INTRODUCING ALBUQUERQUE

For a moment there I could have sworn it was Sanjeev Gurung, despite the near on twenty years since I'd last set eyes on him. I could have sworn it was him. So much so I dumbly watched him pass me by on the street and only brought my vocal cords back from the dead when he was about to disappear around a peeling concrete corner.

- Sanjeev! Sanjeev! Sanjeev!

He stopped finally and turned around. Started walking back up the street toward me. And as he did so I began to see the man change from someone I once knew from school days, way back when, to a strangely recognizable stranger. And yet I once more said the name all the same.

- Sanjeev!

- That's enough of that now. Seriously. Even tanned as I am, am I anywhere close to being as dark as that Gurkha from our childhood? Six months stranded on a Tahitian island is still at best going to leave me no heavier than a strong mocha. Look again.

Almond shaped eyes, with sockets of shade. A delicate nose like a sun dial. A thin trimmed mustache curling in line with a full upper lip, and a few sprouting hairs neath the lower, as if missed by the blade. Grey light sports coat, likely linen. White shirt. And a red tie knotted loosely enough to suggest it was looking for the right moment to catch his neck.

- Jesus.

- No, Louis.

- Louis Albuquerque.

- Precisely. I suggest a drink.