“Words are painted in my mind
Like lollipops on rainbow clouds,
And the more I think I’ve dreamt it all,
The more it tells me I am wrong.”
– The Illusion of Silence, The Suicidal Poet of Grimm

“It’s not my place to just hand salvation over to you,” Lord SkinnyLegs said, shaking Jesse’s arm off. “But I can point you in the right direction.”

“Oh, please, do!” She cried, clutching his elongated arm again.

“Stop doing that!” He ordered, shaking her off for a third time. “I bruise easily.”

Jesse looked confused. “How can you bruise if you’re... you know?” She drew a line across her neck for emphasis

“It’s a figure of speech, here,” he explained, sounding tired.

“Oh.”

“Do you want to know Christ?” Lord SkinnyLegs asked after a moment, all serious and businesslike.

“Oh, yes!” Jesse exclaimed, resisting the urge to grab his arm again. “I want to live!”

“That wasn’t the question I asked,” Lord SkinnyLegs replied.

“I don’t understand.”

“I didn’t ask if you wanted to live; I asked if you wanted to know Christ,” he said. “Well, do you?”

“I don’t understand the difference,” Jesse said, confused – and not for the first time since arriving in that place.

“They are very different,” Lord SkinnyLegs replied, but he would not explain. He only looked at her for a long moment, and then said, “You’ll get there, yet, I think.”

“Get where?” Jesse asked, truly frustrated. This strange creature wasn’t making any sense at all. She buried her face in her hands and sat down on the grey cobblestones. “Maybe I should have been more careful,” she muttered. “I was too elaborate. Some Drano would have done the job just fine.” She pictured it in her mind, and as she thought, she saw herself in a hospital bed, with her family around her. She was looking as though through a window, the glass of which was impenetrable, and she ached. She shook her head to clear it, and looked up to see Lord SkinnyLegs gazing at her – his face very close to her own – with a sad kind of sympathy that bordered on something more than empathy.

“Jesse,” he began in a hushed tone that sounded very unlike the gravelly voice he had previously, “why did you try to kill yourself?”

She didn’t realize there were tears in her eyes until she felt them splash onto her hands. This place felt so real. It was hard to believe that it was all in her mind. It must be all in her mind. What else could explain the strange things she was seeing?

“Jesse?” Lord SkinnyLegs repeated her name as a question, and she knew he still waited for an answer.

She buried her face in her lap, and wouldn’t look at him. She was so ashamed, suddenly; so horribly ashamed. What kind of self-loathing and pathetic person would try to end their own life? Living is not nearly as bad as dying, and she knew from Sunday School as a kid that there were worse things than just living. But it had all just seemed so hard; too hard to manage for someone so young. Much too hard.

“Jesse?” A velvety voice asked, and she looked up.

And achingly beautiful face looked at her with concern. It was not Lord SkinnyLegs, but at the same time it still was. She thought that perhaps she liked him better when he was creepy. He was more approachable.

“Yes?” She breathed, not wanting to be heard.

“Why did you try to end your life?” He repeated.

She gave a short, dead bark of laughter. “What was there that was worth living for in my life?” She asked. The question was meant to be rhetorical, but Lord SkinnyLegs answered it anyways.

“You,” he said simply.

Jesse shook her head again and buried her face in her lap. If there was one thing she knew about life, it was that it wasn’t worth living just for the sake of yourself. ‘You’ was never worth it; not enough, anyway; not in her life.

“Why did you really try?” He asked. He was obviously trying to get to the root of the issue in her heart, but Jesse finally came to the conclusion that there was no answer she could give him that would satisfy his need to know.

“I don’t know,” she said simply, burying her face in her lap again.

“That’s the answer I was looking for,” Lord SkinnyLegs said, his voice gravelly again. “Now, you can begin to seek the answer.” He held out his again-elongated hand as Jesse raised her head again, and she took it. He helped her up. “Let’s see what’s behind door number one, shall we?” He asked, as though it was a game show, and Jesse was going to win a prize.

Lord SkinnyLegs steered her towards the dull wooden boardwalk, by the aforementioned buildings, and pointed to the first one, starting from the right, which was the farthest from the dock and the blue-grey waters beneath. “What do you think this is for?” He asked.

“Decoration?” Jesse asked. “Show-and-Tell?”

Lord SkinnyLegs raised an eyebrow in disapproval. “This is serious business, Jesse,” he warned.

She heaved a sigh and rolled her eyes. “I don’t know!” She cried. “That’s why I’m here, isn’t it? To figure things out?”

He nodded. “It’s one reason,” he replied vaguely. Then he went on to answer his earlier question. “These buildings are the doors of your heart. Inside, you will find lies, and you were find truths. It is up to you to determine how to sort the truth from the lies.”

“But to what end?” She asked.

“We have already discussed this,” Lord SkinnyLegs replied. “If you cannot remember, it’s not for me to repeat it.”

Jesse heaved a great sigh of frustration. “Then why should I do it?” She demanded.

He raised an eyebrow. “Do you really need me to answer that question?” He asked.

Her shoulders slumped. “No, I guess not,” she replied.

Lord SkinnyLegs nodded. “You will see many other things that are not lies, but a deception of another kind,” he continued. “You must be strong. Trust that God will see you through.”

“And if He doesn’t?” Jesse asked skeptically.

Lord SkinnyLegs leaned in close to her, his hot breath touching her face, and said, “That’s why they call it faith.”

AN: Chapter 2: Faith. :) In case you’re wondering, I didn’t describe the pretty Lord SkinnyLegs on purpose. Instead, use your imagination.

R&R. CC is welcome, flames are not.