I held your hand and never once let go as we walked and walked, our hands clutched as I led the way for us. Even as we were in the midst of hundreds – while we forged a path through a sea of the nameless unknown – we were alone.

Weaving through the crowd, I was reminded of the scene of the elephant parade in that film we saw together just days ago.

‘You look happy,’ you teasingly said when I peeled my gaze away from the sky and turned to you.

‘I am happy you came out to spend this night with me,’ I said, though I knew, deep inside, my reply hardly came close to what I was feeling and what I wanted to convey.

We found ourselves on a bridge which has been cordoned for the night, devoid of moving traffic, with only parked cars abandoned by their drivers. The white arches of the iron bridge shone with every explosion in the sky as we hurried to the Fullerton intersection at the far end.

There, in the first few minutes of the newborn year, I kissed you again and again as the painted sky above burned to a climax. And amidst the accompanying cheers of the crowd gathered around the intersection, I softly said: ‘This is the best new year ever. I have never celebrated a new year quite like this.’

And I’ll want to the next year, I thought. And the next. Then the next…

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