It’s Lynx’s 24th birthday.

Come out to the bar, they said. It’ll be fun, they said.

Despite managing to make it 24 revolutions around the sun, Lynx had never actually done this kind of thing before. Oh, he’s had drinks, but he’s had them back in the dorms with his friends, or on nights out at the KTV, or just generally in settings other than this.

But this is fun. It’s nice. The bartender is cute and smiles at him with dimples, and his friends have been having fun going up to the bar to order Lynx a steady stream of increasingly outlandish drinks for his tender cat’s tongue, all of them sweet but some of them fruity, some of them tasting like chocolate and cream.

Lynx still has the taste of heavy chocolate lingering in his mouth, clinging to his lips, when Adia presses himself close.

“Hey, my baby. Are you having a good time?”

Adia smells like leather and the new perfume he’s trying out. It’s cooler and a little more open where Lynx is standing, but Adia has been dancing like mad in the middle of the crowded dance floor. He’s dripping with sweat, and Lynx can feel the heat wafting off of him when he gets in real close. He’s wearing leather pants, the material wrapped tight and snug around his vulpine hips, his dancer’s thighs, and Lynx can feel one of those hips nudging into him with how close Adia is standing.

“Pretty good,” Lynx agrees, tipping the last of his chocolate pudding-tasting drink into his mouth and crunching on the ice cubes.