I look up, where forgotten things go, saying, after a pause, And a robe of some kind.

     The detective nods. what about his demeanor?

     I look up again, Well, he seemed, I don’t know the word.

     mad? angry? upset?

     Those are the same things.

     sad? depressed? unhappy? heavyhearted?

     Heavyhearted?

     disappointed.

     That’s it.

     he was disappointed? about what?

     About everything. But also me.

     how do you know?

     I could feel it.

     he touched you?

     No. I mean, not like that. He looked at me.

     he looked at you?

     Yes, he looked at me, like.

     like what?

     Like I was very far away.

     I thought you said you got a good look.

     I did. Not like that. Like maybe he knew me. But. A long, long time ago.

     so he recognized you?

     I think so.

     and you recognized him?

     Yes.

     but you don’t know who he is?

     I have an idea.

     you have an idea? would you like to share it with the class?

     It doesn’t seem possible.

     alright, miss. so, elderly white man, wavy gray beard to his knees, wearing a robe of some kind? anything else?

     I don’t think I was looking right.

     you don’t think you were looking right?

     I mean, not the right way.

     what’s the right way?

     I think I was looking the way people told me to. but not the way I see.

     he didn’t do anything to you? didn’t touch you? didn’t hurt you?

     He hurt me.

     you said —

     Not like that. In here.

     we don’t really have the resources to investigate matters of the heart.

     Who does?

     if there’s nothing else —

     When I was little, I listened to grownups. But I don’t think they knew.

     you don’t think they knew?

     I think they were repeating what grownups told them when they were little. And now, nobody knows.

     well, if nobody knows —

     I think I have to figure it out myself. Or try.

     you’ll have to do that somewhere else.

     And I think, if something seems wrong, unfair or cruel, then he probably thinks so too.

     did you have a conversation?

     Only in my head. Only one way.

     we don’t deal with that, either.

     I don’t think he’s an old, bearded white man in a robe who only loves some people, who made all the other people just so those people would have someone to hurt. I don’t think he’s sitting on a cloud, strumming a harp, making bad things happen. Or good things. I think that’s us.

     The detective looks at the sketch artist. The sketch artist tilts his pencil-marked pad towards him. you never mentioned a cloud. and only angels strum harps.

     So you know who I mean!

     it rings a bell. but as I said, we have neither the time, nor the resources to —

     Who does?

     The detective shrugs and looks up.

     I look up too. We’re not looking at the same thing. Bu there’s nothing there, anyway. 

     we have a lot of things to do and not a lot of time to do them in, miss. if there’s nothing else —      

    Wait! I take a breath, then, very, very slowly, put my hand over my chest, reach my fingers into the secret place under my heart, pull my hand back, and very, very slowly, hold it up, blood dripping. He’s like this.

     The detective nods, takes the sketch artist’s pad, holds it out to me.

     I press my palm against it. We all look. The red loops and whorls, the broken and bisecting lines, could belong to anyone. And at the same time, only to me. 

     That’s it, I say. That’s him exactly.

– Kate LaDew