On the Saturday morning when it happened, she grabbed Antony by the hood of his sweatshirt and kept a firm grip on the black fabric. There was what looked like a path made of gold in the doorway, a boulder covered in rich green moss, in normal-looking grass. Another child, desperate to be the first person in the world to pass through the door, sprinted toward it and then was pushed out of the way by an adult man. A few people gasped. The child’s mother yelled “asshole” at the man, and someone else turned and started scolding her for using that language in front of the children. A teenage boy chased the man—no one could tell if he was racing him to the entrance or teaching him a lesson for pushing a child. Antony longed to be a member of the scene, rather than an observer. He could sense all the gossip and bragging rights and attention to be harvested from doing something wild in this moment but would never squirm or push away from his mother. That was a story he did not want to have told about him.

The two squeezed through the door at the same time. One stopped immediately. The other went farther in, where he could not be seen.

“This is,” he began, and then the only word that could be used to describe what happened is he popped. Turned into a splash of red and peach with fully intact pink fingernails. Outside, people sprinted away. Still, Antony and his mother did not move.

“You will never go through that door,” she whispered.

He nodded. They were close enough that she understood he would never do that, but she was asking him, quietly, for reassurance and control. Telling him what to do gave his mother what she needed.

Then, the teenager walked out. A streak of red on his face, golden leaves stuck in the top of his thick, curly hair. In his hands, some golden rocks and three of the fingernails. Antony recognized him from school, not from church. He was older and ran track. Jumped hurdles in a way that made him look like a beautiful horse.

“Mateo,” Antony called. “Mateo, you’re fine.”

It was the only thing he could think of saying. The boy was disoriented. He looked around and was weeping, not bothering to wipe at the flow of tears or the blood on his forehead.

“Mom.”