When there were speeches in Ayanna’s church, they were about cultivating curiosity and the pleasures of the Unknown. The establishment had gone through so many names: the Church of Fortitude and Blessings (weirdly sounded kind of like a gym or cult!); the Church of the Blue Doors (too basic!); Curiosityism (too hard to say!); the Unknown Truths (felt too much like a band!); and the current one, Pathsong (already being argued against because it might sound too Christian!). She was learning about the need to be kind, to be curious and adventurous, to value knowledge and to accept that to be uncertain was to be in a necessary emotional space that could lead to true bliss and enlightenment. So many people came and went in her church that there were few generational families like hers. Ayanna’s grandmother wrote in one of her texts, “This is a faith for those who are comfortable with wandering. To be lost is not to be in a negative state, but to embrace the fluidity of life. You come to Curiosityism to find a community that wants you to live, not to treat living like a frustrating waiting room, designed for you to make mistakes and repent ad infinitum.”

Because of the way the church was set up, and because of Ayanna’s height, she was not tall enough to be able to observe everyone around her. So she watched instead her mother and sister, as they knelt, as they stood, as they spoke their belief that the wafer in front of them had been transformed. Olivia smiled and it felt like a secret. Was she hearing God? The organ was playing an ocean of melodies and the stained-glass window nearest to them was a vibrant setting sun. You never have to be lonely if you believe, her mother had told her.

After, they went into the much more ordinary basement with its white tiles and fluorescent lights and waited in line for doughnuts. People kept coming up to and chatting with her mom and sister, telling Ayanna that they were so glad to see them all together at Mass as a family.

While her mom chatted with a group of people, Ayanna ate half her doughnut and turned to Olivia and asked, “Is it like this every week?”

“Sometimes it’s different. Around Christmas or Easter or feast days. My favorite is May Crowning.”

Olivia explained how the statue of Mary was front and center, how all the kids were encouraged to bring her flowers, and how they got to put them in vases that surrounded the statue. Once, Olivia felt sure that she had seen the statue gently smile at her after she offered it a bouquet of lilacs. It made Ayanna feel so much older than her twin to hear her say that. Why rely on imagination when you could actually see extraordinary things? She ate the rest of her doughnut and let her sister talk.