he had seen his share of heroes, too. Major Rawls never knew everything that Owen had known; the major knew only that Owen had been a hero-he didn't know that Owen Meany had been a miracle, too. There's a prayer I say most often for Owen. It's one of the little prayers he said for my mother, the night Hester and I found him in the cemetery-where he'd brought the flashlight, because he knew how my mother had hated the darkness. "'INTO PARADISE MAY THE ANGELS LEAD YOU,'" he'd said over my mother's grave; and so I say that one for him-I know it was one of his favorites. I am always saying prayers for Owen Meany. And I often try to imagine how I might have answered Mary Beth Baird, when she spoke to me-at Owen's burial. If I could have spoken, if I hadn't lost my voice-what would I have said to her, how could I have answered her? Poor Mary Beth Baird! I left her standing in the cemetery without an answer. "Do you remember how we used to lift him up?" she'd asked me. "He was so easy to lift up!" Mary Beth Baird had said to me. "He was so light-he weighed
( John Irving )
[ A Prayer for Owen Meany ]
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