Pythagoras' Pacific Paradise

"What's the point of all this?"

"Is it worth it?"

"What do you mean what do I mean? What's the point of anything?"

"But why?"

I was asking her, but I already knew the answer.

"Because it helps us grow."

As we walked through the woods, scuffing our shoes in the dirt, I thought about our journey. A few months ago, I had no idea that there were people like us in this world – other teens who looked at the night sky and tried to make sense of it all. And then one day, I was walking home from school, and my best friend Jules came up to me and said, "Hey, do you want to go to a gathering at my house?" Of course, I wanted to go to a gathering at her house - her parents are rich, they have an indoor pool, and she's beautiful - but I said no because Jules doesn't host social gatherings. She never drinks or smokes or does any of those things that 'good kids' aren't supposed to do. However, what she did do was tell me about Pythagoras.

Pythagoras wasn't a party either; instead, it was an event known as The Golden Square, where people gathered together, and rather than indulge in typical party activities, they discussed various topics concerning the world. This conversation would span two days (or nights) starting from Friday evening and ending by Sunday night, with the participants unable to leave until Monday morning. At first, I thought she was joking, but she wasn't. She told me all about how this worked, and when she finished, I agreed to join, thinking it sounded cool and fun. And now here we were, just a few days away from leaving for The Golden Square.

Jules was easy to talk to: she listened well, and when she talked, it was usually something that demanded attention. We had been best friends since grade school, back when we were still pretending that everyone else was real while we sat slumped over in our desks during recess, whispering about how much we wanted to play with each other instead of them. But as much as I loved Jules, sometimes she annoyed me too - especially when she called me out like that for asking questions which may have been better left unasked. After all, if there's one thing I hate more than being held responsible for my own thoughts, it's having someone else tell me what they think those thoughts mean. So, instead of answering her question directly (which would have been challenging since we weren't talking very loudly), I asked another one: "How much longer do you think it'll be before Uncle Frank gets here?"

Uncle Frank was Jules' dad's brother - he lived somewhere upstate with his wife Greta and their son Peter but came down pretty often just to check up on Jules' folks because he felt bad about not doing more for them during their divorce when Jules was little. So whenever Uncle Frank arrived, Jules went to stay with him because he always spoiled her rotten. Her face lit up immediately like she'd been waiting all day for me to ask that question: "He should be here soon! Maybe another hour or so!"

And then suddenly, Uncle Frank appeared. There he was – a man in a suit standing out in front of the car with a slightly perplexed look on his face, seemingly unable to believe his luck in finding Jules' uncle right where he expected him to be, parked near their house instead of anywhere else in Wilahan or even the state for that matter. He quickly snapped out of it though: "Hey sweetie!" he said as he ran over to give Jules a big hug; "How are ya?" Then he turned towards me and said, "Hey kid! How goes it?" which seemed odd since he didn't know my name. Until today, we hadn't really spoken more than two words at once since I met him last year - but I didn't say anything because what else could I do? "Fantastic," is what came out of my mouth as soon as I processed his question enough not to sound like an idiot; "I'm fantastic."

He stayed long enough to make sure we knew where we were going (which, by some miracle, we did) before waving goodbye cheerfully from the door of his car while driving off into the sunset towards whatever mansion Uncle Frank lived in these days. Then Jules took my hand - which made me feel kind of funny because she doesn't usually touch me unless we're alone - and led me back into the woods until we finally caught sight of Uncle Frank's car again parked next to Aunt Greta's in front of a little cabin way off-road from everything else, surrounded by fruit trees growing wild alongside a forest pond (which Aunt Greta claimed was full of catfish while Uncle Frank