by Han Nolan
Clare blinked at him and smiled. "I will be right here. You have the whole afternoon."
Archie took her hands in his and examined her palms. The bleeding had stopped again. He looked at her face. She seemed better Her eyes shone the way they usually did. Maybe she was going to be all right after all. He let go of her and Clare got down on her knees again and bowed her head. Archie heard her low hum.
Archie spent that afternoon wandering through the cathedral and walking the grounds around it, his heart full of the desire for God and goodness. Everything he saw, everything he touched, filled him with that desire and a sense of holiness. Kneeling at the front of the cathedral before the High Altar with its Great Cross of the triumphant Christ, Archie reviewed his life and saw that his reluctance to be baptized, his refusal to go up to the front of the church and be "saved," and his indifference to the teachings in his Sunday-school classes had been a way of getting back at his grandfather for shaming him—and a way of proving to himself that he wasn't a Goody Two-shoes. He realized that he didn't need to do that anymore, and his desire for goodness and to love and serve God overwhelmed him. Kneeling in the great cathedral, he no longer felt the ambivalence he had felt about God and religion for most of his life. He remembered what Clare had said the night before: He needed to stop thinking of himself and pay attention to others. He needed to really see them.
For once Archie was seeing things from his grandfather's point of view. He recalled his grandfather's drunken prophecies and understood for the first time his grandfather's own struggle for goodness. The man had gone about town preaching hellfire and damnation to the sinners—the tourists and rich people who had moved into town, threatening his grandfather's way of life and his very farm with their ideas of expansion and growth. His grandfather had been unable to accept the changes and the way the town grew around him, surrounding his farm and littering its boundaries with Taco Bell wrappers and Styrofoam cups. His prophecies and his drinking were his only defense against the people who mocked him.
Archie's grandmother had told him many times of the way life had been when they were young and people listened to Granddaddy Silas. Back then most of the valley was farmland, and no one could read the earth the way Silas could. He was able to look at the stars and the clouds, study leaves on the eastern side of a tree, feel a breeze, experience any number of things, and know what was coming weeks in advance. He knew when heavy rain or a freeze was coming. He knew when there would be floods or tornadoes or drought. His knowledge had been important once, when his friends were all farmers, too, and depended on him to protect their crops with that knowledge. But then the weather-men on television became more accurate, the farms were all sold off, and the tourists came, and people stopped listening to Silas Caswell. Silas and his predictions were no longer needed. That's when he had begun drinking in earnest and roaming about the town preaching to the sinners.
Archie realized his grandfather was ashamed of his drinking. His liver got damaged from all the alcohol, and yet he still couldn't stop, not until it killed him. Clyde had been right—the alcohol killed his grandfather; not Archie, and not his grandfather's anger about the still. His grandfather had been furious with him, angrier than he'd ever been. He had said Archie was in the clutches of the very devil himself, and Archie knew that if he hadn't vomited on him, his grandfather would have beaten him with his belt. He would have beaten him harder than he ever had before. Archie realized, though, there in the cathedral, that all his grandfather really had wanted to do was to beat the devil out of his own self, and Archie forgave him for that. He knelt before the altar and forgave the man for everything, and in turn he felt his grandfather's forgiveness. He believed his grandfather's dying words had been words of acceptance of who Archie had wanted to be all those years before, and who he might someday become. Realizing that, Archie bowed his head and cried with relief.
Chapter 35
ONCE THEY HAD RETURNED to the truck, Archie told Clare all about his discovery in the cathedral. He had pulled out the liverwurst sandwiches and the apples Irving had packed for them and was trying to eat while he explained his new feelings toward his grandfather but he was so overcome with emotion that he couldn't swallow and gave up trying to eat.
Clare listened, nodding as he spoke, as if she knew everything already, and even when Archie told Clare that he felt the best way he could serve the Lord was to return home, and that he believed his life, his future was there, she did not appear surprised or object to his decision.
Archie thought that meant Clare would be going home with him, and once they were on the road, he suggested that they spend their last night at Irving's.
Clare drew her brows together and looked at Archie. "I don't understand. What do you mean by our 'last night'? Last night of what?"
"Our last night of staying in New York," Archie said. "Our last night before we return home."
"But the tower is our home. Isn't that what you meant when you said you wanted to return home?"
"No," Archie said, feeling alarmed. "I meant our real home in the mountains, with my grandmama and your daddy."
"The Cloisters is our 'real home,'" Clare said, turning back to face the windshield, her eyes wide, as though she, too, felt alarmed.
Archie glanced at her and saw how pale she looked. Even her lips looked white. It frightened him. Their conversation frightened him. "The Cloisters is not my home," he said. "Those offices are not my home."
"Of course they are." Clare smiled, still staring wide-eyed out the windshield.
Archie turned off the parkway and drove up the hill toward the Cloisters. "Clare, we can't stay here forever. We need food, for one thing. And we need to go to school or get jobs or something. We can't spend the rest of our lives just hanging around a museum, can we?"
"This is our home, and we will live here always."
"Doing what?"
"Loving and serving the Lord. We're saints, aren't we?"
Archie drove into the Cloisters parking lot. He parked the truck and turned to look at Clare, studying her, She sat leaning against the door with her pale face still turned toward the windshield. Her hair looked thin. Her wrists and fingers and neck looked thin. He touched her hand and felt a tremor He squeezed her hand, and Clare looked at him. Her eyes seemed feverish. He turned her hand over and saw that it had begun to bleed again. Had squeezing her hand caused that? He noticed her robe had dark stains on the front from where she had wiped her hands, as well as the stain on the side.
"Clare, you know how you told me that I don't look at people? I don't really see them? Well, this afternoon I looked at my granddaddy, really looked, just the way you said I should, from his point of view, and I saw him, and now I'm seeing you." He patted her hand this time. "I know you hate hospitals, but..."
Clare jerked her hand away. "No! I told you, never again. They make me take pills. They watch me. They won't let me pray. They hate God. You promised me, Francis, no hospitals."
"But you need help, Clare, and I can't do it. I can't help you. I'm scared. Looking at you now, I'm scared. This isn't our home. We can't live like this, and if you can't see that, then—I—I think you need help."
Clare looked into Archie's eyes and shook her head. "Where is your faith, Francis? Do you trust God so little? God will provide everything we need. Jesus speaks to me and he tells me that we must stay here, together. Saint Francis and Saint Clare must always stay together:"
Archie let go of Clare's hand. "But we aren't Saint Francis and Saint Clare," he said with force. "I'm Archie." He pointed to his chest. "I'm Archibald Lee Caswell."
Clare blinked at him. She screwed up her face as though she was about to cry. He couldn't stand it. He reached out and pulled her to him. "I'm sorry, Clare," he said hugging her. "I have no faith—not like yours. I do look ahead. I want to know where my next meal is coming from. I want to sleep in a bed, and I want to feel safe. I don't feel safe here. And I don't know what to do. I don't know if you're right and you're just follo
wing God or if you're—you're..." He couldn't finish the sentence. He couldn't bring himself to say the word crazy out loud, not in reference to her He let go of her and sat back, closing his eyes. "God, what should we do?" he whispered.
"We must return to the tower" Clare whispered back.
Archie felt confused. Irving was expecting them. He wanted to at least take her there, if not to the hospital. He wanted to hand her over to Irving and then collapse in the nearest chair The worry over Clare exhausted him. Then, thinking that, he felt guilty. Hadn't he prayed in the cathedral for God to use him? Didn't he say he wanted to prove his love to God? Wasn't loving Clare a way of doing that? What did he know, after all? God spoke to Clare. God was with Clare all the time. He wanted to follow God's will for him, and maybe staying with Clare in the tower was it. Clare seemed so sure. Wasn't it better to follow her? She had the stronger faith. And wasn't he acting just like her mother wanting to put her in a hospital because his own faith wasn't strong enough to understand hers? He loved Clare. He couldn't imagine his life without her They belonged together Clare was right; they were soul mates and would be forever Archie sat up in the seat and opened his eyes. He turned to Clare. "All right, we'll stay here tonight," he said.
Clare smiled at him, and Archie shook his head and wondered how many times he would go through this, always questioning and never trusting.
They rode the elevator up to the third floor just as they had done the day before, and then waited in the stairwell for closing time. Clare sat leaning against the stone wall with her eyes closed and her body shivering. Archie reached out and grabbed her wrist to feel her pulse. It felt fast to him, much faster than his own. It worried him. When it was time to climb the two long flights of steps to the top floor, Clare stood up and swayed with dizziness. Archie grabbed her before she fell forward, and he suggested they go back out into the offices and then take the elevator to the top floor.
Clare shook her head. "A guard might notice; we're better off using the steps."
"Then why don't we just stay here on the third floor for the night? You don't look too well."
Again Clare shook her head and started up the steps, but she had to rest several times before they reached the top. Archie thought about carrying her on his back, but he feared losing his balance and falling backward down the cement steps.
By the time they reached the top, Archie was exhausted from his anxiety over Clare. He had brought along the bag of food Irving had packed for them, and he tried to get Clare to eat, but she wouldn't.
"Too much food keeps us separated from God," she said. Then she got down on her knees and crossed her arms over her chest and said, "I now share in the suffering of my Lord, Jesus Christ." Then she began humming, and Archie lay down on the floor using his arm for a pillow, and watched her. Her face looked ghostly in the moonlight shining in through the window. It frightened him and so did her words. What did she mean by sharing in "the suffering of Jesus"? How far would she take that? Jesus had died. Is that why she wouldn't eat? Is that what she expected for herself? It seemed to him she was halfway there already.
He recalled the first time she had come to his house. She had been so vibrant, and her body had looked strong and muscular She had looked healthy and beautiful, and she had been so full of the joy and love for God. He had wanted that for himself. But did he want this, he wondered? Did he want to become the way she was? Would following God lead him to that? Would following her? He closed his eyes and prayed to God. Is this your will for me, Lord? If I follow you will I end up like this? Is that what it means to follow you?
Archie felt the familiar pressure in his stomach just above his belly button. He had always believed that the pressure was a message, a warning from his grandfather but he had come to understand that it wasn't. He had realized back at the cathedral that his grandfather had forgiven him. That's what his dying words had meant. No, the pressure he felt was not some warning from the grave of his grandfather he realized, but his own gut feeling. It was his body trying to tell him what his mind kept ignoring. He opened his eyes and sat up. He looked at Clare and saw her suffering and knew that it was wrong. This was not God's will for her; this was something else. He knew, too, that as much as he loved Clare, he could not follow her anymore. Following her was leading him away from God. Where she was going, he could not follow.
It reminded Archie of when Armory and his family had moved to Washington, D.C. He had wanted so much to go with his best friend. He didn't know what he'd do without him. All his life he had followed Armory. Armory would hatch the schemes, and Archie would follow along. Armory would come up with the challenges, always something he knew he could do better than Archie, and Archie would try to meet them. When his friend moved away, Archie had felt empty, and then his grandfather died and Archie had felt lost. Then Clare had come along, and he had someone new to follow.
Archie shook his head and looked at Clare still on her knees, her body shaking with the effort of kneeling. No, he couldn't follow her. He couldn't follow anyone anymore, not Armory and not Clare. It was time he listened to his own voice, listened to God's voice inside him. He didn't need to hear a real voice the way Clare did to know that living in the tower was wrong and that Clare starving herself was wrong. He bowed his head and asked God, "What should I do?" Then he stayed up all night and waited for the answer;
Chapter 36
ARCHIE WAITED UNTIL the early morning before he nudged Clare and said, "Come on; it's time to go."
Clare lay facedown on the floor humming. When Archie nudged her again, she didn't move, so he bent down and lifted her up. "It's time to go," he repeated, this time with more force.
"All night I saw Christ's Passion before me. Did you see it, Francis?" Clare asked, allowing Archie to pull her up onto her feet.
Archie examined her hands, relieved to see that the blood had dried and crusted over. "No, I didn't see anything. Now come on; climb on my back and I'll take you down the steps." Archie turned his back to her and crouched down, waiting for her to climb on.
"But I can't. I must stay here. We must stay up here, Francis."
He turned back around to face her. "No, Clare. We have to leave now. This is not God's will for us."
Clare's eyes widened. "What?"
"That's right; this is your will. It was your will that brought us up here, not God's."
Clare shook her head, but Archie continued. "What I know, what I believe, is that God's will would never hurt anyone, and staying here, running away the way we did, that hurts a lot of people."
Archie saw the pain in Clare's eyes. Her body started to sink down to the floor and he lunged forward and grabbed her by the wrists and pulled her back up. He shook her arms. "Listen, I stayed up all night thinking and praying about this, Clare, and I realized that I've hurt all the people back home who care about me. Most of all, I hurt my grandmama. She's in the hospital with a broken hip and pneumonia. She could be dying, for all I know, or—or dead, even. I left her. I fooled myself into believing that it was right to go on this pilgrimage because I was so scared and couldn't face the possibility of losing her not after what happened with my granddaddy. And you, Clare, you fooled yourself into believing God told you to come here because you wanted to be where all your good memories are." He shook her arms again. "Don't you see it? You ran because you couldn't take your mama spying on you all the time. You're afraid she'll put you back in the hospital, but Clare, I'm afraid, too. I'm afraid you're killing yourself—on purpose."
"No!" Clare said, struggling to get away from Archie. "That's not true!"
Archie gripped her wrists harder and continued. "And—and I'm angry. I'm angry because you chose me to help you do it—to help you kill yourself. All this time I felt so special because you—beautiful, wonderful, perfect Clare—chose me as your partner your soul mate. But now I see what I have really been chosen for and it makes me angry. This isn't God. This is you, Clare, desperate for a way out—and so was I. Now, I don't know what will happe
n to me if my grandmama dies; all I know is I need to have faith in God—leave it to God. You showed me that. But, Clare, you need that faith, too. You need to go back home, not starve to death up here."
Clare sunk to her knees and bowed her head. Archie let go of her wrists, and she looked up at him and said, "Don't you see, even if I die God is with me. Death is the ultimate union with the Lord. We become perfect in death. We are united forever with God—just like Jesus. Didn't you say you wanted to become just like Jesus?"
"This isn't what I meant!" Archie said. "You just said that even if you die God will be with you, and yeah, I know, you said that before, when I fought those guys in the woods. You thought I was wrong to protect you. Well, okay, the violence was wrong. Like you said back then, God's will is never violence. But, Clare, starving yourself is violence against your own body, and God wouldn't will that, either You know it. And okay, if you die, God will be with you—great. But does that mean I'm supposed to let you starve yourself and do nothing about it? Is that really faith in God? I think faith is trusting in God to help you. It's acting in faith, but in order to do that you have to act, Clare. That's God's will for us, I think. We act, we step out in faith, and then, like you said, God is with us all the way."
Clare closed her eyes and lowered her head. She hummed. Archie felt she was trying to block out his words, but he continued, talking above her humming.
"I don't know, maybe you don't realize what you're doing. Maybe you're—I don't know. You hear voices and have visions and that stigmata thing. I don't get what that's all about, whether it's for real or if you're..." Archie crouched down in front of Clare. "Look, all I know is that I don't have what it takes to figure it out, okay? I don't know. Maybe nobody does. Who can judge? Am I crazy? Are you? Who isn't? I don't know, and I don't have to. I just think that if we stay here, you'll die, and I can't lose you—I won't. I love you, Clare."
