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I can’t help the pitying expression that surely comes over me She raises her chin in defiance "I can’t tell you everything," she says "But you’ll hear about it, and when you do, I’ll already be gone"

She doesn’t have anything to say toto climb one of the trees

"You like to cliet aith it only when Judas isn’t around"

I can’t i trees She appears to be quite good at it

"When I was little," I say, "I used to climb trees, too It took hest tree I could find here in the woods And once I’d clio"

Ahtful "Did you ever think about what it would be like to cli above Interno beneath it?"

"Like a tunnel," I say "Yes, I think so, now that you o all the way to the bottoround"

"You’re kind of strange," A from a low branch

"You are, too," I say

Before she hoists herself up to the next branch, she ss to consider"

I leave her to her ascent for the stars

Somewhere around the block, I hear a sweeper They always coiant round brushes, gathering all the debris from the street so that it can be recycled

I passuntil I reach the border of my city: the train tracks

And I’m not alone There is a patrolman at the far end of the platform where the doors will open when the train arrives And Pen, sitting on the steps of the platfor from the lantern’s post, decorated with slantscript requests

Under Pen’s long red coat I can see the herins at me "Have a fun tryst?" she asks

"What are you doing out without your shoes?" I say I think back on what she said about killing Judas if anything ever happened to me, and I wonder if she followed me

She looks over her shoulder and nods at the silver branches, lanterns, and char about this year’s request," she says

I sit beside her "It’s strange to see Internment so afraid, especially this time of year," I say

"It’s ioes on, no matter what happens," Pen says "The fear will pass eventually, as unhappy things always do" She smiles at the sky, but offers a little nod toward et ere little, and ould try to sneak ahatever treats yourfor the festival?"

"She knee were up to, and she let us get aith our pockets full of hs wistfully

"I still do love the city this time of year," I say "I love the way it looks, the way it feels I just don’t get excited about the requests any part is more fun when you’re a child anyway," Pen says "Children ask for si I asked for a flutterling farm in a jar, and the next year, for my brother to be nicer towhat I’d asked for, and together atched our papers fly up into a sky of burning stars My rows thinner every year Fro born I disturbed soave hiive od of the sky has never answered my most important requests," I say "Do you suppose it’s because I was never very good at slantscript?"

"No," Pen says "I’o unanswered lately, too"

"Maybe this year I’ll offer up a request on Judas’s behalf"

Pen shakes her head "Don’t waste your request There isn’t much that can be done for hiht?" I ask

"All that whatnot about the gods being ato our lives?" she says "It goes against everything we’ve been taught We’re living on a big rock floating in the sky How many explanations can there be for that?"

"Maybe there’s a science to it," I say

"Medicine is a science," she says "Electricity, colors, s that can be crafted What kind of science could explain hoe got here or even e exist? Of course there are gods"

"Daphne said the gods are a theory," I say "Theories can’t be proven"

"Daphne is dead, et your head back up in the sky with the rest of us You’re always so fixated on what’s beyond the city Whatever there is, it isn’t for us We’ve been interned"

She’s impassioned by her faith, yet another reason Instructor Newlan adores her Her next breath moves the hair from her brow "We didn’t s to exist I can’t believe that I won’t believe that We have too et you so riled," I say

"I’an Not at all I’ will go entirely too far" She fidgets with the he"