"I must confess to having wondered on occasion why they don't behave more wisely," Raphael replied politely.

"There it is again," the Creator said, looking vexed. "Raphael, I wish you'd stop using that phrase."

"My Lord, I'm sorry. What phrase?"

"'I must confess.' . . . I'd rather not hear that again."

"Of course, My Lord," Raphael said without rancor. "I shall do as You ask."

"Yes. . . . I know," his Master answered wearily. "Well, I'll tell you why they do it, Rafe. It's because they're so terribly thirsty for some shred of proof that they matter-that they even really exist." The Creator looked away and shook His head. "I did My own share of roaring around wrecking things, I suppose. Just got wilder and wilder in My desperation to be 'real,' until, finally, I pulled that stunt with the comet." The Creator scowled at the memory. "Pouf!" He sighed. "No more dinosaurs. There wasn't even anyone to apologize to. You can't imagine what it felt like to be that lonely.

"In a fit of desperation, I took all the best things about myself; creativity, intelligence-though you'd never have known it from that comet stunt-beauty, immortality, consciousness, everything I could think of including free will, and I made you, Raphael, and all your brothers and sisters, including Lucifer. Then I stood back and said, 'Surprise Me! I dare you!' " Raphael's Master stopped walking, and gave him a sympathetic look. "I must confess, My friend, that Lucifer was the only one who did.

"Don't get Me wrong, Rafe. You make My heart swell with pride and affection every day. But you all did exactly what I wanted you to, all the time, except for Lucifer. He'd hardly opened his eyes before he started looking around and making 'suggestions.' This tree was crooked. That sky was a jarring color. Those creatures were as ugly as sin, though I had no idea what that was then." The Creator smiled ruefully. "It bugged the hell out of Me, at first. But it was also fun to have someone I could finally really argue with." The Creator's smile faded. "I think it bothered him terribly that no one ever took his side. The rest of you were always thanking Me, and telling Me what a wonderful job I was doing. Maybe that's what finally drove him to try making company of his own."

Raphael hoped his Master didn't expect him to feel sympathy for Lucifer. He'd convinced plenty of angels to take his side in the end, and look what it had cost them all.

"He couldn't create things out of nothing, of course," the Creator continued. "Even in My most reckless adolescent moments, I'd known enough to leave certain fail-safes in place. So he found a pair of foraging apes, happily minding their own business, and gave them half the things I'd given him, including his contrary nature. Not enough to make them his equals, of course, just enough to make them conscious of his own superiority, and articulate enough to tell him he was right."

This Raphael remembered all too well. What a storm there had been in Heaven when his Master had found out!

"Remember how miserable the poor creatures were?" the Creator said sadly. "Reason? Consciousness? What did they want with all that? Eve suddenly convinced she had a weight problem? Adam looking at the elephant's penis, and the boar's, then down at his own? What a mess.

"If Lucifer had just stepped up and owned his mistake, I suspect we'd have patched things up. But his pride would not allow it. To err is one thing, but to go down there and tell the poor creatures it was their fault! Well, you'll remember how I hit the fan then, I'm sure. The rest . . . is history, I suppose.

"You know how much time I spent down here trying to fix the massive neurosis Lucifer had inflicted on those sad innocents. But they were too convinced I was angry at them to trust Me. I tried reassuring them. I tried jokes. I even tried punishing them, hoping they'd feel expiated and leave it behind. But nothing worked. . . . And that's when it hit Me, Rafe."

Raphael saw his Master's face grow radiant with excitement. The wind picked up speed, and he heard the mountain groan and rumble at its roots.

"I remember standing on a hill one day, watching them burn down each other's little villages, all trying to shove their own shame onto others' shoulders, just as Lucifer had done to them, and suddenly thinking, 'Oh my God! They really are totally out of control! Even Mine!' Raphael, as awful as I felt about what they were doing, I could not have been happier about what they were! I swear, Rafe, if Lucifer could just have stopped trying to eradicate his shame by getting rid of them all, I might have invited him back with open arms and a hero's welcome!"

This assertion made Raphael quite uncomfortable, but his was not to question.

"Of course, this hardly excused Me from addressing all the damage My own angel had inflicted. So I hung around, trying to shove them back on course: forcing them to apologize when they'd maimed someone, thwarting their little wars, telling them over and over that they couldn't be God no matter how angry they were, scaring the crap out of them when it was necessary. Let's face it, Rafe, I was a world-class party pooper, and yet the most amazing thing happened! A few of the little buggers began to get what I was after, and, Rafe, they liked Me!"

Raphael's Master smiled a childlike, almost silly smile that, for a moment, tempted Raphael to jealousy of poor mortal humanity. The wind died suddenly away, as if the very mountain held its breath. The Creator's eyes were suddenly agleam with unshed tears. "Love. My greatest creation took Me completely by surprise."

"But . . . I do not mean to contradict You, Master," Raphael said, hesitant after his earlier "I must confess," gaffe, "but, how could Your own creation take You by surprise?"

"Oh, I created the things that created love," his Lord replied. "But, while I was more than able to make them obey Me, nobody made them like Me, not even Me! This wasn't just an empty imitation. It was the real thing! Don't you see? They chose, Rafe!

"Well, I saw right off that the whole thing had to stay free, or none of it would be real. You can't control the bad stuff and pretend the rest is spontaneous. So I backed off. I still do what I can, of course. I'm not one to leave the building before the fire's out, especially when I helped set it. But even knowing too certainly that I exist would kill the whole thing. Like what you said earlier, why would you lie to Me? Why would you try? You wouldn't, even though you could. And I don't really want you lying to Me, Rafe. But, in another way, you'll never love Me the way they do-the ones that do love Me, at least."

He gave Raphael a reassuring smile, and being what he was, the angel accepted the truth without discontent.

"So you see, Rafe, I could make that perfect world Lucifer imagines, where everyone always does just what they're supposed to-a world where no one had any option but to believe and obey." The Creator smiled sadly. "To do it, I would only have to murder choice, and with that, any real being, and, with those, love itself. But, I won't murder love, Rafe, just to conquer hate, however tidy the corpse. Unlike my angry angel, I have known eternity in that lonely void. If Lucifer's part in refining my creation is ever finished, I may give him that perfect world he claims to crave, but he'll be its only truly living citizen, and, trust Me, Rafe, he'll complain. Bitterly."

17.

( Waking ) . . . and stare into the embers

searching for some mislaid compass,

until, grown warm and drowsy,

I surrender to the press of blankets

drawn and tucked around me

by deft and unseen servants

of the soft, suppressing night.

Joby stared at the poem he'd been crafting, as if some final stanza might magically appear to resolve the riddle tugging at his metaphorical shirt-sleeves. Ever since his hike with Jupiter, Joby had been haunted by thoughts of the boy's easy laughter, adventurous spirit, and utter lack of self-doubt, until, by now, the bright sap that seemed to flow through all his students here had him feeling such desperate need of some defining answer to a question he could hardly name that he'd started writing poetry again for the first time since college! Things were that bad-here-where everything was always good!

With a sigh and a crooked smile, Joby set his pencil down, pulled on his coat, and set off for one of his now frequent after-work wanders on the headlands. Was there enough of whatever fuel had once burned within him to ignite again? Could he still shine as brightly as his students did? Had he ever been as luminous in youth as they were, or did he only wish he had been now? The more he struggled to remember, the less certain he became.

Gotta leave the path, Jupiter had told him. At times, it seemed almost as if they were trying intentionally to teach him something. But they never told him precisely what. Leave what path? How? Joby hadn't asked, and wasn't going to, because he didn't want to see the boy's blank look, and face the fact that they weren't trying to teach him anything at all-that there was nothing to his vague new urgencies but vague imagination.

Lost in thought, Joby didn't see Hawk until he stumbled, almost literally, over the boy sitting cross-legged and silent in the tall, twilit grass.

"Whoa!" Joby exclaimed. "I almost stepped on you!"

Hawk shrugged without looking up. Joby was about to move on when he noticed Hawk's reddened nose and puffy, pink-blotched eyes.

"Everything all right?" he asked.

Hawk still said nothing.

"Sometimes," Joby pressed uncertainly, "it helps to talk when things are bad. I've had a few bad times myself, and once, when I really didn't want to talk at all, someone-"

"What would you know?" Hawk demanded, finally turning to look at Joby, his face an angry challenge.

"Only what you tell me," Joby answered, fearing he'd been wrong to push.

"Bet you got As in everything," Hawk scornfully accused. "Bet your folks were proud as could be of their little genius."

"You got that wrong," Joby replied. "My father left us when I was thirteen. My mother thought everything I did was going to destroy us all."

For an instant, Hawk looked confused. Then his angry mask returned.

"You're a teacher," he said, sneering, as if that proved Joby's every word a lie.

"By sheer dumb luck," Joby replied.

"Bullshit," Hawk said, turning away again. "Nobody gets hired to teach if they're stupid. I could tell if you were stupid."

"I could tell if you were too," Joby said, sitting down in the grass, not too close.

Hawk shot him an angry glare well suited to his name. Joby met his stare until the boy looked away again. After that, they sat.

. . . And sat.

Joby was about to give up when Hawk asked sullenly, "Why'd your dad leave?"

Ah, Joby thought, and his heart went out to Hawk with sudden ferocity. "I thought he went because he was ashamed of me, Hawk. He didn't think I was much of a man back then. It was a long time later before I realized it was mostly all about things between him and my mom." Hawk didn't move, but his posture softened some. "He's never been willing to talk about it," Joby said, "so I don't know what, exactly, those things were, but it hurt me for a long time . . . They've gotten back together since then, but I still have trouble even visiting them." When Hawk still said nothing, Joby took another risk. "Why'd your dad leave?"

Hawk turned toward him with an expression Joby couldn't decipher. Anger? Fear? Surprise? "Who told you that?" the boy demanded.

"Like you said," Joby answered gently, "I'm not stupid."

" 'Cause he's a fuckin', puck-eating, drunken dickhead," Hawk said quietly.

Joby hid his surprise. He couldn't recall hearing a single obscenity in Taubolt before, and had been lulled into assuming everyone here was innocent of the ugliness taken so for granted elsewhere.

"Do you miss him?" Joby asked.

Hawk's expression became incredulous, and Joby was sure he'd blown it.

"I don't miss him! . . . How could I miss him? He's still screwin' up every day of my life! He'll never quit!"

"How? What happened?"

"My mom won't stop bawling her eyes out! That's what happened. She's never gonna get over it, and I'm fucking tired of it!" He was trembling now, but Joby resisted an urge to reach out and embrace the boy. "If she wants to crawl into her hole and die, I wish she'd just do it and quit blaming everything on me!" He took an angry swipe at one of his eyes, clearly embarrassed by the tears gathered on his lashes.

"What's she blaming on you?"

"The fuckin' note!" Hawk spat, glaring at Joby. "Now she's all fucked-up again, 'cause of you guys and your Nazi little prison camp!"

"You've lost me," Joby said, laying Hawk's anger aside. "What note?"

"The notes you dickheads send to my house every three weeks," Hawk retorted. "I didn't find this one before she saw it, and now she's-"

"Notes about what?" Joby pressed.

" 'Hawk has been absent from school again this week,' " the boy said in an angry parody of adult authority. " 'Hawk is in danger of failing his courses. Hawk is a criminal disgrace who should be beaten with a pipe and executed for-' "

"Okay. I get the picture," Joby interrupted, resisting another urge to assert that Bridget had only Hawk's best interests at heart. "So, how does your father figure in here?"

"Your dad ever hit you?" Hawk demanded. "He throw beer cans at your mom, and slap her around, and fuck with you 'til you got angry, then hit you for mouthing off?"

"No," Joby said. "I was luckier than that."

"That's what I thought," Hawk said, turning away again as if Joby had fallen beneath his dignity to acknowledge. "You don't know shit."

Ignoring Hawk's taunt, Joby said, calmly, "I've been hurt, Hawk. I've lost family, dreams, friends. . . . I've done things that got people I cared about killed. And I've been arrested, if that helps any. So you can sit there and tell me off as if you knew anything about who I am, or you can give me a chance to listen and try to understand. But, whatever you think, I'm not remotely qualified to look down on you or anyone else."

Hawk gave him a skeptical glance. "What'd you get arrested for?"

"Starting a riot in the city I came from," Joby said, braced to finish what he'd started. "A good friend died that day. The police said it was my fault. In some ways they were right. . . . It's why I came here."

"They still after you?" Hawk asked, turning to look at Joby again, his anger turned suddenly to shy interest.

"No," Joby sighed. "My friend's death was even more their fault than mine, and they knew it. So they let me go." He saw Hawk's expression shift from interest to something terribly like admiration, and his stomach twisted. "There's nothing neat about it, Hawk." Joby's eyes began to burn, and his throat to tighten as he thought about Gypsy for the first time in months. "It was nothing to be proud of, and it hurts even to remember now. I just want you to know that I do understand what it's like to hurt."

The eagerness left Hawk's face. "I'm sorry," he mumbled, "for what I said."

"It's okay. You were angry, and it sounds like you've got plenty of cause to be."

Hawk looked down and began to pluck stalks of grass, thoughtfully twirling them between his fingers or bending them into simple shapes. "I got all Bs once, before we came here." His eyes stayed fastened on his busy hands. "Worked my butt off. But when my dad got the report card, he just said I had a knack for falling into a pile of shit and comin' up with a gold ring in my teeth, whatever that means. Told me not to expect him to get all impressed until I was really working up to potential." Hawk stopped fiddling with the grass, but wouldn't look at Joby. "My mom stood there the whole time and didn't say a thing." He shrugged, and sighed. "You had to be crazy to mess with my dad when he was in one of those moods. I know that. . . . Later she told me how good I did and how she was proud of me. But . . ." Hawk trailed off.

"Trying never did me much good either," Joby conceded, losing ground to the heat in his eyes and the lump growing in his throat. "Not 'til I came here, at least. Your dad was wrong about you, Hawk. Sounds like he was wrong about a lot of things." He struggled to find something wise and helpful to offer, but drew a total blank. "Is there . . . anything I can do, Hawk?"

No," he said. "I'm just a screwup."