“What are you talking about?” Marvalyn asked.

“I have a list of things that can hurt you, my brother Rob is helping me make it, and ironing boards aren’t on it.”

“Well, that ironing board … hurt me,” Marvalyn said impatiently—and almost hostilely. And then she realized that she didn’t want to be hostile to this guy. Or boy. Or whatever he was. He seemed fifteen one moment, thirty the next.

“Yeah,” agreed Steve, pondering.

“So … you should add it to your list,” said Marvalyn snidely.

“Yeah!” agreed Steve enthusiastically. Marvalyn watched as the odd young man dutifully added ironing boards to his list of THINGS THAT CAN HURT YOU.

And she wondered if ironing boards actually belonged on that list and was about to tell him that they didn’t—but before she was able to, Steve had closed the book he was writing in and asked Marvalyn, “Should I be afraid of ironing boards?”

“Well, no, but if someone swings one at your head and wallops you with it, then, yeah, maybe you should be.”

“Well—” Steve pulled another black marble composition book out of his backpack, this one labeled THINGS TO BE AFRAID OF, and continued, “See, I have a list of things to be afraid of, too, but ironing boards aren’t on this list either.”

“Well, they shouldn’t be, really,” said Marvalyn, fascinated by the second composition book.

“No?”

“No, you shouldn’t be afraid of ironing boards.”

“But they can hurt you,” argued Steve.

“Yeah, but—”

“So I should be afraid of them.”

“Well, no—”

“So I shouldn’t be afraid of them?”

“Right.”

“But they can hurt me.”

“Well, if they’re used the way you just used that one,” she said, pointing to the ironing board on the floor, “then, yeah, they could hurt you, but—”

“Oh, oh, oh!” Steve exclaimed. “So they’re kind of like the opposite of God!”

It took Marvalyn a moment to process Steve’s strange epiphany.

“What?!?” she finally asked, part dumbfounded and part amused, and completely interested in the explanation.

“Well, ironing boards can hurt me, but I shouldn’t be afraid of them,” Steve reasoned, “but God, my brother Rob says, God won’t ever hurt me, but I should fear Him.”

Marvalyn considered what Steve had just said for a moment. And then responded, “I guess.” She found his reasoning to be sound. She had never quite thought about God in that way before. But it seemed to her like a perfectly good way to think about Him. Or Her. Or whatever It was, because she wasn’t quite sure what God was. If everyone was made in His image, maybe He was a She half the time. Or maybe He was neither a He nor a She. Or maybe God was both He and She. Who knew.

Steve ultimately decided not to add ironing boards to his book of things to be afraid of, because they didn’t fulfill the criteria. And grumbled, “Boy, this is getting really complicated.”

“What is?”

“This business of learning what hurts, what doesn’t hurt, what to be afraid of, what not to be afraid of.”