It was a strange toilet in a land of strange toilets. Didn’t plan on speaking to anyone on the way out, but then suddenly we were both heading for the door at the same time and making way at the same time and saying sorry too much, and that was enough somehow. I don’t know who offered to buy who a drink first, or who suggested another afterwards, but the way things played out kind of made perfect sense. She said she knew a place, and I was surprised because…it wasn’t like that.

And it wasn’t: half an hour later, we were sitting on the arm of a broken ride in a theme park no-one had visited in five years…or that’s what Wikipedia told me later. I asked her what the park was called and she told me “Dreamland.” Nara Dreamland. Like a prayer or a lullaby: Nara, Nara.

It got cold enough that we had to go our separate ways, and I never saw her again. I used to think we’d find each other, that it would just suddenly happen like the first time, but when they knocked down the park a few years later I felt that feeling slip. I couldn’t believe we were still sharing the same sun and breathing the same air in a world without that park. It was like they had scribbled her out of the world at the same time as they signed off the demolition permits. My memory of her faded bit by bit until the only things left were the feeling of her sitting beside me on that broken swing and the sound of her voice saying those words. Nara…Nara…goodbye Nara.