As the searing sun slipped below the surface, the crimson sky faded rapidly to a faint pink with golden streaks of puffy clouds. The heat of the day receded, leaving behind a shivering haze of warm air with the aftertaste of heated stone, dust, and ground. There was the salty breath of the ocean, moist and thick, almost imperceptible during the day, but surprisingly clear at night, as if it were just waiting for the sunset to make the city happier. The twilight, however, was short. The sky seemed to be shimmering with astonishing colors when it suddenly turned a rich blue with fragments of the first stars. Night was coming and engulfing, inviting into its embrace, lavishing advances in the form of deceptive coolness.

You quickly maneuver through the flow of people, passing wide cobbled streets, lavishly lit with lanterns, expensive restaurants and bars, cabarets, salons and theaters. Everything was drenched in greenery and flowers that now, at night, exuded an intoxicating fragrance. Here, among the white-clad gentlemen and their ladies, no one seemed to care about someone like you. Just one of the residents rushing to the night shift at the luxurious restaurant in a wealthy quartet.

Well, you really did rush to your evening and night shifts. The place where you worked wasn't really just a restaurant. It was a restaurant, a theater, and a gambling club. Yes, here you could be served a gourmet dinner and offered an expensive cigar accompanied by a sensual voice and a fancy orchestra. Here, on a semi-darkened stage, you could see the exciting tango of the best dancers of the night city. But as the night grew darker, the entertainment became more forbidding and dangerous. Instead of respectable individuals, more engaging gentlemen appeared with similarly immense wallets but elusive, sticky gazes. With them everything became subtly different, racy and defiant.

"You're late again," Leon, one of the dancers, blurted out wistfully as he watched you quickly grab your uniform. "The hall is full of people already."