Sat huddled in the corner

He looked nervous and had his briefcase on his lap. He had a small portly belly that matched the cheeks of his face that confessed to having had too many expensive business lunches. His suit looked well tailored and his shoes were impossibly shiny, black and lacking in any features except the laces. He had been watching us since we walked in and I think that he was ever so slightly sweating.

"It's warm in here." Miss Summer consoled him in lieu of a greeting. He smiled like it was his first time and nodded just a little too enthusiastically. "Are you here to see the Doctor?"

"ah nah-n-no." His nerves were inventing new words. "I'm from Janus, Morpheus, and Reve ─ the law firm?" his intonation made it seem like he was mostly asking if we knew of his firm.

I remembered the message from Mistress F and the email, (that I had thought was fake.) I was about to start bluffing when Miss Summer opened up with, "Oh. You're here for us! You're the lawyer?"

"yes, Yes, That is I." From his manner of talking I presumed that he was mostly a paper pusher.

Miss Summer asked, as we took our seats a respectful one seat away, "How long have you need practising law?" (We had been about to sit two seats away until the connection had been made.)

"All of my life. Well, all of my adult life. I wanted to be a lawyer ever since high school."

"And how long have you been with Janus, Morpheus and Reve?" Miss Summer is so effortlessly smooth at keeping the conversation going in these situations.

"It will be 27 years in October."

"Wow!" Miss Summer seemed genuinely impressed, "you must be really good at your job for them to keep you for that long."

"Oh, I'm Stacey Reve, I'm one of the managing partners." He still sounded like he expected us not to believe him.

"Stay Cee?" Miss Summer let the name roll around her mouth, "what an original name for an important man, such as yourself."

"My parents were biology professors. I was the subject of a few of their theories. They thought that gendered names were detrimental, and so selected my name as being neutral, long before I was born."

It sounded like a speech that he had said a thousand times. I could even see his eyes glaze over as he became a little animatronic in his delivery.

The conversation continued, "Didn't the receptionist offer you something to drink?" but before Stacy could respond the devil returned with our drinks. I only noticed her as she drew near to us, but it was enough to rapidly take in so much about her. Her height was mostly legs and heels. Her tights were so long under her short skirt that for a moment I had the impression that she must be standing on a box behind a wall covered in nylon. She moved with an impossibly smooth grace that can only come from years of practice. The wine was like a placid lake of resin in the small elegant glasses that seemed to mimic her vertical curves.

"Here you go." she said, offering a glass to each of us. We both thanked her, and my desire to study her as she walked away was interrupted by the private protocol that Miss Summer and I shared.

I turned to look her in the eye, so that we could tap the glasses together and say in unison, "To us." before taking a sip.

Miss Summer turned back to Stacy to smooth over the social faux pas of us drinking without him. I hadn't even swallowed. There are certain flavours that, once you know them, will leap out at you. Rancid fats, salt, Rohypnol, the fermented juice from grapes grown along the Rhine valley, ketamine, cocaine, honey, the tannins of tea, rose oil, straw, ****.

I couldn't taste them all, but I was certain that some of those were in my glass.

I still loved Miss Summer and suddenly had the urge to knock the glass from her hand and pretend that it was an accident. The urge was so strong and so instant that I didn't even realise what part of their conversation I was interrupting. I quickly swallowed, knowing that I would have time to discover, before they could take effect.

"Do we have the same?" I barged into their conversation offering my glass to her and reaching for hers.

She was mildly annoyed by the interruption, and just handed me her glass before turning back to Stacey.

I quickly took a sip of hers and washed it around my mouth... As I searched with my taste buds and tongue, I couldn't detect any difference.