"I tell you, Koichi, I saw fire balls near the pond. I am sure it is a Yokai! We are doomed!! They will start playing tricks and kidnapping folks around here..."

My friend was a bit exaggerating, but it was true that few things happened recently that were difficult to explain... to human like him, at least.

"You know, Shiro, you shouldn't listen to what your brothers say. They are always exaggerating, making you believe the weirdest thing ever...Tell me about your miai. How did it go?"

Shiro's family wanted him married soon. He was going on his twenties, and bringing a bride in the family register was expected. It would bring respect from the clan, and fresh blood in the lineage. In our little Nobeoka, life was smooth and pleasant, but as everywhere else, the first duty of a son was to the family, to provide for the future...

"It was... weird... Koichi. I don't know really what to think about it. The girl was a pretty one, sure, so quiet. My mom loved her. You know, she would be someone she could bully around in the house... But, this girl had something... I don't know... Alien... She was almost too pretty, too subdued, too... perfect..."

I understood what Shiro was talking about. I met this kind of girls pretty often. In fact, I lived among them. Actually, my friend wasn't far from reality when he said she had something alien in her. Well, we didn't really called ourselves, but it was a fact we weren't the same as the man roaming the surface of this planet. The thing was, Shiro should never have met Miko in a miai. His specie and mine could cohabit, could befriend, but they could never unite and mix their essences...

"Do you think you will see her again?"

We were heading to the Inari shrine compound. I didn't know why I was pushing on the subject. I knew there was no chances that Miko would see Shiro again. I had made a blunder, and she was good enough to let it pass for this time.

"I don't think so..."

He sounded distracted, looking around as if he was seeing the place for the first time.

"I don't know how you can live here... it's a spooky place! Look at those foxes statues everywhere. It's like if they are watching you... I can feel their eyes on me, even if they are just stone..."

It was the first time I heard Shino talking like this, about my home. I thought he liked it here. We had some epic adventure when we were younger, playing around the place, in the mountain and the forest. I wondered if... What could have happened during this miai that made him acting so strange now?

"Come on Shiro! What are you talking about? Anyway, you didn't tell anything about yesterday!"

My friend looked at me intently, standing there, just looking and not saying anything. I started to feel uncomfortable. What really happened?

I had made a mistake. My family was in charge of the wishes gathering and data processing at the shrine. We were more than just messengers between the GODs and their believers. The gods, short for Galactic Onlookers Descendants, settled on this planet few generations ago. Well, our generations lasted longer than he humans' so I didn't know exactly in Earth years or centuries how long it was.

We didn't always looked alike the men and women inhabiting this planet. At the beginning, we were more similar to those foxes sitting in their pedestals. Those statues, by the way, were part of the security system in the compound.

"I really liked Miko. She is a quiet and pretty one. But I don't think she liked me much... She did ask me a lot of question about you... Do you know her?"

Shiro was fixing me with inquisitive eyes. What should I answer? Sure, I knew Miko, but we were not close or whatever. I thought she didn't liked me much either. Or was it...?

I made a mistake, sure. When receiving wishes from the believers, I needed to sort them based on the department. People used to come to the shrine to wish for material and physical health essentially. But some also came to ask for a good match. While the first two types of wishes were simple data entry, the money hopeful recorded under the Ministry of Finance, and the physical health seekers registered with the Medical board, those wishing for a good match were first assessed by the Family and Genome department, the a matchmaker would proceed to the proposals and presentation to possible brides or grooms.

I was new in the dispatch job. When I registered Shiro with the FGD, he ended up under the Kitsune branch. Luckily, the matchmaker found my mistake. Well, I didn't double checked the records, but I didn't think I was really at fault there either. I was sure it was a glitch in the system. Nevertheless, Miko had to have one miai with Shiro. And she told me she would get revenge for being forced to meet with a monkey. This was the way she put it. Miko was one of those foxes who didn't like the contact and proximity of humans.

"You know, Koichi... it sounded like Miko would have preferred to have this date with you..."

So that was it. Miko had her revenge. She tried to get Shiro against me, to break our bond... and looking at his reaction, it seemed to have worked...

"Look, Shiro. I don't know what to say... Miko is not really someone I have interaction with. I didn't even think she was aware of our friendship... and we are almost always together since we were kids..."

My friend was still looking at me fixedly.

"Koichi! I want to forewarn you now..."

So, was it the end already? Would he break this friendship of many years? All for a sneaky fox?

"... If you you and Miko become an item, it will be the end..."

It was the end, surely, completely, definitively.

"... I won't stand looking at you with this girl. I don't want to see you suffer, and I am sure you will end up doing it a lot with this one. She is like a conniving little fox. Yesterday, she was all pretty, cute and quiet. But when she looked at me, she gave me goose-bumps. And not the pleasant ones. When she looked at me, I had the same feeling as when I am in the shrine compound, with all these statues following my movements..."

I found it almost funny how Shiro described Miko. Her clan was in charge of security in the Shrine.

"So, you are not mad at me because she was asking question about myself, but because you don't want me to end up with a shrewd fox?"

I surveyed my friend's facial expressions rapidly changing. He had this determined look, this shining star in the eyes.

"Koichi, my friend, I thought I would find love with a miai, but what I found was even better..."

I watched him with question in mind. What would this cryptic sentence mean?

"... I found true friendship. Well, I confirmed it. For now, I will keep this love with me. The one of a friend. I still have time to give a daughter to my parents..."

I felt relieved, somehow. It didn't seem that the matchmaking error had brought pain or stress to Shiro. My friend was a strong one, and I was glad to know he would stay by my side. I had been a bit confused by his words. Even the weather was confused. The sun was bright and high, shining in a clear blue sky, though it was raining.

"You know, Koichi, I always wondered why it was called a kitsune wedding..."