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I blinked up at the Manhattan skyline, awash in the wavy heat of late July. I didn’t worry about looking like a tourist. For one thing, there were few visitors back then – at least, the voluntary kind. My main concern was not fainting. Sweat circles the size of dinner plates dampened the fur between my arms and scrawny torso. My thin muscle shirt mocked my frame, but what else was a New Yorker to do when the temperature crept past ninety? There wasn’t a lot of decorum in the city to begin with and even less of it when searing heat radiated from every filthy surface.

It may be difficult to believe nowadays with the weed-like growth of luxury condo towers and restaurants with stratospheric prices, but 1977 was not a good year for New York. Crime, sleaze, poverty and corruption smothered whatever greatness existed before. I hated my noisy apartment in Chelsea, which I could never keep clean. Dirt practically oozed out of the walls. Someday I’ll visit the ‘media concept consortium’ that occupies that same building (gutted and rebuilt in the nineties) and tell the receptionist about the nights I’d chase away cockroaches gnawing on my half-eaten TV dinners.

I paused for the light at Seventh Avenue, bathed in hot bus exhaust, squinting at the ugly tower across the street that hovered over subterranean Penn Station. Gray memories of the original station trickled across my mind as I waited for the walk light. It was here that I first entered New York as a kid, awestruck by old Penn Station’s vast, solemn interiors of stone, steel and glass. The fact that it was unceremoniously erased to make way for the unbelievably ugly Madison Square Garden was just the beginning of the city’s decline. Perhaps it started it.

Descending into the dirty, dark corridors to my train, I replayed the events of last Saturday night in my head. Slinking out of the restaurant I worked at, I had let the moon play upon my shirtless torso as I wandered the trash-strewn docks of the Meatpacking District. Back then, instead of overpriced sandwiches and luxury hotels, the ‘hood crawled with men looking for carnal pleasure after dark. For guys like me, it was a release. An escape. Something to do before crawling back to my wretched apartment to watch the Tonight Show on a temperamental black and white television.

Like most nights there, I hooked up right away with a handsome dude. Nice fellow. More clean-cut than the rough dudes I liked to play with. The labrador gave me his card afterwards, which shocked me. Most of the guys prowling the waterfront at night would choose a life in Iowa over losing their anonymity. He told me to call him. He had a summer home on Fire Island. He was planning a big party the following weekend. I thanked him earnestly in a hushed voice before skipping home. My heart raced as I dodged piles of trash. Finally! An excuse to get out of this gawdforsaken place for a few days and get my rocks off in a house that didn’t smell like must and mildew.

Gripping the straps on my duffel bag, I descended further to the platform and loped aboard the Long Island Rail Road train. Like the rest of the city, the coach stank with a warm sewer-like odor. The promise of salty sea air and sand dunes helped mitigate the soul-crushing experience of sitting on cracked vinyl seats. Mercifully, we left only ten minutes late.

I daydreamed again as the train rocked and lurched eastward under the East River. Thoughts of cool ocean breezes bubbled through my brain.

After several unexplained stops between stations, I alighted at Bay Shore and asked a panther in a business suit where the ferry was. He extended a claw down the main strip and grunted, clearly annoyed. Thanks, asshole. Still damp with sweat, I meandered into a store and got a Coke. Outside, I pulled my shirt off and rolled the glass bottle between my nipples. My impromptu ice pack worked well enough to give me the energy to buy a ticket to Fire Island and clamber aboard the ferry.

The sea breezes through my fur reinvigorated me further. By the time I arrived on the island, I was practically bounding across the boardwalk and up the path to the house I’d been directed to. It was a fairly modern affair, with dark wood and expansive windows. I knocked.

Nothing.

I rang the bell.

Silence.

Peeking around, I noticed the drapes drawn and a layer of dirt on the welcome mat. My paws were the first pair to touch it in a while, I reasoned. Maybe I was early? I sat on an overturned wooden crate and fished out the paperback novel I’d just started reading. A flicker of worry sparked in the back of my brain as I started chapter three.

By the time I got to chapter twelve, the sun had dipped towards the horizon. Nothing but the sounds of hissing surf and rustling trees surrounded me. I checked the address again for the hundredth time and sighed. Had I been duped? Annoyed, I wandered to the neighboring house, which was alive with the sounds of a happening party. The stoned-looking dog that answered hadn’t seen anyone around next door for weeks. He offered me a brownie, but I passed.

Dejected, I watched as the last ferry motored away to Long Island and considered my options. I had exactly thirty seven dollars and a half-consumed granola bar in my duffel bag, aside from the various clothes I had packed. Not enough for a room at the inn. Not enough to enjoy the next twelve hours by myself. Slumping, I made my way to the beach and watched the sun finally disappear beneath the waves.

What kind of monster would do this to anyone? I considered going back to the party house to phone the guy who invited me, but I remembered I’d left his stupid card on my nightstand. Shivering, I pawed through my duffel for something warm, but I also remembered I hadn’t packed much other than a swimsuit and sleeveless shirts. I had anticipated a warm bed in between sunbathing.

My mind wandered as the temperature dropped. I thought of my awful apartment and stupid job. I thought about how I never seemed to keep a boyfriend longer than a few months. Even the ridiculously-hot summer was pissing me off. Life was indeed pretty shitty. I looked around at the empty beach bathed in moonlight and decided to cry.

No sooner did I begin to weep when the sand moved next to me. What I had thought was a small dune started to sit up and turn toward me. Tears running down my fur, I opened my mouth to shout but the dark shape in the sand began to speak.

“What’s wrong?”

I blinked the tears away and tried to make out the man in the dark. Moonlight fell upon a pair of horns and twinkled on an earring. A bull. A young bull. About my age. Built like a small truck. Starting to stammer a bit, the bull chuckled and put a sandy hoof on my shoulder.

“I didn’t mean to startle you, goat. I thought I might make you faint!”

Now it was my turn to laugh. “I’m not that kind, bull. But I might damn near pass out if you scare me like that again!”

The bull laughed heartily. “I’m Seth.”

“I’m Evan.”

“Let’s get those tears dry, Evan. You hungry?”

Ten minutes later, I found myself in a kitchen three doors down from the dark, empty house that I was supposed to stay in. I watched as Seth opened the door on the avocado green fridge and produced two beers.

“By the time you finish one, I’ll have dinner ready. Just remember to be quiet. My parents are asleep upstairs.”

I nodded and took a beer.

As promised, he’d near-silently made two grilled cheese sandwiches. Garnished with potato chips, I ate voraciously. We watched each other intently and smiled as we ate. I told him my story afterwards. Seth listened carefully and frowned at my misfortune.

Sated, we wandered back down to the beach, a heavy blanket around our shoulders this time. We talked for what seemed like hours. When he secreted me away to his bedroom, the clock only said 11:54. Wordlessly, we stripped naked and got into his bed. I curled up in his hooves and fell asleep to the beating of his heart against my back.

When I awoke, his heavily-muscled arm still held me in place. I blinked. Did we? No. We did not. I marveled at this. It was the first time I’d slept with someone without having sex with them. He snored softly and I giggled quietly thinking of him as a ‘bulldozer.’ This woke him. He squeezed me once and whispered “Sleep well?”

I nodded.

“My parents will leave soon. They have to attend a wedding later today back in Brooklyn. We’ll have the place to ourselves soon.”

More exciting words could not be spoken.

We laid there until the front door slammed shut, then waited ten minutes more before leaving the confines of his room.

Over the years, when someone tells me that they’ve had the ‘best day of their life,’ I will think of the day that began that morning. Seth and I spent that entire Saturday together. From our lazy breakfast on the deck to that night when we finally made love for the first time, I knew then that this was just the first day of our lives together.

Sunday dawned too quickly. I laid there in his arms, basking in the afterglow of a second lovemaking when I realized I had to be back to work the next day. Back to my dead-end job and cockroach-infested box in Chelsea. He would be going back, too. Back to his parents’ place in Red Hook. I tried to shuffle those thoughts away as he caressed my chest with a massive hoof. We still had a few hours.

Then what?

Would it be like everyone else? No. It couldn’t be. It won’t be. I’ve fallen in love. Hard. This is it. Just keep it together, Evan. You’ll see him again. Maybe sooner than you think.

“You alright?” he rumbled.

I nodded. Then I shook my head.

“When will I see you again?”

“I can’t say. But know this. You will see me again.”

Silently, I snuggled into him. I cursed my brain for being so negative.

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