“But I never did escape from this plot-driven world into a more congenial, subtly probable, innerly propelled narrative of my own devising--didn't make it to the airport,...--and that was because in the taxi I remembered a political cartoon I'd seen in the British papers when I was living in London during the Lebanon war, a detestable cartoon of a big-nosed Jew, his hands meekly opened out in front of him and his shoulders raised in a shrug as though to disavow responsibility, standing atop a pyramid of dead Arab bodies. Purportedly a caricature of Menachem Begin, then prime minister of Israel, the drawing was, in fact, a perfectly realistic, unequivocal depiction of a kike as classically represented in the Nazi press. The cartoon was what turned me around. Barely ten minutes out of Jerusalem, I told the driver to take me back to the King David Hotel.”

“So are you turning out like them? Do you still write and draw?""yeah, but I don't do anything personnal or profound. My parents take life way to seriousely. I lke to make people laugh. I had a regular cartoon feature in the school news paper and created some for the year book. Social satire stuff. I've done a couple of political cartoons for wisteria's paper and just got one accepted in Easton's, which has a much bigger circulation. Impressed?”

“The cartoon me writes the books cartoon people read in the cartoon world, because they need things to read there too.”

“I saw this cartoon in the paper, once. That Viking, Hagar the Horrible? He’s standing on the mountaintop, holding his hands to the heavens, shouting “Why me?” And down from the heavens comes the answer: “Why not?” Maybe that’s the ultimate truth; what right to do I have to expect a smooth ride?”

“She was around ten minutes late, as a matter of fact. I didn't give a damn, though. All that crap they have in cartoons in the Saturday Evening Post and all, showing guys on street corners looking sore as hell because their dates are late - that's bunk. If a girl looks swell when she meets you, who gives a damn if she's late? Nobody.”

“Yes,” I told him. “I think the guy playing the Pirate King was awesome.”He stopped where he was.“What?” I asked, frowning at the big smile on his face.“I didn’t say I liked the Pirate King,” he told me.“Oh.” I closed my eyes—and there he was. A warm, edgy presence right on the edge of my perception. When I opened my eyes, he was standing right in front of me. “Cool,” I told him. “You’re back.”He kissed me leisurely. When he was finished, I was more than ready to head home. Fast.“You make me laugh,” he told me seriously.”