She sat against the stone cold statue, trying to remember why she was freezing her paws off in the middle of winter. Then the noise drifted to her ears. Oh, yes. The saxophone player. Somehow those notes drifted into her ears and she could feel her spine settle comfortably against the statue, as if a spine was supposed to relax every once in a while.
“Beautiful day, isn’t it?” Her eyes turned to see a scruffy looking zebra, with a warm smile, the same smile that played those gin-filled notes.
“It is. The sun even came out today.” She turned away from the zebra, her eyes landing on the sun, peeking out from the clouds, high above the skyscrapers.
The zebra lit his cigarette, sat down next to the bear, and took a long drag. He asked her for her astrological sign and she just laughed, but replied, nonetheless. “A Libra.”
“Oh, so you’re crazy, all over the place. I’m a Leo, I know these things.”
She laughed again. How else was a bear supposed to be? “I guess I am a bit all over the place. But then I am also very centered, very happy. For lack of a better phrase, you could say I am living exactly how I want to be.”
The zebra tugged at his graying beard and said, “how old are you?”
“Nineteen,” the brown bear responded, feeling as if such a small number didn’t really measure up to all she had experienced.
The zebra whinnied a gruff laugh, commenting, “That’s the tricky thing about time, isn’t it? You’re so young, and you have it all figured out.”
Time. What time did the bear’s next class start? She glanced at her watch. Ten minutes. She had ten minutes left, but had walked into the park with over an hour.
“I guess time is tricky, because it seems to have left me.” The bear picked up her bag, and thanked the zebra for the tunes.
“See you next week, Libra?” The zebra stripes contorted into an owl’s grin.
“Of course, Leo.”
Me. For Your Consideration. 