you can feel it, and know that it’s there.”
“That’s a cop-out answer, Mia, and you know it.”
I bite back my annoyance. “Why does it matter to you?” I ask. “How does someone’s faith affect you?”
“It doesn’t,” he says, shrugging. “It’s just bullshit, is all.”
He sits there, quiet, relaxed, almost bored. Meanwhile, I’m agitated and frustrated because who the heck is he to judge what I believe. I hop down and stand in front of him, because I want to see him properly, and I want him to see me, to hear me. “What if faith isn’t about believing in one God,” I say quietly. “What if it’s about believing that there’s good in this world, and it may not be right in front of you, and it may not be happening right now, but you know it’s coming… because you believe. You believe that there has to be something better because you’re here, and you’re alive, and there has to be a reason for it.” I watch his Adam’s apple shift with his swallow. “Take this as an example. Earlier this year, in Sydney, Australia, five kids were walking on the sidewalk to go to a corner store or something. A drunk driver lost control of his vehicle and hit all five of them. Four of them died. Three of them were siblings. In one devastating accident, a mother and father lost all their children. You know why they can wake up every day and continue to live? Because they have faith, and because of that faith, they don’t have it in them to hate that driver. They chose to forgive him, and that level of forgiveness isn’t human, Leo. It has to come from something divine.”
“Mia,” he sighs, and he’s still shaking his head, a forever non-believer.
“Okay, how about this: Take a girl”—I choke on the words—“whose parents abandoned her the first chance they got, and she spent her entire childhood thinking there was something wrong with her. That she wasn’t smart enough, or pretty enough, or thin enough, and no matter what she did, they never fucking came back for her.”
Leo’s breaths are ragged as he turns to me, his eyes filled with pity.
“What if faith is all that someone has, Leo?”
“Mia…” he says through a heavy exhale, his hand reaching up to cup my face.
I lean into his touch. “You don’t think there’s a reason someone found my bike on the church steps when I left that night?” I ask him. “How about Laney? You said it was a miracle she survived, right? Or how about the night you nearly drove us over the cliff edge? I saw you, Leo. I saw you looking up at the stars, and your lips were moving, and you were talking to someone.” I press my lips to his palm and then grasp it in both my hands. “Who were you talking to, Leo?”
He shakes his head because he doesn’t want to admit it.
“Who?” I push.
“My mom,” he murmurs.
“Right.” I nod. “So your mom’s body, her soul, it’s not rotting six feet underground. At least that’s not what you want to believe.”
“Of course I don’t want to believe that, Mia. Shit.”
“And those flowers in the field…”
His eyes narrow. “What about them?”
“You said it yourself, they were surrounded by weeds and dirt, and they had no business being there. But they were, Leo. In a place you went to almost daily. You—just you. They were there, and they got your attention enough to remember what shade of yellow they are. Yellow… your mom’s favorite color.”
He stares at me, his breaths short, shallow, and then he leans in, kissing my forehead just once before clearing his throat. “So what? You think it’s a sign or something?” His voice cracks. “A sign for what?”
I pull back. “That’s not for me to decide, Leo. It could be nothing. It could be everything. Whatever you want to believe.”
He laughs once and then pulls me into him, his hands stroking my bare arms. “You’re freezing,” he says, and it’s his way of telling me he’s done talking about it. But I know him. I know he’ll be thinking about it, stewing it over in that complicated mind of his. He runs the pads of his fingers down my arms until his hands meet mine, and then he lifts them both, cups them in his and brings them up to his mouth. I watch as his lips part, his breath slow as it leaves him, warming my hands.