The opening line has attracted much attention among the literati for quite some time, and I am delighted to come up with a splendid one at long last: “The End.”

Addendum (May 25, 2019)

After some reflection, this could also be the closing line. Wow! To heighten the drama to the hilt, it could be the one and only line, as well. Indeed, this would be the winner. That is, fiction brought to its happy end after centuries of wandering, not to mention all the clueless drifting, fumbling, and raucous careening. But the quotation marks remain essential no matter what. Hey, whose words were these? Was this in earnest or was it only fiction, if not a mere joke? If these words came from on high, what happened afterwards? And so on, and so forth. Fiction past compare, I dare say with a barely visible smirk on my crumpled face.