The next day turned into another gray sequence of "Groundhog Day." School, a short sleep in the new, luxurious apartment, and again—the night shift.

  "Yanu, do you think I'll see her today?" I asked, looking into the elevator's panoramic window.

  "A difficult question, Arkgrim," she replied, and in her voice, I caught a strange, almost human sadness. "The probability of the appearance of object 'Yoto' is beyond mathematical analysis."

  I sat behind the counter of "MacDuck," staring at the ceiling. Up there, above the register, was a small leak stain. Out of boredom, I started peering into it, and my imagination began to naturally draw entire worlds in that stain: fantastical castles, floating mountains, battles of unseen creatures... I was so deep in thought that I didn't notice the night outside the window fully taking over.

  Ding!

  The sound of the bell struck a nerve. I jerked my head up. It was her.

  I leapt from my spot and almost ran to the register, unable to hide a joyful grin.

  "Hello, Yoto!" I blurted out.

  She laughed, and the sound filled the empty diner like light.

  "So you were waiting for me? And you didn't even forget my name? Color me pleasantly surprised."

  Wasting no time, I pulled out my "space-phone."

  "Please... give me your phone number. I don't want you to disappear again."

  She laughed again, shaking her head.

  "God, Arkgrim, who meets a girl like this? You are completely hopeless. First, you have to escort the lady to a table, ask how she's doing, strike up a conversation..."

  "Yes, yes, of course!" I scrambled, coming out from behind the counter. "Sit at any table. Which one do you like?"

  "Aren't you going to keep me company?" she squinted playfully.

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  "I will!" With one leap, I jumped over the counter, barely missing the cash register.

  We sat down at a corner table. I looked at her, feeling my heart pounding somewhere in my throat.

  "How are you doing?" I asked.

  "Stop calling me 'you' [formal]," she interrupted. "After all, we've known each other... for a very long time."

  "Alright, Yoto. Then tell me... what do you want to know? You said you know my past."

  She looked intently into my eyes, and for a moment it seemed to me that eternity reflected in her pupils.

  "Listen," she said suddenly. "It smells too much like fried oil in here. Let's go for a walk around the city?"

  I immediately jumped up. To hell with work, to hell with the Dwarf and his fines.

  "Let's go."

  We stepped outside. Yokohama breathed cold, and rare snowflakes melted on the asphalt. We walked along the night streets, and I felt strangely light.

  "Arkgrim, how's your life?" she asked, hands tucked into her pockets. "How are things in general?"

  "Seems fine. Nothing to complain about. New apartment, school... Leon is just busy with training."

  "Listen, Arkgrim... do you have a girlfriend?" she asked this question so casually, as if asking about the weather.

  "Nope," I answered honestly.

  "Well, that's good," she smiled barely noticeably.

  We reached the park. Absolute silence surrounded us. I walked to her left, looking at the frosted trees.

  "Listen," she stopped. "Who escorts a girl like this? The guy should walk on the right."

  I obediently began to walk around her to get to the other side, when suddenly... a sharp tug. She tripped me, and the next second, with a short cry, I fell flat on my back onto the fluffy snow.

  "What are you doing?!" I protested, but she had already lain down next to me, right in the snowdrift.

  "Shhhh..." Yoto whispered. "You always loved this. Just looking. Looking at the sky."

  I went quiet and stared upward. Above us spread a bottomless black sky, strewn with prickly winter stars. And in that moment, a strange feeling washed over me. Deja vu. Deep, powerful, piercing right to the bone. It felt like I had done this a thousand times... The sensation was so real that it caught my breath.

  "Listen..." I began, turning my head toward her. "This is so..."

  There was no one next to me.

  I sat up sharply, looking around. The snow next to me retained the indentation of her body, but Yoto was gone.

  "WHAT THE?!" I yelled into the emptiness of the park.

  A second ago she was here. I heard her breathing, saw the gleam of her eyes.

  "Yoto!"

  Silence. Only the wind rustling the bare branches.

  I stood up, brushing off my jacket. My heart was pounding frantically.

  'Am I schizophrenic?' flashed through my head. 'Was she here, or did I imagine it all?'

  I stood in the middle of the empty park for another ten minutes, feeling the frost creeping under my clothes. She had left again, leaving neither a number nor answers. Only this aching feeling in my chest and a strange certainty that the sky today looked exactly as it should.

  It was an evening woven from impossible coincidences and snow dust.

  I stood in the middle of the park, trying to comprehend how a person could dissolve into thin air in a second.

  "Okay, stay calm," I muttered. "Let's think about the facts. Here is her footprint in the snow, here is the indentation... Oh right, Yanu! I'm not schizophrenic, you saw her through the phone, right?"

  But Yanu didn't have time to answer. A hefty, crumbly snowball hit me in the back of the head.

  I turned around. Yoto stood a few meters away, already packing a new projectile, and little fires danced in her eyes. Yoto stood in the light of the streetlamp, and snowflakes melted in her hair, turning into tiny diamonds. She wasn't laughing out loud—she was simply looking at me, and there was so much unspoken warmth in her smile that the frost suddenly stopped biting.

  "Testing your reflexes!" she yelled.

  I dodged to the left, letting the second snowball fly past my ear, and instantly scooped up a handful of snow.

  "Oh, is that how it is?! Well, hold on!"

  We ran around the park for a good half hour. Every time our eyes met, something inside me responded with a strange, lingering ache and delight. I laughed like never before in my life. We fell, hid behind trees, and covered each other in snow until Yoto threw her hands up, breathing heavily. I felt that I needed no other victory than this very minute.