Out of This World: Page 11 receiving. Yes, I agree. no husband for me, too. No more needs to be said; they both know that they could recount the same stories, and arrive at the same conclusions. So instead they both laugh. And then Miho frames Halley's new face in both hands and presents it to the bathroom mirror. Halley holds back her astonishment - it is as if they are the same woman, only fifteen years apart. And a few minutes later the thought over-takes her, as the waiter refills her coffee and she drinks distractedly, scalding the roof of her mouth. I must be in love. Paul: He believes there are two kinds of men - men that others talk about, and men who others talk to about other men. He claims residence in the latter camp, but unbeknownst to him he also qualifies for the former. His ignorance of that contributes to his charm. He is decent, helpful, but untested. An entire evening spent listening to horrendous stories about friends who have been unemployed for years, or lovers with leu-kemia, or relatives arrested for arson - he refuses himself any deeper contact with misfortune, angst, trauma. Suspicion: As a child, Miho was sick once, for weeks. Drifting in and out of fever, she remained in bed, but her dreams were like life. Cities with heaven-high skyscrapers and avenues that stretched for miles, seaside towns lit by tavern light at dark, farms in the country where she could hide herself in the growing wheat and whisper with the crickets all night. She could see herself in all these places, or at least versions of herself: maybe shorter hair and simpler clothes here, maybe braces on her teeth there, maybe even a scar or two from unremembered accidents. And then she finally became well, and these flashes of almost-memory subsided. But every