8
" I don’t want to suggest that I was listening to or even overhearing the conversation the two of you were having. I am not the sort of man to eavesdrop. I would say, however, your words did seem almost to float on the air from your table across to my own, which in any case is a short distance, and, having arrived, they were, I would say, impossible not to hear, just as one would have no choice whether to hear a car backfire, or a bird sing. Very difficult not to hear, if one can hear, if one has ears; it’s involuntary, you see. We hear things whether we want to or not, and in this way the words you were speaking to one another entered my ears "
― Daniel Wallace , The Kings and Queens of Roam
14
" Ming Kai gasped for air, a breath he didn’t seem to exhale, and his eyes fluttered shut. “He’s dead,” his replacement wife said, not without a little sadness. “He’s dead.” A moment passed, that silent moment when the soul leaves the body. Or, rather, when it’s supposed to. “No,” Ming Kai said, eyes still closed. “Not dead. Sleeping so I can dream.” “Damn you,” said his replacement wife. “Damn damn damn you. "
― Daniel Wallace , The Kings and Queens of Roam