we walked from the elevator

We walked from the elevator into a luxurious hallway lined with works of art. Miles had already disappeared through an open doorway at the end; I could hear a young woman’s voice laughing and chatting loudly in the next room, along with a few thumps and crashes from a drum set.

There was some sort of brief conversation, including a few explosive phrases in a British accent, and then a familiar face met us at the door.

Ryan.

Except radically different from how I remembered him.

He was just as tall, but now he had longer, shaggier hair that was perfectly tousled and styled. His face was leaner, with more pronounced cheekbones, and he sported a couple days’ worth of fashionable stubble. He wore high-end jeans, pointed-toe leather shoes, a black t-shirt with the Union Jack and pictures of four band members on it, a fancy leather jacket, and a small rawhide necklace that looked like he’d picked it up surfing in South America or on some other exotic adventure.

My first thought was, Damn, R