An Imperfect Miracle by Thomas L. Peters Page A

shiny message up on the clouds where nobody could miss it?”
    When she didn’t answer right away, I started climbing up the steps to get a better view. I still didn’t see her lips moving any, but I wasn’t sure that being Jesus’s mom she needed to move her lips to talk. Then I noticed that instead of two tears on her face, now there were seven. I knew because I counted them on my fingers three times. They were all just tiny yellow specks like before, and they were on both cheeks now. But the biggest change was to her mouth. Before it was sort of straight across, like I told you, not really smiling but not frowning either. But now she was smiling.
    It wasn’t exactly a huge knock-your-socks-off smile, but it was a smile, all right. She reminded me a little of how Mom grinned sometimes when she was watching her favorite soap opera, like she was enjoying herself but wasn’t exactly ready to bust out laughing either. I wondered how it could have happened, and then I wondered why she was smiling with all those tears on her cheeks. Then I thought that maybe it had something to do with how she’d healed the old guy with the shakes, by smiling at him, I mean, and maybe crying over him a little too.
    Carlos finally strolled over and gave me a little shove and told me to hurry up because plenty of other folks were waiting to see her. I looked back at some guy and his wife giving me stern looks and bouncing on their toes, so I jumped down the steps to get out of their way. Then I asked Carlos about the five extra tears on Mary’s cheeks, and when it was exactly that she’d started smiling. Right away he gulped a little like he was nervous about something, or maybe he was just swallowing down the mint that he’d been sucking on. Anyway, he said he hadn’t noticed any of it, but he said that his old eyes weren’t nearly as sharp as mine. He said he’d check out my story once the line thinned out.
    Then I asked him how Mary could heal people if she didn’t at least talk to them a little, like asking them what’s wrong and then saying you’re healed or something, like those preachers on television were always doing. Carlos said that Mary didn’t need to talk, because she had powers that were a lot stronger than our puny words could ever be.
    â€œWords mostly just bounce right off you. Mary can sink deep down inside you where words can’t go.”
    â€œSort of like some invisible power, you mean?”
    â€œThat’s right.”
    I thought about it a second.
    â€œIs that how she heals people? By sinking down into them and fixing them up from the inside out?”
    Carlos’s dark eyes twinkled a little.
    â€œIt’s a mystery how she does it, but you’re probably on to something. Too bad you’re not Catholic, Nate. You’d make a good priest, a lot better than some of the sad sacks we’re stuck with these days.”
    I wondered if he was taking a shot at Father Tom. I doubted it though, since they seemed like pretty close friends. I heard that Carlos even lived over at St. Sebastian’s in the basement or somewhere like that.
    â€œIs she gonna do anything else besides heal people?”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œI don’t know. Give everyone an iPod or something. I could sure use a new one since mine’s busted, but Mom claims she can’t afford it. Do you think if I asked her nice, Mary would give me one?”
    Carlos gave his head a quick shake.
    â€œI don’t know. But if she has something in mind, I bet it’s a lot more important than just handing out material things. It’ll probably be something really fantastic and unexpected, something that will shake things up around here, maybe shake up the whole world. And besides, Mary doesn’t need to show her face just to heal people. She can do that anytime she feels like it from her throne way up among the stars.”
    I felt my heart