“Let's chow, and then we'll get our books," Tony said. Just as the door was about to close behind us, he added, "You act like you've never had food before.”

“It gets you thinking about all the parts in a story we never see" --he cleared his throat-- "the parts around the edges. You bring someone like that boy so alive before us and there he is set loose in our world so that we can't stop thinking of him. But then the report is over, the boy disappears. He was just a boy in a story and we never know the ending, we never get to close the book. It makes you wonder what happens to the people in them after the story stops--all the stories you've reported for instance. Where are they all now?”

“Let books take you somewhere you've never been before”

“I had one last try."Does it bother you that I'm not a virgin?" He hesitated a moment before answering."Well, no," he said slowly, "so long as it doesna bother you that I am." He grinned at my drop-jawed expression, and backed toward the door."Reckon one of us should know what they're doing," he said. The door closed softly behind him; clearly the courtship was over.”

“Let's talk about nothing. Look me in the eyes. I'll swim into yours. And we'll just smile. Enough for the whole world to crash behind us.”

“Just stay close to us. If we get in trouble, we'll kill everything.”