She stares at her hands as if they were not her own but someone else’s, and begins squeezing them together tightly. A squishy sound loudly escapes from between the palms as the sweat seeps freely from her over saturated pores and pools between her small thin hands.

“You don’t need to be nervous,” his voice says softly to her from across the room.
She laughs nervously before meeting his relaxed gaze. “I-I-It’s easy for you to say, you’ve been existing in your own little world with just yourself for two years. While the rest of the world tell stories about the great Marty Towns, the man who killed the world in one single night, made a fortune in promises and then disappeared into the nothingness he came from, never to be heard of again.”

“Until now of course,” he says with a soft smile.

“O-O-Of course,” she says with a nervous smile. “S-S-So you have to understand I have a lot of question to ask.”

“No you don’t,” He says softly.

She laughs nervously once more and places a small black notebook on her lap, “Since I first read your book two years ago every question no matter how ridiculous, no matter how absurd, no matter how unrelated are in this book. So don’t think for a second I’m going to avoid asking them to you now I have the chance to.”

He leans forward and laughs, “Please Sophie, you misunderstand my words. Please just open the book and ask your many questions, for I am willing to answer them all.”

Sophie stares at him for longer than she intended to, and when she finally realises her short gaze had turned into a profound stare she turns bright red and quickly opens her notepad. Sweat explodes from her brow as her eyes send the words that are written in her own hand to her brain. She looks up at his smiling face, then back at the notebook and starts turning page after page, the panic growing with each new page opened. Finally as she comes to the end of the book she looks back up into his eyes. “H-H-How did you do t-tha-ha-that?” She asks nervously.

“I did nothing, and how is not the question my dear,” he says as he reaches across to her and places a hand on a page on the notebook and smiles. “It’s why,” Marty says.