Sacha—the Way Back

Novel by

Stan I.S. Law

BY INHOUSEPRESS, MONTREAL, CANADA

ISBIN 978-1-987864-49-6

Copyright © Stanislaw Kapuscinski 2002 and 2008,

eBook Edition 2011, and D2D ed. 2020

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, titles, places and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

Cover design and sculpture by Bozena Happach

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART ONE—Innocence

Chapter 1. Suzy

Chapter 2. Grandma ‘Licia

Chapter 3. Alexander Baldwin Ph.D.

Chapter 4. Grandpa Desmond

Chapter 5. Mr. and Mrs. Norman

Chapter 6. Sacha

PART TWO—The Search

Chapter 7. The Rites of Passage

Chapter 8. A Matter of Fact

Chapter 9. Apron Strings

Chapter 10. Scholarship

Chapter 11. Self-realization

Chapter 12. You’re Never Alone

PART THREE—The Journey

Chapter 13. Reunion

Chapter 14. Not Bread Alone

Chapter 15. Mother’s Town

Chapter 16. The Red Lights

Chapter 17. Once more LA

Chapter 18. The Danger Signs

PART FOUR—The Way Back

Chapter 19. Jail

Chapter 20. Deborah

Chapter 21. A Stranger in a Strange Land

Chapter 22. First Signs

Chapter 23. The Debate

Chapter 24. The Trial

Chapter 25. The Destiny

Epilogue

PART ONE

Innocence

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Every act of rebellion expresses a nostalgia for innocence and an appeal to the essence of being.

Albert Camus

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Chapter 1

Suzy

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It was not at all like his father, Suzy mused, aloud, smiling against her will. This was no peek-a-boo. Not by a long shot.

She was desperately trying to make sense, find some rational explanation, for Sacha’s behaviour before alerting her husband. She’d have to tell him, of course. Sooner or later. Or... or she could wait for Alec to find out for himself. It was bound to happen again.

Suzy recalled that she’d once referred to Alec’s odd behavior as peek-a-boo. This was way back in Montreal, when she had no idea what game her husband-to-be had been playing. At least then, she’d suspected, it might have been some kind of a game. What else could have it been? She did not believe in miracles––then or now—though since, she’d drawn different conclusions. The whole world was a miracle. Every rose, every common or garden flower, every sunset or sunrise was a miracle; although, of late, the latter was a rare occasion. In Los Angeles the mornings tend to be foggy. The sun comes out a little later, shyly creeping out of the morning mists, which drift from the mighty Pacific toward the distant hills. Or do they slide down the mountains? She forgot.

Anyway, her mind was elsewhere.

At the time of Alec’s peculiar behavior, Suzy and Alec had just become officially engaged. Unofficially they practically tied the knot at least a dozen times. But it was only after they had ‘permanently’ moved in together that she’d first noticed his habit of shifting position. That’s what she’d called his peek-a-boo syndrome. A number of symptoms, an array of inexplicable tidbits, but always connected with Alec’s strange if innocuous idiosyncrasies. One moment he was there, or here, the next, virtually in the same instant, she’d see him a few feet away, acting as though nothing had happened. Since then they had both reached their conclusions of what it was all about. Whatever the truth, it was nothing like Sacha’s performance. Actually, over time, Sacha had, once or twice, emulated his father’s odd behavior. Well, say a dozen times, but that last one was different. Quite different.

And much, much stranger.

Suzy recalled that long before his peek-a-boo antics, Alec had displayed quite unprecedented imagination. Even as a lad. Long before they’d shared countless experiences for which there was no rational explanation. Only their shared experiences belonged to the inner world, a realm as subjective as ones own subconscious; whereas with Sacha...

Her mind drifted even farther back to the day when she and Alec had first met. When they first saw each other. She smiled at the unexplainable, at the time seemingly forbidden yet so attractive guiles of the opposite sex. They’d both been around fourteen then. She, a lithe, long-haired girl brimming with youthful confidence, he an awkward lad who had little to show for himself other than a magnificent mop of hair. It crowned his head as the branches crown a deciduous tree. She’d half-expected robins to take flight from it. And then he dove into the water and the mop was gone. When he’d come up for air, his crowning glory drifted behind him like a wake following a boat. Luckily, his hair seemed to spring back into life minutes after he climbed aboard his father’s yacht. And it turned out that he had a great deal more to show than his mane.

Later. Much later.

But even then... She smiled at the thoughts she’s never shared with anyone.

Her mind flashed back to the tango they’d danced at the school prom. She recalled the gaping mouths of other youths as she and Alec swept the floor with contrived arrogance. The others had been capable of little more than twitching, roughly in time with the beat. She and Alec, well, they’ve been dancing. Really dancing. She admitted later, if only to herself, that the relative rigidity of her movements had not been intentional. It had nothing to do with the Latin rhythms. She’d been scared stiff. Literally. In seconds they’d remained the only couple on the dance floor. The others drifted to adorn the walls.

She shrugged at her memories.

She also recalled responding to Alec’s apparent confidence with stiff, jerky movements, worthy of the best professional ballroom dancers she’d seen later on TV. At the time she’d had no idea just how good she’d been. Way back when... when Sacha was not even a spark in his father’s eye...

All her memories invoked smiles. It was hard to believe that when they’d met, Alec was still ‘two’. In a matter of speaking. He was still Alec and Sandra. It was before he became Alexander. Until he became one...

Sacha’s antics were definitely not of the peek-a-boo variety. They were more like the boo with the peek left in abeyance. There was no name for it. Unless you believed in ghosts. Or spirits? Or anything equally as absurd...

It had started, in earnest, just after Sacha’s 10th birthday. To celebrate the first decade of their first-born, Grandma had given Sacha two Siamese kittens. Suzy realized later that she shouldn’t have done it, but she’d called them Peeka and Boo. Guess why? They were the sweetest bundles of joy Suzy had ever laid eyes on. And although the two played havoc with the furniture, the problem didn’t lie with them.

One day, Suzy was reading when the two sprites darted in front of her nose. It wasn’t the first time. Only this time they jumped upwards, and seemed to land on something that enabled them to remain suspended in the air for a few seconds, before continuing their wild chase around the room. Moments later Suzy noticed one other thing. Sacha who seconds ago was standing by the window trying to attract the kittens’ attention, suddenly found himself by the far wall, on the other side of the bed. Now if this were his father, Suzy would have said: Oh no! Not the peek-a-boo again.

But it hadn’t been Sacha’s father. Dad Alec still hadn’t returned from the university.

And then, there was the question of the kittens remaining suspended in mid-air, at arms’ length from her, by the edge of the bed. Just in front of the space where Sacha appeared a second later.

This was no peek-a-boo. Sacha had not shifted positions at supraluminal speed. She’d witnessed, indeed shared in, a number of strange (to say the least) experiences with Sacha, even with Sacha and her husband––altogether, but all those events had been of the ‘inner’ variety. They could have been assigned to the inner, the subliminal, the imaginary realm. To joint hallucinations, if you must. We all have them, occasionally, don’t we? Well, some of us. We all have stories to tell that only make sense to us. But this?

This was a physical impossibility.

At least in the realm of physics—as she’d known physics. What on Earth would Alec say? Sacha’s father was a scientist. An established physicist, with a Ph.D. to his name.

Finally, Suzy gathered all her courage. She knew that she hadn’t imagined things. She knew that she was sane. She’d decided to trust her visual perception.

What happened, Sacha? She tried to make her voice as normal as she could.

Sacha did not stop playing. The kittens held all his attention. A second later he disappeared again and Boo missed him in full flight. Peeka continued to peek from behind the chair. But no harm came to Boo. Sacha caught him in flight and gently brought him down to his chest. The kitten purred so loudly that Suzy could hear him across the room.

What happened Sacha? she repeated.

What do you mean, Mom?

You know what I mean.

She tried to sound stern. It wasn’t easy, as she had no idea what it was exactly that she was supposed to be stern about.

You mean my... my... Sacha obviously was missing the right words. What do you mean, Mom? he repeated, as though playing for time. Then, realizing that he would not get away with pleading ignorance he added:  Dad will explain.

And that was that.

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For the whole of next week Suzy could not bring herself to raise the problem with Alec. Sacha continued with the game that the kittens obviously adored, but only after he’d promised not to repeat, whatever it was that he was doing, outside the bedroom doors. Suzy was worried what effect his antics might have on Alicia and Desmond. In spite of Alec’s and her own tendency towards periodically eccentric behavior, neither Des nor Alec’s mother gave any indication that they suspected anything unusual.

Sacha called the game hide’n seek. He would hide and the kittens would have to find him. Only Sacha’s method of hiding was... unusual. He’d become invisible. And, to Suzy’s and later Alec’s amazement both, Peeka and Boo, continued to find him much faster then either of his parents could. The kittens knew something they didn’t. It wasn’t fair.

When Sacha’s father was about the same age, he already showed an extremely keen, perhaps over-developed imagination. It became so vivid that whatever he’d imagined became real. At least to him—to young Alec. Long before he became Alexander.

And then the problems began in earnest.

One day, Suzy and Alec were on the terrace overlooking the brooding gray rollers drawing towards them over the endless Pacific. The waves seemed to have spent their energies and lapped the shore gently, as though exhausted after a long journey. There was no wind. All was quiet, almost too quiet. Suzy became somewhat drowsy, while Alec, as was his habit, allowed his eyes to drift towards the horizon.

It was then that Sacha disappeared.

One moment he was sitting by the coffee table playing with his Strato Set, the next he wasn’t there.

Thankfully, neither Alicia nor Des seemed to have noticed the event. Neither, at first, had Alec nor Suzy. Then, slowly, Alec nudged Suzy on the elbow.

A good trick that, he murmured, pointing to the Strato structure on the small table.

He was referring to a male interlocking piece insinuating itself into a female receptacle with perfect precision. Suzy snapped out of her sleepy state only to catch her breath. As she watched, the next piece of the Strato puzzle lifted itself from the table, remained poised in the air without any visible means of support; then it drifted towards its destination in the growing construction.

Easy, girl...

Alec put his hand on Suzy’s arm as leaned over towards the table.

Come on, son. That’s enough of that...

The next instant first Sacha’s hand, holding the next block of brightly colored plastic, then the rest of him reappeared beside them. He seemed as preoccupied with his toy construction as ever.

Sorry, Dad, I wasn’t thinking...

Neither of his parents made any comments. They could not think of anything wise or profound to say. Sacha was ten at the time. Ten years and three weeks. They both wondered what lay ahead of him. Ahead for them all.

In some ways, Suzy was glad. Had she told Alec about Sacha’s hide’n seek frolics, she would have risked her scientifically minded husband telling her to take some time off and relax. He’d have told her that she was a little tired, that she ought to paint a little less and spend more time on the beach. And she would end up throwing an assortment of slippers at him in exasperation. And he would dodge her missiles...

Now Alec had witnessed Sacha’s disappearing trick. What she couldn’t figure out was why he did not seem disturbed by it. He seemed to have taken it in his stride, as though it was perfectly normal for his first-born to disappear into thin air.

Actually, it’s quite thick. I think we are in for a lengthy drizzle.

What? What are you talking about?

Suzy forgot that Alec had the ability to read her thoughts. Not always, and not all her thoughts––but thoughts which were ‘pregnant with emotions’ and which concerned him. They’d first noticed this ability of his some years ago. It was neither good nor bad. It just was.

You thought about thin air, he explained.

Very funny!

Only she wasn’t amused. Sacha was a perfect child. Wonderful, bright, smart, you name it. Only she wished he wouldn’t... disappear. Who could tell? Perhaps one day he would disappear and not find his way back? Her eyes were turning moist. What if he...

Don’t be silly, darling. This could not happen. Nothing in the world can disappear.

He does!

It only seems like it. Trust me. Sacha is perfectly all right.

B-b-but... but... Now her eyes were completely wet.

I knew that drizzle was coming, he joked, but walked over and knelt next to Suzy’s deck chair. She pressed her face into his chest.

There, now... there. Trust me Sue. Just trust me.

He might try to explain to his wife what had happened, but in her present emotional state she was unlikely to understand it; and even if she did, she would probably reject his explanation. It had to wait.

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For the next few weeks Suzy continued painting. She had an exhibition scheduled for the end of next month and hoped to enlarge on the number of her canvases. She wondered if she could paint a disappearing object. It would certainly be a challenge. She decided to try. She wondered too if she should share her ambition with Alicia. After all, it was Alec’s mother who encouraged her interest in painting. Without Alicia she would still be experimenting with new styles, without ever developing her own.

Name one old master, one impressionist, or even one so-called modern painter, whose work you cannot recognize, Alicia asked innocently.

How can I name him or her if I cannot recognize him. Her. Whatever...

You know very well what I mean, Alicia insisted.

She did. It was a little embarrassing but Alicia was usually right. It would be less embarrassing if Alec’s mother were the more experienced painter. In fact, it was she, Suzy, who encouraged Alicia to take up painting. Since then, Alicia had directed her talents towards stimulating the artistic talent latent in young people. She loved doing it and she was good, very good at it. Unfortunately she accomplished this at the expense of her own artistic development. Or perhaps, that was exactly what she was doing. Developing herself as a first-class teacher. Or motivator. Who knows what’s written in the stars for us? Most people don’t even try to find out.

As Sacha grew, painting became Suzy’s passion. At her last exhibition she’d sold nearly half of her latest paintings. First she was flabbergasted, then euphoric, and finally decided to visit the church on the hill where Alicia and Des got married, to thank God for her good fortune. The church, a chapel really, hasn’t changed. It was still whitewashed; the winding road leading up the hill to its doors was still overflowing with Bougainvilleas dressed over the low stone walls. On that little hill, time stood still. She liked that. She wondered why. Since the wedding almost ten years ago, she’d never returned there.

Perhaps time was waiting for her.

Suzy was not a religious person, but she did like the padre who refused to commit himself to any particular church. When she got to the chapel, the doors were wide open but the padre was nowhere to be seen. She realized that she’d never taken the trouble to learn his name. A most unprepossessing man. What Suzy really liked about him was his constant smile, his easy-going friendliness and complete absence of moral judgment.

Strange that, she thought, so unprepossessing––yet she could picture him so well after all these years.

She looked around.

A bunch of leaflets in a small wooden box on a table by the door caught her eye. Then she remembered. The padre offered leaflets, with telephones and addresses of, what he smilingly called, his competition. The leaflets had been laying here for ten years. Probably a lot longer. The top ones turned a bit yellow. Suzy’s only interest in religion was to protect Sacha from its influence. It wasn’t an act of premeditation. She did it impulsively, perhaps intuitively, yet, paradoxically, with a deep if unexplained premonition. Knowing how sensitive Sacha was she was afraid of what religion might do to him. She just felt, felt deeply, that she must protect him at all costs.

Ten years ago she wouldn’t have picked up anything that had remotely to do with religion. Now, she was curious. It was with a sort of ‘know thy enemy’ gesture that she picked up one pamphlet. She was stunned. The list wasn’t long but still, it was impressive. The churches, or sects, were listed in vaguely alphabetical order:

Baha’i, Baptist Church, Buddhism, Confucianism, Catholicism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Church of Christ, Church of Christian Science or Christ the Scientist, Church of England, Episcopal Church, Lutheran Church, Mennonite Church, Methodist Church, Moravian Church of America, Orthodox Eastern Church, Pentecostal Church, Presbyterian Church, Seventh Day Adventists, United Church of Christ, The Mormons also known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints...

On the other side of the circular the list continued with notes on Celtic Revivalists, Druids, International Society of Krishna Consciousness, Jainism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Quakers, Unitarian Universalist Association, Rosicruicianists, Shamanism, Shinto, Sikhism, Taoism, even on Wicca and Witchcraft. Each church or organization has been listed in neat columns and was followed by a few descriptive words, an approximate number of members, and their nearest point of contact.

Suzy was sure that this wasn’t the complete list of churches. For a start, all the New Age groups were missing, and she knew they were plentiful. And what of the followers of the great Lao Tsu philosophy? And those who believed in the teaching of the prophet Zarathustra better known as Zoroaster? What of the various Islamic sects, like the Sunnites? The Shiites? What of the Sufis? And the many religions of the African continent? Of the Amazonian jungle? In fact of the Tribal, Aboriginal and Paleo-Pagan Religions? Surely, the Big Churches did not manage to destroy them all. Not yet? Anyway, these were the older, well established churches. Churches that boosted upwards of a few million members.

It’s been a long time since Suzy had anything to do with any particular religion. When younger, she’d read avidly on various myths. In fact, she’d been fascinated by them. What she could never accept was what happened to those beautiful legends when they became adopted, or perhaps adapted, by the many religious organizations.

A fleeting memory made her smile.

She recalled a TV program in which a comic-strip hero, Homer Simpson, attempted to explain to his wife why he does not want to go to church on Sunday:  What, he asked, what if we picked the wrong religion? We’d make God madder and madder!

It would be almost impossible for an honest person to be a member of any particular church without offending so many others. Oh, she wished them all well, but...

What was it that people expected?

People who attended regular services were one thing, but so many others seemed preoccupied with pointing out what was wrong with all the other religious groups, sects, cults and churches. The Hindus criticized the Christians and the Moslem. The Moslem tried to reduced the Hindu ranks by derailing as many trains in India as they could. In turn, the Hindus were becoming more and more militant. They even dangled an atomic bomb over the Pakistan borders. The Christians were busy asserting urbi et orbi that they were the only true religion. The rest, they said, would go to hell.

Suzy glanced at the cross towering over the altar.

And it’s all in your name? she whispered. There was no mirth in her smile.

Others enjoyed different predilections. The Sikhs seemed preoccupied with their headgear, and other symbols arranged surreptitiously under their clothing. Evidently, they no longer carried those symbols in their hearts. And the Jews? The Jews were so busy asserting their right to the land, which God had given them by a personal, immovable, unchangeable, eternal and inflexible Covenant that they were too busy to criticize anybody else. As long as the ‘anybodies’ stayed a goodly distance from the exclusive Holy Land.

Unless they were tourists, of course.

And finally there were the various Christian sects, or churches, although what they had to do with Christ’s teaching she had no idea. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another, she mused: or was it for one another? She recalled the phrase vaguely. From what she’d seen, the various groups disliked each other as water dislikes fire. Many of them thought nothing of murdering hundreds of thousands of people; others would shoot, on sight, any woman who might want to abort a one-day-old fetus––thousands of which are aborted, daily, by nature itself.

There were so many names on the pamphlets. So many churches in whose name you could kill.

There was also a brochure issued by the Church of Seven Planes, which offered everyone the opportunity to become an ordained minister, at absolutely no cost, without any need to believe in anything. Once ordained, however, you would be free to start your own church. All expenses tax deductible no doubt. Not bad work if you can get it, she mused. All you had to do was to get rid of your conscience and bingo, you were a big religious Banana. You could even wear a funny hat to impress people.

But this was the least of the world’s problems.

Lately it became fashionable for everyone to accuse everyone else of being a terrorist. Mostly on religious grounds. Only she knew that the only grounds that fueled the ‘religious grounds’ were economic, yet people who practiced various religions seemed the most gullible, and they were the vast majority. They believed anything you threw at them, providing you did it in the name of God. Any God. Of any religion. Not that the so-called believers practiced the tenets their faith. The hardly knew what they were. But they certainly practiced pointing out the iniquities of all the others.

With trembling fingers Suzy replaced the leaflet on the table. The next moment, for no apparent reason, her knees gave way. She leaned against the nearest pew. A sudden pain shot through her, as though a sharp rod of fire had pierced her heart. Then it was gone.

When she got home everyone was out except for Sacha. He was lying on the bed, his legs bent at right angles, swaying gently as though to some strange music. He was reading. As she drew closer her heart missed a beat. Sacha had a dozen books on the bed with him. He was flipping the pages like a windmill in a gusty wind. All the books were on the same subject. She kept these books hidden in an old suitcase under her bed. She’d hidden them purposely.

She’d hidden them to protect her son.

Sacha was thumbing through the old, worn copies of her esoteric library. Once her passion, she hadn’t touched them since Sacha was born. She kept them under the bed, here, to minimize the danger of Sacha finding them at home, in LA. By the time she opened her mouth, Sacha put the last book down. His face registered a mixture of amusement and disbelief.

Hello, Mom. Do people really believe all this stuff?

There was genuine concern in his voice. For some inexplicable reason Suzy thought she saw, in his eyes, concern for the human race. She shrugged. What nonsense, she thought. He’s just a little boy.

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Chapter 2

Grandma ‘Licia

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There were the Baldwins: Suzy, Alexander and Sacha. There was also Alicia, Alec’s mother, who married Desmond, a little over a year after Alec’s father died of a heart attack. They were the McBrides. Originally, Dr. Desmond McBride, himself a widower, had two sons from a previous marriage. One emigrated to Australia. The other, well, the other was dead. The father and the surviving son hardly kept in touch. It wasn’t really the son’s fault. Many years ago their father made it very plain that his sons had been directly responsible for their mother’s death. No one knew the details, and Desmond wasn’t offering any explanations. As for Alicia, since Suzy’s parents still lived in Kingston, Ontario, way up in Canada, she took on the job of being the family matriarch. A job, she thought, she performed rather well. At least, no one complained.

Her proximity to Suzy drew the two women together, as though mother and daughter, but what was even more important, as really good, trusting friends.

As for living together, it only happened during summer recesses and, more often than not, during weekends. The protracted family reunions took place at the McBrides’ home, in Solana Beach, some 20 miles North of San Diego, fairly close to the Mexican border. The rest of the year the Baldwins stayed in their third-floor condo across the park from Caltech, and the McBrides enjoyed an even better view from the twenty-fourth floor of their rented apartment, only a stone’s throw away from the Baldwins. Dr. McBride did not want to own two residences.

The morre you own the more you’rre tied down. And you do want to travel, don’t you, lassie?

He hardly rolled the ‘r’s when he was serious. He only pretended at being very serious about taking things a little easier and enjoying life with his ‘young bride’. He would enjoy the company of his bride wherever they were. Traveling or not.

The young bride was a grandmother in her middle fifties but she really did look young. In his eyes she still was, and would probably remain, a young lassie, forever.

And thus Alicia regarded Sacha through Grandma’s eyes. To her, he was a miniature Alec. His father’s nose, eyes, forehead, even the mop of hair... But she also saw Suzy in him. She saw in Sacha his father on the outside and his mother on the inside. There was one fundamental difference. To make Sacha truly his father’s son, one would have to die the boy’s hair. For while they both, father and son, sported what, in the late sixties, people called an ‘afro’, Alec’s mop was jet black. His son, however, took after his mother. The mop, equal in size and prominence, was resplendent in pure gold. When the sun hit his hair it seemed to glow with an unearthly aura, as though radiating its own light.

Alicia soon discovered that Sacha was so very, very capable in all fields of art. He exhibited, even at such an absurdly young age, an uncanny maturity in the way he viewed art. He liked or disliked certain color combinations. At first he lacked the vocabulary to explain his preferences, later he talked fluently about the balance, harmony, and visual resonance. If an adult said the same things he would have sound stilted, or perhaps as though making an effort to impress the listener. But there was no presumptuous buffoonery in Sacha’s opinions. He stated his preferences as simply as if he talked about his beloved Strato Set. He treated colors as toys. One had to arrange them in a certain relationships to each other, or they would collapse. In fact exactly like in his Strato Set.

The Strato was a successful marriage of the simplicity of a Lego set with the complexity of Buvös Kocka––the Magic Cube, also known as Rubik’s Cube––only on a much larger scale. There was a right way and a wrong way, and only the right way pleased him. The strange thing was that, when Alicia listened to Sacha, the relationships of colours he proposed also pleased her. Only she wasn’t quite sure why.

Alicia discovered this affinity for color in Sacha a little after his seventh birthday, but it took another two years before he could vocalize his preferences. As for harmony and resonance, Sacha could whistle or hum the more melodic themes from symphonies after hearing them only once. Sacha definitely displayed a great artistic sensitivity. It was as though he, himself, resonated with music and with colours.

Alicia loved looking after Sacha—though her precocious grandson hardly needed much supervision. She loved looking after him because he was such good company, even for a fifty-year-old.

It wasn’t as though Alicia was lonely.

She had Suzy and Alec and of course Desmond. But Sacha was quite different. And it wasn’t just his age. Sacha never tried to convince her about anything. He expressed his own views, and rejoiced in the diversity of the opinions of others. From the time he was eight or nine, she talked to him as though he were an adult. He was certainly knowledgeable enough though, admittedly, his knowledge was derived almost exclusively from books. It was theoretical—untarnished by the compromises which adults imposed on life in general. Listening to him Alicia noticed what an enormous act we put on, particularly when talking to others. Unwittingly, or purposefully, we all try to impress others with our best side. Be it with our real or imagined talents, with our knowledge of certain subjects, or just some contrived sense of importance. Some do so more than others, but we all do it.

And Sacha never insisted on being right.

No one is ever right or wrong, he once said. We just look at reality from different points of view. He was eight when he’d said that.

A year later, she and Sacha were sitting on the terrace, Alicia doing a watercolor, Sacha’s eyes following the convoluted activities of the seagulls. He touched on related subject.

You know, Grandma, the seagulls drop whatever they have in their beaks to attack another bird, who might have a bigger piece. Why do you think they do that?

I suppose they are more hungry, they want a bigger piece? Alicia tried lamely.

Sacha did not appear to have heard her. For a while he continued to follow the birds’ movements with great attention.

They just don’t understand, he said after a minute or two.

Who doesn’t understand what? Alicia asked, her mind back on her watercolor.

The birds. They don’t understand that there is exactly enough for every one of them. And they could conserve their energy if they were satisfied with their portion.

For a moment Alicia was lost.

Enough food, you mean?

Yes, Grandma. There is exactly enough of everything for everybody. It cannot be otherwise. There would be no harmony in the world if it were otherwise.

And with this Sacha went back to his Strato. In Strato things had to be just right, or the structure would