[[Man and woman standing by a train]]
Woman: I'm bad at goodbyes. At some level I never think they're for real.
Man: They make me think of T. H. White's Merlin.
Woman: Oh?
Man: He lived backwards, remembering the future and not the past. To him, final goodbyes meant nothing, while first hellos were tearful and bittersweet.
Woman: Huh - so over the years he'd forget all his friends.
Must've been lonely.
Man: Yeah. He ended up just sitting around at home watching DVDs all day. The best was the time he rented 'Memento'...
[[Merlin is sitting in front of a couch, watching TV]]
Merlin: Well, that was straightforward.
{{alt text: I mean, the black-and-white stuff was running backward, but it hardly mattered to the story.}}