Holy Rollers

by Rob Byrnes

  Chase didn’t respond, so Grant shook his shoulder.

  “Stop looking at him and start listening to me. Tell him to put on something respectable. This ain’t Chelsea or Hell’s Kitchen.”

  “Okay,” Chase said. He was about to leave when Grant stopped him.

  “One other thing. You know how we’re calling you Charlie?” Chase nodded unhappily. “I want you to tell Jared he’s gonna go by his real name while he’s working this job.”

  “He’s not gonna like that.”

  “I don’t care.”

  Grant had more than a few reasons not to particularly like Jared Parsells—including his crush on Chase, and Chase’s crush on him—but one of his pet peeves was Jared Parsells’s name, since it was really Jerry Stanley. He hadn’t changed it for a scam; he’d changed it because he thought it sounded sexier. That bugged Grant a lot.

  Farraday and Jared walked into the house, and Chase darted across the street to catch up.

  “Did I just see what I thought I saw?” Constance asked Grant. “Did a naked boy just get out of the car and go into our house?”

  Grant sighed. “Meet your new partner.”

  On the other side of the driveway, Malcolm was reluctantly serving up Black Angus steakburgers to Mr. Ford and Mr. Herren. He knew Tish wouldn’t approve of feeding crashers, but he was trying to be polite. Not to mention that no one was eating from the grill because they were gorging themselves on deviled eggs.

  Mr. Herren waved his beer bottle in Malcolm’s face. “Want a brewski, Fielding?”

  Malcolm wouldn’t meet his eyes. “No thank you. I’ll have some wine. Later.”

  Mr. Ford grabbed the ketchup bottle and shook. A dollop of redness landed on the burger, and another dollop landed on the driveway.

  “Oh! My! God!”

  There was immediate silence.

  “Oh my God!” Tish said again, although this time in a slightly less ear-piercing tone.

  Lisa looked at her. “What’s wrong?”

  Tish’s voice was strained. “He…he…he…” She pointed at Mr. Ford. “This beast just poured ketchup on our driveway!”

  Mr. Ford looked at the red blotch on the black asphalt. “This?”

  “Malcolm, get the hose! And you two”—now her finger moved between Mr. Ford and Mr. Herren—“I want you out of here!”

  “Hey, Tish, it was just ketchup…”

  “That’s exactly the kind of attitude we don’t want in Old Stone Fence Post Estates!”

  “That is one high-strung lady,” Constance said quietly to Lisa. “I’m getting over to the cathedral before she goes postal on the entire neighborhood.”

  $ $ $

  “…then add a pinch and a half of paprika and you’re done,” Farraday told the neighbors gathered around him. He took a sip from the large tumbler of scotch in his hand. “But remember: a pinch and a half. It’s all about that last half pinch. Other than that, it’s really easy.”

  “And so good,” Ms. Jarvis said again.

  A few yards away from Farraday’s impromptu cooking class, Jared, now in non-see-through clothing, stood brooding.

  “You’ll get used to it,” said Grant. “It is your real name, after all.”

  “Was my real name. If I wanted it to still be my name…it’d still be my name.”

  Tish, now somewhat calmer than she’d been during the ketchup incident, approached and gave Jared the once-over. “And who do we have here?”

  “This is Jerry,” Grant said, before Jared had a chance to screw things up.

  Tish was ever-mindful of the HOA’s rules. “And how is Jerry related?”

  Grant was ever-mindful that Tish was ever-mindful. “He’s my, uh…”

  “Son,” said Jared, a small bit of triumph in his voice. Grant curled his lip.

  “Son?” She studied their faces, looking for a resemblance and finding none.

  “Jerry was adopted,” said Grant. “From an orphanage. Where he was placed because no one wanted him.”

  Jared looked stricken and put a hand to his chest. “I was? How come you and Mom never told me?”

  Tish backed away, and then quickly disappeared into the thinning crowd.

  “Don’t ever do that to me again,” said Grant. “On top of everything else, I’m too young to be your father.”

  “Actually,” Jared said, “you’re older than my father.”

  “Shuddup.” They watched as Farraday passed, leading a half dozen neighbors—including Ms. Jarvis and Mr. Scribner—in the direction of 455. “Where are you going?”

  “They want me to show ’em how I braise my short ribs.”

  Grant shook his head. These suburbs were going to kill him yet.

  $ $ $

  The day he abruptly left his pulpit in Newark, Delaware, could have ended the religious calling of Dennis Merribaugh—some might say it should have ended that calling—but Merribaugh and the church deacons had a gentlemen’s agreement that the past was the past, and as long as he went away it would stay buried. It was, perhaps, the best solution to a very awkward situation.

  That he had ended up with a better position at the Virginia Cathedral of Love was indeed proof of God’s benevolence. It made Merribaugh believe all the more in the power of redemption, and he was determined to spread that word. In a sense, that was what Project Rectitude was all about.

  It was also what drew him to Sister Constance. Although tight-lipped about her past, he could sense her presence at the Cathedral was an effort to atone for sins. He would help her find redemption, and he knew just how to do that.

  He summoned her to his fourth-floor office in Cathedral House, sat her down, and said, “Sister Constance, I continue to be impressed by your commitment to the Virginia Cathedral of Love.”

  “I feel I’ve found a home, Rev. Merribaugh. Praise the Lord!”

  He thought maybe he should tell her that not every sentence had to end with “praise the Lord,” but if it made her happy…

  “And I have news, Mr. Merribaugh!” She didn’t wait for his reaction. “I’ve found a sinner for your ex-gay ministry!”

  He dropped his elbows to the desk and leaned forward. “You have?”

  “I have indeed.”

  Merribaugh smiled. With Hurley’s extended push, the number of registrations for Beyond Sin had topped one hundred twenty. Sister Constance had just helped him climb a bit closer to the goal, which was especially timely given the imminence of the conference.

  “Delightful!” He was genuinely happy. “Just delightful! And what’s this person’s name?”

  She looked at him, her sly smile covering for the fact that she couldn’t remember.

  “This is an extra-special offering to the church,” she said finally. “I’ll bring him around tomorrow, so you can meet him personally.”

  He gave her a broad wink. “You know how to tease a man. All right, I can be patient. But I can’t wait to meet your extra-special homosexual!”

  “I can’t wait for you to meet him, either!”

  Flush with the good news, Merribaugh almost forgot why he’d summoned her. A glance at his datebook refreshed his memory.

  “I wondered if you had the next half hour free.”

  “Yes, I do. Why?”

  Merribaugh smiled. “There’s someone I want you to meet.”

  Minutes later she was following him to the elevator, which descended two floors. And then they were standing on the landing outside Dr. Oscar Hurley’s office. Merribaugh rapped on the door, and Hurley’s distinctive voice said, “Come in.”

  Merribaugh, ever the gentleman, held the door open, allowing her to enter first. She clutched both hands to her chest as she walked inside.

  “It’s like I died and went to heaven,” she said. “You are Dr. Oscar Hurley himself!”

  He smiled at her from his side of the Desk of Christ. It was a common reaction from congregants when they crossed the threshold for the first time.

  “I am indeed. Please have a seat.” Behind
them, Merribaugh closed the door.

  “Praise the Lord,” said Constance, sitting on one of those plush couches as her eyes scanned the décor and her head affixed price tags to various items. “Praise the Lord indeed!”

  Hurley gave Merribaugh a look that asked, What’s with all the Lord-praising? to which Merribaugh could only shrug, I don’t know.

  “This is a thrill for me,” she said. “I only hope my mama and papa are looking down from heaven and watching.” Her real mother and father were retired and living in Atlanta, but this version sounded so much better.

  Because he had good news and because he wanted to stop her babbling, Merribaugh leaned forward. “Sister Constance has also brought us a homosexual who wants to be delivered from sin.”

  “Really.” Hurley smiled at Constance. “That’s wonderful work, Sister Constance.”

  “Oh! You know my name! Praise the Lord!”

  Hurley’s smile vanished and he rubbed a temple that had started to throb. “Yes. Praise the Lord. Anyway, Mr. Merribaugh tells me you have office management experience.”

  “Yes, sir. I ran offices for over twenty years when I lived in New York. Did the books, managed inventory, all that.”

  “We might have a position for you here at the Cathedral.” She put her hands to her mouth and gasped. “Now, I can’t promise this will be permanent…”

  “Praise—!”

  He held out a hand and stopped her. “Yes, yes, we know.”

  “Perhaps I should take Sister Constance to the finance office,” said Merribaugh.

  Hurley drummed his fingers on the Desk of Christ. “Yes, that’s an excellent idea, Mr. Merribaugh.”

  Constance tried to force a tear, but that wasn’t one of her better skills. So she was dry-eyed when she said, “Dr. Hurley, thank you so much for this opportunity to serve the Virginia Cathedral of Love. You’ve made my dream come true.”

  Merribaugh and Constance took the elevator back up to the fourth floor, where he unlocked the door and gestured for her to precede him into the finance office. It was surprisingly small and stuffy, and cluttered with the detritus of a dozen years of use. She spotted the security camera right away. It was exactly where Leonard said it would be.

  “Please make yourself at home,” he said as he fished through a pocket, finally extracting a key on a small fob. “After all, this is now your office.”

  “Mind if I open a window?”

  “Not at all.”

  With some effort Constance lifted the lower pane, and fresh air began to fill the room. In the distance, she could hear the chorus rehearsing “Do Re Mi” in the auditorium.

  The view—who could see in was more important than what one saw looking out—could work to their advantage. The finance office didn’t face the front of Cathedral House, which would have exposed it to the cathedral and most of the campus. Like Hurley’s office, the view faced the rolling hills to the rear of the complex.

  Next she looked below the window, hoping to see a fire escape, but there was only a twenty-foot drop to a terrace. Given the layout of the building, she figured the terrace led to Hurley’s office, meaning it probably wouldn’t be the route they’d want to use if they had to steal the safe.

  When Constance turned around, Merribaugh was unlocking the closet door with that key on the fob. The door opened and she saw the closet was empty except for the safe.

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “Just a safe we use to temporarily safeguard donations to the church. Nothing you’ll need to be concerned about.” With that, he bent down and opened the safe. Mindful of the camera, she tried to subtly look over his shoulder, and caught a glimpse of cash. Merribaugh stuffed some in a pocket before he closed the safe, and then closed the closet door and locked it.

  Minutes later he departed, with his own “Praise the Lord” followed by an invitation to e-mail if she needed supplies.

  Constance smiled. She’d gotten inside and Leonard’s information was proving one hundred percent accurate, neither of which had seemed a sure thing just a few days ago. This job was well ahead of schedule.

  If there was a downside, it was that she now had “Do Re Mi” stuck in her head. She closed the window and sat behind her new desk…a desk she wouldn’t be spending more than a day or two at, the way things were shaping up.

  “Praise the Lord, indeed,” she said and laughed quietly to herself.

  14

  “I’m the gay bait? Is that what you said?”

  Jared wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Yes, he’d been warned in advance that his only role in the job was to be himself, and he’d be paid handsomely to be himself. But when Mary Beth had said he’d be the “gay bait,” it almost felt as if he was being insulted.

  “Don’t listen to her,” said Chase. “We wanted you on the job because we needed someone young and attractive and thought, who better than Jared?”

  That mostly mollified Jared, so Chase turned to Mary Beth. “We really don’t need dissension in the ranks, so can we try to work as a team?”

  She shrugged. “I speak the truth. Just because you have a problem with that…”

  Jared picked up on that. “Oh yeah? Well, your boobs are too big. How do you like that for truth-telling?”

  Mary Beth looked at him with distaste. “You don’t really have a firm grasp on how insults work, do you?”

  They had been sitting at the bar in the corner of the finished basement, on the opposite side from the pool table, and looked up when they heard heavy footsteps descend the stairs.

  “What’s all the racket down here?” asked Grant, who perched on a step. They could only see him below the waist.

  “Nothing,” they replied in unison.

  “Well, keep it down.” With that, the lower part of his body disappeared back up the stairs.

  “I’m still not sure I follow,” said Jared to Chase, in a decidedly quieter tone of voice. “If you need someone gay and good-looking, why didn’t you do it?”

  “Oh, brother,” said Mary Beth, tossing her magazine aside and following Grant’s pant legs upstairs.

  Chase smiled and rumpled Jared’s hair. The product made his hand sticky. “Thanks. But I’m needed on the inside. It’s gonna be an easy job, though, Jared. And you’ll be perfect for it.”

  “So tell me again what I have to do?”

  “Tomorrow Constance will take you to church and introduce you around. All you have to do is pretend you don’t want to be gay anymore.” Jared made a face. “Just for a few days. Next weekend, you’ll have to go to a hotel in Washington, DC, for a few more days, then you’ll collect your ten grand and go back to New York. It’ll almost be a vacation!”

  Jared still had doubts. “Except I’ll have to pretend I hate being gay.”

  “Well, yeah, there’s that…”

  He sighed. “Tell me what the deal is with Washington? Why am I going there?”

  It was Chase’s turn to sigh. Depending on Jared’s attitude, this could be easy or very difficult. “It’s an ex-gay conference. A whole bunch of gay men and maybe some lesbians who don’t wanna be gay.”

  Jared shook his head. “That sounds ridiculous.” He thought about the concept. “They must be ugly or something.”

  “It is ridiculous.” Chase shrugged. “But that’s what you’re gonna be doing. At least you’ll have a nice hotel room.”

  Jared put a hand on Chase’s forearm. “Will you be at the hotel, too?”

  “Uh…” He moved the hand away. “No. I’ll have to be here.”

  Jared folded his arms and pushed out his lower lip. “I don’t want to go to the conference.”

  But Chase knew the right words to convince him it was a great idea. And those words were not even “ten thousand dollars.”

  $ $ $

  Later, over dinner, Jared was enthusiastic about the conference, although maybe for the wrong reason. “Chase says an ex-gay conference is the perfect place to find sex! And if the guys aren’t hot, they won’t b
e telling people and ruining my reputation.”

  Grant shook his head at Chase before turning his attention back to Jared. “You worry about your reputation? Go figure.”

  Constance ran her fork through a spear of broccoli. “Farraday, this hollandaise sauce is fantastic.”

  He frowned. “You don’t think it’s too lemony?”

  “It’s perfect.”

  He shrugged. “I think it’s too lemony.”

  Through a mouth full of broccoli, she said, “Nuh-uh.” Then she swallowed. “I wouldn’t worry about it, Jared. The way things are going, you probably won’t even have to go to that ex-gay thing. If we can figure out how to get around those cameras in the next couple of days, we can clear out of Nash Bog. No more cathedrals, no more meltdowns over ketchup on the driveway… We can get ourselves back to New York, where life is normal.”

  Grant pointed out, “Getting around the cameras is the tough part.”

  Leonard, who had joined them for dinner but had to stand at the center island when they ran out of chairs, nodded. “I’m sure there’s a way. I just don’t know how.”

  “That’s the problem.” Grant looked over at Jared. “Elbows off the table.”

  Chase weighed in. “Leonard, do you know if there’s an above-ground cable we could cut? Something like that might do the trick.”

  “I have no idea. It never occurred to me to look. I’m not a crook…”

  “You weren’t a crook,” said Grant.

  “Technically,” said Leonard, “I’m still not a crook. You people might be crooks, but not me.”

  Grant shook his head. “Another one who thinks if he doesn’t get his hands dirty, he hasn’t crossed the line. Let me put it this way, Leonard: If you bring a potential crime to the table, then sit with real criminals to plot it out, that makes you a crook, too.”

  “But…”

  “Of course, if you don’t want to be a crook, then I’ve got no problem not thinking of you as a crook.”

  Leonard cocked his head. “Really?”

  “Sure.” Grant fixed him with a glare. “You walk away from your share of the loot, and I promise you no one in this room will ever accuse you of being a crook. Fair?”