The executive headquarters of Deities Limited, as far as science goes, doesn’t exist. It has no discernible mass or energy and doesn’t interact with anything, so, to our less-than-perfect powers of observation, it’s not there. At least, not in any “there” we can perceive. The only way to imagine it, even though its physical nature is nothing like this, is to picture a quadrillion-story office building.

Linda always got the aisle seat. She liked having easy access to the bathroom and to the flight attendants.

Frank always took the window seat. He liked not talking to anyone and watching the world go on below as if he weren’t a part of it.

Herbert and Marilyn walked into the newest diner in town, The Brown Bag. A yellow GRAND OPENING banner hung the length of the wall behind the hostess stand and a greasy smell of overdone French fries lingered in the air. Herbert trudged to the front and put his name on the list. The hostess said it would be a few minutes. He headed back to the door and plopped down on a bench next to Marilyn.

At 18,000 miles, when my hair was still blondish, Dad flung me the keys to the ’53 DeSoto Powermaster. It was a voluptuous sedan, with a heavy chrome grille, painted in a deep red color that Dad called “Sophia Loren’s lipstick.” I was fifteen. It was a Sunday, and we were still wearing our suits from church. I didn’t know why he’d done it since the car was only a few years old, but it was my first ride, and I worked that beast all over Peoria—up and down the same streets—counting how many green lights I could rush through without finding a red one.