HOPEWATCH &  The Art of Peace

A Fiction Work by:

Yianni Palos
Copyright © 2003










All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce “HOPEWATCH &  The Art of Peace”
or portions thereof in any form without the prior written permission of the author.







   



    Back




PREFACE


The twelve immemorial travelers sat in their ancient thrones and silently stared at the massive, double doors. Mankind’s world, the world they had ruled, lived, and loved it seamed to be seeking its own destruction. There was nothing they could do to save the human race. They could strike thunderbolts, move mountains, change the flow of rivers, steer the depths of oceans, control the fury of the wind . . . but they were utterly powerless to change the course of the fast approaching doom. They had summoned the Alloterrs, who regulated inevitably the affairs of life and ruled both gods and man, to appear before them, to reveal the next torch bearer of Hope through their intricate tapestry.
In front of them, an old couple sat by the enormous marble table, looking intently at the dimly flickering light of Hope. They had kept its flames burning in the hearts of humans for a long time. The time had come to step down, to hand the torch to the new Messenger of Hope – to become his guardians, his teachers. Patiently, they waited, too.
The double doors opened silently. Both gods and men rose and respectfully bowed their heads as the Moirai entered into the immense room, placed their living web of life onto the table and, in solemn faces, looked at the old couple.
The long silence became eery, unbearable.
“Have you decided who my successor is?” asked the old man, humbly.
“Yes!” the Moirai spoke in unison. “A boy not yet conceived.  On the day of his birth, the Amulet of Hope shall be delivered into his hands. His name shall be known as “Hopewatch.”
                   


   

ONE


Although his name was Hopewatch, everyone in his small village called him “Hopsy.” He was seven years old, medium stature for a boy of his age, with chestnut-brown hair, and an exceptional childlike smile. The very thought of a smile seemed to initiate a small dimple on his right cheek. He had tried pushing his tongue against the small dimple or sucking his right cheek to hide it when it wasn’t an appropriate time for him to be smiling, but after some time it became very obvious to everyone what he was trying to do. As he grew, he’d thought of many different ways to somewhat hide his odd behaving dimple, but finding all his efforts in vain, he finally gave up and learned to live with it. What he liked most about himself was his extraordinary big honey-brown eyes. They seemed to exert his true feelings at all times. One look into his eyes and his mother, Narkiz, knew instantly how he felt.
“You’re an open book,” she would say to him. “I know when you’re sad or happy, excited or content. One look into your eyes and I know whether you’re lying or telling me the truth.”
Hopsy thought that his mother was the most beautiful lady in his small village. She was slender and somewhat on the tall side for a girl. Her shoulder length charcoal-black hair prettified her oval face and her warm chestnut-brown almond-shaped eyes. He loved her  beautiful smile and her soft and gentle voice. She loved dresses. “Pants are made  for men and boys,” she would say smiling to him. “Do I look like a man or a boy to you?” Unlike some of the other women in his village, he’d never seen his mom in trousers.
The night before his seventh birthday, he had tried and tried to sweet-talk to his mother. He had offered the once-a-year occasion as an excuse to skip school just for that one day, but she just wouldn’t listen to his reasoning. He still had to do his homework. He still had to wake up early in the morning. He still had to attend his regular classes at the school. Her last words were, “You are going, Hopsy.” And that was that.
It was on this day when he . . . no, not he . . . when the vision came to him for the first time.
He was standing in front of the blackboard with a piece of white chalk in his hand, adding, and multiplying numbers. He was halfway through solving the math problem when he suddenly found himself nearly paralyzed. He felt like a frozen statue – a statue made of bones and flesh. He had tried to move his hands, his feet, and other parts of his body, but he could not. The only thing he could feel was his pounding heart as his unblinking eyes gazed at the blackboard. He also felt something calm and soothing taking hold of his mind and the huffing and puffing reactions of his bizarre thoughts. It seemed to him, standing there almost paralyzed, that his mind would fly apart if he brought no order in his confusion.
The numbers he had written, magically flew off the board one after the other, and as if parading, they vanished through the solid walls. He saw two ghost-like shadows looking at him as they loomed outside the classroom window. They emerged through the thick glass panels, hovered over his classmates, and finally landed gracefully in front of him. He caught their eyes not merely looking at him, but staring, staring. Staring at him.
Hopewatch couldn’t see their facial features. Somehow their faces kept changing and moving like tiny rippling waves on the top of a pond. He was sure that he could poke his finger right through their ethereal bodies. Their eyes reminded him of a big glass marble he once had. He couldn’t  tell their age, or even what they looked like, but he was sure that the figure of the tall ghost belonged to a man, and the short one to a woman. They faced one another, nodded agreement, then they turned and smiled at him.
The man ghost glided effortlessly over the polished wood floor without moving his feet, approached the blackboard, took the white piece of chalk from Hopsy’s hand, and started writing something. What was he writing on the board? Not knowing became unbearable. He felt as if nothing he had known was as important as knowing this. And there it was at last. A single phrase.
Dream the Hopeful Dreams of your Destiny
The ghost put the chalk back in Hopsy’s hand, smiled, glided back, and held the hand of the woman ghost. Holding hands they bowed their heads to him with respect. Then they floated through the air, waved their hands goodbye to him, flew out the room the same way they had arrived, and disappeared from his sight as suddenly as they had appeared.
“Well done, Hopsy!” The teacher’s lofty voice shattered his vision into nothingness. “Next time I’ll give you a harder problem to solve.” He chuckled. “You can step down and take your seat.”
As if in a daze, Hopewatch stepped down, eased himself into his small desk, and stared at the chalkboard. He saw his own handwritten numbers on it, and although he knew he had not finished solving it, the problem was solved. Not only that, but the man-ghost’s message was not on the board any more. Just like the two ghosts, it had vanished, too. Confused, Hopsy slipped his hands under his desk and pinched his legs to ensure himself that he was not dreaming. He was in the classroom, the teacher was there, so were his schoolmates. Did they not see the two ghosts – their message on the board? He looked around. The faces of his classmates seemed to look as they always had. Normal.
He looked at the blackboard again. He could see that the math problem was solved correctly, but he couldn’t tell how. He tried to remember how and when he managed to solve it, but couldn’t. Somehow, for him, time itself had been frozen during his vision. Or, was it the other way round? It had to be. No one had seen the two ghosts or the writing on the board. No one but him. He had to hide his dimple with his hand.
“Dream the Hopeful Dreams of your Destiny.” The seven words seemed to be carved into his mind. Although he couldn’t understand their meaning, the phrase was there, seen clearly with his mind’s eye. He felt a little strange, but also excited at the same time by the thought that the message was a secret birthday present for him. Yes!  A secret present from the two friendly ghosts. What else could it be? He made a mental note to thank his mom for not listening to him, for making him go to school.
On the way home he decided to tell his mother the whole story about the two ghosts. His mother would know what that symbolic phrase was trying to conceal and what it meant for him if it revealed itself in a much simpler way. He trusted his mother’s judgement. She was always there for him; she was a good listener. She would listen to him without interruption, smiling, encouraging, holding his hand. He was very happy to have such a superb and understanding mother. He couldn’t remember ever seeing her angry; not with him. Not with anyone.
Without looking back he walked toward his home. A block away from school, Hopewatch recognized Lilly’s light footsteps approaching. The shepherd girl. His best friend since they were babies. Lilly’s flowing, long, curly red hair bounced on her slender body with each step as she walked next to him. For a while they walked in silence.
“Both Lilly and you are Sunday children,” his mother had said once.  “You were born first and the following Sunday, there comes Lilly crying.”
Everyone in the small village believed that Lilly was a very strange little girl. The villagers murmured flying telltales about her since she was a tiny baby. She would sit cross-legged in front of animals, her green eyes staring into theirs, whispering her thoughts to them. The animals would look into her eyes, listened attentively, nod their heads, or wiggle their tails in response. The villagers believed that she could talk to animals.
“Can you read my thoughts, Lilly?”
“No.”
“You told me that you can read the thoughts of animals. How come you can’t read mine?”
“Because animals want me to read their thoughts, and because they never learned how to hide them from me or from other creatures. Somehow animals know what other animals think and feel. They can sense it. They have this extra sense that we humans don’t have. When they talk to me, I feel like I’m reading a book. It’s all there in the book. All I have to do is read it. I know it sounds weird. But just because I can read their thoughts that doesn’t mean I’m crazy, or something. Does it, Hopsy?”
“No, it doesn’t. Of course not.” He paused, then asked, “Do they tell you their secrets?”
“Animals don’t have secrets, Hopsy. They’re not like us.” Lilly touched his arm gently. “Hopsy, we don’t have any secrets between us. We’ve always trusted each other. Haven’t we?”
“Yes.” He sighed. Staring at his shadow in front of him, he walked on it step after step. “It’s funny,” he murmured as if talking to himself. “I step on my shadow but I feel nothing. Like a ghost it follows me wherever I go. Lilly . . . ?”
“What?”
“Do you think if I had stepped on a ghost, I mean a real ghost, would he feel something, like pain?”
Lilly grabbed his arm and they came to a stop staring at each other. “Hopsy, let’s sit against that shaded wall, and you tell me what it is you are not saying. I can see it in your eyes, but I can’t read your mind, remember?”
After putting their books on the ground, he sat down with his back resting against the whitewashed wall. Lilly sat in front of him and crossed her legs under her body. Her hair touched the blades of the grass. Her green eyes stared into his, intensely.
“Now, tell me,” she said quietly. “Everything,” she emphasized.
Hopewatch took a long breath and let it out slowly, readying himself for the worst. Ghosts? He knew there were no ghosts nor did he believe in ghost stories. At best they were only imaginative and entertaining stories – stories to scare small children. Lilly would laugh at him. No, that was not fair to Lilly. Lilly would laugh with him, but not at him. There was a certain respect and understanding between them. Lilly was his best friend. He lifted his head and stared into her attentive green eyes.
“Thank you, Lilly,” he said.
“Tell me – when you’re ready. I’m not going anywhere.” An easing smile appeared  on her face. The same soothing, trust-me smile she always had when she talked to her four-legged friends.
“Today at school – did you notice anything strange when I was doing the math problem? Did you see something . . . uh . . . unusual?”
“No, I didn’t. But I felt something.”
“What, Lilly?” he said, excited.
“I felt as if the air-conditioning was blowing icy-cold air in the classroom. It lasted for maybe a few minutes, I think. I had to hug myself and rub my arms to stop shivering. When you finished the problem, the air was normal again. That was weird.”
They, his two friendly ghosts, were in the classroom. No! It was not just a vision. They were real. They were there, and Lilly had felt their presence but couldn’t see them. Why did the ghosts show themselves only to him? What was their message? Why him? His imagination, his young need-to-know mind ran wild.
“Lilly, you may think that I’m climbing up on the nut tree, or losing my mind, or something even worse, but it wasn’t the air-conditioning that made you feel the icy-cold air. It was them. And I didn’t solve the problem either. They did it for me.”
“They? I don’t understand you, Hopsy. Who are they?”
Looking into her eyes, he told her everything. First her eyes got big, then bigger, her mouth opened wide, and when he finished telling her his vision, she mouthed a soundless, “Wow!” After the initial secret-sharing excitement was burned-out somewhat, Lilly wrote the phrase on her yellow notepad. Then they manipulated the words moving them around, attempting to better understand the real meaning of the phrase. They ended up with two phrases, which they thought made more sense than the single one. Full of excitement they read the results of their combined efforts.
“Your Destiny / The Dream of Hopeful Dreams.”
“Hopsy,” said Lilly in a trembling voice, “you must be special to them. I think they’re preparing you for something very important.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know.”
They were so much engrossed with Hopsy’s vision and trying to solve the mysterious phrase that they didn’t notice a man sneaking closer to them until his tall figure was standing above them. He stood there, hands crossed in front of him, his right foot tapping on the soft grass, and staring down at Lilly’s notepad.
His name was Tito Sophfron. The right half of his face was severely burned from the top of his forehead to under his chin. A milky filmed, pupilless right eye gaped open through his burned eyelids. It seemed that it was always fixed on the same spot, as if staring through whatever his good eye was looking at. Both his mouth and nose were deformed and crooked terribly toward the burned side of his face.
“What are the two of you doing here?” he shouted with his throaty, raspy voice, his eye still glued on Lilly’s notepad. “Give me that,” he demanded, thrusting his long arm towards Lilly.
“No!” Lilly said and jumped to her feet. “You can’t have it.” She started taking backward steps while holding her notepad behind her back with both hands.
“Give it to me, you animal freak, before I break your neck like a twig.”
“Leave her alone, Mr. Sophron,” Hopewatch said calmly. He stepped between them and faced Tito. “What she wrote on her notepad doesn’t concern you.”
“You crummy little things. I’ll . . .” Mr. Sophron started to say, but left his sentence unfinished.
Buster, Lilly’s two-year old wolf was standing next to her, snarling and showing his sharp teeth to Mr. Sophron.
Lilly’s father, Antony, being a shepherd himself, had found Buster in the woods when he was still a tiny cub. He had watched the young white-haired animal crawling on his belly, its big golden eyes staring at the same spot, carefully moving toward its target. When it was close enough to his quarry, it leapt into the air and its paws touched squarely where the sparrow had been. The cub looked up at the might-have-been meal as it flew into the thick branches of a tree. Despite this failed attempt, and with a renewed confidence, the cub then scrutinized the slight movements of the grass. He hopped in the air and landed on all four paws at the same time. Another futile attempt. He ran after the trail of the escaping lizard through the zigzagging grass.
Antony watched and smiled. The cub had stepped in Antony’s shadow, looked at him with his big, golden eyes, and showed him its small sharp teeth. Antony tried to scoop him off the ground. The pup moved rapidly, crawled into the bushes, and tried crudely to imitate the rumbling, growling sounds of his parents. The cub gave a fair fight before he was captured. Antony fed him some fresh milk, put the cub in his lunch sack, and knowing Lilly’s abilities with animals, he gave it to her as a present. From that day on, she took good care of him and named him Buster. And as if by a miracle, wolves no longer attacked or mutilated their sheep or goats.
“Keep that thing away from me,” Tito muttered. Terrified he walked backwards distancing himself from Buster’s teeth, then he was gone.
“Thanks, Buster,” Lilly whispered in his ear as she combed his gray hair with her hand. “Come, Hopsy,” she said smiling, “let’s go away from here before Buster gets angry.”

Tito Sophron paced to his door, pushed it open, and kicked it shut. He was furious. He had been humiliated by those two little punks. He was a soldier. He had fought and shed blood for his country. He had been deformed doing his duty – protecting his fellow men, his flag. What was wrong with the world anyhow? The Spartans knew exactly what to do with their children. Took them off the streets at age seven, taught them soldiering, taught them to be strong, taught them to fight, made killers out of them. Kill the enemy. They’re everywhere. Kill them all. Exterminate.
Tito’s blood was boiling hot. He forced his fingers into a giant fist, raised his arm  above his head, and hammered the table forcefully. The middle of the table caved inwards, broke in two, and with a final squeaking sound, fell on the floor. He stared at his fist as if he had never seen it before, then he chuckled aloud. “I still got it! God help me, I still got it,” he shouted and tried to smile at his image in the mirror, but he couldn’t. His smile looked more like it was frowning or mocking him. No matter. Although he knew that his smile looked crooked and ugly, it was his smile. He liked it. He’d earned it. Hadn’t he?
His eye stared at the broken table. Suddenly, an uncontrollable urge of wrath rose from the great depths of his gut. His right booted foot landed hard on the half table, sending it to the other side of the room. He watched it crash onto the floor. It squeaked and creaked like a dying creature as it fell apart. He smiled. Yes! That felt good. He kicked the other half even harder. It flew six feet high, traveling toward the kitchen window. It smashed the glass into tiny pieces, and bits of glass struck noisily down on the floor. It went through the broken panels, and landed outside on his small vegetable garden, destroying his tomato, onion, and pepper plants. Now that he had worked the anger and frustration out of his system, he felt much calmer, and nimbly justified.
Now he could pick up the phone and do his duty as he’d always done. No little punks would take glorious fighting warriors and make amicable citizens out of them. That was unacceptable to Tito. He could never permit that. As long as he had one drop of blood left in him, he’d be a fighting soldier, so help him God.
He picked up the phone in his huge hand, dialed a number, and tapped his boot on the floor, nervously.
“It’s me. Me, Tito. Yes, Tito Sophron. Tito in the small . . . village, you know. Yeah, that Tito. I think it happened. I heard him talking to his, uh . . . animal-talker friend. She freaks me out, man. I heard words . . . Something about destiny, ghosts, dreams. No, I didn’t have the chance. Sir . . . the wolf – she has a damn wolf for a pet. Unbelievable. Yes, I’m listening. I will, sir. Yes, sir. Goodbye, sir.”
He’ll show them punks and, at the same time, do his patriotic duty for his country.

Somewhere at the foot of the tall mountains there was a green oasis. Hidden under the shade of the enormous trees, a well preserved old wooden house was built on the banks of the peaceful creek. After entering through the window panel, fixing the math problem, leaving their message on the blackboard, and paying their respect to Hopewatch, the two ghosts flew hurriedly back home, and emerged into their living aged-old bodies.
“It started,” said the old man. Then he took his long stick and made a circle in the air. “Now let’s sit back and watch.”
Instantly, the circle became a giant, alive, viewing screen. They saw the puzzled face of Hopewatch as he walked back to his seat.
“Such a beautiful little boy,” the old lady said, giggling with joy. “He is the one, yes?”
“Yes, Mother. He is the one. We know that already. That is, if he doesn’t change, if he follows his destiny, if we can keep him safe from his enemies, if –”
”Look here,” she stopped him. “I’ve been married to you for how long now? I don’t know and I don’t care to know it either. I’ve lost a son and  a daughter for our cause. Your children. I want no more deaths. If you can’t protect the boy, then cancel the whole thing. You listening, old man? I have no more tears left to cry. Do you hear me?”
“Yes, Mother.”
She took a picture from the wall and stared at the faces of her son and daughter. Charles was six years older than his sister Henrietta. Like their father, Zoticus, they were tall and slender. “My tall cypresses,” Pheope used say to each one as she  looked lovingly into their eyes. They looked alike except for their eyes. Charles had inherited his father’s serious, pale-brown eyes, and Henrietta her mother’s, shining, gray-blue eyes.
Both, she and her husband, Zoticus, were devastated when the messenger had knocked on their door. The message was very simple, but explicitly clear. Their son, Charles, and their daughter, Henrietta, were both dead. Charles had died instantly from the powerful explosion of a claymore mine. For Charles the evidence was conclusive. Fingerprints and dental records showed, without a doubt, that Charles’ body was blown to bits and pieces. The messenger had ensured them that Charles had died instantly. As for Henrietta, although they couldn’t locate her body, she, the messenger had said, had either been eaten by wild creatures, or drifted away in the thick jungle, most likely injured from the powerful blast, and died elsewhere. After two days of searching and combing the immediate vicinity in the thick jungle of Vietnam, their investigation hadn’t produced any hopeful evidence that she might be alive. So, Henrietta was listed as MIA – Missing In Action.
With hardened hearts and saddened spirits the old couple had accepted the government’s explanation and looked no further into this saddest of affairs. Scratching their deep wounds would only make it  worse than their bleeding hearts could bear. It had taken more that three years for Pheope to accept the death of her children and to return their framed picture to the wall of their house. She placed the picture back on the wall, and after making sure that it was perfectly level, she turned and stared at her old man as if he was not there.
“Can you protect the child?” she asked at last.
“Yes! With my life.”
“Is that a promise?”
“Yes. It’s a promise.”
“Good.” She kissed his aged, wrinkled cheeks, held his hand gently, and sat by his side.  “Now we watch.”
After about two hours or so, Zoticus snapped his fingers and the screen disappeared.
“I believe they handled Mr. Sophron wisely,” Pheope said, giggling. “We have to keep an eye on that Tito. Such a mean man. Destroying his own furniture. Did you see that table flying out the window? I thought that was hysterical.” She stood up, still giggling. “Some tea?”
“Yes. That’ll be just fine,” he said, and made a mental note about Tito Sophron




TWO


As the bright sun vanished behind the gray and ashen colored mountains, the blue sky painted itself bluer. Flickering, as if trying to wake up from its long daytime sleep, the morning star appeared in the sky, then turned itself to dazzling gold. The quarter moon emerged shyly next to the shining star and slowly grew to silver. The earth was changing her bright and colorful dress to her dark one, preparing nature for her nighttime creatures.
Dusk was hugging the earth when Hopewatch arrived at his home still pondering the events of the day. His mother, Narkiz, was taking the evening meal from the oven. He breathed the delicious aroma of baked chicken, potatoes, onions, and carrots smothered in olive oil and lemon juice. His favorite! He licked his lips in anticipation. She put the roasting pan on the top of the white-tiled countertop. The steaming chicken looked golden crisp. Next to it he saw a freshly baked chocolate cake with white icing letters. He read:
Happy Seventh BirthdayHe felt strange. How could he forget his own birthday? His birthday was always so special to him. Each year, he would invite Lilly, devour large pieces of chocolate cake, act silly, play, and watch television.
“Mom, I’m sorry,” he said apologetically.  “I had a long and very strange day, and I . . . I just forgot.”
“I thought so,” Narkiz said and opened her arms wide. He rushed into the safe harbor of her bosom. She hugged him tightly and kissed his hands and cheeks. “Happy birthday, my precious little one. I just wish your father was here to celebrate with us your seventh birthday and to see how much you’ve grown since  the last time he saw you.” She sighed. A momentary sadness appeared on her face, then it was gone.
His father, Theo, was the captain of a merchant ship. He would come home from his long journeys all over the world, stay with them for ten or twenty days and leave again for ten months or for a whole year sometimes. His mother’s face would sparkle with joy and happiness in those days he was home. Then before the day of his departure, she would cry secretly so his father wouldn’t notice her sadness and despair. But Hopsy knew better. “I shall never get used to this separation thing,” his mother would say to him while looking at his father as he took his seat on the bus. As the bus became smaller and smaller, a small dot on the dusty road, she would hold his hand tighter and tighter. Sometimes it hurt him terribly but he didn’t mind. Something in his heart pained him even more.
“Hopsy?”
“Yes, mom?”
“Aren’t you forgetting something? What’s wrong with you today? You’re here and you’re not. Aren’t you going to invite her for your birthday dinner?”
“Invite?”
“My forgetful, absentminded son.” She shook her head in exasperation. “You’re such a silly goose sometimes.”
“Oh, yes! I’ll be right back,” he yelled, and ran out of the door.

Lilly was all dressed up, waiting.
“Happy birthday, Hopsy,” she said, and handed him a small round stone. Veins of blue, black, and red could be seen inside the see-through glasslike stone. “I found it in the river and I thought you might like it.”
“Thanks, Lilly. When did you find it?”
“Some time. Don’t you like it?”
“I love it. It’s very beautiful.” Suddenly he found the air unbearably thin. He felt strange, uncomfortable. He couldn’t tell why his stomach was acting so funny. The whole day was strange. What was wrong with him today? He wanted to say something nice to her, but he couldn’t find the right words. “Uh . . . we better go. Mom is waiting for us,” he said instead.
“Did you tell her?” asked Lilly.
“No,” he mumbled.
“Will you tell her?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
When they arrived home, Narkiz had prepared he table with festive colors, the special china, the delicious food on the plates, and seven little white candles on the birthday cake.
“Mmm,” they said at the same time as they sat across from each other. With  elbows resting on the table, they stared at the cake, and licked their lips.
Narkiz cast her eyes at them. “Chk, chk, chk ,” she warned them and waved a finger. “First a silent prayer, then roast chicken and veggies, and, if you’re good, then we’ll cut the cake.”
After a while, Hopsy glanced at his mother. She looked shocked. Her eyes peered at him, then at Lilly, down at their plates, then back at him, to Lilly . . . as if watching the strangest Ping-Pong match. Most of the food on their plates was gone, the soft drinks in their glasses almost finished, much cacophony from knives and forks, but not a sound from either him or Lilly. He knew his mother. She couldn’t stand not knowing. Lilly and he, almost always, talked loud, shouted at each other, and ate as fast as they could chew, just so they could get to the delicious dessert faster.
“What’s wrong with you two?” she asked with a sigh. “You haven’t said a word, or gulped your food down like hungry wolves, and you’ve completely avoided eye contact with each other and also with me, as if I don’t exist, as if I were a ghost.”
Instantly Hopewatch and Lilly eyed one another. Their forks froze in midair and their mouths stopped chewing. Lilly nodded slowly without taking her eyes from Hopewatch. Their heads turned, unblinking eyes stared at Narkiz, and as if something or someone removed the cap on the piled up words in their minds, they both started talking excitedly, and moved their hands like maniacs at the same time.
Narkiz smiled and covered her ears with her hands as they chattered in marvelous shrills and moved their forks in front of her like deadly swords.
“You’re impossible,” Narkiz said with an exasperated smile. “You refused to talk since you got here as though you were eating tongue-numbing leaves and all of a sudden . . . all right. What is it? Birthday boy, you go first.”
By the time they had finished telling Narkiz the events of the day, Narkiz’s facial expression was rapidly changing from smiling to somber, to frowning, to terror, and finally, to relief. Suddenly she stood up and disappeared into her bedroom.
Hopsy and Lilly looked at each other, frowned and moved their hands and shoulders in an I-don’t-know gesture. Was she upset with them? Did she think that they were making up cruel stories to scare her or something? She just stood up and left. She’d never done that. She’d always asked question after question. Why not now? What was wrong with her? Why did her face change like that?
Hopsy heard her approaching footsteps. Holding a small silver box, Narkiz took her seat at the table. Her face looked distant and calm. She put the little box in front of Hopewatch.
He eyed its intricate patterns, conscious that both Lilly and his mother were staring at him intently. A wave of frustration, a discouraging feeling entered his mind. He felt that he already had enough surprises for one day. Reluctantly he stretched out his hand, the tips of his fingers touched the box, and instantly he withdrew them, as if the surface of the box held some unbearable energy. Minutes seemed to elapse in a dull and uneventful silence.
“Open it,” Narkiz said in a whispering tone. “Go on . . . Open it, son,” she repeated as if awakening from a spell, encouraging him.
“What is it?” asked Hopewatch, still unwilling to touch it.
“Just open it, look at it, hold it. Then I’ll tell you where and how it came to me.”
“More mystery,” Lilly said rubbing her hands with excitement. “Open it, Hopsy. I’m dying to know what it is.”
“Wow,” said Hopewatch as soon as he flipped-open the cover of the box. “Wow.”
“What? What?” Lilly shouted. “Let me see.”
Hopewatch moved his fingers on it. As he gently ran his fingertips on its smooth surface, something warm entered through the pores of his skin, vibrated through his flesh, and an exquisite, nameless feeling stirred his heart. Holding the silver chain with both hands, he pulled it out and lifted it up in front of him. Sparkling with colorful lights, a transparent amulet hung on it. His name was carved inside the amethyst stone.
HopewatchHe was speechless. How could anyone carve his name inside the transparent stone? Weird. First the ghosts, then Tito and Buster, and now this. His seventh birthday seemed to get stranger and stranger by the minute. What was going to happen next?
Lilly stretched her hand over the table. “Let me see, let me hold it, Hopsy,” she begged. She took it from him, and looked and looked. “Beautiful,” she repeated breathlessly. “I knew it,” she resumed with conviction. “I knew it.”
“Knew what, Lilly?” Narkiz asked in a surprised tone.
“Hopsy is special.”
“I must say that I have to agree with you Lilly,” Narkiz murmured quietly.
Four wondering eyes filled with amazement and fascination stared at Narkiz. She took a long breath, stared at the amulet, and as if talking to herself, she started telling them her story.
“I have seen them also – the ghosts. It was the day you were born . . . the most precious little bundle I ever saw in my life when the midwife placed you in my arms. “Get to know each other,” she said to me with a tired smile, and left the room quietly. You were so soft, so handsome. And those eyes of yours, staring at me. My heart was pounding with immeasurable joy in my swollen chest. I don’t remember for how long I held you in my arms, just looking at you and loving you more and more as the seconds ticked away. Then I noticed a shadow coming through the window of my room and then another one followed.”
“The ghosts!” Lilly uttered in a bewildered voice.
“Yes, the ghosts,” Narkiz said and sighed. “At first I was horrified. I’d heard many horrible stories of ghosts breathing into the mouths of newborn babies, suffocating them, or even stealing their souls. With my arms wrapped tightly around my precious baby, I gazed at the short ghost. My frantic mind wanted to do a million different things but my body refused to follow its commands. I just stood there frozen, as if in a trance, staring at them.” Her voice took a throbbing richness that Hopsy never heard in it before. “Then the lights of the room grew brighter and brighter, and the air enhanced itself to the sweet smell of jasmines. I felt like screaming for help, fleeing the room with you in my arms, and never look back, never return. Right then the woman ghost looked at me kindly, smiled, and suddenly all my worries seemed to fly out the window. She came closer, bent over and looked at you for a long time. Then she put the amulet in your little hands. Maybe it was my excitement, or my state of mind with what was happening, but I swear, you smiled at her. The man ghost looked at me, and said, ‘Give him the amulet at age eight. It will protect him from any harm.’ Then, they were gone.”
“His name – that’s why –”
“Yes, Lilly. That’s why we named him Hopewatch.”
After Hopewatch said goodnight to Lilly, he remembered what she’d said. ‘You are special.’ Special for what? He didn’t feel special. The more he thought about what was happening to him, the less he understood. “Your destiny . . . ”What was his destiny? What is the dream of all dreams? His name, Hopewatch, carved in the amulet. Hope watcher? How does one watch hope? He closed his eyes. Sleep followed.
Three hours later he woke up smiling and giggling. Fourth of July, he mused, as he remembered his vivid dream. Lights. Beautiful, colorful lights.  Rainbows of blues, reds, greens, yellows, gold, silver . . . and all different hues in between. Brilliant lights ripping through the air and opening up like exotic flowers. His best dream ever. If this is the dream of  all dreams, Hopsy thought smiling, then he was the luckiest boy on Earth. Hurriedly, he pulled the covers over him. He had to see  the Fourth of July again.







THREE

   
Eerie and spooky things started happening to Hopewatch from that day on.  They were playing baseball. The day was beautiful, the sky was cloudless and blue, and the cool breeze just right. Leo took practice swings to loosen up. Hopsy guarded second base. At thirteen, Leo was eight inches taller than Hopewatch and very fit. “Mister Macho,” the teacher called Leo once, and the name stuck with Leo. He was mean. Mocking everyone, and fighting with the other kids seemed to give him enormous pleasure. Although some of the kids liked to be his friends, he always brushed them off. “Who need yuh,” he would say looking down on them. “Don’t needs yuh. Don’t need no one. Baby sitting ain’t my rocket. Go to your mama. Go on now. Go on before I kick yuh where it hurts,” he would say, exhaling forcibly, and snorting like a happy pig in ankle deep mud.
The pitcher tossed the ball. An eery silence fell over the field. Hopsy heard the bat strike squarely against it. Clung. The baseball flew toward him and Hopsy knew it would land right between his eyes. Terrified, he closed his eyes, clenched his teeth, and waited for the blow. Just before the ball landed on its target, forceful hands dragged him down ento his knees. He squinted, peered around, but no one was there for him to see. The ball flew inches over his head. Leo made it to second base just before the ball thrown by his teammate landed safely in Hopsy’s glove.
The silence seized. People on the bleachers leapt to their feet, clapped their hands, and shouted. Hopsy’s mother moved her hands forcibly to her sides in a proud gesture of “Yes!”
Leo chuckled. “Hopsy, you were very lucky . . . this time. Next time, wham, right there – right between your eyes. Too bad you had to duck, huh.”
“Yeah, right,” said Hopewatch staring at Leo’s missing tooth. “Who knocked it out, Leo?”
“Mind your own beeswax,” Leo replied angrily and kicked the dusty ground.
Although Leo thought that no one knew how or who knocked his tooth out of his mouth, the word had spread around the village like a virus. Everyone knew Leo’s “Who-knocked-out-the-bully’s-tooth,” story.

The baseball incident was the first. The second time, Hopsy had climbed to the very top of a tall tree to check a bird’s nest when the branch he was holding snapped with a spooky sound. Then silence. The same eery silence just before Leo had hit the ball. He found himself flying toward the hard ground – his death. Or if he were lucky enough he’d end up with broken ribs, arms, or legs. Maybe more. He looked at the ground coming at him fast and hard and suddenly he felt his body as weightless as a feather, floating and drifting slowly downwards through branches and leaves. Amazed, he saw the tree branches below him  move out of his way, as if invisible hands were making a safe path for his downfall. His feet touched the ground. He moved his hands frantically over his body, checking for injuries. He couldn’t believe it – not a scratch. He looked around, eyes searching. Nothing. Nothing but trees, grass, blue skies, and cool breeze cooling down his inflamed face.

Six months after his seventh birthday, Buster, Lily, and he strolled on the banks of the river gathering edible snails, when they heard a panic-stricken yell.
“Jesus Almighty God!”
They rushed toward the voice. Tito Sophron was sitting on his behind, knife in hand, the leg of his pants drawn above his right knee.
“Damn snake,” he repeated, and kept cursing and cursing as he moved the sharp knife over his leg, cutting hastily skin and flesh three inches lower from a very tightened string around his leg. Tito bent his body, and tried to suck the blood with his mouth, but he could not reach the cut. “Hopsy, Lilly, help me,” he begged squeezing frantically his leg with his hands. “Please. Don’t let me die like an animal.”
The most incredible, the most amazing thing happened right then. Buster leapt into the air, landed next to Tito’s leg, growled once, and started licking the venom of the viper snake. Hopsy couldn’t take his eyes from Tito’s disfigured face. His good side looked pale like a bleached yellow wall. Blue veins flared ready to explode, ticking, ticking, while his burned side was bloated like a grotesque, dried-up leather ball. His arms were stretched by his sides holding his motionless body, open palms turned to fist, and his wide open eye was glued at Buster’s tongue licking out the poisonous blood. Hopsy wondered what made Buster to suddenly suck Tito’s blood, when not too long ago, he yelped at him angrily, ready to tear him apart while protecting Lilly.
“I owe you . . .” Tito said, and paused. “I owe you my life,” he continued staring at Buster, then at Lilly and Hopewatch. A queer smile, an appealing smile, almost human-like, appeared on the left side of his face. “Not too late for someone to change his bad habits, is it?”
Tito Sophron had been in many places and he’d seen whole lot in his life. After he came out of the hospital, he had received  many shining medals for his bravery and a monthly check from the government. Great many stories flew around since his coming back home, but only he, Tito, knew the real truth of what had really happened. One of Tito’s Vietnam buddies had sat in the café, sipped his beer, heaved a long sigh, and looking at the curious faces of the villagers he started telling his version of Tito’s bravery in Vietnam.
“It was like hell. We heard the automatic weapon spitting out bullets in our direction, and quickly we took cover in this empty house. I looked around. Tito was not in the house. We thought that the poor sucker was gunned down and dead. Then, without any warning, came the blazing hellish fire. The fire . . . it was as if someone had poured odorless gasoline in and around the  house. Fire was licking and eating the wooden house, black choking smoke entering our lungs, bullets flying like mad hornets from the machine gun. We were trapped like blind mice. We knew that we were either going to take a bullet if we ran out of the door or burn to ashes if we stayed inside.
“Suddenly, the continuous yackking and rattling of the deadly weapon stopped. Two seconds later Tito knocked the door down and jumped into the hellish inferno shouting, “Get out, damn it. Get out. I’ve got the son-of-a bitch.”
“There was this injured guy in the back room with half his leg blown to pieces. Tito ran to the door like a raging bull facing the red cape and knocked it down. We fought toward the exit door and rushed out of the house coughing and spitting smoke, and I thought, ‘Poor Tito and that legless guy will burn to ashes.
“Oh, man, you had to see him when he appeared under the door frame. He held our buddy in his strong arms; blanket over the guy, alive. But let me tell you, my friends, the horror I saw with my own eyes. Tito’s half burned face was still smoking. His eye seemed to be melting in front of us. “He’s safe,” Tito said, and collapsed on the ground.
“Some while later, the chopper landed and took him to the hospital. We thought we would never see him again. Well, we were wrong. After about three months, and with half his face gone, he came to pay us a visit. He was going home, he said. I’ll never forget what he said next. “You’re my brothers, my family, my friends. I’ll miss you.”
The story teller drew quiet for some time. Then he knocked the butt of his beer bottle on the table and, “To Tito,” he saluted.
And now Tito was asking Lilly and Hopewatch if it were too late to change?
“No, Mr. Sophron,” Lilly said, petting the enormous neck of Buster. “Buster doesn’t think so.”
“Come,” said Tito,  pulling down the leg of his pants. “I’ll walk you home. It’s not safe for you wandering all alone, you know.”
From that day on, Tito, who had been nothing but mean to Hopsy since he had returned from Vietnam, now seemed to follow Hopewatch everywhere. He would suddenly appear out of nowhere, smile, “How is my boy today?” he would ask, and disappear again.




FOUR


It was the oddest year in Hopsy’s life. One mystifying event followed another and he didn’t know how to explain them even to himself. They just kept happening every time he was in some dangerous situation. No one in the village suspected anything. The only people who knew about the mysterious events were Hopewatch, his mother, Lilly and Buster, and his new friend, Tito Sophron.
“You must have a guardian angel following you and protecting you,” his mother had said to him, and Lilly nodded agreement with that simple explanation. Tito’s “When the time comes, you’ll know” answer to the strange events was even simpler and more humble than his mother’s explanation.
Seven days before his eighth birthday, the village crier spoke loudly announcing the coming of the greatest magician into their village.
“My fellow villagers, ladies and gentlemen, and especially all the children of this village, listen to me. The greatest magician of all times is to arrive into our village and entertain all of us with his magical tricks. This once in your lifetime, not to miss, event is going to take place in our Main Square this Sunday after church.” The crier then moved about fifty or sixty yards and cried the same message all over again.
The traveling magician arrived on Saturday and the villagers helped him build the removable stage. They went back and forth to his covered wagon, and moved boxes and boxes and stuff onto the top of the stage. The stage looked great in the middle of the big Main Square when it was finished. After the Sunday service was over, the villagers gathered around the stage to witness first hand the magical tricks of the magician, who was kind enough to bring such a show to their small village. The magician came out from his wagon and stepped onto the stage.
“Oh! Ah!,” the villagers went on and on admiring his magical, long cape. He looked so handsome and so very tall in his tall hat.
The magician tapped the top of the table with his magical wand to quiet down the villagers. Then he walked through the children sitting on the ground and grown-ups as well, and started collecting shiny coins from their ears. After that, he did card tricks. Then he cut a white cotton rope in four pieces and put it back together in one piece again, and did the same trick with a newspaper page.
The villagers oohed and aahed at the end of each magical trick, and now and then they looked into each other’s ears to see if there were any more coins.
After the magician completed his white rabbit-in-the-hat trick, he put his hands on his hips and two white doves flew out from his wide sleeves and landed on the table next to the rabbit.
“Magic, magic, magic,” the villagers shouted very loud, whistling and clapping their hands feverishly, and Hopewatch  thought, It’s so much fun to be a magician!
“I’d like to have a volunteer for my final magical trick,” said the magician looking at Hopsy’s mother. “Come!” he said extending his hand to her. “Come up on the stage”
“Me?” Narkiz said shyly, and looked around bemused.
“Yes, you, beautiful lady,”  he said. “You shall be my assistant for my final magical trick. Come, come,” he said. “No reason for you to be shy or frightened.  I promise I’ll be gentle cutting you in two pieces.”
“Oh, my! Oh, my,” she said, and with a great reservation she stepped onto the stage.
“Narkiz, Narkiz, Narkiz,” everyone shouted and clapped their hands applauding.
Narkiz smiled at her proud, little precious son, as if to say, “Don’t you worry, son. It’s only some harmless magic trick.”
The magician rolled a big box into the middle of the stage, and opened the two concealed covers of the box. Narkiz climbed in the box and lay down on her back. The magician put the lids back on and whispered something to her. She nodded, smiled, and wiggled her toes. The magician took a huge lumberjack’s saw, placed it in the middle of the box, moved it back and forth, and cut the box and Narkiz’s body in two.
“Ah! Oh! the villagers screamed in an alarming horror and disgust. They covered their eyes with their hands, then peeked, and snooped with open-mouthed curiosity through the narrow openings of their fingers.
With tears falling from his cheeks and his bottom lip covering the top one, Hopsy stared into the eyes of his smiling mother. He couldn’t understand why his mother was smiling. Anyone else in her place, including himself, would have been screaming their lungs out from the unbearable pain. It was horrible, insane. He couldn’t stand looking at her like that, but all he could do was stare – stare at her smiling face, her wiggling toes, and bite his lip to stop his sorrowful sobbing.
The magician pushed and separated the box in two. The smiling face of Narkiz was to his right, her wiggling  toes to his left. The villagers screamed in revulsion. The magician smiled in pleasurable satisfaction with the horrific affects he had bestowed upon the poor villagers, and Hopsy was on the verge of shouting at the cruel magician and crying out of despair.
He loved his mother in one piece. What would he do with a two piece mother? How would he explain to his father what happened to his wife? His father would be furious with him for letting something like this to happen to his lovely Narkiz. This was bad. Very bad! Hopsy’s mind painted pictures of horror. He could see his mother’s upper part resting on the bed, or in a chair, while her lower part strolled in and around the house. He felt his pounding heart beating faster and faster as if wanting to jump out and run deep into the woods and hide there for ever and ever.
When the magician knew at last that his trick would have a lasting effect in the minds of his shocked audience, he put the two parts together, smiled reassuringly, tapped his magic wand on the box three times, and wailed his magical words.
“Abbra Cadabbra. Show me the magic!”
An utter silence fell on the Main Square.
Slowly the magician opened the upper lid, then the other.
“Come out. Step out,” he said in a thunderous voice, and helped Narkiz down on the stage. They took a few steps and bowed in front of the bewildered audience.
Suddenly, pandemonium broke out in Main Square. The villagers stood on their feet, clapped their hands feverishly, pounded  their feet on the ground, and screamed and yelled with delight. Hopewatch leaped with joy into the arms of his one piece mother.
Right then and there as he hugged her neck tightly against his face, he knew he must, he had to become a magician. He knew that the magician had laid the groundwork to his destiny. The decision struck him like a bolt of lightning. He had finally realized his calling. Tito was right after all with his simple down-to-earth explanation, “When the time comes, you’ll know.” But, “The Dream of Hopeful Dreams?” He didn’t know how to translate the true meaning of those words. He was sure though that the answer to that question would also come to him somehow -  just the way he had discovered the path to his destiny. He had to be patient.
The villagers helped the magician load his belongings into the covered wagon, gave him gifts and plenty of food, two live chickens and a cat to keep him company on his journeys to many different places. They filled his collection plate with coins and some paper money. Then they told him to keep all the coins he’d collected from their ears, he certainly deserved it, and begged him to come back as often as he could.

For the next seven days, Hopewatch thought over and over again about his inspired revelation to enter into the enchanting world of magic. Could a little boy of his age become a magician? He didn’t know. He also had no idea where he should go to acquire such knowledge and skills. He figured out that if there were schools and teachers for math and geography and history, and so on, there ought to be a school where he could go and learn the art of magic from the wise magician. Certainly the wise magician would charge his students an arm and a leg to teach such amazing skills to little boys like himself. His mother wouldn’t mind paying the exuberant amount of money for his tuition.
Now that he had solved those puzzling questions, he opened the yellow pages of the phone book and looked under, Magician, then under Magic, and finally, under Wise Magician. He couldn’t find a single advertisement for what he was searching. When he had spoken to his mother about his newly revealed desire to learn the wonderful tricks of magic, although she had agreed wholeheartedly with him that he should learn the magic, she didn’t know where he could find a magician or how easy or difficult it would be enrolling in such a school. Then he thought of Tito Sophron. Tito had been in many places. He’d definitely know how to locate the wise magician’s school.
Hopsy smiled with his sneaky thought. He would pop the question to Tito tonight at the dinner table. His mother had invited Tito to attend his eighth birthday celebration. He remembered Tito’s shocked face when he opened the fancy invitation envelope from his mother. Poor Tito opened his mouth and the envelope fell on the floor. He stuttered like an retard for some time, and then his huge body fell on the couch. Finally, when he regained his composure, he stood on his feet, and made a saluting gesture.
“I’m honored by your mother’s invitation to your birthday party, my boy. Of course I’ll come.” He rushed to his closet and stood there staring at his clothes. “How should I dress up, eh, how?” he talked to himself aloud.
“Casual and simple,” said Hopsy.
“Casual and simple,” he tried to imitate Hopsy’s voice. “Are you out of your mind?” he resumed with his regular heavy edged voice. “For one, I don’t remember when was the last time I’ve been invited to dinner by someone, and two, it’s your eighth birthday.”
Then he stared at Hopsy, his good eye got bigger, his hands moved nervously in front of him as if gesturing something, looked at them, then shoved them nervously into his pockets.
“Tell me, Hopsy,” he said, “who else is going to be there? You see, son, because of my face people somehow shy away from me. It’s been a long time. I think I forgot how to mingle with people, or to be my old self around them.”
“Don’t worry, Mr. Sophron. We like you just the way you are. My mother invited just you, and I’ve invited Lilly and Buster.”
“Oh, good,” Tito said, and heaved a big sigh of relief.

At exactly six o’clock, Tito knocked on the door. Hopsy took his huge, baseball glove-size hand, and showed him to the table. He was dressed in his freshly pressed Marine uniform and shining black boots. The medals on his chest shone like Christmas lights. He looked very awkward, and stiff.
“Thank you for the honor, Narkiz,” he said, standing by the table like a soldier before his general.
“Thank you for coming to Hopsy’s birthday dinner,” Narkiz said politely as they shook hands. She pulled the chair for him. “Now sit down and relax as you would’ve done in your own home. I already know that this home is also yours. You have done so much for my son lately that we feel you are part of our family.”
“Thank you, Narkiz.”
As soon as Tito sat in his chair, Buster skidded toward him, lifted his body and his paws landed on Tito’s legs. He pet the animal below his ears and tapped his smooth back.
“Buster” said Lilly, “leave him alone. That’s enough. Go sharpen your teeth on the yummy bones Narkiz gave you.”
Buster eyed her for a second or two, growled at her with his wolfish sounds, put his paws on the floor, scurried  to his plate, and resumed his loud bone-chewing.
After a cold beer and some idle conversation about this and that, and the nice weather they had this year, Tito finally relaxed a bit and dared to stretch his legs under the table. As the evening went along he seemed to relax more and more, and sometimes he even smiled at the silly jokes made by Lilly or Hopsy. Halfway during the traditional birthday meal – baked chicken, potatoes, onions, and carrots smothered in olive oil and lemon juice – Hopsy popped the question to Tito. He thought about it for a second, then he shook his head gravely.
“I’m sorry, Hopsy,” he said. “I wish I did, but I don’t. Come to think of it, I’ve never heard of such a school. But don’t you give up. When the–”
“When the time comes, you’ll know,” Lilly finished Tito’s phrase.
They all started laughing at the same time.
After they finished their scrumptious meal, and the plates were stashed in the sink, Narkiz put the chocolate birthday cake in front of Hopsy.
“All right, Hopsy,” said Tito. “Close your eyes, make a wish, and blow out the candles.”
Hopsy closed his eyes and he wished to himself. “I wish and I wish again that by tomorrow morning I would know how and where to find the wise magician’s school.” He opened his eyes, took a long breath, and blew out the eight light-blue candles.
Narkiz went into her bedroom and came back holding the amulet. While Tito studied it with a curious expression, Narkiz told him how the amulet came into her possession. Then no one could stop Lilly from telling Tito what they were writing on her notepad the day Buster got very angry with him. Throughout the detailed narration of the two incidents by Narkiz, Hopsy, and Lilly, Tito nodded wittingly, and here and there he dropped an, “Aha,” or “I see.”
“Oh, I knew he was special, all right,” Tito said when Lilly and Hopsy finished telling him everything, but he didn’t elaborate any further than that, no matter how many questions Lilly  asked him. He looked at the amulet one last time and ceremoniously placed it around Hopsy’s neck. “Keep it under you shirt, Hopsy,” he said and tried to smile. “Let no one see it.” He paused and apologetically looked at them for a few seconds. “I’m sorry that I can’t answer your questions, I really am. I’m not good at spelling out what others entrusted me.” Suddenly his face become challenging and deadly serious. “But, I’m going to tell you this, Narkiz. I’ll protect your boy with my own life if I have to. That’s a promise.”

That night Hopsy had a dream. He was sitting on the balcony of his house all alone, sipping lemonade, and  thinking about the wise magician. As if enchanted by some magical spell, he could now see a colossal stone castle on the very top of the steep rocky mountain. He was astonished when he found himself in the middle of the enormous courtyard of the castle. For a second he wondered how he got there, then he put it out of his mind. He saw children wearing long and colorful cloaks, holding magic wands, and making things appear, then disappear. Others climbed on brooms and flew around and about smiling, giggling, and having fun. Hopsy was about to step on a toad when it bounced in the air and safely landed in front of him. The toad looked at him. “Watch your steps,” it croaked, and hopped away.
A blonde haired-girl about his age looked at him, searchingly. “Go away! You’re a human boy. You don’t belong here,” she said in an angry tone, and touched his shoulder with her wand.
Suddenly the scenery changed. He found himself standing on the top of a hill in the middle of a treeless green land. He looked around for some time and all he could see was silvery-green grass and blue skies. Then he saw something like cotton clouds floating toward him. He looked at them and instantly he knew that the two friendly ghosts were paying him a visit once again. He smiled. They waved at him, hovered around and about in some strange formation, and soundlessly landed in front of him.
“Come, Hopewatch. The Wise Magician awaits,” said the woman ghost.
“Your destiny awaits,” said the man ghost.
“How do I get there?” Hopsy asked them.
“Trust your instincts,” she said.
“Trust your senses and you shall know,” said the man ghost. “Let them be the pathfinder of your destiny.”
“The amulet will guide you there,” they said in unison.
Instantly, he woke up. The ghosts’ words still echoed in his mind. He blinked and blinked his eyes by the enlightening knowledge within him.  He now knew  how to find the Wise Magician. Holding the amulet with both hands, he closed his eyes, smiled, and went back to sleep.

                           




FIVE


When Narkiz awoke, she found herself siting upright, gasping, drenched with icy sweat. An uneasy feeling washed over her, a feeling of impending doom. Her heart pounded like an alarm clock, her chest rose up and down in short gasps, her hands shook. “A dream,” she murmured, but she couldn’t remember having one. “No!” She was sure it was not that. It had to be something else. What?
“Hopsy!” she moaned in terror.
She run out her room, and opened Hopsy’s bedroom door. She rendered a long sigh of relief as her eyes hugged the smiling face of her precious son. He was sleeping peacefully on his left side, hands out of the covers, holding tightly onto the amulet. She leaned over him, kissed his forehead and cheek, sat on the bed, looked at him lovingly, and when finally she left the room, she closed the door behind her as quietly as she could.
Narkiz watched Hopewatch as he opened the door of the house and looked at the  beautiful morning. He breathed in the crisp morning air, stretched out his arms yawning, and smiled. Narkiz walked to the door and hugged her little boy.
“Breakfast, my precious?” she asked.
“Mom,” he said eyeing her carefully, “I had a dream.”
“Come, son,” she said pushing him gently in the house. “Let’s have our breakfast first, then you tell me all about your dream.”
When he finished telling her his dream, she hugged him for a long time. Of course, she thought. It all made sense now – the pounding heart, the fast breathing, the uneasy feelings. Yes, it was a dream that woke her up, but not hers. Quietly she started preparing his backpack. Although she had known, for the past eight years, that the time would come when her little boy would be on his way to something special, and although she had prepared herself for the occasion, suddenly she found out that she was completely unprepared. Her motherly instincts demanded that she hold him tightly in her arms and never let go, but did she have the right to interfere with her son’s destiny? What if her parents had rejected her husband, Theo, for marrying her? Would there be the birth of their son, Hopewatch? She shook her head slowly as an answer to her heartbreaking, but nevertheless,  accommodating thoughts.
“Hopsy?”
“Yes, Mom?”
“You’ll be careful, won’t you?” Narkiz pleaded earnestly as she helped him with the backpack. “The world out there is very big. It can be cruel, nasty, and very mean.”
She wondered why her last words stirred a sad feeling in him. Was it the subtle change of her worried voice?
“I hope,” she said looking at him with her cloudy eyes, “you’ll find what you’re looking for. Remember, my little precious, I will always be with you.”
“I know, Mom. I’ll be careful,” he said touching the amulet beneath his shirt.
She kissed his hands, and slowly she let them go, as if one more second of touching her son’s hands meant the whole world to her. He reached the corner of the house, paused, turned, and waved his hand, “Goodbye.” Narkiz waved back, “Hurry back, my little one,” she whispered. Then he was gone.
Heavy hearted, she stood at the same spot for a long time, hoping for his face to reappear, to hear his voice once again, even if that meant only another goodbye. The loud ringing of the phone startled Narkiz. She rushed into the house and picked up the receiver.
“Hello,” she said, and quietly she listened for the next two minutes. “Thank you, Tito,” she said complacently, sighed, and hung up the phone.
What Tito had said was encouraging and reassuring news about Hopsy’s safety on his journey to his quest.  Deep down she knew that the two ghosts, the amulet, and now Tito, were protecting her precious to reach his chosen destiny. Why had to be her son? Exhausted, her body fell on the sofa. She felt as if a vacuum had sucked up all her energy. She placed her hands on her lap, closed her eyes, and the tears trickled down on her cheeks.

Hopsy reached the boundaries of his small village and sat under the shading umbrella of a big tree. He took off his backpack and placed it in front of him. He looked at his village on the side of the small, gently sloping hill. The small river below made a semi-circle around the village before it disappeared beyond the green hills. He could see his house, the church, the school. He could see people walking on the flagstone streets. They looked tiny, like little dots on the page of a big book. He couldn’t make out who was who or what they were doing. He sighed.
“Oh, how beautiful you are,” he talked to his village, “with your washed white wall houses, the red-tiled roofs, red, yellow, and pink bougainvilleas on your walls, flowers on your balconies, the little flagstone streets, the creek. When I’ve learned what I want, I’ll come back and entertain you.”
With that pleasant thought, he opened his packsack and took out some bread, olives and cheese, and ate hungrily. A small sparrow flew down through the branches of the big tree and landed next to him.
“You look hungry,” he said to the sparrow, and gave her some of his bread. “There you go,” he said, and placed it on the ground between him and the sparrow.
The sparrow looked at him, tilted her head left and right, and, unafraid of the boy, took tiny bites with his ash-gray little beak. Hopsy took his water canteen from his backpack and poured some water in its small screw-cup.
“There you go. Have some water, too.”
The sparrow dipped her beak in the cup, lifted her head up to the sky, swallowed the cool water, and chirped after each drop. After drinking a few more drops of water, she fluffed her feathers, picked the leftover bread into her beak, stared at the boy, and flew up into the branches of the tree.
She has to feed her little babies, the boy thought. That thought made him both happy and sad at the same time. Though he had left his village and his mother just that morning, he knew in his little heart that he already missed both, especially his mother. Was she crying? He closed his eyes, sighed, then looked up into the branches of the big tree.
“I have to do this,” he spoke to the mother sparrow. “I have to. Don’t you see that I am on my way already? I can’t just turn around and go back. I have to do this,” he insisted. “It’s my destiny.”
With his belly full and his thirst quenched, the boy stood up on his feet, put his backpack on his back, heaved a big sigh, and off he went. He walked and walked tirelessly until the sun lowered itself in the western sky with its dazzling colors.
“Magic!” Hopsy spoke to the sky and to the sun on the distant horizon. He stopped and stood still for some time admiring the magical colorful lights. Suddenly through the fused rays of the setting sun, he saw a few shadows moving toward him, growing bigger and taking on shapes as they advanced closer in his direction. Hopsy put his hand above his forehead to block the glare of the dazzling, orange sun. Now he could see a small grey-haired donkey, an old lady sitting sideways in the donkey’s saddle, and a very tall, skinny, old man, holding a big stick, walked next to the donkey,. The ripped and parted seams of his long robe swept the dusty path. They stopped when they were in front of Hopsy.
She was dressed in a long brown dress, decorated with small flowers, sandals on her bare feet, and an ashen kerchief that covered her gray hair. Her smart, constantly searching eyes were gray-blue. With her eyes fixed on him, she moved her head forward, “Mm-hm,” she said, and nodded a few times. The old man’s pale-brown, melancholy eyes eyed Hopewatch compassionately, intently. His gray-white hair and beard were long, his forehead was carved with deep wrinkles. The end of his long stick and the bleached by the sun robe touched the dusty earth.
They are much older than I thought, Hopewatch said to himself. Much older than his mother or father or the teacher. They were even older than the old, old priest with his white beard and long ponytail. He’d never seen them before.
The donkey, the old man, and the old lady looked at him for a long while in silence. Silently, he looked at them, too.
“Where are you going little boy?” asked the old man. “Are you lost?” His voice was peaceful, warm, and friendly.
The donkey moved his big head, flapped his huge ears, and stared at the boy with his big golden eyes. The old lady bent down her gray-haired head and narrowed-eyed she peered at Hopsy from the top of the donkey’s saddle.
“Where do you come from, little boy? Are you lost?” the old lady asked affectionately. Her voice was soothing yet alert at the same time.
Hopsy thanked them for their concern, then he said, “I was looking at the bright, orange sun and the colorful clouds in the sky. How beautiful and dazzling they are. Such  magic. Magic,” he repeated.
The old man stared at the old lady, she stared back at him, the donkey blinked his eyes, and then all of them stared at Hopsy.
“Where are you going, little boy?” asked the old man again.
“Where do you come from, little boy?” the old lady repeated.
“Does it really matter where I come from?” Hopsy replied politely.
“No, not really,” said the old man with a smile, “but don’t you think that you have to know where you’re going?”
“Yes, of course it matters where you’re come from,” the old lady expressed angrily. “Don’t you be listening to that old fool. It’s always important to know where we come from, and where we are. Hmm? We’d be lost for ever if we didn’t.”
“Oh,” the boy said, surprised by the sudden anger of her voice.
“Don’t you listen to her, son,” the old man said . “It doesn’t matter where you slept last night. All that matters is where you’re going to sleep when you’ve reached where you’re going. Am I right?” he asked the little boy and raised an eyebrow.
Was he smiling? Hopsy couldn’t tell. “Yes. I guess you’re right,” he said.
“So, little boy,” the old lady said furiously, “you must think that I’m wrong then?” Her lips now formed a thin line of anger.“Is that it?”
He could tell she was very upset with his answer. “No,” Hopsy responded calmly. “I think you’re right also. I think that both of you are right.” He smiled thinking that what he’d told them was a smart answer.
“Oh!” they said at the same time. They stared at each other for a few moments in  thoughtful silence, then they eyed the little boy again, and stared some more.
“Yes, I think so,” Hopsy said with conviction.
“How can we both be right,” the old man said with a display of an evasive smile on the edge of his lips, “when each of us thinks that the other one is wrong?”
“Yes, how? Hmm?” asked the old lady, and pushed her head forwards, as if asking him, “Where do you get those crazy ideas of yours?”
She looked very surprised and very troubled with his simple answer. “Let me tell you something, little boy,” she shouted, pointing her finger at him. “For a long, long time now, don’t you dare ask how long – since the old man and I met, fell in love, and married, we have debated and quarreled over and over again who was wrong and who was right. This kept our blood flowing, kept us young in our hearts, and at the end of the day, though our squabbles were not yet solved, we were always happy. Who are you, little boy, to tell us otherwise? Are you the thief of our happiness? How could both of us be right? Hmm? Do you know something that we don’t? Are you a disguised magician? Didn’t you say, ‘Magic,’ twice?
She was furious. Oh, she was. Hopsy could feel her anger dripping down on him. He sensed it down somewhere deep in his stomach.
“Here, my sweet honey,” the old lady said to the old man. “Come, give me a hand. Help me down from this beast. I want to talk to this little boy, and talk I will. I’d like to ask him, how both of us can be right, and both can be wrong at the same time. That little boy has a lot of explaining to do. Come now, dear. Help me down.”
The old man walked in front of the donkey, paused, looked at Hopsy disapprovingly, and shook his head. “Look what you have done to my dear old lady with your both right and both wrong nonsense,” he said. “Look how upset she is.” He shook his head again, turned around, raised his hands, and helped his old lady down.
The donkey jolted his giant head, flapped his huge ears, his big golden eyes stared at the little boy, wiggled his tail happily, then stretched his big head up toward the big sky, opened his mouth, and started braying a donkey song. Very loud.
“Shut your big mouth,” she shouted at the donkey, and slapped its ears. The old lady stood in front of Hopsy with her hands on her hips. Pursed lips, an angry face, and two gray eyes stared intensely at him.
“Look here, little boy,” the old lady said. “Explain to me how can I be wrong and right at the same time? Hmm? Come, come, explain, speak up.”
“Explain, explain, speak up,” the old man said, leaning on his long stick.
The donkey moved his jaws happily chewing long sprouts of green grass. Hopsy was sure that the donkey was thanking him in its donkey mind for his senseless answer which had made the old lady get down from his back. The donkey moved his ears back and forth,  as though he’d figured out that chewing the exquisite spicy grass was much better than having someone mounted on him.
“Well?” the old couple said at the same time, still peering at him.
“Well,” Hopsy started explaining. “It’s very important to know where we come from.”
“Aha!” yelled the old lady and stared at the old man. “See? I was right all along. Go on, go on, little boy. I love the way you’ve started your explanation. I knew he was wrong.”
“Just you wait,” the old man said calmly. “Just you wait and listen and see. Go on, little boy. Tell her the rest.”
“Well, as I said,” the little boy resumed, “it’s very important to know where we come from, because–”
“Tell him, little boy. Tell that old man why. Because . . .” she helped him to resume.
“Because if we don’t, how would we know how to turn back if we’re lost?”
“Good point, little boy. Um-hm. That was good,” said the smiling lips of the old lady. “Do you know what I tell him all the time?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Then look, listen, and learn. Are you listening?” she asked.
“Yes!”
“I always tell him that if we don’t know where the sun comes up at dawn, how would we know where the sun will come up the next morning? Right? Now, go on, son. Go on! Tell him some more.”
“We have to know also,” the little boy resumed, “where we are. Because if we don’t know were we are, how would we know which way to go, where we’ve started or where we’re going, or even which direction, and which path or road to take? So we have to know where we come from and where we are.”
“And . . . ” they said in unison and gazed at the little boy, as if their lives depended on what he had to say next.
“And we also have to know where we are going–”
“Why?” the old lady stopped the little boy. “Hmm? Why?”
“Tell her, son,” the old man said in an encouraging tone.
The donkey stopped chewing the grass, his big eyes stared at the little boy, and his huge ears moved forward, attentively.
“Well,” the little boy continued, “if we don’t know where we’re going, we’ll be always going, and going, not knowing when or where to stop, and we’ll be forever lost.”
“Because . . .?” they said at the same time as they craned their heads closer to him.
“Because by going and going aimlessly we come to a point, then we stop, look  around, and no matter how much we look, we no longer know where we are, or where we came from, or even where we’re going.”
They looked at the little boy silently for a long time, then stared at each other, then looked at the little boy again. The donkey flapped his big ears and resumed his chewing.
“So, little boy,” the old lady said, eyes sparkling, “it seems that both, the old man and myself, are right. Yes?”
“Yes!” said the little boy nodding.
“Come then, come,” the old lady said with a big smile. “You’re riding on top of the donkey. You’ll be our guest for tonight. We’ll give you something to eat and a bed to sleep in, for the night is coming soon. You made both of us very happy with your explanation. The least we can do for you is to be thankful and hospitable. Hmm?”
“Yes! The least we can do,” the old man agreed.
The donkey stared at Hopsy and slowly moved his head left and right in a negative gesture.
“I’d rather walk. I love walking,”  the little boy said. “Mother says that it will make me grow big, tall, and strong.”
“And very handsome, if I may say,” added the old lady giggling. “All right then, my handsome little boy, we’ll walk with you. Yes?”
“Yes, thank you,” Hopsy said.
They took the boy’s backpack, placed and secured it on the top of the donkey’s saddle, and holding the boy’s hands, one on each side of him, they started walking, followed by the happy donkey. And as they walked they started singing.

Leaving the past behind, remembering we walk,
Walking into now we learn, sing, and smile,
Toward our fate we walk, we walk.

Soon, they reached on the top of a downward sloping hill. Now, Hopsy could see a big old barn, a storage shed, and a small, wooden house under the big trees.
“There we are. Our little home,” said the old man pointing down below with his long stick.
“Home, sweet home. We’re back,” the old lady sang.
Down the sloping hill they went, smiling and happy. And there they were, all them, waiting. A red rooster, a dozen chickens, a Mother hen with her yellow tiny babies chippering around her, a fat, white pig, a white spotted black cat, and a dog with honey-brown hair, white patches on his paws and under his neck, and a brown spot on it’s cute nose.
“Just look at them,” Hopsy said . “They’re so happy to see you.”
“I better feed them. They must be hungry,” the old man said.
“I better start cooking,” the old lady said. “We are hungry, too. Hmm?”
“How can I help?” Hopsy asked them.
“Little boy,” the old man said, “you can take the saddle from the donkey, put it in the storage room, and then treat him with some golden hay.”
The little boy took down his backpack, pet the long neck of the donkey, and thanked him for carrying it on his back. Then he took the saddle off and treated him with some hay. The old man went in the storage shed and came out holding  a big sack with both hands.
“Here, here.” he said. “Tsh, tsh, tsh,” he called, and threw handfuls of yellow corn seeds on the ground. The pig, the rooster and all the chickens, rushed to the golden seeds and started eating. The cat meowed. The dog barked.
“Patience, patience, my good friends,” the old man said. “I only have two hands, two feet, and one body.” Then he walked to the shed and came out holding two smaller bags. “There you go, my friends,” he said pouring some dog and cat food in two separate bowls. The dog barked and moved his tail happily, the cat meowed and purred thanking the old man, and they both started eating. The old man went to the stone-fenced well and filled a big, beat-up tin container with fresh water.
The old lady had started the fire in the iron stove and their dinner was almost ready. The little boy licked his lips as he inhaled the mouth-watering aroma of freshly baked bread.
“Come, come, set the table,” the old lady said as she lit the oil lamp. “Dinner is ready. Let’s eat before the twilight is gone. Night is falling very fast.”
“A moment of silence to thank Mother Nature for the plentiful food she has provided for us,” the old man said in a very appreciative tone.
After paying their silent respect, they ate their delicious meal, cleaned the table, washed the pots and dishes, and went to sleep.

The bright rays of the sun came through the small window of the room and touched the face of the sleeping little boy. Hopsy opened his eyes, “Good morning sun, nice to see you, too,” he said. He stretched his arms, yawned a few times, stepped down from his huge bed, kissed the picture of his mom and dad he had placed on the side table, and put it back in his pocket. He walked to the well and washed his face with the cool water, brushed his teeth, and entered the kitchen.
On the top of the table he saw his backpack, a glass of fresh milk, a big plate with scrambled eggs, and toast, and jelly and jam. He also saw a nicely folded map, a First Aid Kit, and a small note. He read the note first.

Little boy. Eat your eggs and toast and jelly and jam, and drink every drop of your milk. Hmm? We stuffed your backpack with food (a loaf of bread, boiled eggs, jelly, jam, and fruits), so you have something to eat on your long journey. We left you a map and marked the road with arrows for you to follow. Be careful, little boy. The world out there it’s very big and it has many, many, way too many paths. Choose the right one. Goodbye, goodbye, and thank you for all. Remember: just follow the arrows. Yes?

Hopsy ate his breakfast, drank his milk, washed the dishes, put the note and the map in his little pouch, wrote a thank you note for the kind old couple, and with his backpack on, he walked out of the house.
He said goodbye to the pig, the chickens, the Mother hen, her little babies, and the rooster. He pet the cat, hugged the dog, and off he went following the marked arrows on the dirt road. He stopped at the top of the small hill, turned around, and waved his hand at the house. “Goodbye little wooden-house,” he said. “Thank you for letting me sleep in one of your rooms. And now goodbye, goodbye. I’ve got to go.” Follow the arrows, he reminded himself, and walked onwards to his long journey.






SIX


“Happy Days?” Leo mumbled and turned off the television set rumbling with anger. He hated both the tune and the show – his mother’s favorite; Arlene giggling with the tasteless humor. Humor? Give me a break. He picked up the handset and dialed the number.
“Yeah . . .  it’s Leo, sir.” He listened for some time. “Sir, I will, sir. I said that I’ll try, sir. Fine. Yes, sir. I’ll stop him, sir. Yes . . . No matter what it takes? I like that. Thank you, sir.” Click. The line was dead.
Leo brushed his hands together with excitement and walked into his bedroom. He pulled the big box out from under his bed, unlocked all six combination locks, one after the other, and placed the content of the box on his spotless army styled made-up bed. In his mind’s eye he could see Sylvester Stallone readying himself for revenge in First Blood. Leo’s favorite action movie. He loved Arnold too. Tough guys–unforgiving, merciless. For them, killing seemed like strolling in the park with gorgeous women hanging on both their arms – lustful looks in their eyes.
Leo looked in the mirror. “Uniform, boots: Check. Knife and gun in their holsters: Check. War paint,” he grinned. “Check.”
Leo was ready to open the front door when he heard his mother’s voice from upstairs. “What’re you up to, Leo?”
“Oh, Mom,” he retorted. Narrow eyed he peered up the stairs. “Let me be, will yuh?”
He stepped out the door and slammed it shut. Gee whiz, why don’t they leave him alone? Why don’t they mind their own business? Not a minute ago he, Leo, was swimming in the sea of pleasure. He was smiling. He was happy. He was Stallone, Arnold, and, oh, yeah, Bruce Willis, all in one.  And now? Now she’d made him angry. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He had to calm down before . . . Yeah! Smiling crookedly, he hurried his pace.

Hopewatch saw the figure standing in the middle of the path. It was Leo. He was fully dressed for combat. He held a large knife and pretended to remove dirt from his fingernails as he kept eyeing Hopewatch.
“Check out what the wind blew my way,” Leo said, sneering.
“What do you want, Leo?”
“Me? Nothing.”
“Then get out of my way.”
“No can do, my man. Orders, you know. He wouldn’t like it. Personally, I think he hates you.”
“Who?”
“Listen, Hopsy,” Leo hissed as though spitting dirt when he said Hopsy’s name, “if I were you, I’d turn around and scurry on back home with my tail between my legs. You don’t know who you’re dealing with. Do you? Take my advice. Go home.”
“Like you said, Leo. No can do, my man.”
“You know something?  I was calm. I was happy just standing here cleaning my fingernails with this here sharp knife. Now you come, standing in front of me, jabbering your mouth, mocking me, and making me very angry. I’m warning you, do what I say. Or else . . .” Or else, what?”
“Listen to this. I love this line . . .”  Leo cocked his head to his right side, put the knife in its sheath and moved his fingers as if readying himself to draw his pistol. “Prepare to die.”
The rustling sounds from the nearest bush startled them both. Tito’s impressive figure rose tall behind the thicket. Tito’s face looked somber and dark, his eye glued on Leo. He took slow steps, like a wolf before attacking its prey, and stood menacingly between Leo and Hopsy.
“Give me the belt, Leo.” His mouth hardly moved, but the words sounded eery and dry as if they were generated in a deep well before they came rushing out.
Leo took backward steps. Hopsy checked Leo’s face. He had that look. The same evil grin that hang on his lips before he had struck the baseball. Kissing eyebrows, squinted eyelids, pursed lips.
“Traitor,” Leo shouted angrily. “Traitors must die!”
The immediately following events happened very fast. Leo’s hand moved swiftly to his pistol. Hopsy heard the deafening “Boom.” Tito’s body charged at Leo like a striking snake, grabbed the gun with his right hand while his left backhanded Leo’s face. Leo moaned in pain.
“Get lost, Leo. Beat it,” Tito said, and waved his hand at him as if shooing chickens.
Leo took a few steps toward the village, paused, turned and stared at Tito. “You hit me. I’ll tell him that you hit me. You’re in big trouble now, mister. He’ll fix yuh. He hates traitors you know.”
“Go home, Leo. Don’t make me come after you. I usually don’t forgive people shooting at me. But, hey, I’m a changed man now. Can’t help it. You should try changing too, Leo.”
“No way in hell,” Leo said, spitefully.  “I’ll be back,” he hooted,  turned, and scurried home.
“You’re bleeding,” breathed Hopsy as he stared at the steaming blood coming through Tito’s fingers.
“Not to worry, son,” said Tito reassuringly. “Just a scratch. I’ve seen enough and I’ve been through hell in my life. I’m, you could say, used to being shot at and injuries. Let’s go and sit by that tree and have a look at the damage on my arm. How about you, son? Are you hurt?”
“No. I’m fine.”
“Are you sure, Hopsy?”
“Yes, sir. Thank you,” Hopsy said admiring Tito’s cool courage.
“That’s good. All of a sudden I feel better,” Tito said sitting down with his back resting against the tree trunk. Carefully he rolled up the sleeve of his injured arm.
“I have–” His very thought made Hopsy shiver. The First Aid Kit. How did the old couple know this would happen? Or was it a coincidence? He suspected that Tito would follow him. He always did since the snake incident. Although he was annoyed at first by Tito’s constant shadow, he’d grown to like it. He also liked the idea that Tito kept an eye on him. Way too many strange things kept happening around him. And now Tito’s promise to Narkiz had come true. Tito had taken a bullet on his arm protecting him. But the First Aid Kit? How could he explain that?
“Just a scratch, Hopsy. Nothing too serious to write home about,” Tito said as Hopsy applied the gauze around the bullet wound. “Now I believe you were going somewhere?”
“Yes, I was,” Hopsy said. “Are you going to follow me again?” Tito nodded. “Then why don’t we walk together?”
“Because we don’t want our enemies to know our strength. Do we?”
Enemies? He had no enemies. Everyone liked him, except of course, Leo. Hopsy couldn’t understand why Leo hated him so much. But then again, Leo hated everyone, except of course his younger sister, Arlene, who had knocked the tooth out of his mouth. From that day on, Leo was terrified of her; he tried to stay out of her way even in their own house. That thought made Hopsy smile and remember the “Who-knocked-out-the-bully’s-tooth” story.
“Mr. Sophron,” Hopsy said with a big smile, “do you know who knocked out Leo’s tooth?”
“No, not really. Too busy looking after you. But if you do, I’d love to hear it. Just like everyone else, I like a good laugh now and then.”
“Well,” said Hopsy, “it’s a funny story. My mother and I were going to Sunday morning church service when Arlene, Leo’s twelve years old sister, and her mother, Joan Carpenter, came out of their home and trotted along with us. Joan’s face, which most of the time stays drown and sullen because of the many complaints she’d received from the other villagers about her son Leo. But on that day her face shone like a bright sun after the heavy rains were over and the clouds were gone. After the morning pleasantries were over and done with, Joan hopped jovially in front of my mother and started laughing like a schoolgirl.
“Let me tell you, Narkiz,” she said, “about the mysterious ways of God; about the miracle he bestowed upon my poor unworthy existence.”
“Oh, Mother,” Arlene retorted sulkily, and then smiled as if she already knew what her mother was going to reveal to my mother.
“So, there we were having our supper,” Joan Carpenter started her story, “bless the great Lord, when Leo flipped his hand in front of himself, like that, fast and swift, and when his hand stopped moving, and his palm had become a fist, like this. Next thing I know, Leo extends his fist over Arlene’s orange juice and opens his hand. Guess what I see in Arlene’s glass? Go ahead, give it a shot.”
“A dead fly,” I said.
“Oh, no. No, Hopsy,” she said, and shook her head. “It was a fly all right, but it wasn’t dead. It was alive. A dreadful one; one of those big ones, you know, the ones that buzz around and around and make lots of noises, very annoying if you ask me. It was drinking and swimming happily on the top of Arlene’s orange juice. Now I saw this and in my poor mind I thought that the unholy hell was about to break loose and destroy my house. I thought my Arlene here would take the glass and dump the juice on Leo’s face. I could see the two of them yelling, fighting, tearing each other’s faces, not to mention all the mess on the table, the floor–”
“What happened next?” my mother stopped Mrs. Carpenter before she could describe all the mess her two children could have done in the house, outside of the house, in the yard, and maybe on their red-tiled roof.
Joan took a long breath. “Well, let me tell you, Narkiz. Nothing like that happened. It was like I was watching a picture show. Arlene here stood up with a smile, and in perfect composure, (you know how she smiles when she gets angry) pushed her glass toward Leo. ‘Drink it, Leo,’ she said. Oh, my. I thought her voice sounded like a stone thrown into a deep river. Very peculiar, weird, throbbing, like waves, you know. Anyhow, Arlene says, ‘Drink it. Leo,’ and Leo says, ‘Make me.’ So my little darling girl, Arlene–“
”Oh, brother, so embarrassing,” Arlene interrupted her mother.
“You hush and let me tell them the story the way I saw it. Where was I . . . ? Oh, yes. Arlene pushed back her chair, nice and slow, stared at Leo, and without rushing her steps, she walked toward him. He stood up. When she was an arm length from him she stopped and said again. ‘Drink it, Leo!’ I was frozen with the idea of my two children fighting right in front of me, and with what might happen next. ‘Make me,’ Leo repeated. ‘Make me. Can’t, can yuh?’
Wham.
Arlene’s fist struck Leo’s big mouth. I don’t know if Leo saw silver or gold stars  flying in front of him, but I’m sure he saw one of those colors or maybe both. Blood came out of his mouth. He moaned and started spitting blood on my beautiful wood floor. Then out came the tooth, hit the floor, bounced up and down a few times, then stopped. I was horrified,  and this . . . this . . . oh, I was thrilled with joy. I put my hands over my mouth to contain the piled up laughter in my throat. I felt like a cheerleader holding pom poms, jumping up and down, and cheering, “Arlene, Arlene, Arlene . . .” But I bit my lips and held in my joy. I didn’t want to embarrass Leo more that he was already. I know he is a blockhead. I know he has discipline problems, Lord I tried, but you see Narkiz, he is still my child.”
“What happened next?” my mother asked, and I listened closely, expecting to hear the worst  part of the story.
“Nothing much really,” Mrs. Carpenter resumed as if talking mostly to herself. “Leo fell on his knees crying, ‘She knocked my tooth out,’ he cried, and I said, ‘Go wash your face, Leo. Stop bleeding on my floor.’ ‘Mom, she knocked it out,’ Leo moaned, picked up his tooth from the floor, and before he’d reached the bathroom door, Arlene said, ‘Hey, Leo, don’t put it under your pillow. Tooth fairies don’t give presents for knocked out teeth.”
Mrs. Carpenter sighed. “I’m telling you, Narkiz, the good Lord blessed my house with his presence. I’m going to light the biggest candle I can find in the church praising his name.”
Tito and Hopsy laughed for a long while, then they ate.
“I better be going now,” Hopsy said with a smile. “Thanks, Mr. Sophron.”
“Yeah, yeah. Thanks for the funny story and for the first aid on my arm. Now scram. I’m not that good with niceties,” Tito said, and chuckled pleasantly.

“Peace?” shouted Megalos in anger and disgust. The word came out of his mouth as if spitting chewed up, bitter grape seeds. Megalos was terrified of her. If he only could exterminate her, total chaos would follow. Chaos – his bread and butter. He would become ageless, boundless, timeless, eternal. The king of the hill, the tycoon, the Chief Executive over life and death. He loved wars. War was his game. His opponents were not the enemy. They were part of the game. Just like baseball. At the end of the game, win or lose, you shake hands and look forward to another prearranged game. And now this little boy, Hopewatch, was following her footsteps. He had to stop him.
His freshly shaved and oiled head gleamed under the bright lights. He raised the black whip above his head, his hands shook as if having fits, breathed in short, violent gasps, and brought the whip crushing down on the shining table like a sledgehammer.
“I don’t want to hear that word. Not at this meeting, not out there, not ever. Am I understood?”
“Yes, sir,” four voices said in unison.
The minutes went by in horrible silence. Megalos loved spreading fear through their hearts. The oldest and the most effective weapon of governing the lives of the weak. Grant them raw fear; reap the rewards. So damn easy. He peered at their intimidated faces, one after the other, cherishing the affects of his iron-glad words.
His gray eyes landed on the historian, Professor Marcus C. W. Coopenthall. He was a short, skinny little man with wild gray hair, and a goat-like beard. Next to him sat two look-alike, corpulent, middle-aged men with their unlimited money supply for his holy cause, “The Art of War.” He, Megalos, needed them. No! Not really. He could fight, if he had to, with his bear knuckles and enjoy punching his opponent face. They needed him. That’s right. Without him, they wouldn’t have a choice but to shut down all those weapon factories  they owned around the world. The Art of War kept them in business, kept the money rolling in, piling up.
Megalos stared at the forth person in the conference room, Leo. Leo was shaking. Good, Megalos thought. Fear should teach the little punk not to fail next time. The one thing Megalos liked about Leo, was the punk’s mean and vexatious character. In many ways Leo reminded him of himself when he was at Leo’s young age. He had such beautiful memories from his boyhood. He was indestructible. Not only the children and their mothers were scared of him, but also both their cats and dogs. He felt like smiling with his fun memories, but he thrust them down into the turbulent ocean of his past life. Right now, he had to be stern and tough and vicious. He pointed the whip at Leo. “Speak,” he shouted.
“Like I said, sir. Tito came out of nowhere. He surprised me. But I drew my pistol, the one you gave me, and shot the traitor.”
“Yes. He is a traitor,” said Megalos shaking his head and grinding his teeth. “But you see Leo, you didn’t kill him, as I ordered. The bullet just scraped his arm. Next time make sure that you shoot him right between his eyes.” He chuckled. “Come to think of it, Tito has one eye.”
Leo forced himself not to smile. “Yes, sir. Right in the eye.”
“Good,” Megalos said, and placed his whip on the notes of the historian. “Read,” he demanded.
The professor fixed his reading glasses on his thin nose, cleared his throat, and started reading.
“Leo was surprised by the sudden presence of Tito Sophron. Leo stepped back, and fired the gun at the traitor. The bullet scraped Tito’s arm–”
“Professor Coobenthall,” Megalos stopped him, and stared despairingly at the ceiling. “I was wondering for whom do you work for. Them or The Art of War? Who is your employer Professor?”
“The Art of War, of course,” the historian mumbled.
“Then, my dear professor, I must advise you, for your own good, of course, that you change your writing style.”
“To what, if I may–“
”Write: Young Leo eyed the traitor, Tito Sophron, like an eagle before attacking its prey. The traitor had to die. Leo stepped back slowly and drew his gun in lightning speed. When the heavy smoke thinned in front of Leo, he saw the traitor’s hands holding his chest. Red steams of blood rushed out through the traitors fingers and stained his shirt. Young Leo had shot Tito Sophron in the heart.
“You shot me,” cried the traitor, and like a rotting log, he fell into the deep ditch.
“Wolf meat,” said the brave boy and spat on Tito’s face. “They’ll take care of you before sunrise. Why waste another bullet?”
Young Leo turned around and looked about. The soles of the cowardly Hopewatch seemed to be touching the back of his head; escaping Leo’s justifiable wrath. Leo smiled. He knew he could catch up with the coward, but he didn’t feel like jogging at that moment. He’d take care of him next time. Our hero climbed down in the ditch and kicked the dying traitor to fend his anger. He had done well for now.”
“Very vivid,” said the professor still writing.
“Brilliant,” said the two look-alikes at the same time. “Brilliant.”
“Print it. Publish it,” Megalos ordered.
Megalos pushed back his chair, stood tall, walked around the huge table, hands held the whip on his back, and stopped behind the two men.
“Don’t turn your heads, gentlemen,” Megalos said. “Just write the checks.”
“How much?” said the one on the right.
“Just sign it. I’ll take care of the proper amount,” Megalos said, and sat back in his chair. “Leo, you stay,” he resumed looking at the two blank checks on the freshly varnished table.
“Yes, sir,” said Leo, obediently.
The other three knew that the meeting was over for them. They left the room silently.





SEVEN


Hopewatch walked and walked, and walked some more. When the sun was ready to do its magical disappearing act behind the tall gray mountains, he found a nice place to sleep the night over. Mr. Sophron, as usual, appeared out of nowhere. They  thanked the old couple for their delicious dinner, ate, and then Tito disappeared again into the woods. Hopsy kissed the picture of his parents, and went to sleep.
When the sun came up, following the arrows on the road, he walked again until the sun was in the middle of the blue sky. Suddenly, the road ended at an enormous plateau. The little boy stopped and stared around for a long time.
“Which one do I take? Which one do I take?” he asked himself staring at the twelve different paths.
“Take me, take me,” each of the paths seemed to sing like sirens to Hopsy.
“I think I’ll stop, eat some bread, boiled eggs, jelly and jam, drink some water, and rest for a while, before I decide which path to take,” Hopsy concluded.
Hopsy sat under the shade of a tree where he could see all the different paths, and took out his lunch that the old couple had stuffed in his backpack. Magically, Tito sat next to Hopsy, and when they finished eating, he was gone again.
The little boy took the map out from his pouch, and opened it in front of him. He looked at it carefully. He could see now the big road that he had traveled ending in the center of the half-circle shaped plateau.
“Now I see,” Hopsy spoke to himself, looking at the big road. “Everyone  travels on the main road, comes to this big plateau, and then chooses his or her own path.” With that philosophical thought locked in his mind, he resumed reading, from left to right the different colored arrows drawn on each path.
“I will lead you to pride, and honor, “The Art of War,” said the first.
“I will lead you to the glorious, “The History of Humanity,” said the second.
“I will lead you to the art of knowledge and reason, “The Art of Philosophy,” said the third.
“I will lead you to the world of “The Art of Science and Technology,” said the fourth.
“I will lead you to the “Art of Social Science,” said the fifth.
“I will lead you to the intricate paths of the mind, “The Art of Psychology, said the sixth.
“I will lead you to “The Art of Magic,” said the seventh.
The little boy smiled and giggled cheerfully. He now new which road he had to take, so the Wise Magician would teach him his magical tricks. He would now learn how to make a rabbit suddenly appear in the tall hat, how to make white doves materialize in thin air, how to fish flowers out from the wide, long sleeves of his cape, snatch many coins from the ears of his villagers, and many, many more fun tricks. Then he would go back to his small village and entertain his papa, Theo, and his mother, Narkiz, the teacher and the old priest, and everyone else with his magical tricks. Hurriedly, he took his pen and made a circle on the seventh path and then, made a forward pointing arrow . After that, he read the rest of the last five paths.
“I will lead you to “The Art of Biology” said the eighth.
“I will lead you to “The Art of Politics,” said the ninth.
“I will lead you to “The Art of Justice,” said the tenth.
“I will lead you back to “Your Little Village,” said the eleventh.
The little boy marked the eleventh path with a backward pointing arrow. Then he read the last remaining path.
“I will lead you to “The Art of Peace,” said the last one.
“I’d like to thank you all and each one in turn,” Hopsy said looking at each path on the half-circle of the big plateau, “for all the opportunities you’re giving me, for all  the things you’re willing to teach me. But I’ve made up my mind. I’m going to take the path to The Art of Magic. Though each one of you sounds promising and fun, I’m not ready for you. No, no, no,” he repeated ten times. I’m not ready for you, or you, or you . . . ” he said as he pointed his hand to each of the other ten paths. Looking at the eleventh path, he said respectfully. “Thank you path eleven for willing to show me the way back to my village, but you have to wait until I’ll come back from my journey to The Art of Magic.”
He folded his map, put it in his little pouch, and rose on his feet. Now that he’d studied his mop, silently he scrutinized the twelve paths. All of them were open for him to enter. All but one. A huge restricting wall blocked the path to The Art of Peace.
“This is very strange,” Hopsy thought staring at the enormous erected stone wall that  blocked the entrance of the last path.  He couldn’t understand why anyone would build this huge restricting barricade.
Two round, red blinking lights were mounted at each side on the top of the wall. Under the warning red lights was a big red sign. The sign said:
STOP
DO NOT ENTER
PATH UNDER REPAIR
DETOUR: Through “The Art of War”
Below the warning sign he saw an arched entrance door, and on both sites of it, there were two inlaid bookshelves. Books were stocked neatly one next to the other, at each side of the door. At the lower rim of each window was a smaller sign. He read:
“The Art of Peace” Take One. It is Free.
The little boy moved his legs all the way to his left. He arched his back and started reading the golden lettering on the wide spine of the first book.
The Art of Peace
Volume One
4000 B.C.
A hologram of a white dove, holding an olive branch in its claws, seemed as if it were ready to jump off the spine of the book and fly into the sky.
Then he read the spine of the next book, and the other, and the other . . . all the way down to the last one.
“How can it be? How can it be?” Hopsy repeated with surprise over and over. All the books seemed to be exactly the same. All of them said, The Art of Peace, Volume One. The date on the last one was: “2000 A.D.” That was the only difference between the first and the last.
The little boy put his finger on the last book and as he moved to his left, he read the chronological date on each book. He counted sixty books in all, thirty books on either side of the arched door. Now he knew that every one-hundred years, a new Volume One of The Art of Peace, was published by Dove Publication.
Hopsy felt a little disappointed because he did not expect to see the same Volume One of The Art of Peace in the span of six-thousand years. He thought there would be hundreds and hundreds, and zillions of different books, many volumes, and magazines explaining The Art of Peace to everyone.
So, he took the book dated 4000 B.C. and opened the first page. It had no number on the top of the page. Five inches below the top it said,  “In the beginning . . .” The rest of the page, and also the back of it, were blank.
On the top of the next page there were the numbers, 99.01.01, and the rest was empty of any words, numbers, or even pictures. Then every twelve pages the middle number change to 02, then 03, and so on. On the last twelve pages of the book, the middle number was 12. On the very bottom of the last page there were only three dots. “ . . . ”
Completely confused with the chaotic disarray of all those numbers, he was now sure that Dove Publication knew nothing about numbering correctly the pages of their books. All the books he had read or looked at in the small library at his school,  were  numbered starting with one, the two, and so on, keeping the correct number on each page. He made a mental note to tell the people at Dove Publication that they had it all wrong, and that he would be glad to teach them how to fix their mistake, so he and everyone else would know which page was which.
“It’s got to be some big mistake,” the boy decided. He put the 4000 B.C. book under his arm and opened the 3900 B.C. book. “The same mistake also,” he said disappointed, and put that one back on the shelf. He took the 3800 B.C. and opened it. The same beginning, the same ending, the same stark white, blank pages, page after page. He opened the next, and then the next to that, and the next to that, until he reached the 2000 A.D. book. He hoped that the last one would be different than the rest. He closed his eyes, and wished that the last edition of The Art of Peace, Volume one, was filled with colorful, beautiful pictures, and amazing stories. He opened it. The same beginning, the same end, the same numbering. “No!” he exclaimed, shook his head, and looked at the cloudless sky in desperation.
Not only he had to teach them how to number pages, but now  he had to also teach them how to read and write more than “In the beginning . . .” And when they had learned enough reading and writing, he had to tell them many stories about his beautiful village and his colorful, but simple villagers, what they did and how they did it. Then he could tell them about his mom and dad, about all the children in the school and the teacher, and all the things that had happened to him since he was born, especially the odd things that kept happening to him since his seventh birthday.  Then they could go to his village and take lots and lots of pictures to fill up all the empty pages of the book. His village and the villagers would be more famous than that Marco Polo guy, maybe even more famous than Colombus and his three ships. Hopsy knew that this would be much better than all these empty books.
 Right then he remembered the traveling magician who had stopped at his little village to entertain all the villagers with his magical tricks.
So, the little boy thought that all those books in the inlaid windows, had to be, he hoped would be, magical books. Holding in his hand The Art of Peace, Volume One, 4000 B.C., Hopewatch walked to his backpack under the tree and carefully placed the book on  top of it.
He then cut a small, straight piece of wood with his pocket knife and shaped it like the wand the traveling magician had used to put his mother back in one piece. He raised his brand new wand above the book, tap, tap, tap, he tapped it three times, and just like the magician, he rendered the magical words, “Abbra Ca-adabbra.” Slowly now he took the book with both hands and placed his finger somewhere in the middle of the book.
“Come out. Step out. Show me the magic!” he bellowed, and opened the book. He was stunned. Both pages where stark white; not a single word, not a single picture. The left page was numbered, 45.07. 01, and the right one, 45.08.01. He was ready to close the book when the last number on the right page whirled and started to change to two, three, four, five and stopped on number six. Suddenly colorful, ethereal shapes started materializing on the 45.08.06, blank page. The shapes moved slowly as if awakening from their long, long sleep. In an thrilling astonishment the little boy’s eyes focused on that page. He was mesmerized; he was speechless with the magic he was witnessing.
There was the winding river with its crystal clear waters flowing down through tall snowy blue mountains, the rolling hills and the green valleys. Tall trees,  bushes, green grass, bamboo tress, and colorful wild flowers sprang up and grew on the hills, the valleys, on the shores of the lake, on the banks of the river and on the six islands of it’s delta. Faint musical sounds reached his ears, and suddenly birds and butterflies jumped out of the page and flew up, up in the sky.
Eyes wide with glee, mystified, the boy threw himself on the tall silvery-green grass, and watched the birds, dragonflies, and butterflies as they flew and hovered above him. He looked at the magic, listened to the delightful songs of birds, smelled the sweet perfume of the flowers . . . He smiled brightly, and laughed, and laughed, and laughed. He felt the magical clarity as he watched them flying in the blue, blue sky. He thought he was . . . or was it a feeling? He couldn’t tell. A feeling of being lifted higher and higher, flying, floating among them, with them, and smiling with joy. Smiling, giggling, laughing.
“The Art of Peace, Volume One, 4000 A.D., page 45.08.06,” he said to himself, over and over again, so wouldn’t forget this magical number.
A beautiful hummingbird flapped its wings and hovered in front of the little boy.
“Thank you, thank you, little boy for believing in The Art of Peace. The beautiful magic of Peace,” sang the hummingbird to the little boy. “But now we have to leave, we have to go,” the hummingbird finished in a sad chirp. Before Hopewatch could respond, the snowy mountains, the big river, its delta with its six islands, the hills and the valleys, the silvery-green grass and the colorful flowers, the birds and the butterflies, all, flew back into the book and vanished on page 45.08.06. Instantly, the last number changed back to 01. Then the book closed itself.
The little boy threw himself onto his feet, opened the book, and in an utter disappointment he stared at the blank, 45.08.01, page. “Come out, come out! Show me the magic!” he hollered and waited while holding his breath. Nothing happened. He closed the book, tapped on it three times with his wand, “Abbra Ca-adabbra!” he said and hurriedly opened the book. “Please, please, do it again,” he hoped and wished. Like a night  owl gazing into the darkness of the night to spot the movements of a concealed creature, he stared and scrutinized the page. White pages stared back at him, and white they remained. He gazed at the blank pages for some time hoping to see the magic again, but nothing, nothing happened. He closed the book and tried it again and again. Nothing! Nothing after nothing. “You are in that page. I know you are. So, come out!” he demanded. Nothing again.
“I have to get to the bottom of this,” the little boy said stubbornly, a blunt defiance in his tone, and momentarily ignored his journey. With dashing legs, arms jerking, head forward, pursed lips,  he reached to the shut wooden door of the Art of Peace and tapped on it with his wand. Not receiving an answer, he eagerly banged on the door with his fist.
“Hello! Is anyone in there?” the little boy cried out. “Please, answer me if you are in there.”
“Give me a moment,” a soothing voice of a young girl came through the arched door. “I’ll be right out.”
Shortly, the arched door opened slowly, and a beautiful young woman – Younger than my  mother – the little boy thought, stood below the opening of the arched door. Her long, silk white dress touched the ground. A wide, emerald-green silk belt, made a butterfly bow above her right hip and the two ends of it dangled down to her side and touched the toes of her golden sandals. She is as beautiful as my mother, the little boy mused looking at her long, honey-brown hair, her oval face, and her big, midnight-blue eyes.
“I can’t remember the last time,” she said in a melodic, nostalgic voice, “when someone knocked on my door. It’s been so long, oh, so long!” she said in a sad murmur, and sighed, as though the waves of grief and pain had run her being’s length and were returning now from some remote, distant shore. He knew that feeling. He could see it in the eyes of his mother every time his father had to leave on one of his long trips.
The young woman moved her head slowly to her left and then right, as if chasing memories? Dreams maybe?
Her eyes focused on him. “What is your name, little boy?” she asked. Her voice took an elevated richness, sending a warm, soft, safe tingling feeling through his body. Funny! It was the same warm and safe feeling he’d always felt in his mother’s arms.
“My name is Hopewatch, but everyone calls me Hopsy for short, except my mother, Narkiz,” he said. He was wondering how a beautiful woman like her could hold so much sadness in her eyes. He tried to figure out how many zillions of friends she must have.
“Oh!” said the beautiful young woman, teasingly. “And what does your mother, Narkiz, call you?”
Hopewatch’s face turned red. “Do you really want to know?”
“Of course I do,” she replied cheerfully now. “Would I have asked you if I didn’t?”
He felt that same warm feeling again.
“All right,” he said and sighed in exasperation. “She calls me, “My little boy,” or “My little precious.” And now,” he continued hastily to cover up his bashfulness, “it’s your turn to tell me your name.”
“I think you know my name,” she said. “Why don’t you give it a try? Let me hear you say it. I want to hear it so much!”
She closed her big, blue eyes, and waited silently for his answer. Oh, how beautiful she looked!
Without thinking, the words escaped out of Hopsy’s mouth. “Peace! Your name is Peace,” he said.
She opened her eyes as if just awakening from a long restful sleep. “Gleaming, twinkling, and flickering with millions and zillions of stars in the midnight blue skies,” the little boy thought as he looked into her sparkling eyes. A tiny-weeny, itsy bitsy bit prettier than Mother, maybe? Quickly, he erased that thought from his mind. Both his mother and Peace were the prettiest. Yes! That’s it. Done with.
“Hopewatch, would you like to see my house?” Peace asked.
“