The storm was chasing us. If Mom was awake at home, she was freaking out.

Streams of water followed us down the second hill, eroding miniature canyons between the roots, rocks and fallen bits of bark.

There were no puddles in the second valley, but a lake. Patches of saturated dirt protruded from the sea like a herd of giant snapper turtles. The water was not still, but alive with raindrops--trillions of them--providing the cesspool an eerie, rippled texture as if it was boiling.

“Come on!” Mara said and grabbed my hand.

I stumbled to keep up, dipping and dodging limbs and trunks, feet galloping through mud, heart racing like a ticking time bomb.

“There,” she said and nodded to a distant pine. Over the next hundred feet, the maples, oaks and sporadic birch trees gave way to pointed conifers. Clumps of brown needles created an undulating crust on the water's surface.

We reached the tree at the base of Mara's hill. She ducked beneath the lowest branch and pulled me inside the sanctuary of the thousand-year-old pine. (I was certain that if we cut it in half, the rings would prove its age.)

My teeth chattered, not because it was cold, but because that's what teeth do when the body is drenched in rain. We stood in a foot of water but the conifer's trunk was dry. The thick awning held back the downpour and muffled the sound of falling rain.

The droplets on Mara's face were crystalline, uniform, and evenly spaced... I looked like I just pulled my head from a hippo's butt.

She unstrapped the sack from her shoulder, removed two candles, rosary beads, and a matchbook stolen from the top shelf of the buffet. She placed the candles side by side on the lowest limb.

“What are you doing?”

“I can't go up there like this.” Her hands trembled as she struck the match. The flame colored her face with its initial bold burst and illuminated every raindrop on her cheek like polished rubies. She crossed herself. “I want you to hear my confession.”

I wasn’t sure what she meant, but I nodded.

“Don't look at me,” she commanded. “Turn around.”

My feet sloshed in the flood as I faced the shroud of needles. Through the thunder and pelting rain, I heard Mara's soft but rapid breath.

“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been sixty-three days since my last confession.”

“What do I do?” I whispered.

“You're supposed to ask me questions.”

“Like what?”

“Like what I did wrong this week, or questions about my body.”

My mind leapt headfirst into the possibilities. I wondered if “confession” meant she had to tell the truth. I was certain I had seen enough priests in movies to put on a believable performance.

Before I could think of a question, Mara gave me one. “Just ask me what sins I've committed.”

I cleared my throat. “Tell me, child, what sins have you committed?”

She sighed. “I sleep in on weekends,” she said.
“Sometimes till noon. I said the word 'asshole' twice. I said 'lesbian' three times, ‘shit’ four times, and 'butthead' six. And I stole the matchbook from the top of the buffet.”

I grinned, but Mara couldn’t see my face so it didn’t matter. “Is that all, child?” I asked.

“Lust, father.”

“How so?”

“I slept in bed with a boy that I like.”

“Oh?”

“I told another boy secrets about my body.”

Ryan. “What secrets?”

“I covet. I see what Livy has and I want it.”

My molars ground together like pieces of chalk. “Tell me more, child.”

“I'm vain. I want to be pretty. I like wearing makeup. I like when people compliment me. But sometimes...”

“Yes?”

“...bad things happen.”

“That's--”

“If I wasn't vain--if I didn't like being pretty--Dorothy might be alive.”

I wanted to comfort her. But the confession wasn't over. “Is that all, child?”

“I lied.”

“You lied?”
“To a different priest.”

“What is this lie you speak of?”

Mara hesitated for the first time. “I told him I confessed all my sins...”

“But you didn't.”

“No.”

“I can’t forgive you unless you admit all of your transgressions.”

Water sloshed behind me. Mara was pacing. “Only Ms. Grisham and Principal Dolman know...”

“You can tell me, child.”

She sighed. “It happened in fourth grade. Trevor Tooth Fairy sat behind me in math.”

“Trevor Tooth Fairy?”

“They called him that 'cause he bashed his front teeth on the teeter-totter when his friend jumped off the other side. There was blood everywhere ‘cause he had braces and they cut his lip.”

“Gross.”

“His teeth were just hanging outside his mouth by the wires. I just called him Trev.” Mara picked bark from the tree. “Anyways, he sat behind me in math. He poked me in the back of my neck every day with a ruler. Hard. He called me names. He called me Luscious Mara Lynn even though I never called him Tooth Fairy. Every time he said ‘Luscious’ and ‘Lynn,’ his tongue would squeeze through the hole of his missing front teeth. I never tattled. I just laughed and played along because he wasn't that different from the other kids. But when we were learning to draw circles in math, he started snapping the pointy end of his compass into my neck instead of a ruler. He made it bleed, but nobody knew because my hair covered the scars.”

“That’s awful...”

“Then came the school musical. It was called 'Fifty Nifty States' and I got to be Michigan. Aunty... I mean Ms. Grisham... she made my costume. I carried a bucket of cherries on stage for my solo. Trevor was dressed like a cowboy ‘cause he was supposed to be Texas. Before the show, he gave all the kids bubble gum to chew, then just before the curtain went up, he collected everybody's wet gum into a big wad and stuck it in my hair.”

“What did you do?”

“In my heart I was crying. But I pretended to be happy for the rest of the show.”

“No... what did you do to Trevor?”

“If I tell you... I'll be pure again?”

“Yes, child.”

A surge of wind lifted our awning and huffed out the candles. “Several weeks passed, but I didn't forget. I waited until he went to the bathroom alone. I followed him inside--” She stopped.

“And?”

“I went in the boy's bathroom and...”

“Mara? What did you do?”

Her feet splashed. Her mouth spat gibberish as if she was speaking in tongues.

“Mara?”

“Don't turn around!” she said. Her breathing quickened; rapid sucks of air, in-out, in-out, in-out as she paced tiny circles in our fort. “I--”

I resumed my Priestly manner. “Young girl, tell me what happened in the bathroom.”

“I... I was boiling. I...” Her frustration erupted in a barrage of made-up curse words. “I went in the bathroom... because I was mad. But... he wasn't even a bad kid!”

“Mara, what did you do?”

“I--” she stammered again. “I can't say it!”

An epiphany accompanied those four honest words; a revelation so profound that it still affects every aspect of my adult life: proof of the impossible; proof of magic or God or the missing link in our evolutionary chain; the singularity of the human race if only people knew. Mara Lynn was the embodiment of the phrase, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” Her allure didn't just fit every man's impossible ideal, she was a shapeshifter, an accidental mind-fuck, forced--by whatever “It” bestowed her power--to say things or do things or look a certain way, targeting the specific desires of every single human being. Her first confessions were silly. They were adorable. I felt empathetic; drawn to her words as she listed the minutia of her dirty deeds. But this new sin--this thing she did to poor Trevor Tooth Fairy--it was so disturbing that she couldn't even say it because saying it might taint my perception of the perfect girl.

Mara wasn't just beautiful, she was supernatural.

And if she was supernatural, then maybe her dream was true. Maybe there was a spaceship waiting for her on that hill. Maybe Mara Lynn was some divine experiment gone awry; an alien weapon perhaps; a demon.

I could hear her wringing her tongue behind me; fighting her curse to complete her confession. If she couldn't shed the sin, she wouldn't be accepted.

“Child,” I said.

“I can't say it.”

“You don't need to say it. I know what's in your heart. In the name of God and Jesus and wholly ghosts, you're forgiven.” I bowed my head and crossed my chest (spectacles, testicles, wallet, watch... just like she taught me). When I turned around, I was James again.

Mara was silent, but I sensed something new. The way her eyes settled on mine for the first time today; the way her brow appeared tender, accepting; the way her hair had unbound itself from the braids but still hung perfectly straight. If she was crying, the rain covered her tears. 

Then she hugged me. She wrapped her arms around my neck and pulled herself up and against my chest. “You're a good friend,” she whispered.

I cringed. “Wait. I have something to say before you go on that hill.”

She released my neck and backed away. “James--”

“I won't let you leave till you hear me out.”

Mara turned away, but she didn't leave.

“I think you're pretty,” I said.

“I know.”

“I want to kiss you.”

“I know.”

“I want to look handsome for you, lose weight for you. I want to call you names like 'sweetheart' and 'darling.' I want to hold you and buy you things--”

“Just like everybody else.”

“Exactly. That's the whole problem. I try to be different so you’ll want to kiss me too. It’s all I think about. 'Should I tell her these things? Or should I keep them to myself?' Because if I tell you how I really feel, it means that I'm the same as the zombies outside your window.” I touched her ear lobe. “I don’t think you’re weird 'cause you’re pretty.” I touched the pin-point scars on the back of her neck. “I don't think you're evil 'cause you're mad.” I took her shoulder and turned her around. “Those things you told me? They’re not your fault. The saints aren't gonna hate you 'cause you stole some matches or slept in a boy's bed when you were scared. If that priest was telling you somethin’ different, he’s full of crap.”

“But Danny--”

“Danny B’s a psycho. He was a psycho before he knew you. He deserves to die for what he did.”

“Don't say that.”

“No, I will say it. Danny deserves to die. And you didn’t make him kill your cat.”

She nodded.

“I don’t know what your dream means, but if there really is something on that hill waiting to judge you, you've got nothing to worry about.”

Another burst of wind. Mara's hair whipped and twirled behind her head. The candles fell from the branch with quiet plunks in the rising sea.

“You wanna go out with me?” she asked.

“Only if you like me.”

She smiled and nodded. “I do.”

A thunderclap shook the ground as her lips touched my cheek. The terror from the bolt entwined with the elation from the peck and my heart rose and thumped with tangible, unquenchable, delicious pain.

Despite my previous epiphany, I knew Mara didn’t kiss my cheek because she had to, she did it because she loved me... because I won.

Her cool fingertips brushed the hair on my neck. “It's time to go,” she said.

“What?” I asked, shaking my head. “You can't!”

“I don't have a choice.”

“But you're my girlfriend now. Let's go home and--”

“James,” she said. “If I stay, bad things will happen to us. If I go,” she kissed her index finger and pressed it to my lips, “I'll be your girlfriend forever.”