You squint against the light. It sears painfully. You try and remember how long you've been in here, but it's no use. Time doesn't really exist in the tank.

Have you gotten in the tank before?

You must have. You remember it. Don't you? You're sure you do. 

You press the button and release the glass, stepping out. The disorientation is strong this time around. It's difficult to remember much of anything. 

Julia's waiting for you. You remember her, of course. Vividly. And what does anything else matter?

Her hair is different. Longer. Has it been a while? Have you been away from her for a long time? What an awful thought.

Maybe she's thinking the same thing, because she approaches you quickly. Desperately, almost. "I tried to not do this," she says. "I tried to wait. Stay away. See if I could... give it up." She shakes her head, laughs. Bitterly, a bit, but also defiant. It's the laugh of someone who's accepting a hard truth. "And I couldn't. Can't. Why should I, right?" You're struggling to follow. You want to help, want to be what Julia needs, but she's too frenetic for you to read. 

She makes it easy on you. She kisses you. She turns you around, bends you over the table. She presses into you, hard and fast and without preamble. It hurts, but it's so good to hurt for Julia. She needs to hurt you. You need to let her.

When she leans in over you and drapes something over your head, you're surprised. The plastic wraps snug, bunching tight around your throat, and your body begins to stiffen with involuntary panic. She's cooing something in your ear as she fucks you, the rabid thrusts helping to keep you focused and present. You can't make out her words. Your shallow breaths are all you can hear, that and the hard crackling of the plastic as it constricts tighter and tighter over your face.

As you tug in gasps of air, thinner and thinner and less useful each time, you find yourself thinking this is strangely familiar. You have the sense that this has all happened before. Your lungs burn and ache, agonizing, empty. The breath you pull in has nothing to it, nothing to sate you, nothing to keep you here. You have the sense that you and Julia might just be doing this forever.

And isn't that beautiful?

THE END.