Page 48 of Haunt Me

“That’s lovely,” I tell her. “Do you believe in God?”

“I don’t know if ‘believe’ is the right word,” she replies. Our steps crunch on the hardened snow underfoot. “It’s more ‘afraid’. Terrified, actually.”

My eyebrows shoot up. “Why on earth are you terrified? God is someone you pray to when you’re in trouble… someone who is supposed to help you.”

Except He didn’t. So that’s why I stopped asking.

“Someone who punishes you,” Eden supplies, and a chill runs down my spine.

“Eden, no, don’t think like that… God, for those who have faith in Him, is supposed to be someone who loves you, who saves you, who….”

“Who counts all your sins,” she adds.

“What sins, Eden? You are perfect.”

She looks at me, and there is so much guilt in her light brown eyes, I shiver.

“Let’s get out of here,” I murmur quickly and grab her hand, “this place is giving me the creeps. And not in a good way.”

She half-laughs at that, and I tighten my fingers around hers, letting her ground me to life and reason.

We walk silently back to town, our shoulders pressed against each other’s the whole time, and it’s just as well we don’t talk, because I couldn’t talk if I wanted to. All I can concentrate on are the words ‘hope is a saint, hope is a saint, saint hope’. I put music to them, and hum it so that I don’t forget by the time I’m in my room.

Then I think of her saying that she is afraid of God, and of me telling her I don’t believe in Him, that maybe I never did. My parents believed and lived according to their faith. But me? I just followed along, for their sake.

The day my dad died, I did not stop believing.

I stopped pretending–the effort was too much. Worthless, even.

But it was not then that I stopped believing. This faith had never been mine, so maybe I had never had any faith to lose. My dad’s love… I truly had that. That is what I really had. And I did not lose it when I lost him. Instead, it has grown.

It grows every day, even though we will never meet again. He is gone, but his love is constantly with me.

‘These things are unable to be lost: Love, faith, hope…’These words, hidden somewhere deep in my memory. Love, faith, hope. One by one, I think about them.

Here is what I know about hope:

Hope is the worst monster and the best saint.

And I know now something about love I didn’t before: That I have not lost my dad’s love. He’s gone, but it has stayed. So maybe it’s true about love, that if can’t be lost.

But my faith that is suddenly gone? It had never been there to begin with. And on the way back home, that realization makes me sadder than I’ve felt in days.

…

In less than a year’s time, I will compose and write a song calledSaint Hope. It will become a hit. Nearly every single personin America will be able to hum its melody—millions will memorize its lyrics.

And my heart will be completely hopeless every single time I sing it to my thousands of fans.

…

“Do you believe in ghosts?” Eden asks me a few days later.

I know she’s still thinking of the cemetery. I know our conversation stayed with her, as it stayed with me.

“Have you been readingWuthering Heightsmore than the normal amount again?”

“What is the normal amount?” she asks.

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