He was unlike everything else in the world.
Hope thought.
There were 118 elements on the periodic table. Together, they made up the world and every living and nonliving thing in it: ants and elephants, stones and sky.
But He had nothing to do with them.
He was something else entirely.
Once the thought came to him, Hope had no doubt. He knew it to be true.
He was God, a true deity. When you looked at Him, you felt not even the slightest impulse to resist.
Nor was there any need to kneel. That was a human custom, a way for people to express submission to one another. But before a god, submission was a foregone conclusion. The moment He appeared, every creature, whatever it was doing, had already submitted to Him. There was no need for ceremony.
One enormous glowing sphere after another appeared in the sky, shining with multicolored light. Each sphere took shape, then vanished in an instant. They seemed to be right before Hope's eyes, yet when he reached out, they were far beyond the heavens.
Their light bathed Hope, Wilbur, Lavinia, all the Night Hawks, and everything else on the ground in color.
It was His gaze. Hope knew He was watching them—not with malice, nor with goodwill, but with utter indifference.
"Put your hand down." Wilbur had finished reciting all the verses. "He's just an apparition."
An apparition?
"He isn't here?" Hope asked.
"No. He's everywhere. He sees everything in the world," Wilbur replied. He tucked the book under his arm and fastened the top button of his shirt.
So He's watching me when I use the bathroom, too... Hope's mind wandered.
Wisely, he kept the thought to himself. There was no point in saying it. Before a god like this, nobility and