I looked up, out the window at the trees, dusted in snow fine as talc, like arrows pointing skyward. Heavenward.

My eyes dropped back to the book in my hands. They continued down the page, catching phrases here and there that intrigued me. I continued to read. The numbers got in the way at first, but after a while I didn’t see them. A new section, labeled First Corinthians. I continued to read. Second Corinthians. A verse with a different kind of number. A note in the margin. A reference? I took a guess at how it worked and found myself in Matthew. Red-typed words, the tag Jesus said coming before them. His words.

I read more.

The room began to grow lighter, the sun slowly rising and casting butter-yellow rays onto the floor. My eyes dry and tired, barely open now, but still reading, six pages left. Angels and thrones and churches and judgments of fire and earthquakes. The makings of a first-rate horror movie. I fell asleep on the couch with the image of an endlessly sunny world full of music and a man in the center on the throne of gold, casting a never-ending light.

I’d been at the cabin for three days and was beginning to miss civilization—or what little of it I usually interacted with. I’d read nearly the whole Bible over the past two days, and while the first section bored me some, the second section fascinated me. I couldn’t get enough of it. But I didn’t know what to do with it.

I analyzed over and over the few prayers I’d heard Greg deliver, trying to determine the etiquette and structure before attempting one myself. It appeared far easier than I thought it ought to. But there had been in Matthew, in red ink, a prayer that sounded vaguely familiar, that Jesus said was the way to pray. I tended to think Jesus would be the authority, but Greg didn’t stick to that formula, and I started to wonder if maybe he wasn’t as smart as I had thought him to be. But could he really get something wrong when the “right” way was right there?

Jesus seemed like a cool guy, and until I read Revelation I thought praying would be no big deal. But then I read that last book, and the image of Him there scared me, and suddenly I wasn’t as eager to launch into a conversation with Him unless I really knew what I was doing. Until now I’d managed to hold off calling Greg because I’d wanted to do it all on my own, but this was too important to botch. I pulled his number from my jacket pocket and drove down to town where I could use a pay phone. Sean hadn’t installed phones at the cabin.