Fiction, consumed incautiously, eventually bleeds into reality. I used to watch Naruto on Thursday evenings after school. It was always a huge relief to leave the serious, entangled world of high school and puberty and gossip for twenty-three action-packed minutes of animated ninjas beating the crap out of each other. For one half of one hour each week my mind was translocated to a place with rules I could understand and interactions I could follow, and so I became obsessed. I remember discussing the Sasuke-Itachi showdown with the same grave, hushed tones that most people reserved for the kind of events that involve the police. I could (and still can) make hand signs with disturbing fluency. No, I promise I can, check this out—wait, where are you going??