Slowly, as I lie curled on my side, pieces of my dreams start coming back. At first, it’s just images: a checkerboard; a dish of ripe mango slices; my hand sweeping statues off a shelf at Saintly Souvenirs; a mouth, wide-open and hungry-looking. There’s a soundtrack too. The statues clattering to the ground; a crash of thunder; someone moaning. I try to push the memories away, but the images and sounds won’t go.
What were the matchy-match sisters doing in my dreams? They were outside Saintly Souvenirs, peering at the window display. Only the display was all wrong. The huge Jesus on the cross was laughing, and instead of the tiny Jesuses inside the snow globes, there were miniature me’s. And the miniature me’s were wearing hot pink short shorts and a bikini top.
“I need a few more vials of miracle oil,” one matchy-match sister said to the other.
In my dream, I tapped on her shoulder. So hard she stumbled. “You’re wasting your money. There’s no such thing as miracles,” I said.
She looked as if I’d slapped her. Remembering this makes me feel terrible. But in my dream, it was different. I was different. I didn’t care about that silly woman’s feelings. Imagine two old ladies dressed in matching clothes!
There was more. Now I see my dream self marching into Saintly Souvenirs. Colette was at the counter, setting up our old cardboard checkerboard. “You go first,” she said, smiling up at me. But instead of taking a turn, I hit the board with the side of my hand and sent the red and black discs flying.
Now I remember a smell. The sweet, heavy smell of ripe mangoes. Colette was laying the bright orange slices on a tray. “No, no,” she said, pushing me away when I reached for one, “they’re not for you, Ani. You’re allergic, remember?”
But I grabbed a fistful of mango slices and shoved them into my mouth. Their sticky juice dribbled down my chin, then down my neck. In my dream, I didn’t bother wiping it away.
“Oh no!” Colette said, covering her mouth.
But in the dream, I didn’t go into anaphylactic shock the way I would if I ate mango in real life. In the dream, there was hot black lava churning inside me; I was a volcano about to explode. “What do you know?” I shouted at Colette. “You’re a stupid slut!”
Colette’s eyes were all pupil.
I can’t believe I called her a slut, even if it was a dream.
Me—Saint Ani! But in the dream, I felt good. Free. Strong. As if I’d climbed to the top of Mount Everest and shouted at the top of my lungs. As if nothing could hold me back. Not having to be kind or responsible. Not having to be anything like my saintly namesake.
And now I see another piece of my dream. A shorter one. I was leaving the shop. As I left, I ran the side of my hand along the shelf of miniature porcelain statues of Jesus and Saint Anne.
The statues tumbled to the ground. I knew from the clattering sounds some were broken. There would be shards of porcelain on the floor. But I didn’t care. Let Colette vacuum up the mess.
I was tired of cleaning up after her.
I cover my eyes with my hands. What does it mean if the me in my dreams is so cold and cruel and angry? Can all those feelings be inside me too?
Oh no, there’s more. Maxim was in my dreams too! He was walking into Sweet Heaven.
I marched right up to him. I wasn’t going to skulk around the way I did in the sporting goods store. Skulking wasn’t my style. Not in last night’s dreams, anyhow! Maxim shoved his hands into his pockets. “What’s up?” he said, all Mr. Cool. “You look really good, today, Ani— like you’re on fire.”
I was on fire!
“You’re full of shit,” I told him.
His mouth fell open. Then he laughed. A big laugh that made his face twist up. “I can’t believe you said that. Colette says you never swear.”
This time I laughed. “I do now!” Then I stepped a little closer to him and I was glad when he stepped back. “Maybe Colette and other people fall for your bullshit, but I don’t. I know exactly what kind of ”—I stopped to choose my words—“selfish, phony asshole you are.”
I can’t believe I said those things. I don’t think I ever even thought them before.
Do other people say and do terrible things in their dreams? Or is it just me?
Maxim has vanished, and now more fragments are coming back. I want to make it stop, but I can’t. My mind wants me to remember—wants me to know how bad I really am.
I was on Avenue Royale. I was a giant and my legs were stilts. When I passed Saintly Souvenirs, the store seemed suddenly tiny and very far away, like I was seeing it through the wrong end of a telescope.
In the next snippet of dream, I was walking under the center arch of the basilica. I had a plan: I was going to make the walls and golden ceiling shake. I was going to make the statues cover their mouths and groan. Whoever said churches had to be quiet? Quiet and rules were for the old Ani; the dream Ani wanted noise and chaos.
I’m still curled up on my side, trying to make sense of all the pieces, when my body does something weird: it shudders. The shudder shoots down my spine like electricity, then spreads around my belly and between my thighs. The feeling was in my dreams too.
Someone’s hand was on my waist. It was a soft warm hand and it was reaching under my nightgown, grazing the tops of my breasts, moving over my belly and toward the band of skin just above the top of my underwear. I didn’t know who was touching me like that—and I didn’t care. All I knew was I didn’t want the feeling to stop. No one had ever touched me that way, made my skin feel like every inch of it was alive.
“Ani, you look like you’re on fire.”
Maxim’s mouth was open, and his teeth were very white, but he wasn’t laughing. I could hear a faint moaning sound in the distance.
Maxim was touching my waist, his fingers making small round flutters.
My thighs were hot and strangely heavy. I really was on fire.
“Kiss me,” I said, reaching up for the back of his head.
I remember what I was thinking: So this is what it feels like to want someone. It’s why Colette said yes even when Maxim didn’t want to use a condom.
The dream me ran my fingers through his hair. It was so thick and soft and dark. I can still see it, feel it even.
But that doesn’t make sense. Maxim’s hair’s not dark.
A wave of shame so big I’m sure I’ll drown washes over me.
And now I realize it’s my own hand under my nightgown, moving down my belly. I’m aching again. And that moaning sound is coming from me. I pull my hand out from under my nightgown and shake my head. I have to make the dreams—and the achy feeling—go away.
The pillow is damp near where my mouth is. My thighs still feel hot and heavy.
I might have been dreaming, but I know one thing for sure: the feelings—all of them—were real.
Outside, the bottom of the sky is beginning to turn pink. I pull the pillow out from behind me and throw it over my head. I need to sleep some more. Just sleep— not dream.
Twenty
The basilica museum is smaller than I remember. Why does that always happen when I go back to a place I haven’t been in a long time?
The museum doesn’t have many sculptures or old paintings the way other museums do. There’s an ancient wheelchair with wooden wheels, though I doubt it’s worth much, even on eBay.
Colette, Iza and Josianne are with me. The lady at the information desk perks up when she sees us. “It’s wonderful to see young people take an interest in our collection. You girls give me hope for the future of the church.”
“We’re not really interested in religion,” Colette tells the lady. “We’re here for Father Francoeur’s lecture. My friend,” she says, turning to Iza, “thinks she’d like to do community work in Africa some day. And my sister—”
That’s when I tug on Colette’s arm and drag her toward the all-purpose room where the lecture is going to be.
Along the way, we pass a 3-D display about Saint Anne’s life. It’s not done with rea
l sculptures—they’re more like the dummies you see in store windows. Only these ones are wearing robes instead of tight-fitting jeans and sexy T-shirts that show their nipples.
Colette wants to stop at the display of old letters and back issues of The Annals of Saint Anne. The Annals is a magazine about miraculous healings.
“Only for a minute,” I tell her when we’re near the small dimly lit section that has rows and rows of letters and pages from The Annals. They’re displayed along a wall inside glass cases and lit from behind.
When we were little, Colette and I always begged Mom to bring us here. Mom would read us the old letters. I think I still know some by heart. I try saying one in my head.
We placed a picture and a statue of Good Saint Anne underneath Gilles’s pillow. Since then, Gilles has had no more convulsions.
Colette drags Iza over to one of the frames. She’s going to read the letter out loud, the way Mom did. Even before I’m close enough to hear, I know which one it’s going to be. Colette’s favorite—from the achy bones lady.
Springfield, Massachusetts
April 1952
I am writing this letter to attest that after suffering for many years from severe arthritis and rheumatism, I was cured after a single application of Sainte Anne’s oil. My bones no longer ache on rainy days.
Yours in the Lord,
Yvonne C. Desmarais
“You should get a copy of that letter for your shop,”
Iza tells us. “You could hang it up near the miracle oil.”
“Hey, how come we never thought of that?” Colette’s voice bounces off the walls.
“Shh,” I tell her. “This is a place of worship.”
“No, it’s not. It’s a museum.”
“You’re supposed to be quiet in museums too. Plus, it’s a basilica museum.”
Iza uses her elbows to separate us. “An-ette!” she says.
“Quit arguing, will you? Besides, the lecture’s about to start.”
Father Francoeur is doing a PowerPoint presentation about his work in the Liberian leper colony. At first, I can only look at him from the corner of my eye. I see his priest’s collar peeping out from under his dark suit. When I try to look right at him, my face heats up. Colette said she knew all along I was crushing on Father Francoeur. She knew it even before I did.
We’re sitting in folding chairs. Colette insists we sit up front. “So you can be near you-know-who,” she says, winking in a way that makes me want to strangle her.
Thank God no one else hears her!
I’m wearing Mom’s old cowboy boots. I found them when I went down to the basement to look for the free weights. They were all in the same box, and when I tried the boots on, they fit perfectly. “Consider them yours,” Mom said when I came upstairs wearing them. “They’re too small on me. Besides, it’s not as if I’d have much use for cowboy boots now. Did I ever love those boots when I was your age! I practically lived in those things. I saw a picture of them in Seventeen magazine and I phoned every shoe store in Quebec City till I found a pair. And now all these years later, cowboy boots are back in style.”
I’d rather look at my boots than at photos of lepers. Their skin is splotchy and the women are topless, their dark breasts hanging from their chests like overripe fruit.
I prefer the photos of the Liberian landscape—the forests of rubber and mango trees, a bird with a bill so huge it looks like it belongs on a dinosaur, flying against a turquoise sky. I also like the photos of the marketplace where the villagers sell clay pots and tie-dyed fabric.
I wince when Father Francoeur shows us a photo of a little girl with leprosy. Two of her toes are missing. The girl is wearing a bright blue headscarf and looking right into the camera. Colette stares back at her without even flinching.
Later, everyone laughs at a photo of a chimpanzee stealing a bunch of bananas from a stall at the market. “That chimp is from Bossou,” Father Francoeur explains, “but there are lots of them in Liberia.”
After the presentation, Father Francoeur gives his talk and there’s a question and answer period. He tells us he spent nearly five years in a Liberian town called Ganta and that he likes the term Hansen’s Disease better than leprosy. In Ganta, there were more than seven hundred people with the disease.
“Wasn’t it difficult to…be around those people?” a woman sitting behind us asks. From the way she wriggles her nose, you’d think she’s worried she could catch leprosy from looking at Father Francoeur’s photographs.
Father Francoeur’s answer makes me admire him even more. “You’re right,” he says, “it was difficult, especially at first. Most of us aren’t used to being around people who are different from us, or who are sick. But it didn’t take me long to realize that people with Hansen’s Disease are no different than the rest of us. They feel all the feelings we do…love”—I hope the others don’t notice me gulp when he says that—“and hate and everything in between. They have hopes and dreams; they want to make beautiful things just like the rest of us do.”
There’s a cardboard box on the podium in front of Father Francoeur, and now he reaches into it the way a magician reaches into a black top hat. Only Father Francoeur pulls out a terracotta pot, not a rabbit. The pot has a wide brim and a delicate narrow base. “It’s the pot you saw in one of the slides. Made by a woman named Mamawa. Mamawa had Hansen’s Disease.”
Colette is bouncing again. “Weren’t you afraid you’d catch it?” she calls out, not bothering to raise her hand the way we’re supposed to.
“Leprosy is less contagious than most people think. Like AIDS”—I wince again; Colette still has to go for an hiv/aids test—“it can only be transmitted through bodily fluids. So, no, I wasn’t afraid I’d catch it. I didn’t have time to feel afraid. There was too much work to do. While I was there, we built latrines, a community kitchen and a small church.”
Iza raises her hand. “Do you think a person like me could go to Africa some day and do community work like you did?”
When Father Francoeur smiles, I wonder whether I should say I want to go to Africa too. Maybe what Father Francoeur said is true, and I’d stop noticing how bad the people in the colony look once I got to know them.
“But Iza, who’d blow-dry your hair in a leper colony?” Colette calls out, and everyone, even Father Francoeur, cracks up.
“Ani,” Father Francoeur says when we’re all standing up to leave, “if I could have a word with you.”
Colette nudges me. “We’ll wait outside,” she says. At least she doesn’t wink.
I hope Father Francoeur can’t tell I’m trembling inside. It feels weird to be alone with him here.
I bet he’s going to ask about Mom or maybe about Marco Leblanc. I prepare my answers: Mom’s spirits are picking up; she even wants to start lifting weights the way Marco’s been showing her. I’m not sure how much to tell him about Marco. Maybe because he’s a priest, Father Francoeur will be upset to know Marco’s got a boyfriend.
“You seemed upset this evening, Ani,” Father Francouer says. “I wonder if it’s something I could help you with.”
“I’m fine,” I lie. There’s no way I can tell him about my dreams.
“Okay then,” he says, “but if you need to talk, I’m here. We’re friends, aren’t we, Ani?”
“I guess,” I say.
Father Francoeur steps back to the podium, where his laptop is. “Ani”—I can feel him looking down at my legs— “those are your mom’s boots, aren’t they?”
“Uh-huh. I found them in a box in the basement.”
“Ahh,” he says, closing his eyes, “that explains it. Have I told you how much you look like she did then?”
“A lot of people say that.”
Father Francoeur shuts his laptop. “Do you mind unplugging the power cord, Ani?”
Maybe it’s because I’m not used to wearing cowboy boots, but when I reach over to unplug the cord, I end up tripping over it. Just as I’m falling, Father Francoeur rushe
s over and grabs my arm to break my fall. His fingers press into my arm. His hair is thick and dark. He smells like lemon soap.
I want to touch his hair. I want to kiss him. I lean in a little closer. I can see the pores on his chiseled nose.
Father Francoeur releases my arm. Then he takes a step back. Does he know what I was thinking?
“My God,” I say, “I don’t know what got into me. Forgive me, Father Francoeur.”
He rubs the skin above his priest’s collar. “There’s nothing to forgive, Ani. Nothing at all.”
But I know there nearly was.
Father Francoeur smiles. For a second, I’m afraid he’s going to laugh at me. “It’s those boots,” he says. “They need new soles. Take it from me. I specialize in souls.”
It’s a bad pun, but we both laugh. The tension that was in the room is almost gone.
Though Father Francoeur hasn’t said so and Mom didn’t let on, I’m beginning to get something I didn’t get before. Even if the clues were there. The little Bible Father Francoeur took to Liberia. Even the fact that Mom never mentioned him. “You and my mom—you were more than just friends, weren’t you?”
“That was a lifetime ago.”
He could have said they were just friends, but he didn’t. So I was right. “Did you…you know…love her?”
“I did.”
For a moment, I’m jealous of my own mom—and of what she had with Father Francoeur.
“So why’d you become a priest? Why didn’t you marry her?” If he had, Father Francoeur might have been my dad. Only I wouldn’t have been me. And Colette wouldn’t have been Colette. Everything would have been different. And I wouldn’t have had my dad.
Father Francoeur gestures to two folding chairs in the front row. I sit on one; he takes the other. He is too far away now for me to smell his soapy smell.
“It happened—my calling—after Marco’s accident. I suppose it was because I felt responsible. Not only because I let Marco go home drunk. There was more to it than that.”
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