Maybe, they thought, it was for the best. Because if the priest died, he would never have to lose his church.
There were no answers, then. Until one night last week, during a particularly painful and mournful hour. At that moment, a reason was given through sweat-soaked dreams of blood and thunder. And now the priest understood the pain and silence. He understood the meaning and the message. He was special. He was chosen. He was ready.
One more sermon. One last Lord’s Prayer. One final Eucharist. And then he could close his burning eyes and sleep for eternity. Because this would be the last service, it should be something he would be remembered for—so that when his headstone was starting to fade, someone might think it worth tidying up. So that when his name began to be forgotten, someone might think it worth speaking again. Telling his story.
Reminding others.
And this is why he had plastered posters up around the town, deigning to walk in the cigarette butts and dog shit that were left as souvenirs of the area’s best bits. The priest shuddered as he did it. He disliked venturing down to the town at the best of times; but now, with such an enormous task heaped upon his bony, fractured shoulders, he felt the judgement flowing from those who saw him. They distrusted him in his black, dress-like cassock and his dog collar, marking him out as something different.
Something special.
Unique.
Just like his church.
But despite their wariness, the townies were also curious. Most had never actually seen the man—he was just there—part and not part of the place, known and not known. And now he was in the midst of them, involving himself in their lives. Pasting up homemade, hand-drawn signs that told of promises and rewards. Of course, they wouldn’t go. They would not attend church this Sunday just to find out what the wasted old man wanted. What he meant by his cryptic treasure hunt clues that all led to the same place in the end. What he could hardly wait to tell them.
The priest watched, safely back on his hill and surrounded by the peaceful dead, the grass so green as it fed on their moldering corpses. Plants grew well up here, and the yew trees were quite something to behold. Yews. Yes. He could no longer even look at his long-limbed companions, perfectly sculpted by nature, without recalling the developers and the name of the new estate. Yew Tree Meadow. It didn’t even make sense. There was no meadow. And there wouldn’t be any trees once the diggers came.
It didn’t matter now anyway.
The priest watched as the little people far below scurried around the lamp posts and phone boxes, ignoring, as usual, the signs about littering; ignoring, for once, the doomed girls’ calling cards. He could see their interest, their curiosity. He could see he had them then, and that they would be there on Sunday. I’ll go if you go, it’ll be a laugh, don’t you get free wine or something? let’s find out what the old git wants, let’s go, let’s go, let’s go and then we’ll forget.
But they wouldn’t forget.
No one would.
The priest finished his prayers and stood at his pulpit, reading through his well-prepared sermon, making sure. He couldn’t allow for anything to go wrong. Engrossed in what he was doing, he didn’t notice the church beginning to fill. It was only when the bells started ringing that he realized with a start and a jump of his heart that he had just ten minutes until he needed to begin—to inform and educate and entice, to embrace these new followers—because there would be so very many new ones, greedy and nosy, unable to stay away, unwilling to miss out. And he, of course, was just the same, exactly the same—so he understood and he would tell them so—and show them God. He would allow them in.
The priest trembled as his legs told him they had had enough. And he shook as his hands tried to grip the neatly printed paper with his beautiful words trip-trapping across it. And his mind swirled and curled around itself as he remembered that it hadn’t been Sunday just now.
It had been Saturday, early afternoon, the day before now; the day before the end of it all.
The thought caused his heart to rattle and a spasm of pain to jolt through him. Time was passing quicker these days, in the final days, and he wondered what he had done in the interim; the time between his prayers and climbing into the pulpit. He hoped it was good. But he couldn’t remember, and perhaps he had simply slept. His eyelids felt heavy and his tongue was full in his mouth, so that was certainly a possibility. It would explain his tired legs and numb arms if he had been asleep standing up like the mystics of India. Ironic.
The faint smell of body odor may even have been his and not the hooded youths, dirty black boots stomping grit and turds and mud all over the priest’s freshly polished floor. Along with everything else, his sense of smell was failing now, and it might have been that it wasn’t there at all; that no one smelled, that everything was as light and fresh as if it were new born.
Except that it wasn’t. If only. A new world, blinking in the sunlight, confused and mewling but free of all the brokenness that had been heaped upon it . . . now that would be something. That would be everything.
That would be the priest’s world soon enough.
Not soon enough.
The bells were incessant, and the priest wanted to cry out, to tell them to please just stop—but he couldn’t do it. They were a part of this as surely as he was, and everything had to be perfect. Who else had arrived amidst his reverie? There were some faces he recognized, or thought he recognized, and more that he had never seen before . . . unless they were the ones who taunted him in the town, who spat at him, who tried to trip him when he walked. Unless they were the ones who called him names and accused him of atrocities. Unless it was them. He saw them now, saw them differently; wanted to hold his arms out to them and thank them for coming, for allowing him this day.
But he did not.
The priest stood down from the pulpit and made his way out of the church and into the vestibule. The sexton was already there. Of course he was. And he was preparing the sacrament: stale wafers and vinegar wine bought bulk and wholesale from the local cash and carry. The men nodded at one another, silence needed for such an important task.
But the priest found he had to speak. “It’s crowded in there,” he murmured, nodding back towards the pews, which were filling and filling and filling with people; men, women, children; a couple of guide dogs. He didn’t like the dogs shedding all over everything, but he accepted them for now, even though he hadn’t invited them.
The sexton smiled, fiddling with a packet of wafers, trying to open them but unable to gain purchase. The priest snatched the bag from him, snapped it open, and handed it back with his teeth and gums showing.
“Full to bursting,” agreed the sexton, carefully counting out wafers and then realizing what a pointless and thankless thing it was that he did. “I’ve never seen it like that, not even for the carol service.”
Ah. Carols. The priest’s favorite thing. And if he had thought about it, if God had given him more time to plan, he might have thrown a few into the mix, just because. He was sure no one would have minded, what with Christmas cards and decorations being in the shops now for a month or more. Too early, too soon, too much.
Another reason to be pleased to be out of here.
And yet . . . carols. It was too late now to ask the organist, limbering her fingers up with a bit of Pachelbel at this very moment, to change her playlist. It was too late now to expect everyone in the audience to know all the words without spelling them out, one by one, on a big screen above their heads. The priest missed proper hymn books, faded and tatty and loved. He missed the time when the congregation would be happy to sing, and wouldn’t need any aid to get the words right.
Those were the days . . . but they were long gone now.
At least the screen kept the ones with short attention spans (and wasn’t that everyone?) interested for as long as the music held up.
“Maybe this year we’ll be able to recruit a choir.”
The priest snorted as he brought his heavy head
up to face the sexton again. “What? Sorry, what? I was a million miles away.” Or further. What was the distance between heaven and earth anyway? A child at Sunday school—when there had been enough children to warrant a Sunday school—had once asked him that question, and he had laughed and patted that child on the head and not said anything. But perhaps there was an answer after all.
The sexton patted the priest in the same condescending way, the same way that told the priest he didn’t entirely know what to say except to repeat himself. “I was just saying, maybe we’ll get a choir this year. What do you think? It would be lovely to hear them raising the rafters again.”
“It’s been a good while,” said the priest. He didn’t elaborate, as he couldn’t remember exactly how long it had been and he didn’t want to embarrass himself by getting it wrong when he should know. He really ought to know; at least he knew that. That was a comfort in a time of such confusion and such soul shaking despair. “Too long,” he added to seal the reminder. It probably had been. If he couldn’t remember then it had to be an age.
It didn’t matter.
Nothing mattered except what God had told him to do, what to say, how to die, how to live in these final few moments. The priest reached out one skeletal arm and gripped the sexton’s. The other man flinched, surprised at the strength behind the decay. “Thomas,” said the priest, looking at the sexton for the first time, looking properly, seeing a real human being there, a proper person, someone good, someone worth saving. “Get out.”
The sexton recoiled, shaking his arm as though it were on fire. “Father, I—”
The priest shook his head and tried to soothe his almost friend. “You’ve done nothing wrong, Thomas, but I don’t need you here. In this room, in this church. Go home, leave this place, leave me. Go back to your . . . mother, is it? Sister? Whoever it is you’ve told me about, the bedridden one. Go back to her, pray with her and for her, and don’t be here.”
Thomas gasped. Surely Father Fletcher was having a breakdown; mental, physical, soulful. He tried again to press forward, to continue with the ordering of the sacrament, trying to do his job and forgive the priest as he was supposed to. But Father Fletcher was not going to allow it.
“It’s your sister. I remember. Shannon. I can’t quite . . . I don’t recall what her illness is, but it’s something . . . bad. Something unfair. But more unfair would be to ask you to be saved and not her. Do you see?”
Thomas did not see. He was scared. The priest’s voice echoed around the small room in tune with the never-ending bells that rang above the world they had made theirs for the moment. “Saved?” Thomas squeaked. “How? Saved how?”
The priest smiled, soft and sad and sentimental, and he leaned in close and whispered to the sexton; “Saved by me. The ones who have come today, the ones who would never normally dare to step foot within such a sacred and beautiful building as this one, they will be saved. I will show them what they’ve been missing, and they will thank me.”
The words tickled Thomas’ ear and he sighed along with them, relief letting itself be known. So that was it. A sermon for the doubters, for the layabouts, for the scroungers and the wastrels. Thomas was none of these things. Thomas did not need saving today.
“All right. Okay,” he said, placating his priest, thinking he understood beneath the weirdness of things. “I’ll go.” But he wouldn’t. He would stay and bear witness, he knew that. How could he do otherwise, especially when Father Fletcher was so close to the end?
The sexton’s words pleased the priest and he nodded. “Good man. Go on, now, I can finish off here. But do me one more favor—one last favor—would you, Thomas? Lock the doors. When everyone is in, lock the doors and then leave.”
Thomas crossed himself, hoping he was doing the right thing. “Of course. Whatever you say.” It was a peculiar request, an unsettling one, and Thomas wasn’t sure what to do about it. “See you soon, Father.”
“Not too soon, I think.”
Strange words.
But Thomas put on a smile that meant nothing and disappeared out of the door that led to the car park strewn with empty crisp packets. He breathed in fresh air and felt the winter coming. Keys jangled in his pocket, and he used them, snapping the lock shut as he had been asked to do. Father Fletcher knew what he was doing. Of course he did. And it wasn’t for Thomas to question him. Within seconds he was back in the church, using the main door this time; and he positioned himself at the back, hidden as best as he could be, surrounded by the monsters the priest was so keen to save.
Thomas doubted he would ever understand Father Fletcher. With that last thought of the man he had come to love, Thomas the sexton left the church, smiling at those strangers who passed him, those who were running in case they had already missed something, and locked the heavy, scarred oaken door behind him.
As though the mere thought of the priest could conjure him up, the bells stopped their maddening clanging and Father Fletcher took to his pulpit. He had never been one for too much ceremony. As much as the flinging of incense and chanting of Latin might inspire some, it deadened him. It had never been about that . . . it had never been for him. So instead he had no procession, and if the congregation hadn’t been made aware of him from his hacking, violent cough, they may not have noticed him at all.
But there he was, resplendent, perfectly poised in the pulpit, ready to speak. There were certain words he needed to express, his own words. But he eased them in with what they were expecting—a short welcome followed by a hymn that everyone knew. Deliberately obtuse, Father Fletcher gave nothing away as he spoke. “In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” Without Thomas there, Father Fletcher was the only one to make the sign of the cross. He ignored that fact. “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” There was no response. Now a little anger was beginning to build. It was written there, right there, in the order of service they were all so intently staring at. It wasn’t hard.
He could not lose it now. He had to continue. Breathe, breathe . . . just breathe.
“Good morning, everyone, I’m so pleased you could attend. It’s so wonderful to have a full church again, especially on such an occasion as this.” He offered no elaboration, and no one called for it. Father Fletcher continued, noticing someone for the first time. “And look, we have a celebrity in our midst, our very own mayor. Welcome.”
They two enemies smiled politely at one another, each baring their teeth, each territorial over this old building, crumbling and devastatingly perfect. The mayor considered whether now might be the right time to make her announcement, the letter with the details, every last one, was snug in her handbag and she couldn’t remember the order of the service, couldn’t quite think if there would be a better time later. But she left it. She’d have time, surely, to speak before the end.
“And now, we must sing a hymn that we all know from our school days, if there were any.” His little dig at the idle and the indolent went unnoticed, of course. As always. “Onward Christian Soldiers.”
They sang, if it could be called that, a caterwauling that went up to heaven and offended the sky as it passed.
And then it was time for the communion. Bread and wine and promises to be good that would be broken within seconds, within moments of the unfaithful falling back into their hard wooden seats. Would they come? Would they take the offering that he tried and failed to explain was the body and blood of Christ? There was no halfway here, no room for maneuver. It was real and it was true, even if he couldn’t make them see it.
“For those of you unfamiliar with what happens now, for those who can’t follow the order of service there, it’s simple. I’ll wait here for you, and all you need to do is to stand up, follow one another like sheep, come to me and let me save you. Eat the body, drink the blood. Be with God.”
Father Fletcher held out his arms and blessed the chalice and the paten, blessed the wine and the wafer. Aga
in. He could bless it as many times as he liked and still the result would be the same. The whole church was blessed—it was special and holy—and even if a church hadn’t been built on the hill, it still would have been a sacred place to be. Surely they all knew that? They had to. Father Fletcher could feel it as he beckoned those closest to him, a gangly girl with blue hair and an older man, straggly and thin, to approach. He smiled so that they would not be afraid. And he felt the power surge through him, electric and light, static and thunder.
The girl reached him first. She was unsure, unhappy at the prospect; but the smell of the alcohol revived her and she took a bite of bread, staring at the chalice all the while. “The body of Christ,” said the priest, watching her swallow. “The blood of Christ,” he intoned, his voice cracking with fear and amusement as she took too big a sip of the wine and began to cough and splutter, spray flying from her and onto the altar. She held up a hand to tell everyone she was all right before anyone could rush to help—although no one would—and fell back into her place, dropping her head to her lap not to pray but to catch her breath.
One down.
And when Father Fletcher looked away from the blue haired girl, he saw a miraculous thing. The entire congregation was standing before him, a long line of misfits snaking its way down the center aisle of the church and away, twirling around cold stone pillars and backing out towards the door to the car park.
“The body of Christ. The blood of Christ.”
Over and over the priest said the same words, and each time he felt stronger, safer, more sure of himself than ever before.
There wasn’t much left after everyone had had their fill, but there was enough. Father Fletcher downed the remainder of the wine and wiped the chalice with a white cloth, smoothing and soothing, enjoying the feel of the metal beneath covered fingers.
When it was finally over, the priest waved away the trappings of tradition. No one cared. No one was there for that. And as much as it pained him, he had to be quicker. He needed to grab their attention; and then, when the time was right, he needed to introduce them to his God.
Darkness Ad Infinitum Page 11
