It would be like old times.

I thought if I came back, kept coming back, I thought that maybe, I was just dreaming I know, but I thought maybe you would come back too, some time, and it would be like old times. Hey, I was just dreaming. That I would be back here with you, like real love.

REAL LOVE BY LINDSAY SMITH 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 95

Vivien stares at the laptop in her corner office on the 29th floor. A Qantas jet sails across the glass wall behind her. (It seems to just hang there forever.) Her phone chimes.

She clatters down a long glass corridor of scattered light to reception, a stark minimalist space facing the lifts furnished with a Pantone-coloured designer-dysfunctional desk and chairs, and a potplant palm.

The receptionist mutters something unintelligible into a headset mouthpiece, pushes across a courier box. Vivien nods to the receptionist, tears open the box, and pulls out a bottle of wine.

A man in a stiff black business suit squirms in his seat and looks at his Rolex.

Ding! The lift doors open …