There were no churches on Church Street. The last one closed down a few years ago and stood abandoned, its congregation moved to cheaper, “safer” suburbs. The front doors were closed and locked and most-likely nailed shut, and plastered with “Condemned” signs. Furball had passed this place a thousand times before and each time he felt sorry for the church, not because of what it had been, but because of what it was: it was alone, unloved. Somebody had just walked away from it.

He understood it.

The bus let them off in front of the church. There were kids sitting on the leaf-covered steps in front of the church. They were mostly human, with a few furs peppered in, all of them dressed in black and adorned with chains and spiked collars. Furball knew them as “The Church Street Dirties.” They were surrounded by cigarette smoke.

Ty, Furball could feel, watched them from over his head.

“You know them?” He asked.

Ty turned away, starting down the sidewalk towards the Strip. “Used to.”

“Not any more?”

“I guess not.”

Furball sighed and shoved his hands into his pockets, mirroring Ty. His ears dropped against his head and he narrowed his eyes. Today, they were both going to be difficult to deal with.

The neighborhood started to change around them. The further east they walked, the closer together the houses got. Cars moved off driveways and lined the streets, their drivers opting to walk or bus-it to work. The College District grew up around the University of the Midwest, Gateway City, and formed into a solid community, the mainland to Furball and Ty’s chain of island fortresses in a sea of pavement.

On two stone pedestals, flanking either side of the street, crouched two stone lions. They faced away from Gateway City, their spears held ready to defend their home from the great, expansive west. This is where the county stopped, and The Strip started. The Strip was nothing more than a few blocks of shops and bars and restaurants in the College District, but to every west county kid it was a night club. For many of them, this was as close to downtown as they’d ever get. For Furball, it was the first time he got to roam The Strip without any kind of adult supervision. He decided he wasn’t going to tell Ty this; he came into her group younger than any of them and he always felt childish. They told him, Ty and Bryan and their friends, that he was more mature than most of them, that aside from his appearance, no one would know he was thirteen. He never believed them.

Ty stopped in front of the Church Street Times office and scanned the headlines of this week’s paper. Furball looked around. He noticed for the first time that he was surrounded by furs, real furs, not the kind from TV. These furs weren’t desperate or ignorant or violent, not the Esperanto for drug-dealers or thieves or terrorists the television had turned them into. They were executives, coffee shop owners, entrepreneurs and artists. They walked alongside humans, held the door for each other, sat at the same tables and shared coffee. And they thanked each other, with real, sincere thanks. Furball wanted to sit down and take it all in, because he knew he wasn’t likely to see a scene like this anytime soon.

Ty moved on, taking them past Church Street Records. It was the kind of store that was becoming more and more rare in Gateway City, and didn’t exist at all in Java. It was locally owned, built in what must have been an old theater. Between the entrance and exit doors was the old box office, now home to the creepiest mannequin Furball had ever seen. The store employees named it “Shar,” and Shar held CDs of the latest releases for customers to see. And it seemed like everytime Furball was in the Strip, Shar had been dressed differently.

Ty tugged at the arm of Furball’s coat “Let’s go in here,” she said. She pressed through the front door, holding on to his coat as they entered. The warmth of the shop hit him hard, pushing its way into his lungs. He gasped, and then adjusted. The carpet by the door was worn through, exposing the smooth concrete underneath. The walls were covered with band posters, dating all the way back to sometime in the 1970s. In front of them, aisles of CDs stretched towards the back wall, past the band merch, past the DJ stand and the vinyl, for what seemed like hundreds of feet. Furball’s tail twitched back and forth. He understood this. He knew this was Something.

Ty tugged on his coat again before dropping his arm. She wandered over to the punk section. Furball blushed.

A human stood behind the counter. He was somewhere in his twenties, and he watched the two furs enter the store. “Shouldn’t you guys be in school?” He asked, his tone betraying that he probably didn’t care what they were doing.

“Yes,” Ty said. “Yes, we should.”

“Rock,” the human said. He disappeared back into a magazine he had been reading. Furball recognized him as a “huminal,” a racial slur of sort, but nothing furs took seriously. It meant, to humans, a human that had been rejected by humans and hung out with furs. Very scandalous. It wasn’t outwardly clear to someone who wasn’t looking, but Furball, in the past few months, had picked up a few things from his group. One was the Mammalian Unity Party patch on the employee’s coat. The other was the collar he wore around his neck. It was a reference to slavery, but most people used it now as a symbol of solidarity with furs. Tail still twitching, Furball turned and followed Ty.

Ty had already situated herself in the Punk section. She idly fingered through the CDs in the rack. Furball didn’t recognize any of the bands. He sank back into the aisle. Ty and Bryan had introduced him to punk music a few months before, and everything still fresh and awkward. He watched Ty, something so many had done before, friend or otherwise. She deserved better. She was a perfectly nice person, and she took the brunt of so much anger. She just set off something in people. He felt his face start to burn, and for a brief moment, he was jealous of Bryan. He sighed, not particularly unhappy, just frustrated with his hormones.

“What’s wrong, kid?” Ty asked.

“Nothing,” Furball mumbled.

Ty shrugged, and went back to the CDs.

Furball bit his lip. “…Ty…?”

“Hmm?”

“Why-” He looked around and lowered his voice. “Why did you kiss me?” His face burned hotter as he pulled into himself. He couldn’t look at her.

Ty looked up from the CDs. “Because you needed it. Because you were sad and I don’t like seeing you like that.” She put her arm around his shoulders and drew him into her. “I care about you.”

“What about Bryan?”

“Well, I care about Bryan a lot more-”

“No, I mean, won’t he be mad at me?” His ears flattened against his head.

Ty pulled her arm away. “Nah. He prolly would have done the same thing.”

Furball nodded, letting his shoulders down.

Ty pulled a CD from the rack. She studied the back for a moment, and then showed it to Furball. The album was from a band called “The Pelts,” another racial slur aimed at furs. Furball heard it more than he cared to talk about, and it stung every time. The band, though, was one of Ty’s favorites. It was a live CD — the cover was the band on stage, all four members visible. Garrett Blanke, the lead singer, was in the middle of a lyric, singing into the microphone, his legs spread apart, his bass slung low. Over his shoulder, Al Martin, the guitarist, commanded stage presence like Garrett, full of spite and energy. Tucked away in the corner of the stage was Rin Sho. He was the quiet member of the group, and he played the guitar better than just about anyone. He could own the show if he wanted to. Kim Pine was on the drum stand, her arms moving so fast they blurred. Furball wanted to play like Kim, but he wasn’t good enough yet. He missed the band his friends had put together. They stopped playing when Jon left. They needed him.

Ty raised her eyebrows at him. When he nodded, she smiled and took the CD back, holding it gingerly in her hands. “So what are you doing here?” She turned away and started back towards the front of the store. Furball tried to keep pace with her.

“You… you brought me here.”

Ty slowed. “Why aren’t you in school?”

The calico thought a moment. “I can’t stand it anymore.” His hands balled themselves up, and he held them at his sides. “I mean, I really can’t stand it. I’m tired of being one of — how many? — five furs in the school? And god forbid any of them are in my grade. At least you have Bryan in yours.”

“It’s not that bad,” Ty said.

Furball sighed. “I’m not as lucky as you are.”

“What? What’s that supposed to mean.”

“I don’t have any friends.”

“Of course you do. You have me and Bryan and Jeremy.”

“No. You have Bryan and Jeremy. You don’t know how frustrating it is. You don’t sit alone at lunch every day. You don’t have the administration telling you not to talk to human girls.”

Ty froze. “Really?”

“Yeah, once.”

Ty narrowed her eyes. Furball retreated from the CDs, back into the generic rock section. Ty followed close behind.

“You ever think about running away?”

Furball looked up. Ty was looking right at him. She held her hands down in her pockets, her shoulders up, her ears down a little. Furball decided this was Ty’s insecure stance. “Sometimes,” he said. “Not as much as I used to.” He waited for a response. When none came, he looked away. “Sometimes it’s worse.” He checked Ty for understanding. “Do you?”

“Not anymore.” Ty moved forward, past him, her hands out of her pockets, her shoulders back, ears up and alert. “I’m happy now.”

“Except for today?”

“Except for today.” Ty made her way to the counter to pay for the CD. The clerk, the human, rambled excitedly about the Pelts. Ty answered back, focused on paying. She kept her answers short but polite. Serving his purpose, the human went back to his magazine.

Furball ducked his head into the cold. Tears crowded in the corners of his eyes, and he squeezed his eyes shut. Ty grabbed him by the arm and lead him away from the store. She pulled him hard, and when he opened his eyes, she was looking straight ahead, her ears back, mouth drawn firmly shut. She made a sharp turn at the street corner, and suddenly Furball was in an alley behind Church Street Records. Ty steered him behind a dumpster and pushed him against the brick wall of the store. He whimpered and opened his mouth to protest, but Ty cut him off.

“Do you really think about killing yourself?” She asked, her hands pushing hard on his shoulders. Her ears were still down, her dark green eyes locked on to his. He whimpered again; she was hurting his shoulders. He tried to turn away, but couldn’t move against Ty’s weight.

“Listen to me.”

Furball turned his head away — it was all he could do — tears welling in his eyes. Ty moved so she could look at him.

“Don’t, OK?” That stung. This wasn’t strong Ty or insecure Ty. She was hurt, and it was his fault. It was the same Ty he heard this morning, injured and tired, and a little afraid. He didn’t want to look at her. He didn’t want to cry.

“Please don’t. Don’t do that to us, don’t hurt us like that. Don’t… take yourself away from us.”

Furball squeezed his eyes shut again.

“We need you,” Ty said, and Furball opened his eyes. He searched Ty of sarcasm or ridicule and found neither. “You’re important to us, and we care about you very much. We need to stay together, understand?”

Furball nodded, and Ty let up off his shoulders. He fell into her arms, letting her hold him close. She stroked his ears back and rocked him slowly. She pulled his wrist out from between them.

“What’s this? She held his wrist up to eye-level. Furball tried to pull it away. “Did you try to cut yourself last night?” She sat down, taking Furball with her.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice only a whisper. He didn’t look at Ty. He didn’t want her to know how ashamed he was. He could feel Ty starting at his would and he wanted to throw up.

Ty brushed her fingers over the cut, then let out a giggle, and then burst into laughter. Furball blushed, his ears dropping against his head. He pulled his arm away and covered his wrist with his hand.

“Oh man,” Ty said between fits of laughter. “That’s… that’s not even the right side. There’s no blood vessels on that side.”

Furball narrowed his eyes while Ty composed herself. “Hey,” she said, stifling a giggle. Furball turned to her, right into her gaze. She watched him carefully, studying his reaction. Then, very slowly, she drew her arm back and punched him hard in the shoulder.

Furball jumped, and tried to shout at her, but couldn’t force the words out. He gave up, closed his mouth, and hunched over. He fumed for a moment.

“That was for being stupid,” she said. “Don’t do it again.”

Furball nodded, staring at the ground.

Ty stood and stretched, and pulled Furball up with her. He dusted himself off and turned towards the mouth of the alley. He got out on to the sidewalk when he realized Ty wasn’t with him. He turned back into the alley. Ty was reading a piece of paper. Furball froze. She looked up at him, her ears fallen back against her head. He rushed forward, taking the piece of paper, and shoved it into his pocket. He fled the alley, pushing himself to the other side of the block before he stopped at the corner. He leaned against the traffic light post, his heart pounding. He had forgotten about the note. He hadn’t realized it had fallen out of his pocket. Maybe Ty had pulled it out. He shook all over, ashamed with himself.

Ty strolled up next to him, slipping her hand under his arm. He looked up at her, she down at him. “OK?” She asked.

Furball dropped his eyes. He hadn’t expected that. He nodded.

“What now?” Ty asked. She started across the street, taking him with her.

Furball shrugged. He didn’t feel like talking anymore.

“You wanna go over to the collective?”

Furball stumbled. “The anarchists?”

Ty nodded. Her tail twitched behind her. She watched the sidewalk ahead, her eyes bright.

“Won’t they, like, kill us?”

“Them? Nah. They’re nice. C’mon, I’ll introduce you.”

Furball looked up at Ty. “How do you-?”

“Secret. Can’t tell.”

Furball sighed. He leaned against Ty’s arm and thought that maybe he had been wrong the night before. Ty reached down and ruffled the fur on his head. This, he decided, was comfortable. He adjusted his arm so that Ty could get a better grip, and let her lead the way.

[g]