They floated on a little way.

"Are you sure now that I'm real?" she asked.

"If you want me to be honest, no," he replied. "But I want very much to
believe it."

"Then listen to me," she said, leaning toward him. "I'm real." She
slipped her arms around his neck. "I've always been real. I always will
be real. You want proof? Well, I know I'm real. So do you. What more
can you ask?"

He stared at her for a long moment, felt her warm arms around his neck,
listened to her breathing. He could smell the fragrance of her skin and
hair, the unique essence of an individual.

Slowly he said, "I believe you. I love you. What - what is your name?"

She thought for a moment. "Joan."

"Strange," he said. "I always dreamed of a girl named Joan. What's your
last name?"

She kissed him.

Overhead, the swallows he had created - _his_ swallows - wheeled in wide
circles above the lagoon, his fish darted aimlessly to and fro, and his
city stretched, proud and beautiful, to the edge of the twisted lava
mountains.

"You didn't tell me your last name," he said.

"Oh, that. A girl's maiden name never matters - she always takes her
husband's."

"That's an evasion!"

She smiled. "It is, isn't it?"