Dark. It is dark. Everywhere is dark. But with a step, the LED-padded soles of my left shoe glowered and a small illuminated portion of the tiled floor filled my vision.

As I repeatedly stomped my left and right foot, alternately and energetically, almost as if I am performing a tap dance in the exhibitions but not so as there are no sounds, I finally realized why it wasn’t so dark anymore. The rowdy crowd registered in my senses, and with them each wearing fluorescent trinkets, clothes and accessories, my environment now flared with all the colors of neon.

Because it is so noisy, I couldn’t hear the expected clink-clanking caused by the contact of my rubber shoes with the fragile tiles. And thinking that something seems wrong, I stomped for a long time; my legs even got lightly strained. And now, my girlfriend probably thinks I am a fool which is why she can’t look straight at me without bursting to laughter as she makes her way pass the masses to my not-so spacious but isolated little corner.

She passes me the fries and the coke that thankfully survived the road unspilt despite her unsteady grip. I finished them in a short while. I even playfully took a small bite out of the burger in her hands which is one of the few things I know is her favorite.

It isn’t that I never bothered to know much about her, but these days I often have trouble recalling those same little details that I used to treasure up to my dreams when we were younger and more distant. After all, we’ve only started dating a few weeks ago, but I’ve loved her for 32 years.

Not that she knew.

Perhaps, I’m even more of a stranger to her now. I nevertheless still had the memory of pursuing her back during seventh grade, but the only truth she knows is that I used that time to flirt with the marked girl of the class’ resident jock, Charles.

The girl’s name is Ivy, and my girlfriend is Annikka. I affectionately call her Nikay. Well, I used to only say it in my heart, but one time I unknowingly called out to her as that, we were not yet together then, and she heard it and told me it sounds nice.

Oh how I remember how deep I blushed then. She later told me that it wasn’t that noticeable owing to my dark brown complexion and the huge, nerdy glasses that nearly covers 3/4 of my face. I’m wearing a different one today, one of those cat-eye glasses that suits my youthful face just fine. She’s wearing contacts today; her regular is a similarly nerdy purple eyewear, to mine, that somehow makes her plump, triangular nose stand out all the more.

Comparing her to Ivy, maybe she really isn’t that pretty; her only advantage may be that the amount of melanin in her skin is at that threshold where you can still admirably view her features even when there’s only minimal lighting such as the portable, three color faux concert lighting fixtures stationed atop the movable wooden platform at the center front of the hall.

We’re faraway from it, near the building exit and beside an arcane-powered cooling apparatus. At times, the lights would project at the walls near our corner. We observed that when the red and green ones overlap, the projection would turn cyan; if it’s the red and blue ones, the result would be magenta while the red and green ones would produce yellow.

Music started to play and she pulled at my arm, signaling that she wants us to dance. But I wasn’t paying attention to her anymore, I heard something she didn’t and it is a signal that could cost me my life if I did not pay attention to it.

“Excuse me but I have to go.” It may be the first sentence that I spoke to her tonight but I no longer care. A shadow by the neighboring building has long held my gaze.

Could it be? It couldn’t be, right?

I winded my way pass the crowds. They called out but once again nothing registers.

I have to get there. I have to get there.