Quince looked at the playing song on his iPhone and smirked as the Skytrain streaked out of the tunnel under False Creek, slowing down for Olympic Village. Of course Broadway was dark tonight, he silently chastised the band. It was the sixth to last train out of downtown and–surprise!–it’d been raining. Not that he cared much; you weren’t a Vancouverite unless you learned to shrug off wet weather.

It said 12:31 am on the screen as the robotic voice announced his stop: Broadway-City Hall. The train was pretty empty; a little early for most out enjoying Friday night, but really, he was done. The group that had went out fractured by the drink and the mass of humanity that the downtown clubs had been, reduced to text messages and see-you-tomorrows, so he’d taken the Skytrain home. His stop arrived as music pumped through his earphones, rolling his eyes as he remembered liking this album back in high school.

He was on his own as he climbed the stairs towards the Cambie & Broadway intersection. The few others disembarking had headed for different exits. It felt strangely spooky as he climbed, and a moment later he figured out why: it was dark, alright. Blackout dark.

The Starbucks sign, not-so-original Original Joe’s, the streetlights: all was black, only the headlights from cars breaking the darkness. A polite four-way stop reigned at the intersection, though. Quince chuckled in amusement and used the screen from his phone as a flashlight, wiggling it to get the drivers’ attention. They let him cross, as the song shuffled to the next track in his headphones.

He saw someone else waiting at the bus shelter in the dark, lit by the light of her own phone, a cute calico feline. He pulled the earbuds as he approached her. “Hey,” he said. “Wild, eh?” She looked up and he was immediately entranced by her eyes. Lit from below, the irises sparkled an emerald green, the facets of it catching his breath.

“Yeah,” she said. “It’s spooky.”

He wasn’t sure later how he kept up his half of the conversation as he gazed at her. He didn’t care about getting home any more; he just wanted to stay this close to heaven. Still, the song around his neck had only shuffled once when she suddenly looked past him. “Oh, my ride,” she explained, stepping out of the shelter.

He checked to see if by chance it was his bus too…then blinked. The calico stepped upwards, putting her shoe into the loop of a string tied to a giant dark sphere hovering there. “Maybe I’ll see you ‘round!” she called. He watched as the balloon rose, lifting her into the stars and behind a building.

His bus was right behind as the sphere sailed upwards. The door opened, his mouth closed, and he mounted the steps. He paid, dropped into a seat, looked at his phone, and then deliberately turned it off.