching his destination.

  He was the first of the three men to finish doing his business. Upon returning, he found Dahlia shuffling the cards.

  “Finished stacking the deck, Daylily?” he greeted her. “I’m going to insist on cutting at least five times, Delphinium.”

  “We’re back to that again?” she lightly sighed. “Your sophomoric name-calling won’t do any good, you chuckleheaded Romeo. I have you exactly where I want you!”

  “Losing horribly?” he said.

  “Behind me,” she affirmed. “Or as the 6 to my 9. I’ll take either one.” Her blue stare sparkled.

  He blinked and searched for a suitable reply. “Or . . . you’re on top?”

  “Why not all three?!” she cried delightedly, even as Jag grabbed his chair and started sitting.

  “What’s that?” asked the disheveled twin. “On top of what?”

  “Oh, I was bragging about winning, and Proto confirmed that I was winning,” she explained. “I’m just riding high! So to speak.” Her lips curved up.

  “Ah,” said the sweatsuited man. “What happened to all that modesty stuff?”

  Dahlia laughed. “You know Jag, you are absolutely right. From now on, I’ll be humble as . . . a missionary!” Her gaze glimmered at Proto.

  The other two were now returning to the table. “What are you doing in my seat?” Jet calmly asked his brother.

  Proto hadn’t noticed until now, but Jag indeed was sitting across from him.

  “Deciding if I’m going alone.” Jag flipped a coin and it came up heads. “Yep, going alone.”

  “Excuse me? No, no you’re not!” replied Jet with alarm.

  “Too late!” cried Dahlia. “A card laid is a card played . . . or something like that. No takebacks!”

  Proto frowned and laid his cards down. In Euchre, “going alone” meant that Jag would play the round by himself without Proto’s help. But if he won every trick alone, he’d get 4 points instead of 1, winning the game.

  “This isn’t happening!” Jet insisted. “Get out of my seat.”

  “Sorry, Bro, but someone has to save your winning streak,” Jag languidly replied.

  “Well, this game seems likely to have a happy ending,” said Mayger to Dahlia.

  “Quite! I’m almost not ashamed to call you Partner,” she said. “But, as a wise man once said, count no Mayger a winner till he wins. Count no girl happy till her happy ending comes.” She glanced at Proto sidelong, lips quirked up.

  Unfortunately for Team Glorious Victory, their name proved inapt once again. Jag flipped his coin before every single trick and, miraculously, ended up winning them all.

  “Well then.” Jag turned and beamed at his twin. “About that winning streak.”

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  “I’m almost not ashamed to call you brother,” Jet allowed.

  “That was almost a compliment!” observed Jag.

  Meanwhile, Mayger sighed and started cleaning up the cards.

  “Game over. Two Tokens to continue,” said Proto, holding out a hand.

  “Continue?” Mayger yawned and handed over two Breath Tokens to Jet. “What say you, Partner?”

  “I say this pink-haired partnership is at an end!” fumed Dahlia.

  “Indeed!” came a booming voice from beneath the vast painting.

  Proto turned and saw that Somnus was striding in.

  “I’ll be needing your help at the Shadowcaster, Dahlia,” the long-haired man went on, his green and purple robe swishing around his ankles as he approached. “And, Mayger, why don’t you come too. That way I won’t have to repeat this to you later.”

  “Repeat what?” grumbled the pink-haired loser.

  “How about, ‘Yes, my Lord! May I ask how I could help you?’” admonished Somnus. “First’s name, I’m the Nightly Hunter! Not your mother waking you up early on a Saturday morning.”

  Jag leaned and checked Jet’s watch. It looked tastefully understated and ludicrously expensive, like most things Jet wore. “Oh. Uh, I should probably be off too.”

  “Probably fifteen minutes ago, yes?” agreed Somnus, turning to the sweatsuited twin. “As you know, I hate watches and clocks, so I don’t fault your tardiness too much. I’ve just learnt not to give you time-sensitive tasks.”

  “Thanks, Lord of Dreams,” replied Jag.

  “You see?” Somnus turned to Mayger. “Simple politeness. Be more like Jag.”

  “Four words I never expected to hear,” declared Jag.

  “That waggish modesty!” admired Dahlia. “You should learn from him, Sparky. . . . Just that part though.”

  “Well, good game, Partner. I’m off to count my fortune.” Jet fistbumped Proto.

  “Modesty does more for a man than a fancy watch and nice clothes!” called Dahlia at Jet’s back. “And annoying Euchre skills.”

  “I guess you’re on your own, Proto. You and your coffee,” observed Somnus, eying the black mug. “Your colleagues should return later. Till then?” He shrugged.

  “Till then,” finished Proto, “work hard, keep clean, and always stay focused?”

  “Always focus? Heavens, no!” rejoined Somnus. “Rodents and vermin always focus. What separates man from beast is that his mind and spirit wander far from the here and now. It’s out there that he finds what’s true and inspired. Man is man because he dreams. Focus when you must, but dream when you can.”

  “Very wise, Lord of Dreams,” Jag complimented.

  “Truly a font of spontaneous wisdom, from which we’re blessed to drink abundantly,” concurred Dahlia.

  “Jag, have a Breath Token,” said Somnus, flipping one to him. “And, Dahlia, lay it on a little thinner, I’m trying to lose pride.”

  “That’s my first Token all day!” Jag celebrated.

  With the game over and Team Glorious Victory in no mood for another round, Proto’s fellow players soon left the lounge, followed by Somnus.

  “By the way,” called Proto to the departing Lord of Dreams, “your mother says to visit more.”

  “What? I can’t hear you,” Somnus called back. “Also, tell her she needs better drinks. And ask her about the last time she visited here. In case she’s forgotten, it was December 31, 1999. Ask our bartendress how many Sea of Dreams runs she made afterward to restock!”

  “What?” replied Proto.

  “I said, I can’t hear you!” the robed man replied.

  Then, he was gone, leaving Proto on his own with his coffee.

  Clink.

  Well, not quite on his own, was he?

  He looked over at the bar. There was Lilac, quietly polishing glasses, one after another. Clink. Her two loose strands of black hair on either side of her face swayed back and forth as she leaned. They made her pallor even paler, together with her black eyes.

  He remembered when he’d first seen the depths of that dark gaze. He looked down at his Lilac-style coffee, and his lips curved up.

  He recalled her sitting with her lilac-covered picnic basket, watching the Sea of Dreams, as sakura petals drifted over her and him. Her black gaze had reflected that whole moment, and it’d sparkled.

  Today, though, she looked more like the blank-faced bartendress he’d met on his first day here. Her downward black stare was a void.

  Moved by an instinct, he rose and approached the bar with his mug.

  Amid her polishing, she didn’t seem to notice him until he stood a few feet away. Or maybe she just had more important things to do.

  “Very Lilac-style,” he said to her, holding up the black and white-lacquered mug.

  “The coffee or the cup?” she asked impassively, continuing to polish.

  “Disappearing on a mysterious journey for days,” he answered.

  She finally looked up at him and raised her brow.

  “And returning with fresh coffee in a fixed cup,” he went on. “Thereby making everything right in the world, Madame Bartendress!”

  She stared at him a moment. Then, she turned and walked away, descending the kitchen stairs.

  He winced. “A spirit she comes, a ghost she goes!” he called hopefully as she disappeared.

  He stood there a full two minutes before he finally sighed. I tried. He decided to go lie down. Lifting his black mug to his lips, he sipped the last dregs of coffee inside.

  But when he lowered the cup, Lilac was ascending the stairs. She had a milk bread sandwich cut into four squares on her plate, similar to the ones they’d eaten by the Sea of Dreams. She set it on the bar and began eating.

  He wasn’t sure what to say and decided to let her go first. But she didn’t say anything, so neither did he.

  “Would you like half of it?” she finally asked.

  “Would I.” He immediately took a bite of one of the sandwich squares. It was delicious—as elegantly balanced and tasteful and understated as everything that Lilac made and did and said.

  He allowed satisfaction to close his eyes and curve his lips upward. When his eyes opened, she too was smiling.

  “I hope I’m not eating your lunch,” he remarked through a mouthful.

  “Not at all,” she replied. “I don’t have the biggest appetite.”

  “Lucky me, huh?” He took another bite.

  “I don’t know. Do you think so?” She regarded him earnestly. “I’ve certainly wished I were different.”

  Proto—realizing that they were talking about more than food now, but not knowing exactly what—said nothing. He looked into her eyes, but they were faraway.

  “I think that’s why I chose this job when I arrived here,” she recalled. “I wanted to savor everything. That’s how other people were. Taking it all in and loving it.” She waved toward the tables where Proto and his friends had been seated earlier.

  “I couldn’t, though,” she said. “It always felt like I didn’t have room for it all. I had to keep things at a distance. I couldn’t get too close, because I could only allow things inside in little bits.”

  “But then I found a solution. If I made things for others to savor, I could share in their happiness. Even from afar.” Her black gaze, still afar, was sparkling.

  “‘Is that my happy ending?’ I’ve always wondered. ‘Sharing from afar? Or is there something more for me to share?’” Her black eyes fell to Proto’s black mug. She clasped its handle.

  He stared at her a moment, then clasped her hand around the handle. “I’m sorry for breaking this. That isn’t what I meant to do. Far from it.” He hoped his face conveyed what words couldn’t.

  “There’s no need to apologize. This is mine,” Lilac mused, running a finger along the mug’s old crack. “And this is yours now.” She traced her fingertip along the new crack. “You’ve made it yours.” She lifted the cup and his clasping hand to her breast. “Yours to do with what you will. And it will only become more yours by doing so.”

  He blinked at her curved gaze. Like a star before a black hole, he felt himself yearning forward.

  “Yours to break and mine to mend.” She handed him the mug, and suddenly he was set free. “But try not to break it too badly. Most things can be repaired, but not everything.” Her black eyes fell to Proto’s pocket. “Not everything.”

  His lips pressed. He felt like he’d died and every bad thing he’d ever done was under review. “I promise I won’t—”

  “Don’t promise you won’t break it again. You don’t know that yet.” She looked down at the black mug wistfully. “But if you have to let it down, try to do so gently, and it won’t shatter. I promise.”

  He opened his mouth. “I . . . ”

  She put a finger to his lips. “No, you’ve said enough. You’re good at speaking up. I know when to stay silent. Between the two of us . . . well. Now I’ve said enough.”

  He met that sparkling black gaze for a moment. Then, he found himself leaning toward her.

  She took a deep breath, eyes uncertain—then clasped the mug he was still grasping and held it up between them. “Not today. You’ll know when.” Her black eyes sparkled with moisture. But she was smiling too.

  Then, squeezing his hand briefly, she turned and walked away.

  Proto wasn’t sure where she was going and when she’d be back. But that wasn’t for him to know today. Of that, he was sure.

  He went to his room and lay on his simple white bed. His eyelids sagged shut. And soon, dreamy figures moved before his inward gaze.

  One of those figures was pale with long black hair and gliding deftly across his prospect. But there were others too. There were others.

  These were mere memories—perhaps memories of a dream!—and yet nothing had ever felt so real.

  He had a choice to make. Of that, he was sure. But how much longer did he have? “You’ll know when.” Would he be ready? Would he make the right choice? Was there a right choice?

  that Pokémon. Check it out! The link is in my profile.