August 8. Phase of the moon: Last Quarter.

Every day, Teddy goes down to the lake.

In the morning, I hear the squeal and slap of the screen door, and then I hear his shoes thump down the porch steps. From my window, I watch him walk from the house and head down toward the water, fishing pole propped on his thin shoulder, tackle box in hand. It is a strange ritual, and useless, I think, because he never brings back any fruits of his labor. Every afternoon, he returns empty-handed but cheerful.

Today, I follow him.

He does not see me as he rambles through the woods toward the water. I stay far enough behind him so that he can’t hear my footsteps. He is singing anyway, in his high and childish voice, an off-key version of the “Kookaburra” song, and is oblivious to the fact he is being watched. He reaches the water’s edge, baits his hook, and throws in his line. As the minutes pass, he settles onto the grassy bank and gazes across water so calm that not even a whisper of wind ruffles the mirrored surface.

The fishing pole gives a twitch.

I move closer as Teddy reels in his catch. It is a brownish fish and it writhes on the line, every muscle twitching in mortal terror. I wait for the fatal blow, for that sacred instant in time when the divine spark flickers out. But to my surprise, Teddy grasps his catch, pulls the hook from its mouth, and gently lowers the fish back into the water. He crouches close, murmuring to it, as though in apology for having inconvenienced its morning.

“Why didn’t you keep it?” I ask.

Teddy jerks straight, startled by my voice. “Oh,” he says. “It’s you.”

“You let it go.”

“I don’t like to kill them. It’s only a bass, anyway.”

“So you throw them all back?”

“Uh-huh.” Teddy baits his hook again and casts it into the water.

“What’s the point of catching them, then?”

“It’s fun. It’s like a game between us. Me and the fish.”

I sit down beside him on the bank. Gnats buzz around our heads and Teddy waves them away. He has just turned eleven years old, but he still has a child’s perfectly smooth skin, and the golden baby fuzz on his face catches the sun’s glint. I am close enough to hear his breathing, to see the pulse throb in his slender neck. He does not seem bothered by my presence; in fact, he gives me a shy smile, as though this is a special treat, sharing the lazy morning with his older cousin.

“You want to try?” he says, offering me the pole.

I take it. But my attention remains on Teddy, on the fine sheen of perspiration on his forehead, on the shadows cast by his eyelashes.

The pole gives a tug.

“You’ve got one!”

I begin to reel it in, and the fish’s struggles make my hands sweat in anticipation. I can feel its thrashings, its desperation to live, transmitted through the pole. At last it breaks the water, its tail flapping as I swing it over the bank. I grab hold of slimy scales.

“Now take out the hook,” says Teddy. “But be careful not to hurt him.”

I look into the open tackle box and see a knife.

“He can’t breathe out of water. Hurry.” Teddy urges me.

I think about reaching for the knife, about holding the wriggling fish down against the grass and piercing it behind the gills. About slitting it open, all the way down the belly. I want to feel the fish give a last twitch, want to feel its life force leap directly into me in a bracing jolt-the same jolt I felt when I was ten years old and took the oath of Herem. When my mother at last brought me into the circle and handed me the knife. “You have reached the age,” she said. “It’s time to be one of us.” I think of the sacrificial goat’s final shudder, and I remember the pride in my mother’s eyes and the murmurs of approval from the circle of robed men. I want to feel that thrill again.

A fish will not do.

I remove the hook and drop the wriggling bass back into the lake. It gives a splash of its tail and darts away. The whisper of a breeze ruffles the water and dragonflies tremble on the reeds. I turn to Teddy.

And he says, “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Forty-two Euros in tips-not a bad haul for a chilly Sunday in December. As Lily waved good-bye to the tour group whom she’d just shepherded through the Roman Forum, she felt an icy raindrop fleck her face. She looked up at dark clouds hanging ominously low and she shivered. Tomorrow she’d certainly need a raincoat.

With that fresh roll of cash in her pocket, she headed for the favorite shopping venue of every penny-pinching student in Rome: the Porta Portese flea market in Trastevere. It was already one P.M., and the dealers would be closing down their stalls, but she might have time to pick up a bargain. By the time she reached the market, a fine drizzle was falling. The Piazza di Porta Portese echoed with the clatter of crates being packed up. She wasted no time snatching up a used wool sweater for only three Euros. It reeked of cigarette smoke, but a good washing would remedy that. She paid another two Euros for a hooded slicker that was marred only by a single streak of black grease. Now dressed warmly in her new purchases, and with money still in her pocket, she indulged in the luxury of browsing.

She wandered down the narrow passage between stalls, pausing to pick through buckets of costume jewelry and fake Roman coins, and continued toward Piazza Ippolito Nievo and the antiques stalls. Every Sunday, it seemed, she always ended up in this section of the market, because it was the old things, the ancient things, that truly interested her. A scrap of medieval tapestry or a mere chip of bronze could make her heart pound faster. By the time she reached the antiques area, most of the dealers were already carting away their merchandise, and she saw only a few stands still open, their wares exposed to the drizzle. She wandered past the meager offerings, past weary, glum-faced sellers, and was about to leave the piazza when her gaze fell on a small wooden box. She halted, staring.

Three reverse crosses were carved into the top.

Her mist-dampened face suddenly felt encased in ice. Then she noticed that the hinge was facing toward her, and with a sheepish laugh, she rotated the box to its proper orientation. The crosses turned right-side up. When you looked too hard for evil, you saw it everywhere. Even when it’s not there.

“You are looking for religious items?” the dealer asked in Italian.

She glanced up to see the man’s wrinkled face, his eyes almost lost in folds of skin. “I’m just browsing, thank you.”

“Here. There’s more.” He slid a box in front of her, and she saw tangled rosary beads and a wooden carving of the Madonna and old books, their pages curling in the dampness. “Look, look! Take your time.”

At first glance, she saw nothing in that box that interested her. Then she focused on the spine of one of the books. The title was stamped on the leather in gold: The Book of Enoch.

She picked it up and opened it to the copyright page. It was the English translation by R. H. Charles, a 1912 edition printed by Oxford University Press. Two years ago, in a Paris museum, she had viewed a centuries-old scrap of the Ethiopic version. The Book of Enoch was an ancient text, part of the apocryphal literature.

“It is very old,” said the dealer.

“Yes,” she murmured, “it is.”

“It says 1912.”

And these words are even older, she thought, as she ran her fingers across the yellowed pages. This text predated the birth of Christ by two hundred years. These were stories from an era before Noah and his ark, before Methusaleh. She flipped through the pages and paused at one passage that had been underlined in ink.