Today, Chapter 17 - Messages is released. I hope you all enjoy the continuation of the story.

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Chapter 17 - Messages:

Moments arrived wherein each person felt they were being watched. Maybe it manifested from the dread of the wrong person unearthing their secret or from transgressing legal boundaries, despite noble intentions.

Many experienced this as a fleeting feeling. A tiny sliver of duration within existence’s vast tapestry.

Lupus wished it was only for a few seconds. He had felt a lingering prickle at the back of his neck ever since a shadow had trailed him before his initial patrol. Once he completed the plans to meet Liam and Tyler while on patrol, the unsettling sensation intensified.

Every passing second on the call with Liam risked his chances of being caught organising a breach of the Vastelerian Interaction Public Safety Act. Lupus pictured a wall of monitors and speakers that broadcast private conversations in Brackenmoor.

In a paranoid society, that level of surveillance and invasion of privacy was inevitable. Essential to maintain the status quo of whatever societal structure governance desired. For Lupus, that meant sustaining the divide between Vastelerian’s and Petritan’s.

It was not just unjustifiable, but obscene. Had Lupus not been concentrating on what he was saying into the microphone, he would have vocalised his frustration aloud. Instead, he asked Zoe to warn Liam about giving away their plans, and tapped into his media training to lead the conversation without arousing suspicion.
The plan appeared straightforward.

“I’m on patrol from Friday until Sunday,” Lupus sighed, addressing himself more than the jaguar on the other end of the call. He hadn’t seen Liam in ages, and Lupus desired their reunion, yet they needed a cunning strategy. “After that, I’ll need to ask Carlos about next week’s patrols.”

Having no clarity on next week’s patrol schedule was part of the problem and why there was pressure for them to meet this weekend. That did not rule out taking precautions as they completed the details.
Fortunately, Lupus handled navigating the conversation well and was smiling as the plans came together. It was also easier for the jaguar to listen in with them being back in their dorm.

Lupus turned his attention back up to the basement door to listen in to Carlos talking to Noah, and said, “Our patrol starts on Friday at 7 pm. I won’t be online from 6 pm.”

Liam replied when Lupus heard the basement door creaking. The wolf did his best to stifle a reaction before saying, “Alright, I’ll talk to you later,” and ended the call before Liam could ask what the noise was. He placed the headset on the desk, then faced the basement door.

“We’ve got something to show you. Let’s go,” Noah’s voice drifted down the basement stairs to the wolf.

Lupus did what he could to bury his conflicting feelings over meeting Liam as he replied, “Okay?” with mild uncertainty. “What about Zoe?”

“She’s tucked avay on me,” Carlos projected from somewhere out of Lupus’s view.

Lupus let out a faux sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose. Understanding the protogen’s ‘tucked away’ comment took him one second. However, the text did not reveal their hiding place, and based on Lupus’s observations of Carlos and Zoe, they could be in one of two locations: his t-shirt or jean pocket. Both options made him realise how much those two trusted one another.

He ascended the basement steps, the wooden floorboards creaking under his weight. As he emerged into the living room, rays of daylight bathed his body through the shutters.

❆ ❆ ❆ ❆ ❆

Just thirty minutes north of the market and thirty more before you reach the centre of Brackenmoor, you couldn’t miss it.

Lupus wished more people would come.

Billboards. Dusty billboards towered like Petritan apartment blocks in the clearing. A crowded group of people surrounded each billboard and blinded him from seeing what had attracted them. Lupus had his theories: news bulletins and job advertisements. Newspaper companies’ prohibition in Brackenmoor and the scarcity of job vacancies made it impossible for such a large crowd to gather.

Logic dictated that it should have been an eyesore; somehow it had been welcomed as the little trees planted around their bases. Despite its apprehension, the wolf’s thoughts lingered on the worst possibilities regarding the billboards and their subjects. However, the small sense of delight on each of the crowds’ visages ruled out that possibility before he pondered on it further.

‘What’s going on?’. Curiosity led the wolf to venture forth, though he kept his defences keen as he stepped under the canvas arch and into the crowd. Lupus compressed his posture to allow him to slip into the crowd.

Lupus sensed the crowd’s eyes redirecting towards him. They seemed to be more interested in finding out than in being troubled. He saw the bystanders stop and whisper among themselves. It was unnerving being the centre of attention in this congested crowd. He knew an arctic wolf puzzled them about being there and why he was there.

When thinning bodies allowed him billboard views, he grasped its appeal. Messages scribed in chalk filled the billboard, one of which caught Lupus’s attention: ‘One day, I will be a successful mixed-size streamer.’

‘Mixed sizes?’ The words echoed in his mind. Lupus stepped closer to re-read it to make sure he had read it right. He did and read the variety of messages around:

‘One day, I’ll approach a Petritan town without people running from me;

‘One day a Petritan will trust me enough to sit on my shoulder;’

‘One day I hope to hold a Petritan in my hands.’

Lupus stepped back in disbelief. After The Division, in what way could Vastelerians yearn for re-cohabitation? How could they after the slander, insults, and rumours Petritan’s spread about them? How could Vastelerians forgive them? They had lost friends. Family. Lovers. Yet, after almost three decades, they clung to the hope that it would change.

His eyes lapped the perimeter, and then he noticed every billboard displayed the same type of message—all began with the wishful phrase ‘one day…’.

He looked at the next billboard, and the next, and the next. Different billboards, but they still bore the same hopeful messages from the locals. He read them line after line, and realised that the messages may have been different, but they all wished for cohabitation. It was a travelogue of Vastelerian’s dreams and wishes. Unlike a wishing well where people tossed coins and begged for riches, power, or other selfish desires, these boards had an altruistic purpose.

To preserve Brackenmoor’s hope of re-cohabitation—going strong after The Division ended mixed-sized society.

Lupus understood that this idea could only exist here. Propaganda could extinguish, obscure, or smother hope beyond these walls. Vastelerians remained monsters in the sight of Petritans.

Still, within Brackenmoor, these supposed monsters possessed sufficient soul and spirit to erect a billboard symbolising hope. Something Douglas, or Thomas, or that fox at the cafe could create.

Then the thought struck him.

Vastelerians often carve their wishes into wood; maybe his parents did likewise here. That was workable, right? Such a wish would be acceptable amongst the messages that longed for re-cohabitation. After all, they both sought reunification. One could hope, but he wondered if he could.

Lupus’s eyes flicked across the chalked lines to scan each message. His gaze darted from corner to corner until he caught sight of anything mentioning family. A name. An arctic wolf. His home town. Anything that might link to his past or to reuniting the family.

Nothing.

Lupus resumed walking through the group of visitors clustered on one board, footsteps crunching over the gravel. He moved onto the next billboard, searching for something he half-believed was gone. Hope exists to maintain the firm conviction that improvement is possible, irrespective of unfavourable circumstances.

With a quiet exhale, he stepped back, masking the slither of disappointment folded behind his eyes. He resumed his search on the next billboard and sifted through them as if they were missing persons posters after a natural disaster. His ears twitched, tail low, yet still looking.

Once the crowd thinned, he noticed a cheetah in their early twenties was chalking a message onto the board. Lupus stopped a few feet behind them and watched in silence.

Then he turned.

Nearby, away from the throng, Carlos and Noah beamed at him.
His gaze drifted from them and back to the boards. ‘Why here?’ he wondered, his ears giving a subtle twitch. ‘Why bring me to this place?’

While he pondered their reasoning, the cheetah and people walked away. Lupus advanced to inspect the messages near. For Carlos and Noah to stroll up to him.

Lupus remained silent, his gaze distant, a faint smile gracing his lips as his attention strayed toward the billboards. He reached out and traced a paw along the billboard's edge.

They stood beside him. Noah folded his arms and followed Lupus in scanning the board. Carlos watched the wolf before he nudged it with an elbow.

“It’s your turn,” the protogen said.

Lupus’s brow creased. ‘My turn?’ he thought, a flicker of confusion stirring beneath his guarded expression. Carlos answered that question when he glanced down and held up a piece of white chalk in his open palm.

The wolf did not take it. He only stared at it, heartbeat steady and heavy in his chest as the protogen’s intention settled in. It was his turn to write something. For his own sake, not theirs, nor that of the gathered multitude. A way to transfer the weight from inside his ribs out into the open. He clung to the idea that his growth had robbed him of his Petritan life, while seeking acceptance for the change.

Anyone in this place desires reunification. He wished to be the Petritan wolf, whose tales gave strength to the voiceless.

Lupus knew he wanted that, but he had another wish, one that had somehow survived past his childhood. He hoped for the opportunity to know his parents. A selfish desire compared to the others’ wishes for cohabitation, but he craved it. To find his biological parents. A hope that he thought was extinct a month ago.

Maybe that was his hard truth. That hanging onto hope in this country was akin to a rose flower withstanding pesticide. Time should have extinguished it. He felt so battered; he doubted his capacity for even one sentence. Lupus looked inside himself to salvage the remaining embers of hope he had to summon and string together a message.

This place, he understood, comprised more than message boards. It was a destination. This place served as the ultimate stop for unfulfilled Vastelerian dreams. A graveyard of forgotten wishes. And yet… Here he stood, chalk in paw, conflicting on whether he should let go of his hope to see his parents.

Carlos’s hand settled on Lupus’s shoulder. The wolf turned to him to ask, “Why did you bring me here?”

The protogen fixed its gaze upon him and informed him that this site was Hope Wall. Every Vastelerian. Every Ascendant. During their time in Brackenmoor, each individual had paused before these billboards, penning their aspirations. It was a ritual, born not of tradition, but as a coping mechanism to handle everything The Division created.

“You can vrite anyzing you vant,” Carlos insisted in a gentle voice, while his fingers stroked back and forth across the wolf’s shoulder. “We can look avay.”

That wasn’t the problem Lupus faced. After all, he never shied away from someone watching him write. Benefits of being a journalist sharing space with Douglas. Instead, his challenge involved what to pen, or if committing it to paper meant conceding defeat once more. Writer’s block that stemmed from an unwillingness to put chalk to the billboard. He couldn’t…he couldn’t believe things had come to this.

Noah placed a hand on his other shoulder. “Lupus?” The lizard spoke only those words to him.

“I don’t know,” he admitted. He knew that revelation would earn him ridicule from other journalists. Here, it resulted in a comforting shoulder stroke from both Carlos and Noah. “I don’t know what to write.”

“Anything you hope or wish for,” he replied.

Lupus hung his head low and raised the chalk towards the billboard. When the chalk pressed against the billboard, he looked up, and then movement caught his eye.

Lupus noticed a distant stranger’s gaze, which shifted elsewhere the moment their eyes connected.

The stranger approached him, and there was something familiar about them. It was a crow dressed in a black-striped shirt buttoned to the collar and matching black trousers. Time weathered the black pigment in his plumage. He observed the white envelope in their left hand as they approached. He thought back to when people used to receive telegrams to communicate sombre news. Distress marked the crow’s expression upon reviewing the letter. Had this crow been following him?

Cast under the stranger’s scrutiny, Lupus stood still and watched the crow step closer and closer. Though instinct compelled him to hold his ground rather than retreat, he used the moment to study the crow’s movements. What stood out most was that the bird never lifted his gaze again—his dark eyes flicked only between the envelope in his hand and the ground beneath his feet.

Instinct told him to stand his ground rather than flee, but as he did, he took the time to study the crow’s actions and body language. He noticed that the bird never looked up to him again; rather, his beady eyes focused on dancing between the envelope and the ground. Why did he avoid his gaze? What did the letter contain?

“Hey, guys—” Lupus spoke up to Carlos and Noah as he lowered the chalk down.

Lupus didn’t need to say more because his friends had already understood. They stepped forward to position themselves between him and the approaching crow, just before the bird crossed into the circle of billboards.

Carlos stepped forward right up to the crow. “Can ve help you, sir?” he said. The protogen went straight to the point and pressed a palm into the crow’s chest.

The bird came to a halt. “My apologies I didn’t do it sooner; I had to wait until I was back together,” said the crow. His voice was thin and raspy, and he seemed to choke on his words. “My name is Clarence. I have a letter for your friend, Lupus.”

‘How did he recognise me?’ Though he might’ve conversed with the crow earlier, it wasn’t sufficient for him to disclose his name.
Noah stepped forward and asked: “How do you know Lupus?”

A sombre sigh escaped his beak as he handed a Vastelerian-sized letter over to Carlos. “I’m so sorry to do this here,” Clarence whispered, awaiting the protogen’s acceptance of the envelope. “I was hoping to give you this in private.”

Despite the barricade Carlos and Noah formed in front of him, Lupus stepped forward to say, “If this is about the time we bumped into each other, it’s fine.”

The bird persisted in ignoring Lupus’s eyes. “It’s not,” Clarence muttered and left the wolf in a state of confusion. “Please, may you give this letter to your friend?” he asked both Carlos and Noah.

Lupus stopped right behind his friends, within reaching distance of the envelope. The wolf tilted his head to gaze at Clarence’s eyes, and he could’ve sworn they flinched away from him. “Sir, look at me and tell me how you know me?”

He felt a pull of doubt, yet Clarence still met the wolf’s stare. “I only know the stories your parents told me,” he responded, and with that said, a vacant stare replaced the curiosity in Lupus’s eyes.

Before Lupus opened his maw, Carlos and Noah both turned back to him.

That instant, the wolf’s world ceased. Lupus didn’t speak—couldn’t. Clarence’s comment had opened Pandora’s box inside him and released any undealt trauma he had left behind at the orphanage. He internalised and sought shelter within himself. Insensitive to his surroundings. He pushed those emotions back into Pandora’s box and tried to lock it with denial.

‘He couldn’t have known them…could he?’ That single shard of doubt kept those thoughts alive. It fanned the flames of unanswered questions that he had buried years ago. He found his confidence waning as the silence continued and his questions mounted. It chipped away at the self-reliant wolf to reveal the orphan beneath his bravado—the boy who had spent a lifetime yearning to know his own story. And now, he could talk with someone who could tell him his heritage, shed light on his parents.

Never since growing had Lupus experienced such smallness.

That raw vulnerability paved the way for Lupus’s defensive and guarded instincts to bare teeth. It took the front seat of his mind and barked, “Is this some kind of joke to you?” To the crow who flinched back at his reaction.

“A joke?” Clarence echoed back. His voice crackled with faint indignation, but it wavered just enough to betray his surprise. “No—no, it’s not a joke. I wouldn’t joke when I’m pressed for time,” he added in earnest.

On the inside, Lupus desired for the bird’s defence to shatter his looking glass of self-defence. That they would provide a compelling reason to lower his guard. The wish that didn’t belong on the surrounding billboards.

On the outside, wrinkles emerged on Lupus’s snout. He held back a second bark, but redirected that fury to balling two fists by his waist. Something—anything that could contain an orphan’s anger, while Clarence spoke his case.

“They helped me out long ago and I wish to return the favour—” the bird’s voice quietened when they caught sight of Lupus’s fists. “I don’t expect you to believe me, but I can remember them. They were good people.”

‘How dare he?!’ Lupus turned away as a knot twisted his gut in every direction.

Whatever voice Clarence chose, nothing prevented further agitating the equilibrium in the wolf’s head. Lupus envisioned his parents, just how the crow depicted them. He yearned for that to be true, but his apprehension about trusting a stranger held him back. Trusting strangers didn’t belong in this world, yet it was his only option.

“Please take this letter. Your parents would want you to—”

He didn’t look back at Clarence. Couldn’t. Not with his heart thudding in his ears. “Don’t tell me what my parents would want for me,” he barked out loud enough to summon parts of the crowd’s attention.

Lupus twenty-minutes ago would’ve cared how people thought of his reaction. Not now, not when his broken mind fortified itself. That part of him aimed to protect the remaining wolf and fend off any threats. Unfazed by the confused or offended gazes directed his way, the wolf allowed the anger within him to keep etching itself onto his posture and expression.

Clarence tilted his head down to the ground. “My apologies, I was just trying to help. Please, can you take this letter?” he whispered and took a step forward. “It will explain everything better than I can.”

Carlos’s hand nudged him back. “Sir,” he said, firm. “I zhink it’s time for you to go.”

The crow tilted its head up to meet the protogen’s gaze. He cast one last glance at Lupus to plead for the wolf’s eyes. Clarence’s plea seemed akin to seeking absolution. However, Lupus offered in return only a stare and a snarling, wrinkled snout.

Clarence’s wings drooped. He seemed older in that moment: slouched posture, distant eyes, and very little soul left in his voice when he whispered, “I understand, my apologies.”

He maintained a defensive posture, yet a small part of him let down his guard, resulting in a brief, unguarded smile for Clarence.

“Please,” he muttered to Carlos with a raspier voice. “Take this.”

The protogen flicked his visor back at Lupus, searching for any sign of objection in his expression, but the wolf remained silent. Carlos, finding silence, confirmed he should retrieve the letter.

Lupus watched the exchange from behind. He remained still and silent, but his eyes tracked the letter’s movement from talon to protogen hand. When Clarence stepped back afterwards, his wings folded against his sides, and an awkward silence fell among them. Without the noise from the nearby crowd, awkwardness would have been clear.

Clarence met Lupus’s gaze. The bird appeared ready to continue, yet its thoughts remained unspoken. Not when Noah spoke up on his behalf. “Sir, with respect, I think it’s time for you to go now,” he echoed Carlos’s sentiment from earlier with that same gentle voice.

The crow met Noah’s gaze and nodded.

Lupus took a breath to ease himself and the wrinkles on his maw. “Sir…,” he interrupted with a whisper that caught the bird’s attention, but Lupus fell silent.

No bitterness reflected in the crow’s gaze. Clarence looked at Lupus with an emotionless visage. “I…wish you the best, young man. I wish we had crossed paths sooner,” he responded with a rasp voice that betrayed the emotion his facial expression worked hard to conceal.

Without another word, Clarence shifted his weight to turn. Beyond his age, a hollowness marked the retreating man’s gait.

Lupus watched him go from behind his shoulders. A tightness coiled in his chest that refused to ease. He assumed it was the letter in Carlos’s hand, but it was the sight of the crow’s stooped back, sluggish pace, and most crucial of all, they walked alone. Lupus didn’t know how much of that sorrow he handled, but he knew he’d added to it, and that truth gnawed at him. Owning a self-defensive nature didn’t excuse the words he’d thrown at Clarence.

A female border collie — young, short, and slim — had appeared behind Lupus, tapping a hand on the wolf’s shoulder. “Pardon me, but may I use this billboard?” She asked.

“Oh, right,” Lupus offered a faint smile to the lady, “We were leaving anyway.”

Two more women of a similar age to the collie had appeared beside her, in front of the billboard Lupus blocked. Unlike the border collie, they offered the wolf no courtesy, only crossed arms, scoffs, and an eye-roll. A tall, bloated cheetah that bore an uncanny resemblance to Thomas Sinclair queued behind the three ladies. Observing that he impeded the queue and seeing the elderly man walking alone, Lupus leaned to Carlos, whispering, “I’ll return.”

Both Carlos and Noah stepped aside to let Lupus through. The wolf took steady steps to catch up to the black and grey-feathered bird. When he reached him, he extended a paw and tapped the bird’s shoulder. “Sir,” he said, “I’m sorry, but I wanted to say thank you for—”

Clarence turned. Gone was the fragile, mournful crow who had handed over the letter. In his place stood someone guarded and impatient, feathers bristling with irritation. “Who are you?” the crow narrowed his eyes.

Lupus froze. The bird’s eyes held no trace of recognition. Just an icy stare. Clarence’s form housed a stranger’s countenance.

“Clarence? We were just speaking—” Lupus stopped when he understood that this was more than mere rudeness or forgetfulness. Although the crow had moments of lucidity, it seemed the familiar became unknown to Clarence.

Lupus’s hand drew back. He straightened his shoulders and forced a calmness into his tone. “Um, apologies, sir,” he replied as a sympathetic smile emerged on his snout. “Wrong person. Thank you for everything, though.”

The crow’s initial head tilt stiffened straight. “Don’t waste my time,” Clarence snapped, eyes narrowing as if Lupus had just interrupted something important.

Lupus knew it wasn’t malice nor cruelty. Clarence had forgotten him. The crow, who out of the kindness of their heart had offered to give Lupus an opportunity to seek closure, no longer stood in front of him. Along with it, the only soul who might have known his parents had succumbed to the bird’s foggy mind.

“Stupid canine,” the crow scoffed, brushing past Lupus without a second glance, and headed off down the dirt path.

Lupus stayed still. Then came the soft crunch of footsteps behind him as Carlos and Noah approved. He didn’t look at them. His eyes lingered on the road where the old crow had vanished.

When he spoke, it was nothing more than a whisper. “Can we open the letter tomorrow?”

The question hung in the air until Carlos nodded at him. Today had taken more from Lupus than he’d expected. Though he wanted answers, desperate for them even, he wasn’t ready. Not tonight. Maybe tomorrow, after he had seen Liam and Tyler in person again. That should help give him the strength to read it with some mental fortitude.

If he was going to know his heritage, Lupus needed his friends…

❆ ❆ ❆ ❆ ❆

“Liam, may I ask if we are close to Brackenmoor?” Tyler spoke in a hushed voice, conscious that he was asking the same question he’d repeated too many times since they’d left London.

With the rental car tailored for the local speed limit, it took far longer than it should have if Liam had driven his Mustang. They settled for a Ford Focus, whose redeeming features were the touchscreen dashboard and its roomy interior.

Liam tapped the dashboard screen to pull up the route duration: 25 minutes.

Tyler nodded and slanted back into his seat. He’d never suffered from motion sickness, but the anxiety of facing Lupus again in person triggered a sense of nausea that came close. “Okay,” he muttered back, internalising to steady his thoughts.

“Do you, uh, need a minute?” Liam’s eyes glanced at him through the rearview mirror. “I could stop at a service station located several miles back—”

“No, it’s…alright,” Tyler whispered, and looked to Liam with eyes that shimmered like moonlight dancing on the ocean. “I’ve gotta rip the band-aid off, right?”

For a moment, Liam rested a comforting hand on the otter’s thigh. “He’s the same wolf you worked with. Please don’t take that interview as a sign of who he is as a Vastelerian,” he assured and lifted his hand from Tyler’s leg.

Tyler averted his gaze, his elbow landing on the door. He sighed and stared out the window. Sunset overcast the empty field. As dusk painted the landscape indigo, his thoughts returned to his final meeting with Lupus, the instant his megalopateophobia began. Having realised that, the otter mumbled, “You weren’t there.”

“No,” Liam said. “But, do you remember why I’m driving a rental car and not my Mustang?” he added, eyes fixed on the darkened road ahead.

Tyler already knew—Liam explained everything once the jaguar left the hospital. Everything from what Lupus did after he grew to how an Ascendant’s emotions become amplified post-growth. Yet, the otter wondered why someone brought it up as he answered, “Because it got crushed?” with caution.

“Correct. Our friend crushed it,” Liam spoke with a nonchalant tone that conflicted with the severity of what Lupus did. “He wasn’t himself when he did it. Just like he wasn’t himself during that interview with you and, ugh, that Douglas guy.”

The otter responded with a nod of understanding. His eyes drifted from the window and down to his smartwatch. A sombre sigh slipped from his lips.

“You’re right. Sorry. I’m just—” he trailed off, returning his focus to the view outside to help say it. He let his webbed hand fall back to his lips.

“Scared?” Liam answered for him and looked back at him through the rearview mirror. “I realise that, but don’t you want to see him before your departure for America?”

Tyler’s shoulders sank as he stared out into the endless dark of the countryside, where the last traces of sunset had vanished. He felt disheartened—guilty, even—that he hadn’t told Lupus he was leaving. Perhaps his remaining twenty minutes involved practicing the conversation until he hit upon the perfect wording.

The otter drew a breath. “Again…you’re right,” he said, glancing with a small, defeated smile. “I do.”

Liam offered a cheek-inflating smile. “Who knows,” he uttered, his voice lighter, offering Liam reassurance, “perhaps things will change when you return to the UK. We won’t have to meet up with him in secret.”

Tyler didn’t respond right away. He lowered his gaze to his smartwatch. After a pause, he covered it with a webbed paw and whispered, “Yeah… maybe. We can only hope.”

“Hoping for a better future is the first step to a better future,” Liam replied. “When will you return to Britain?”

“I’m not sure yet,” he admitted.

Liam nodded. “Well, just let me know. I’ll be happy to pick you up from the airport. Heck, I’d be happy to host you.” He said as his tender smile turned into a smug, coy grin. “Unless you want Lupus to pick you up and you sleep inside a matchbox,” Liam added with a chuckle to lighten the mood.

Tyler let out a light giggle as he breathed out, “Yeah, maybe.”

His mind wandered for a moment. Not down a path that imagined the version of Lupus he met during the interview, but the one that helped him since he joined the company. He pictured that version of the wolf standing outside the terminal, down on one knee, offering a hand for his luggage and him. Afterwards, his mind imagined him slipping inside his friend’s pocket and being carried away. A thought that made his lips curl wider as he admitted out loud, “That sounds nice.”