The carnival was winding down, its coloured bulbs buzzing faintly in the cool night air, the scent of popcorn, fried dough, and burnt gunpowder mingling in the breeze. The game booths had gone dark one by one, and the last straggling visitors were long gone, leaving behind only litter and memories. In this hollowed-out fairground, a rat sat atop the rim of an empty caramel corn bucket, its grey fur illuminated by a flickering string of dying bulbs. Its whiskers twitched not in fear, but in quiet calculation.
Across from the rat, the fireworks merchant leaned against his wooden cart. He wore a threadbare jacket with singe marks on the sleeves, evidence of a career spent too close to sparks. A long wooden box of rockets was slung over his shoulder by a leather strap. A few stray rockets poked out, their paper skins adorned with names like Starfall and Midnight Sun, promises of brief beauty. The merchant exhaled, a cloud of breath in the cool air, and narrowed his eyes at the rat.
"You again," said the fireworks merchant, voice tired yet laced with amusement. He nudged an empty candy apple stick on the ground with the toe of his boot. "I thought you'd be off chewing on leftover candy apples by now."
The rat tilted its head, black eyes glinting with an intelligence far beyond what one would expect of a common rodent. "And miss another night of you shouting about your fleeting explosions? Hardly," it squeaked, the tone carrying the cadence of a refined, if sarcastic, conversationalist. "I live for disappointment."
The merchant let out a short laugh and stood up straight. "Fleeting? My fireworks make the crowd gasp. They point, they cheer, they remember the colours for years." He gestured broadly with one arm, as if addressing an invisible audience beneath the empty tents. "You what do you do? Scamper in circles in a sawdust kingdom?"
A small grin tugged at the rat's lips, exposing two sharp incisors. It tapped one clawed foot on the rim of the bucket in mock impatience. "I gnaw," the rat replied dryly. "On wood, on wire, on the mental scaffolding of anyone foolish enough to speak to me. Your fireworks vanish in a puff of smoke; my words linger like an itch you cannot scratch."
The merchant adjusted the rocket box on his shoulder, rolling his eyes upward as if seeking patience from the heavens. "Yeah," he scoffed, "but when people think of a good night, they think of the sky I lit up, not a rodent telling them they're wasting their lives."
"And yet," the rat said, hopping down from the bucket rim to the cobblestones with a soft thump, "you're still here talking to me."
The merchant chuckled, the sound echoing off the shuttered tilt awhirl nearby. He cast a glance around to ensure they were truly alone. In the distance, a few carnival workers were silhouettes moving in the dark, packing up booths and securing equipment for the night, but none close enough to overhear a man chatting with a rat. Satisfied, he continued, "Maybe I like the company."
"Or maybe," the rat said with a sly grin, creeping a few steps closer, "you're just waiting for me to admit your sparks matter."
"Do they?" the merchant asked quietly. For a moment, genuine uncertainty flickered in his eyes, as if the rat's cynicism had pried open a door in his mind that he usually kept locked.
The rat twitched its whiskers, sensing the momentary vulnerability. Its voice lowered, almost gentle, but the words were as barbed as ever. "Only in the same way you matter briefly, loudly, and usually when people are looking the other way."
A silence settled between them. Overhead, one of the last carnival bulbs gave out with a soft pop, making the remaining light all the scarcer. In the distance, a lone leftover firecracker from earlier in the evening popped as well, a final exclamation point on the night. The sudden crack startled a roost of pigeons on the rafters of the empty Ferris wheel; they took off in a flurry of wings, disappearing into the darkness.
The merchant laughed softly at the timing, rubbing a hand over his stubbled chin. "Guess we're both pests in our own way."
"Difference is," the rat said, "I don't need applause."
They stood there, surrounded by the fading hum of the carnival: a distant generator finally chugging to a stop, the creak of a loose sign swinging in the breeze, the drip of condensed night mist off the striped roof of the candy floss stand. Each of them was lost in their own thoughts for a moment, each silently convinced the other would be the one remembered in the morning.