her lips, only to be lost in the wind. “Well, I think it’s clever.”
Wisps of hair blew across her face, but she did nothing about them. Rather than tuck them behind her ears, she just let them fly around while she smiled to herself, silently taking in the scenery before her.
Once we made it through the low-speed zone, I gunned it, practically gliding across the water in the hopes of getting there faster. The entire time we sped toward the center of the lake, she held onto the console with one hand and my T-shirt with the other. I couldn’t help but think that if she held onto me like that all the time, I’d never slow down. Unfortunately, though, I had to. As we neared the shining steeple standing tall out of the water, I let off the throttle until we came to an idling speed.
“What is that?” Kenny asked in awe, with her mouth just as wide as her eyes.
I pointed ahead of us, directly at the steeple, and began to explain as if I were leading a tour. “That’s the church. Well, technically, what’s left of it. Initially, it was this tiny stone building that stood in the very center of the town. It was maybe thirty feet by thirty feet, but it rose high into the sky like a watchtower. The brass steeple that you can see from here used to have a massive bell that hung beneath it, and the entire dome was open.
“As the town got bigger, the church had to be expanded to hold more people. Instead of knocking it down and rebuilding, they simply added onto the original tower, making it into the shape of a cross. And what used to be the original church, the center of the new one, became the pulpit. But because of the steeple and giant bell that hung above it, the entire church was dark inside, regardless of how bright it was outside.”
“They didn’t expect that when they decided to make it bigger?”
Noticing how much closer we were, and knowing how much more of the story I had to tell, I pulled back on the throttle, practically cutting the engine altogether. “I guess not. They probably assumed that opening the ceiling that led to the steeple would fix the problem. Except it didn’t.”
Enamored with my retelling of the church’s history, she asked, “What did they do?”
I’d recited this tale so often I could easily convince someone I had lived in Chogan and had attended this church. But for some reason, narrating it to Kenny made it feel like the first time I’d ever told the story.
“They removed the bell and enclosed the top with glass. You might not be able to see it now, but when we get closer, you’ll notice that there’s not much left of the stained glass. Thanks to the river and the way the dams work, the flow of water has ruined more than half of it—the rest of the damage is due to being buried beneath a lake for the last forty-some-odd years.”
The boat followed the current as it drifted toward the steeple without much interference from me. And as we grew closer, her focus became more intense, her attention glued to the tarnished brass that stood proudly through the water’s surface.
“Did that work?” It was like she’d held her breath while waiting for the answer.
“Yeah.” I, too, found myself unable to take my attention away from the historic landmark. “After that, no matter where the sun was in the sky, the entire church lit up.” I leaned down, bringing my lips closer to her ear, and added, “Everywhere except in the very center of the pulpit.”
“Wait…what?” There was no denying how absorbed she was in my story.
“You heard me. The entire church was regularly bathed in sunlight…except for the very center, the pulpit, the only remaining part of the original church.”
“But why?”
“There’s actually a myth about it. I have no idea where it came from or how long it’s been told, but apparently, if you stood at the podium beneath the dome and the sunlight landed on you, it meant that your guardian angel was watching.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” she argued with the bridge of her nose scrunched. “The whole thing is glass; how would the sun not shine on you?”
“You’ll see when we get inside.”
Kenny turned on her heel and faced me with shock and maybe a hint of horror in her slightly obscured expression. “We’re going inside? Are