At the coffee shop he hoped Mari would be there. Knew she wouldn't. She probably lived someplace further out. Probably didn't make as much as Jackie. Maybe Mari lived out in Queens or Long Island. The people in this coffee shop looked hip and rich. A world Joey didn't belong to. He might fit in better wherever Marianna was.

That's probably why she visited 

Westcity

. She seemed down to earth. He imagined what her trip there was like for a few minutes until he caught himself. What the hell was he doing? They had spoken for three minutes at the airport. And here he was trying to imagine a week of her life. He wanted to find her on social media. In the old days people would ask each other for a phone number if they wanted to keep in touch. That would've been a bit easier he thought. Maybe a bit more exhilerating. Rather than stalking them online.

He didn't even have a last name though. Just Mari. Marianna. And there were so many people in New York. How could he find her. But then Joey was able to narrow it down. 

Spacecity

. There couldn't be that many people who worked there with that name, right?

He took his laptop out. Decided he'd write a snippet first before trying to search for Mari. He did this thing where he'd write everyday with a friend. At first they wrote like this, thinking it was their way of writing a novel together. But his girlfriend had listened to him talking about the ritual. And she'd decreed that it was more akin to them playing video games together. That sounded about right.

He went to the obscure URL. Saw what his friend had wrote last. And began to write about a man who was dying. And he had to find a person to take care of his dog. In this world he was creating with his friends... dogs lived seven times longer than humans. So people would desperately try to find new owners for their pets as they faced death.

In our world it was one thing to ask someone to watch your 

dog

for the weekend. Or even to ask them to take care of the dog when you couldn't. But Joey and his friend thought it would be neat to imagine a world where it was the norm for a dog to have multiple owners.

He didn't want to do this writing first. He wanted to look for Mari right away. But he knew he'd get stuck in that search. So he wanted to get the writing out of the way.