What are they doing?” he whispered.
The pinball machine’s scoreboard was full, the bank’s windows fogged. They were so involved- so cofaithed- that they didn’t know we were there.
The VW’s face joined, “Are they hurting each other?”
I took a breath. “There’s risk involved, because of what they can’t see. Plus the risk of trust. But no-they’re not hurting each other.”
The bank whispered something in the pinball machine’s ear and the pinball machine giggled.
“What are they saying to each other?” the VW said.
“They’re expressing their faith, VW-sharing it.”
Just then I heard a rustle, soft at first, then louder…Distracted by other things-the VW, the faith in the trees- I had forgotten to keep the mountain straight in my mind. I had let it go, and now it was changing, reversing itself, growing young: the leaves were turning from brown back to green… THIS was western Massachusetts-unpredictable; a changing moving bitch; a switcher of faces…how could I have many any progress here when mountains were mountains one moment and something else the next; when people were here one day and then GONE?

Auteur: Christopher Boucher