You hear stories. Stories are, for one, an exquisitely simple way to organize things. And even stories like, “boy meets girl, girl wants boy, they get married and have children,” even the boring ones make you want to hear what happens at the end. Then there are those stories where you dread the ending you can sense is approaching, that you hear and you hope they aren’t true, though what makes them so effective is that somewhere, you believe that they did really happen, to somebody. There are stories that are fantastic, and not all do all doubt that they ever really happened: Christ, many believe, rose from the dead, without any earthly intervention; Muhammad was supposedly given the whole of the Qur’an by the angel Jibreel; Elijah was said to have been swept up to heaven in a whirlwind. And perhaps these go to the quick of the story’s very essence: they make you want to believe. If only for a little while, and perhaps, the part of you — however small — that is still a child. Which wide-eyed, still has a world to discover.