Lost Boys

"I wasn't translating," said DeA

Step started the car and they pulled out of the parking lot onto the road.

"I really do want to know what you were doing," said Step.

Stevie didn't answer.

"Stevie," said Step.

"What?"

"I said I really do want to know what you were doing that made you late getting out to the car."

"Talking," said Stevie.

"Who with?" asked DeA

"A lady."

Not a friend, then. "What lady?" she asked.

"I don't know."

DeA

"What did she say to you, Stevedore?" asked Step.

"I didn't like her," said Stevie.

"But what did she say?"

"She said she had a vision about me."

His words came to DeA

"Yeah," said Stevie. "Sister LeSueur."

"And what did she say about her vision?"

"I don't want to say."

"You've got to," said DeA

Step reached over and gently touched her on the thigh. He was telling her to keep still, that she was too intense, that she wasn't going about it the right way. For a moment she resented him for daring to police her comments to her own son, but then she realized that she was simply transferring the anger she felt toward Dolores LeSueur to the nearest target, her husband. And he was right. They'd learn more from Stevie if he didn't know how upset they were.

"The reason we need to know, Stevie," said Step, "is that no matter what she thinks she saw, and no matter whether it was really a vision or just a dream or just something she made up, she had no business telling you about it."

"It was about me," said Stevie.

"In a pig's eye," murmured DeA

"Sister LeSueur doesn't have a right to get visions about you, Stevie. She's not your mother and she's not your father, she's not your anything," said Step. "The Lord's house is a house of order. He isn't going to send visions about you to somebody who has nothing to do with you. So if she got a vision, I bet it didn't come from the Lord."

"Oh," said Stevie.

Step had laid the groundwork well, but now DeA

"He'll tell us," said Step, "as soon as he realizes that it's right to tell us. You had a bad feeling when she was telling you, didn't you, Stevie? That's why you said you didn't like her."

"Yeah," said Stevie.

"Well, don't you think that maybe that bad feeling was a warning to you that the things you were being told were lies? It made you feel bad, didn't it?"

"Some bad and some not," said Stevie.

"Did she tell you not to tell us?" asked Step.

"Yes," Stevie said quietly.

"What?" said DeA

"He said yes," said Robbie.

"I heard him," said DeA

"Then why did you say `what'?" asked Robbie.

"Your mother was just surprised," said Step. "Stevedore, Stevie, Stephen Bolivar Fletcher, my son, you know what we've told you before. If someone ever tells you children that you mustn't tell your parents something, then what do you do?"

"I know," said Robbie. "We promise that we'll never tell, but then the very first chance we get we do tell you."

"And why is that?"

"Because no good person would ever tell us to keep a secret from our mom and dad," said Robbie.

"Remember that, Stevie?" asked Step.

"Yeah," said Stevie.

DeA

Step pulled the car at once into the driveway of a Methodist church parking lot. The parking lot was emptying out-apparently the Methodists got out of church about the same time the Mormons did.

"Why are you crying, honey?" asked DeA

"I don't know," said Stevie.

"Stevie, whatever this woman said to you, it's time for you to tell us."

"She said ..." He started crying in earnest now, so it was hard for him to talk.

"That's all right, Stevie," said Step. "Just tell us slowly. Take your time."

"She said I was a really special boy."

"Well, that's true," said Step.

"And she said that the Lord had chosen me to do wonderful things."

"Like what?" asked Step.

"Like Ammon," he said. "A missionary."

"Yes?"

"But first she said that I had to prove that I was good enough."

DeA

"Did she say what it was you had to do to prove yourself?" asked Step.

"T-teach my parents, she said."

"Teach us what?" asked Step.

"R-righteousness," said Stevie.

DeA

"Well now," said Step, "what do you think she meant by that?"

"I don't know," said Stevie.

"I do," said DeA

"Why not?" asked Stevie.

"Because the lesson I taught said that every person can talk to the Lord and you don't need anybody else to tell you what the Lord wants you to do, because the Holy Ghost can talk right to your heart."

"After I'm baptized," said Stevie.

"Which is only a little more than a month away" said DeA

"Why not?" asked Stevie.

"Because Sister LeSueur likes going around and showing other people how spiritual she is." DeA

"Yes," said Stevie.

"So she wants me to stop saying things like that," said DeA

"Me too," said Step. "I gave a lesson that said things like that, too."

"So she went to you to try to get you to think that she was having visions about you," said DeA

"Why would she tell a lie like that?" asked Stevie.

"She's trying to steal you from us," said Step.

"Like a bad guy!" said Robbie.

"Just like a bad guy," said Step. "Only bit by bit, and slowly, starting with your heart. Starting by making you doubt us. Making you wonder if maybe we aren't righteous, and if maybe you need to learn righteousness from somewhere else and then teach it to us. And where do you think that somewhere else would be?"