House of Holy

At 8 o'clock promptly, I met up with Yuna just outside the back entrance of the train station. I had to come up with some excuses to tell Sayna and Shu. I mean there is no reason why I would need their approval to do anything, but somehow I didn't want to tell them that I was going out to meet up with a girl at this time. 

"Hi there, Boh"

The girl saw me first and greeted me. 

"Hi-"

Then I realized I didn't even know this girl's name yet. 

"Uh… sorry, but I still don't know your name"

"Ah, my bad. I haven't told you yet, hehe. My name is Yuna"

"Ok, Hi Yuna"

"Yeah, hi Boh"

"You knew my name?"

"Well, you are not an exactly low-profile guy in our school"

"For all the wrong reasons"

"Well, let's just move on now then, shall we?", Yuna cheerfully suggested.

Yeah, I appreciated that she did this. 

I then followed Yuna to some dark back alley, which felt a bit weird. But the place she brought me to was a cafe that was lit brightly inside with a nice warm glow from the strategically well-placed lamps around the walls. The place had a bit of a mellow feel to it, but the atmosphere felt friendly.

"May I take your order, please?"

The waitress came to us to take our orders. 

"I will have a glass of house wine, how about you, Boh?"

"What-? Wine? We are-"

Then Yuna put a finger over her lips to shush me. 

"Yeah, we are trying for a baby but it's okay to drink every now and then, right?"

:Choke:

I literally choked while drinking water as she said this.

"Oh, great. I wish you guys all the best!"

The waitress seemed genuinely kind.

"Yeah, thanks. My husband will also take a glass of wine then"

"What a lovely young couple you guys are"

The waitress gave us a warm smile and left to fetch the drinks.

"Psssst, what are you doing?!"

I whisper-shouted.

"Hey, how else are we gonna get drinks?"

"We should not be drinking alcohol in the first place, and what if they ask for our ID?"

"Don't worry. I got this, and nobody, I mean NOBODY's gonna think that you are younger than me"

Yuna then fished out an ID card from her pocket, which looked really authentic. I could only tell it wasn't because I knew she couldn't be 19 years old.

"Look-, I don't know if I'm okay with this"

"Just relax Boh. We could have gone to my place to look at pictures, but maybe you are right this was better"

"I didn't suggest this, though?"

Then the waitress brought over two glasses of red wine and set them on the table, then left us with a grin and a nod. 

"Cheers"

Yuna nonchalantly lifted her cup to offer a toast.

What the hell. 

I decided to stop thinking and just see how this night unfolded (did I have any other option at this point?), so we toasted together. 

"Cheers"

After that awkward and unexpected start to the evening, we were having a surprisingly good time. I learned that she was genuinely into arts, all the way from classics to post-modern (which I did not understand very well). But she wasn't cringely artsy either. Our conversation flowed so naturally from one topic to another, every now and then coming back to the topic of art as that's what brought us here in the first place, but we talked about anything and everything.

By the time I finished my third glass of wine, I suddenly noticed something. 

Why didn't I think about it before?

What I noticed was that in the entire cafe that had about twenty customers including us, I was the only guy in here.

"Uh-, Yuna. I just noticed something"

"Hmm?"

"Why aren't there any guys in this place? It's like I am the only man here"

"Ah-, I didn't think of telling you. This place is a lesbian meet-up place"

What?

"Wh-why would you bring me here then?"

"I thought you'd like it"

That was oddly wrong and right at the same time. I mean she was wrong to assume that I would like it if I knew we were coming to a lesbian cafe, but she was absolutely right that I was having a good time here.

":Sigh:… I guess you are right, in a way"

"I'm glad"

"But does that mean… you are also-?"

"Nah. I just like this place. It's not like you are not allowed here either. They don't have any policy like that and they welcome anyone. It just happens to be popular with certain demographics"

This girl was really strange, but I was having a strangely good time too. 

"Anyways, let's move to a different place now"

"No, I didn't mean to say we should leave"

"Don't worry, Boh. I'm not suggesting we leave because you don't like it here. But there's another place I wanted to go with you today"

"What kind of place would that be?"

"It's called House of Holy. It's another great place to hang out"

That name sounded weird as hell too (well, maybe hell is not a good word here), but somehow I believed in her now. If it was a place she wanted to take me to, it probably was a good place.

We walked about 15 minutes through the webs of dark back alleys and arrived at a place that had what looked like a heavy and old wooden door, and the said door had an elaborately decorated cross on it, making it look like an entrance to some ancient monastery. This place had bouncers outside the door, but they seemed to know Yuna already as they welcomed us and just let us through. 

This 'House of Holy' felt very occult-ish. There were so many framed paintings of Jesus, God, and whatever memorable events they were from the Bible that I've never read. I knew enough to realize that all this was very Christian, but at the same time, it all felt very occult-like rather than a place of worship for an organized religion. 

There weren't chairs or separate tables, but instead, the place was littered with very large bean bags of various colors. Everyone was half submerged in these bean bags, laughing, enjoying drinks, smoking, and just generally having a good time. As we entered, I excused myself to go to the toilet and found that man's toilet was marked with a picture of Jesus on the door, and the woman's toilet had a picture of Mary. That made me chuckle. 

We found a bean bag in the corner that was available and submerged ourselves in it. We had more drinks, smoked (first time in a long while for me), and talked the night away. 

I haven't had such a carefree night for so long.