Wouldnt It Be Good - Nik Kershaw <Instant • 2025>

Alistair looked up and saw Julian. He didn’t scream. He didn't call the police. He just looked at Julian’s cheap, damp coat and his worn-out shoes.

Julian looked at the man he had envied for months. He realized that while he was looking up, wishing for the shoes, the man wearing them was looking down, wishing for the escape of being nobody. Wouldnt It Be Good - Nik Kershaw

He found Alistair in the living room, slumped on a designer sofa that cost more than Julian’s yearly salary. There were no guests. No laughter. Just a stack of legal documents and a half-empty bottle of gin. Alistair was staring at a photograph of a woman, his eyes rimmed with red, his hands shaking so violently he could barely hold his glass. Alistair looked up and saw Julian

One evening, through a fluke of a broken service elevator and a misplaced key, Julian found himself standing in the hallway of the penthouse floor. The door to Alistair’s unit was ajar. Driven by a desperate, feverish curiosity, Julian slipped inside. He just looked at Julian’s cheap, damp coat

"You look like you sleep," Alistair said, his voice a gravelly wreck. "I haven't slept in three weeks. They’re taking the company. They’re taking the house. And she’s already gone."