It is explainable how it ended up like this. You and Liam met up a few years ago, when you were in your early twenties, and you used to have great conversations - the same acid humor and quick thinking to make jokes brought you together like nothing could. However, you've lost contact. He moved on with his life, you did the same, no exchange of numbers or addresses to send mail - not that he'd do that, after all, it's a cheesy thing to do.

The Internet era started to emerge and with the new millennium coming up, you were abusing the functionalities of the new technologies, using all the resources you could to explore this new world opening right in front of your eyes. The nights spent in front of the Windows 95, praying for the disked Internet to load just one more web page were hard, but it was worth it. At least once a day you'd exchange with some pen-pals you found on-line - these communities had a lot of cool people, even though you were aware of the dangers involved, obviously. Caution is never too much.

One, in particular, quickly became a regular in your email box. He was as funny and interesting as her old friend used to be, and the emails were long enough to entertain you in the morning or the late evening. You both kept emailing for a few months, exchanging some travel memories, sharing the same taste in music and films, sometimes arguing about life peculiarities.

The last email made your heartbeat go fast, though. You were used to this reality of only finding this friend online, but it seemed like the time to the day of meeting up in real life was coming.

Ey up, mate! Hope you're doin' good. Just thought I’d drop you a quick line to see if you fancy meetin’ up? I'mma be in your area for the weekend. Could do with a good chinwag, and I’m dyin’ for a proper brew – none of that fancy shite, mind you. Lemme know if yer gonna be free, and we’ll sort out. Get back to me soon, yeah? x