The lonely balloon, as red as a cherub’s face, sailed lazily through the expanse of the heavenly blue.  For some five days and five nights, it had been a helpless passenger on the weariless wings of the wind, journeying approximately one thousand and seventy-two kilometers, or a little over. Day six, and what helium remained was swiftly being delivered into the hands of the roaring Caecias.  Tied to the balloon was a string, a swirling, whirling tendril on this crimson angel; fastened to the string was a note with a name; the name was Amesha Spentas.

The ten year-old boy got the idea from his erudite grandfather one Sunday afternoon.  They had arrived home from church, had a light repast, and settled in for tea when the grandfather finally noticed Amesha’s unusual quiescence.  True, the boy was prescriptively withdrawn, but today it was utterly recherché.

“What’s on your mind, son?” he asked.  A simple question, to be sure, but it teemed with hidden signife.

Amesha was thrown on beam ends, to say the least.  How did his grandfather have this perpetual knack of reading him like a book?  Not anything on your mind - what is on your mind?  A specific question called for a specific answer.  Daring not to lay eyes on his grandfather, he studied the reddish-amber liquid in his cup for perhaps too long.

“Well?” his grandfather said, gently.  He was sitting in his rocking chair, teetering slowly back and forth, but he didn’t lean forward.  Like a shepherd confident that his yeanling would come to him, he simply said, “Amesha?”

At that, the young boy’s gaze fell on his grandfather’s staid and somber eyes.  Deferring was, of course, labor for naught.  Roll the stone up the hill now, and it would simply roll back down again, a work of Sisyphus.  His grandfather had taught him better than that.

Amesha swallowed.  

There wasn’t a good way to say it, he realized, but then the truth is that way sometimes, Laodicean - you just have to spit it out.

“I’m doubting my faith,” he uttered flatly.

Rocking back and forth, his grandfather sipped his tea, and slowly nodded.  Steam curled away from his cup and dissipated in the air between them.

“You were baptized, what, six months ago?”

Amesha nodded.

“Why?”

Quickly, Amesha answered, “To let God know I love him.”

The grandfather shook his head.  “Wrong.”

“Wrong?  What do you mean?”

“Anyone can love God, and it doesn’t require water immersion for him to know it.  You immerse yourself in water to let everyone else know.”

Amesha looked down at his tea, feeling stupid and ashamed, and worst of all, insolent.

“But come now,” his grandfather said.  “Surely there must be a root to this unfortunate dubiety. 

 A worm must burrow into the apple before you can bite through it.”

“Well,” Amesha began softly.  “I won’t lie to you.  I thought things would be...different, after my baptism.”

“Different?”

Amesha nodded.

“But you’re doing fine in the congregation.  Different how?”

Amesha looked up from his tea.  “I have no friends, grandpa,” he said.  “None at all.”

“And you thought getting baptized would make you, what, popular?”

“Not popular, but accepted at the very least.”

The old man nodded.  “I see,” he said.  “Of course, you don’t need me to tell you your motives are a bit widdershins.  To swim in the sea, you must let go of the balsa; without the balsa, you will surely drown.”

“But grandpa, I am a declasse,” cried the boy.  “I’m Ishmael!”

“Now, now,” said the grandfather.  “Even the zebra belongs to a genus; without the genus, how would the kingdom stand?”

Amesha sighed.  He had exposed his problem, but led himself down a blind alley in the process. He didn’t know what to say.  Catechism just wasn’t his metier.

For several minutes, the two of them sat there in silence, sipping tea, trading glances, and listening to the creak of the rocking chair.

Then, the grandfather said, “What’s this really about?”  He paused.  “Is this about...that girl?”

Amesha was dumbstruck.  He truly was transparent, it seemed.  Reluctantly, he nodded.

The grandfather smacked his lips.  “Well,” he said.  “You are only ten.”

“That doesn’t help me,” Amesha replied.

“Hmm,” the grandfather said, scratching his chin.  “Have I ever told you how your grandmother and I met, God bless her soul?”

Amesha thought for a second, then said, “I don’t think so.”

So his grandfather proceeded to tell the tale, that some fifty years ago he found himself adrift in a similar boat.  But that was not how the idea materialized.  It was from a heretical teacher that encouraged her students to conduct a sociological experiment, to connect with someone you’d otherwise never have the opportunity to meet.

“Miss LeFuet, her name was,” said the grandfather, shaking his head, as if lost in a morass of memories.  “A remarkable woman.”

Amesha was confused.  “So...” he said.  “Are you guiding me toward love, or friendship?”

The grandfather smiled the smile of Christ, and said, “If you’re lucky, perhaps both.”

So it was the very next day in the last week of April that young Amesha watched his own messenger disappear in the cirrus-streaked sky.  Whether or not this crimson Gabriel would reach anyone at all, or die trying, seemed entirely up to Parcae, if ever the Fates existed, what better mirror of moria than the wandering breath of Adonai?

Three weeks passed, and his hope began to wane.  He was the first to check the mail everyday right after school.  But everyday, the pillar box contained nothing for the young boy.

Then on the sixth of June (some forty-two days of waiting), a letter came.  The return address said 192 Avichi Street, Ulara, Amesha noticed in wonder.  But there was no name.

Quickly, the boy hurried inside and up to his room, where he carefully consulted a map on his wall.  Ulara...Ulara.  Amesha smacked his forehead in amazement; Ulara was over a thousand from his home here in Sokkvabekk.  His crimson Gabriel had traveled far indeed.

Amesha plopped himself down on his bed, where he sedulously opened the envelope, as if it would self-destruct if he did it wrong, or too fast.

He removed the letter, and instantly the balm of Gilead filled his nose.  He knew all along the odds of his balloon finding a girl were pro rata, but he was a malist by nature, what his grandfather would call a comforter of Job.  But he smiled, relieved, savoring the sweet redolence. 

Definitely a girl.

The letter read as follows:

Dear Amesha,

Amesha couldn’t help but smile.  Not only a girl, but ten also?  Ten!  What were the chances?

He wrote back immediately.  He debated over telling his grandfather, but ultimately decided against it.

Six days later, Silbe replied.

And Amesha wrote back immediately.

And six days later, Silbe replied.

And so it went for several weeks.

And weeks turned into months.

Over the months, the two shared everything about everything, growing together like grapes of the sea ripening on the vine of tenderness.

Then in October, on the first day of October, a letter from Silbe came that said, simply,

I thing we should meet.  What do you think?

He, of course, wanted to meet her desperately, but the mere prospect of seeing her in the flesh made him instantly green around the gills.  And he didn’t know why.

“Perhaps shedding the anonymity of the epistolary relationship is opening your eyes to the reality of the situation,” his grandfather offered.

Amesha shrugged.  “Perhaps.”

“And you’ve only come to me now...because?”

Amesha shrugged again.  “I don’t know, really.  I guess I just wanted her all to myself.  Doesn’t everybody need a secret?”

“Arcanum arcanorum is the cloak of Robin Goodfellow,” the grandfather said sagely.

“So, what are you saying?”

“What do you think I’m saying?”

“Are you saying I can’t meet her?”

“No.”

“Are you saying I can, then?”

“No.”

Amesha winced, utterly confused.

“What I’m saying, son, is this: whether I say yes, or whether I say no, you’re still going to do what you want.  You’re asking for absolution for something you haven’t even done yet.  I can be your Polonius no more.  This is not my decision to make.”

Amesha took that as a yes, and sent the letter off.

Six days later, Silbe replied;

Yes, Amesha replied.  But where will we meet, exactly?

                                           Kisses,

October seventeenth, and young Amesha Spentas was dressed in his best suit with red tie.  And as sick as a dog.

Well, he had most of the day to prepare what he was going to say; it was a four and a half hour trip on the omni to Leh, a small town where the park was located.  Too much time, really, Amesha thought, resting his head against the vibrating window.  His breath came out in splotches, smearing his reflection, and somewhere between douceur and existential woe, the young boy was lost in the Land of Nod.

When he awoke, he was there.  He stepped off the omni, and followed the main street to Orcus Avenue, paying close attention to his map.

Stygian Creek was hardly more than a loblolly, a ditch of weeds and muck, that encircled the entire park.  But there was a tiny bridge that spanned it.  Amesha took a deep breath, and crossed.

It was a typical park, albeit badly maintained.  The merry-go-round, seesaw, slide and swings, all chipped and rusted, comprised the area.  Haggard trees here and there stood hunched over half-rotten picnic tables, the branches nearly barren, outstretched like gigantean fingers. 

Everything could’ve used a fresh coat of paint; the floor of the park a raking and mowing.  It was hardly the Elysian Fields.

Somewhere in the distance, Amesha heard the cry of a single crow, the skreigh of a timeworn chain, and suddenly he was no longer alone.  He looked down at his watch; it was six o’clock exactly.  

Someone was sitting on the swings, a girl in a black dress, slowly swinging back and forth like a gentle pendulum.  He approached nervously, but steadily, like she was the axis of his heart, the lodestar of a vast and nebulous world.

“Silbe...?”  he called out, squinting, drawn ever closer.

“Amesha.”

Closer, he stopped dead in his tracks, the sails lowered, the anchor dropped.

“Amesha, just let me explain, okay?”

He didn’t say anything, couldn’t.

“Amesha?”

The girl in the black dress got up from the swing and traversed the distance between them.

“It is me,” she said, taking his hands in her own.  “Don’t be angry, okay?  Don’t leave.”

“But you’re...”

“Sixteen,” she finished.  “Well, fifteen, technically, but sixteen in actuality.  I was afraid if you knew the truth you wouldn’t come.  Don’t be angry.  Are you angry?”

He didn’t know what to say.  Standing there, holding her hands, the sun a sliver of orange behind her, staring at her face, it as if words were inexsistent.  She was an ebon-haired angel cast loose.

“I’m not angry,” he finally said.  “To tell you the truth, I’m just glad you turned out to be a girl. All this time I feared I was in love with a pedophilliac.”

Silbe chuckled.  “Women can be pedophiles too,” she said.

“That’s true.”

“Come,” she said, leading him by the hands to the swings.  “Let us talk of other things.”

They both sat down and kicked backward lightheartedly.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were so cute?” asked Silbe.

Amesha blushed.  “You never asked,” he said.  “Why didn’t you tell me you were so beautiful?”

She smiled.  “You never asked.”

She was beautiful, he thought.  Exquisite.  “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“Does this...change things?”

“You mean the age difference?”  She looked off in the distance.  “Not for me.  Does it for you?”

“Hmm.  I don’t know.”

“Look at it this way,” Silbe said.  “Now you have a girlfriend with a nice set of nenes and a nappy yoni.”

Amesha blushed.

“Aww,” she said.  “You see, you are such a pure heart.”

“I’m only ten,” Amesha said.  “Give me time, and I’m sure I’ll be a regular base-minded knave.”

“Oh no.  Don’t ever change.  It’s adorable.  Besides, once a pure heart, always a pure heart.”

“You think?”

“Yep,” she said.  “Unless of course you were Satan.”  She chuckled.  “Hey, what time do you have?”

Amesha glanced at his watch.  “Six oh eight.”

“Okay.  Six oh eight.  You never answered the question, you know.”

“About the age difference?  I said I didn’t know,” Amesha said.

Silbe looked down and rearranged the puckery in her dress.  “I’m not wearing any skivvies,” she whispered, looking at him with a gleam of dalliance in her eyes.  “If that helps.”

Amesha fought not to blush again, but his mind got the best of him, and his face encrimsoned like port-wine.  Not exactly sure where this coquetry was going, Amesha said, “You know, I’ve never even kissed a girl.”

“I know.  But who said anything about kissing?” she said, smiling scampishly.

From somewhere inside her glorious bosom there rose a deep but delicate giggle.  “You know what you are?  A clean slate, an unblemished dove,” she said, tapping his nose.  “I love doves.” 

And her rubicund lips spread to bear the grin of a chessy-cat.

Sitting there on the swings, they alternated back and forth, like two oscillators of flesh and blood. Whenever they fell out of unison, Amesha would adjust his momentum accordingly, so that they fell back in sync.  Back and forth, back and forth, two unlikely horologists of vis vitae, watching a jaded sun chase ragged shadows across the Park of Peccancy.

“What time do you have?” Silbe asked him.

Amesha glanced at his watch.  “Six twenty-one,” he replied.

“Oooh,” she said, rubbing her hands together.  “One more minute.”

“One more minute till what?” asked Amesha.

“Till my birthday, silly.  Or did you forget?”

“October seventeenth,” Amesha said.  “No, I didn’t forget.  At six twenty-two precisely?”

“You didn’t forget, eh?”

“No.  Thought I reckon the actual birthdate is different than you told me...”

“Well,” she said, trailing off.  “You didn’t forget, but brought me no present, I see.  Hmm.”

“No,” he said.  “I don’t, um, celebrate birthdays.  Didn’t I tell you that?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Oh,” he said.  “Sorry.”

“Why not?”

“Why didn’t I tell you, or why don’t I celebrate them?”

“Both.”

Amesha thought for a second.  “Hmm,” he said.

“You don’t even know?” she asked, giggling.

“Well, I thought I did until you asked me.”  He looked down at his watch.  “Ten seconds,” he 

reported.

“So...what religion are you, then?”

“Five seconds.”

“You’re not one of those Jehovah Witnesses, are you?”

“Six twenty-two,” Amesha said.

At that, Silbe leaped from the swing, and cried out, “Sweet sixteen,” spinning and whirling like a dervish, her dress fluttering up around the bare curves of her hips.  “Am I a woman now?” she asked, raising her eyes to the growing twilight.

Amesha flushed Titian-red.  She certainly looked like a woman, he thought.

“Come,” she said, taking him by the hands.  Together, they reclined on the teeter-totters, and watched the fainting sun pull the last of its glow across the dusk-smeared door of heaven.  Silbe sighed.  “Demi-jour,” she whispered.  “The blood of life.”

One by one the stars poked through the canopy of the sky.  The two of them laid there, hands clasped to one another’s, contented in somber silence.

“So...what religion are you, then?”  Silbe asked, turning to look at him.

Amesha cleared his throat, buying fragile time.  “Why do you ask?” he said.  “What religion are you?”

“I asked you first.”

“I asked you second.  Ladies go first.”

“Okay,” she said, turning back to the sky.  “I used to be chthonian, since you ask.”

“Chthonian?”

“Diablerie, basically,” she said flatly.  “Black magic, witchcraft, Satanism, whatever you want to call it.”

Amesha chuckled.  “No, seriously,” he said.

“I am serious,” she told him.

A couple seconds passed, but all he could say was, “Oh,” slowly loosening his grip on the soft confines of her hand.

“It’s no big deal,” Silbe said.  “I mean, I came to my senses.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah.”

“So, what are you now?  Catholic?” he asked with a wince.

“No,” she said.  “Atheist.”

Amesha fell off the seesaw.  “Atheist!” he exclaimed.  “My God, girl, what’re you trying to do to me?!”

“What’s the problem?” she asked, sitting up.

“What’s the problem?!  You don’t believe in God, that’s the problem!”

“So what?  Lots of people don’t believe in God.”

Amesha walked back to the swings, shaking his head in shocked disbelief.

“What’s the big deal?” Silbe asked, coming over to him.  “It may change how you look at me, but it doesn’t change who I am.”

“How I perceive you is who you are,” Amesha told her.  “What else do I have to go on?”

“So, I take it you believe in God...”

“Of course!”

“How could you?”

“How could I not?”

“Look around you, Amesha,” she said, spreading her arms wide.  “This world is a horrible place. 

The only god you could possibly believe in would be a god of atrocity.  Look at what he did to your father, your mother, your grandmother.  That’s a god of love?”

Amesha sighed.  “It’s...complicated.”

“Says the gobe-mouches.”

“No, it really is,” he retorted.  “You’ve read the Bible, I’m sure.”

“Yes, but I had to stop,” she said.  “The more I read it, the more I believed a loving god does not exist.  And a god without love is like a day without the sun.  It’s argumentum ad hominem; logical fallacy.”

“Well...”

“Just look at it rationally,” she said.  “Do you know what the devil spells backwards?  Until you embrace the devil, you haven’t truly lived.”

“But you don’t believe in a god, neither good nor evil.”

“Well...it’s complicated,” she said.

“Says the nodding niais.”

“Look,” she said.  “God according to worldly concept cannot exist.  But I refuse to believe in a nefarious deity who gains sadistic pleasure from our misery.  I’ve been down that road.  It’s a terribly sad way of seeing the world.”

Amesha sighed.  “I’m confused,” he admitted.

“Don’t be,” she told him.  “Don’t be.  If it’s one thing my grandam LeFuet taught me, it’s that you can’t make sense out of a senseless world.  It’s like picking a plum from an apple tree.  It’s not going to happen.”

“So...you’re a nihilist.”

“Essentially.  But how I do loathe titles.”

“So...nothing matters,” Amesha said flatly.

“Who knows?  Maybe your balloon never really found anybody at all.  Maybe you’ve imaged all of this.  I could be a figment of your imagination.  You could be a figment of mine.  It’s funny.  For a long time, I used to think the world was a drawing, and everything I saw was what the audience was seeing somewhere in a great lyceum, teaching the young children the fundamentals of human nature, and perhaps the properties of light, and...”

Amesha just looked at her.  He felt shame, but didn’t know if it was for her, or himself.  Seeing her bathed in the soft starlight, she truly was the devil and the deep blue sea.

Eventually, they moved to the merry-go-round, and laid down between the bars.  For a long time, he laid there next to her, holding her clammy hand, and fought the chill of the night, listening to her talk circles within circles as they spun lazily on a metal disk fixed to a rotating earth, revolving around a sun, circumambulating the center of a galaxy, wheeling aimlessly among a million other spiraling galaxies through a universe poised like a pale of tears on the fickle finger of God.

The next day was Sunday.  Amesha and his grandfather had gotten home from church, had a light repast, and settled in for tea, when the old man asked,

“So, how did it go with your...mystery girl?”

“Silbe?  All right, I suppose.”

“I noticed you talking with that one girl today, after the sermon...”

Amesha nodded.

“Silbe, eh?”  He used to be so good at anagrams...

“Grandpa, was grandma the only girl you’ve ever loved?”

The grandfather shook his head.  “No,” he said, almost sadly, lost again in that morass of memories.  “A long time ago, I thought I was in love, before I met your grandmother, of course, God bless her soul.  She was an older woman, and I was her bodhi tree, you could say.  An unconventional woman, way ahead of her time, but I cared for her as deeply as any boy could.  

She was ostracized, naturally, and moved far away with the only proof that our love ever existed.”  He paused, then said.  “But I never would’ve met your grandmother if it wasn’t for her, and you and I surely wouldn’t be sitting here having tea.”

“But how do you know if a girl likes you?”  Amesha thought for a second, then said, “Better yet, how do you know if you like a girl?”

“Like?”

“Love.”

“Well,” his grandfather said.  “It’s like faith.  It can be strong, or it can be weak.  It either exists, 

or it doesn’t, but you know by its works.  Love without works is dead.”

After a pause, the old man said, “So, are you?  In love, I mean.”

Amesha shrugged.  “I don’t know.  I thought I was.”

“Let me ask you a different question: do you think God loves you?”

The boy shrugged again.  He reflected back over the course of the last year; feeling left out, getting baptized, and still feeling left out; finding Silbe and meeting her face to face.  It all felt like some huge test, and there was no way to know if he passed or failed.  But as to whether God loved him?  “Well,” he said.  “If he does, I honestly don’t know why.”

The grandfather smiled that smile of Christ, and, taking a sip of tea, said, “I think that’s the best answer any of us could make.”