Janet Burroway, a finalist in Narrative’s Fourteenth Annual Poetry Contest and First Place winner in the 2017 Winter Story Contest, is the author of numerous novels, including The Buzzards, Raw Silk, and Bridge of Sand. Her work also includes short fiction, plays, poetry, essays, texts for dance, and children’s books. In addition, she coauthored Writing Fiction, the most widely used creative writing text in America. Burroway is the Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor Emerita at Florida State University.

Long Time No See

A One-Act Play

by Janet Burroway

Starbucks. Loveseat, chair, coffee table. Wendell, thirty years old, in sweats, shabby running shoes, and a three-day beard, sits hunched over a cappuccino and the classifieds. He reads intently, circles an item or two, is discouraged, then persists.

She enters, burdened with coffee, pastry bag, handbag, portfolio, and jacket but managing. At twenty-eight, she is ravishing: slender, smart suit, high heels, lots of hair, dangling earrings—a knockout.


SHE

Is this free? D’you mind if I . . . ?


WENDELL

(Grudging.) Help yourself. (Sees her.) Please.
People on couch
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