She stood up slowly, her hands pressed to her mouth, and walked toward the front window. Sophie, who had been lying in the front window in a pile of not-yet-hung Christmas garlands, stood also, the fur on her tail standing out in a bottle brush. Zach bowed from the waist as if acknowledging a standing ovation, and Sophie took off like a shot back into Sarah's office, where she cowered under the desk.

To Sarah, it was the most amazing thing she had ever seen. The corners of her mouth turned up in a grin, and she shook her head and spread her arms in acknowledgement. Zach motioned for her to join him on the sidewalk and she opened the door. "Do you have your keys?" he asked. She felt in her pocket and drew them out. "Lock the door, then, and let's take a walk."

She reached inside and pressed the door's lock button, then pulled the door shut and followed him down the sidewalk, still grinning.

"Zach! Zach!" she cried, hurrying to catch up to him. "You are an angel!"

"What have I been telling you?" he asked. "You're awfully hard to convince."

She walked slowly around him, and then turned to look behind them. There were several people on the street, but no one seemed to be paying them the slightest attention. She would have thought that everyone would be goggling at him--after all, how often did you see an angel on the street, even in Florida? "How come no one's looking at us?" she asked him.

"They can't see me," he said.

"What do you mean, they can't see you?"

"Just what I said--they can't see me. I'm invisible to them. You have to believe in angels in order to see them."

"I didn't believe," Sarah said.

"You may not have believed that I was an angel, but you do believe--otherwise, why would you have written all those letters?"

She stopped. "What do you mean? What letters?"

"The letters to the Dead Letter Office. You remember, don't you?"

"Well, of course I remember, but how did you know about them? I thought they were private . . ."

"As private as a prayer." He stopped walking and turned to face her. "Listen, Sarah," he said. "The Dead Letter Office is my project. It . . . I'm the angel in charge of memory. I made it because I thought it might help people deal with their memories more easily, let go of the bad ones, in a way. It appears I was wrong. At least in your case, it seems to have made things worse. I was fearful that you would never get over your grief, and I thought maybe . . . I don't know. I thought maybe I could help."

He had started walking again, but Sarah, stunned, still stood in the middle of the sidewalk, people walking around her as if she were one of the streetlights.

"I don't understand," she said. "You made the Dead Letter Office? You read my letters? You read my letters?" Furious, she started running, and when she hit the turnoff for the beach, she ran unthinkingly down toward the ocean, sinking down into a pile of misery on the sand. When she felt him standing over her, she said, looking out over the ocean, "I can't believe you read my letters."

He crouched beside her, the wings now drooping and forlorn. "Sarah, didn't you want someone to answer you? Didn't you hope that someone was reading them, that someone understood you, and would help you if they could? That's all I wanted to do."

She continued to stare out over the ocean silently. "I don't know," she said, finally. "Maybe." After another long moment: "I just . . . wish I could tell them, you know? I didn't get a chance to say goodbye. They were both dead before I knew it, and I couldn't tell them that I loved them. And I've been searching for a way ever since."

He reached over and put his arm around her. "Sarah," he said. "Oh, Sarah. They know. Believe me, they know." She turned and buried her face in his chest and cried as if her heart was breaking, but by the time she stopped, it felt as though it had been healed.

* * *

He helped her up, and she wiped the tears from her face with her palms. "I'm sorry," she said. "I don't usually fall apart in public. I try to keep it at home." She laughed. "I feel pounds lighter. Thank you."

"Good," he said, smiling at her. "Do you want to go back to the store?"

"Not yet. Let's stay out here a little while longer. Do you mind?"

"Of course not," he said, and took her hand as they set off down the beach. When they reached the hardpacked sand, Sarah reached down and, steadying herself with a hand on his arm, took off her sandals and carried them in her hand.

"So . . . you . . . what? Have the internet in Heaven? That's how you read my letters?"

"Well, not exactly, but something like that. I mean, I didn't actually have to use a phone line, or an actual computer, although the process is pretty much the same."

"Oh, come on," she said. "If you're not using a phone line or a computer, the process is nothing like the same!"

"Well . . . maybe not. But the result is basically the same. Well, okay, no, maybe it really isn't anything like the same. Does it matter?"

"I guess not, but I'd just like to try to understand it."

"Well," he said, "it's just like prayer. You pray, assuming--or hoping--that someone will hear you . . . it's just that the vehicle is different. In simple terms, I'm sort of the librarian in Heaven, and I'm kind of in charge of the internet, so . . . well, I heard you, and I came."

"What are libraries like in Heaven?" she asked.

"Much like yours here," he answered. "Except we don't have to whisper."

She laughed. "Cute," she said. "You know, I always kind of wanted to be a librarian."

"Yes, I know," he said.

"Oh. Right. I guess you would," she said. "Is there anything you don't know?"

"There's a lot I don't know," he answered. "I'm not omniscient."

"I thought you were," she said.

"Nope. I'm just an angel. God is omniscient, but I'm just a regular angel."

"What's he like?" she asked.

"Who?" he countered.

"Who? God, who do you think??"

He thought.

"Well, you know that new reggae gospel? He likes that quite a lot." He tried to hide his grin.

She swatted him on the shoulder. "You know what I mean! I don't mean what does he like, I mean what is he like!" Then she gasped and flung her hands to her mouth.

"What?" he asked. "What's wrong?"

"I just swatted an angel!" she said from behind her fingers. "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to!"

"Hey, it's okay, Sarah. I'm perfectly fine. No lightning bolts from the sky, see?" He gestured toward the black bowl of the sky. "And as far as God, he's very difficult to describe. But I think I can assure you that he won't be striking you down for smacking me. In fact," he said, first grinning at her and then sobering, "hit me again if you think it would make you feel better."

"No, it's okay," she said, laughing weakly. "I'm okay. At least for now, I think I'm okay."

* * *

They walked on silently, their fingers intertwined. They looked out over the Gulf and saw the lights of a distant ship--a yacht or a fishing boat, its masts strung with Christmas lights. And then suddenly, from the blackness of the sky, a shooting star. "Quick!" he said. "Make a wish." She closed her eyes and squeezed his hand. "I think I've already done that," she said.

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