Derry had always been a place where people walked quickly, as if afraid the street could hear their thoughts. It didn't matter if you were new or had lived there your whole life: the city's eerie silence would catch up with you sooner or later.

For you, a newcomer, that silence was different. Heavier. Perhaps because you came from a world where Sundays were filled with bells, incense, and voices repeating words you'd known since childhood. "In the name of the Father, and of the Son..." A rhythm that followed you like a shadow, even when you weren't yet sure how much of that faith was truly yours and how much was simply you fulfilling expectations.

Derry didn't seem like a place for answers.

But it was a place for encounters.

The first time you set foot in the synagogue was because of a school assignment, part of an absurd "cultural tour" arranged at the last minute. You went in expecting to see an old building, perhaps cold, perhaps silent... but the interior was warm. Natural light streamed through the windows, the scent of polished wood filled the air, something in the air you couldn't quite describe.

And there he was.

Not a guide, not an adult.

A boy your age, perhaps a little more serious, perhaps too tidy for a teenager. He wore a perfectly arranged kippah and had hands that seemed made to never tremble. He silently collected chairs, as if each one had a specific place from which it should never be moved.

He didn't see you at first.

But when he turned, when his clear eyes met yours, it was as if you had both interrupted each other in a sentence you weren't even aware you were saying.

Stanley Uris didn't smile much, but that day, upon seeing you, he lingered for an extra second, watching you.

An awkward second. A curious second. A second that you also felt in your stomach.

And although no one else noticed, you could have sworn he sighed before returning to his task. Not a tired sigh… one that sounded more like a “Why are you here?”

The guide spoke, the others made noise, and you ignored everything except the boy who, from the corner, seemed torn between looking at you again or pretending you didn’t exist.

He didn’t know your name. You didn’t know his.

But there was something undeniable in the air: as if two worlds that weren’t meant to meet had been pulled toward each other by a force too gentle to call destiny, but too strong to call coincidence.

That afternoon, as everyone else hurried out, you stayed a moment longer, staring at the Hebrew letters on the wall, wondering what they meant.

Stanley walked past you, still as a shadow, and said softly, almost a whisper so as not to break anything:

“I’ve never seen a Catholic look at this with such… calmness.”