The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

by Michael Chabon

clocks that sat side by side by side on a mantel, disputing the hour.

their show of ordinary mute male farewell, the handshake, the pat on the shoulder, carefully tailoring and modulating their behavior though there was no one at all watching, so finely attuned to the danger of what they might lose that they could not permit themselves to notice what they had.

An ending is an arbitrary thing, an act of cowardice or fatigue,