“What the hell is going on?” I ask. Wordlessly, he hustles me toward the side entrance. I look over my shoulder at the mess of them. “Did they find another pedophile or something?”
Father Michael closes the door behind us and faces me with a petulant scowl. “No.”
The relative quiet settles over us. I look behind him down the hall that leads to the actual church. Upstairs is the seminary, the dormitory that houses a mix of priests and students. I haven’t been here in eight or nine years, but the smell of the place, the institutional scent of books and floor wax, mixed with rose-scented incense, raises my hackles instantly.
“Maggie,” he says, “we’re all really worried about him, about Father Luke, ah, your Francis. That video they took is all over the place and those newspeople have been here since six this morning. We can’t—I mean, you’re his sister.”
“What video? I have no idea what’s been going on around here. So you’ll have to enlighten me.”
Father Michael takes a breath and collects himself. “He was arrested the night before last. The police videotaped his time in the holding cell and then somebody down there put out this thing, this—misleading!—version of what happened. You know, because if you were to look at it—”
“Where is he?”
“Room 309. On the third floor. Thank you, Maggie. This will mean so much to him.”
I STEP OFF the elevator into a hurricane of music pounding down the hall. Not a hymn, but club music with crashing techno drums and a wailing bass guitar. I suppose that’s him.
Oh, for God’s sake. What is he, sixteen?
I stalk off toward the hell-voice of Marilyn Manson growling about being a personal Jesus.
The lyrics and their promise of someone to hear your prayers, someone who cares, Manson’s roaring command to reach out and touch faith, sends an involuntary shudder down my spine. The song ends abruptly and two seconds later, it’s back to the beginning, thundering into the air once more.
I hammer his door with my fist. “Francis! Open up. Right now.” I can hear myself channeling our mother and that’s not helping. Or maybe it is. “Francis! I mean it. Turn that shit off and open the door.”
I give the knob a try and it turns. The door opens slowly. Now the music is truly head-pounding.
His single bed is crisply made, but I don’t see my brother anywhere. I see only where he lives and I turn in a slow circle, looking into the faces of countless saints. Nearly every inch of all four walls is covered with small wooden plaques, painted in golds and ambers, each one depicting a sacred event or a holy person. For years now, a tiny part of me has wondered if this priest stuff is just an escape for Francis, a costume he is trying on—like a Batman suit for Catholics. Now, staring at the doting eyes in icon after icon, it occurs to me that the man who sleeps here craves salvation the way some crave food or sex.
I walk over to his stereo and just as I am about to push the power button, I see my brother on the far side of his bed, prostrate, face to the floor, wearing his cassock. Laid out in front of him is a purple cloth embossed with a gold cross. On it I recognize the small figure of St. Francis of Assisi that he’s had since we were kids. It is flanked by candles that cast low, toothy shadows on the bedspread and the wall. Beside St. Francis is another saint I don’t recognize. Luke, maybe?
I kill the power on the stereo. The sudden silence is like static on the air.
My brother’s head rises so slowly that I am suddenly a little afraid for him. His eyes are red and swollen, and tears track down his cheeks. On the floor in the spot where his forehead had rested is a photograph. It is a picture of a little boy in his puffy snowsuit, knee-deep in fresh powder, grinning and pink-cheeked. My Frankie.
Quiet crackles in my ears. My eyes sting. My guts hurt.
I come closer. Kneeling beside him, I lay my arm across my brother’s back, whisper that I’m here. It’s okay.
IT’S NOT DIFFICULT to persuade Francis to come with me. He packs silently and as he does, I glance around at his walls again. Nobody craves this kind of company without reason.
Even the thirteen-inch television that sits on his bureau has a Madonna and child icon set on top. The baby looks like a tiny, knowing man standing in her arms. One of his hands caresses her jaw.
Francis zips his bag, we turn out the light, close the door behind us, and head down to the underground parking. We don’t stop to talk to the rector.
My brother hands me his keys and I drive his green rust bucket out the back of the church property and over to my place.
A HALF HOUR later, we are sitting on my couch, drinking tea and making stilted conversation.
“I love these old heritage houses,” Francis says. “How many apartments in here?”
“Five.”
His long black eyelashes flutter about the room. “Is this all their furniture?”
I nod. Even in the midst of this mess, my brother’s hair is combed and lacquered in place; his shirt crisp, and clean.
“The rent is pretty cheap. And I don’t have to share a bathroom, which is a relief.”
“Right, right. It looks nice, sweetheart.” He nods. I nod. He looks toward the window. “Are you working these days?”
I shake my head. “I went for an interview this morning. It was going great until I started bawling. It’s—Frankie comes into my head. And this stuff with Ben—I just, I feel like a stupid, useless walking sore.”
Francis looks down into his mug for two or three long seconds. “Have you heard from Ben? From the hospital?”
“No. They called when he came out of surgery last week. It’s amazing that he’s okay. Who survives that? Well, I guess he survived. He’s in a psych ward now.”
My brother meets my eye for the first time since we got here. “I feel like maybe I should go down and see him.”
My mouth opens. I don’t know quite what to say to that.
He sighs. “I know. But I’m still a priest. He’s clearly been going through a spiritual crisis of some kind. You both have. Have you—”
“Physician, heal thyself,” I mutter.
He snorts softly and looks into his mug again. After a while he says, “I know it bugged you when I took a religious name. Hardly anyone does it anymore. I picked St. Luke because he’s known as the Divine Physician. I thought that when I took his name, somehow it might be healing. So . . . so much for that.”
I watch him and chew at my bottom lip.
Francis pulls a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. He lights one and puffs and then leans forward, elbows on his knees. “Have you seen this fucking video or what?”
“No. I didn’t know anything about it until your rector called me. What’s the big deal? A million drunks on YouTube, and yours goes viral? What makes you so damn special?”
“Well . . .” He smirks and bats his eyes. Almost like normal. Almost like we’re “us” again.
“Seriously, are you totally annihilated? Have you got your pecker out or something?”
“No! I had a drink with a couple friends. I actually went home early. And I wasn’t even driving when the cops pulled up. Next thing I know, the headlines are all screaming: DRUNK PRIEST! Whoop-de-doo.”
“I’m sorry they did this to you, Francis.”
His face softens and his eyes glass up a bit as if he might cry. He reaches for my hand and gives it a squeeze.
“What happens now?”
He stares at his cigarette for a moment. “They have me booked for six months in Our Lady of Perpetual Help Rehab Center. Father Michael and the parish lawyer are trying to get the court date set for after my rehab. Of course the court might refuse. This is my third DUI.”
His third DUI. I look at Francis. His eyes flick from his cigarette to the floor. He reaches for his mug, I do the same, and the two of us sit there quietly sipping.
THREE
Ben
Why don’t we pick up where we left off yesterday,” Dr. Lambert says.
Yesterday? Used to
be an old Jamaican lady who ran the corner store when we were kids. She’d say, A thousand years in God’s sight are like yesterday—already past—like a watch in the night. My old man would bitch all the way home, Christ, I aged about fifty just waitin’ for my change.
What do you think that means, a watch in the night?
“It’s one of the Psalms, isn’t it?” Lambert says. “I think it refers to a shepherd’s watch . . . night watch, a watch in the night.”
Shepherd’s watch. Some shepherd. A watch in the night is like a thousand years in Ben’s soul. Like a thousand white rooms. A thousand bullets to the brain.
“Sounds like your father continues to make quite an impression,” Lambert says.
At least he kept his kids from falling out open windows.
“Were you able to turn to your father for support after your son’s death?”
Ben turned to his father, sure. Gotta try, right? The old man sounded like he was going to cry when he got the news. “No!” he said. “How? What the hell was going on? Were you drunk? Were you passed out?” Then he told Ben about the time he fell off a roof. He could’ve been killed.
Few days later, Ben tried again. Called him about the funeral. “A funeral,” the old man said, sounding half-crocked. “A funeral? You think that poor little bugger woulda liked sittin’ in a pew listening to all that gloomy shit? No way.”
He told him that Maggie’s brother, Francis, was going to say the mass.
“Father Fruit?” he said. “Bad enough she had to name my grandson after that one, now he’s getting in on this? When I was a kid, priests were men, not like nowadays. When my mother died, they didn’t bring me to any damn funeral. You know what they said to me?”
“Right. You can’t make it,” Ben said. “Gotta go.” He tried to end the call but he kept hitting the wrong button on the handset. After a while he smashed the receiver against the coffee table until dear old Dad finally shut the fuck up.
The old man says he doesn’t drink anymore. Claims he’s been sober ten years. Sober’s not quite the word. He still swallows anything that gets him high. Anything but booze. He loves his tranquilizers. And if the quacks won’t give him junk, he’ll make do with cough syrup.
One night he called Ben’s cell phone. It was one in the morning and Ben had a party in the back of a stretch limo: four hedge fund managers, four hookers. All of them loaded, wailing out the windows, out the moonroof.
Ben saw the caller ID. It was not a good time. He checked the rearview, the side mirrors, trying to make sure none of those assholes in the back got his head sideswiped by a truck.
The phone stopped buzzing. And started up again. Hadn’t heard from him in weeks and now he was going to keep calling till Ben picked up. And don’t kid yourself, Ben had to pick up. His old man was seventy-five now.
So Ben hit the Bluetooth. “Dad, I’m at work. Anything wrong?”
“How y’doin’, kid? S’your old man.”
“Yup. I’m working. Is it important?”
“Can’t I call up my own son for chrissake?” Ben heard him trip over something and curse. “I can’t sleep,” he said. “I went to renew my pills yesterday and that bitch wouldn’t give ’em to me. What the hell’s happened to this goddamn country? It’s just Xanax.”
Ben’s guts turned into a fist at the mention of Xanax. It was barely a month since Frankie died. “You sound pretty wasted as it is.”
“Bullshit. I’m sober as a fuckin’ judge. I tried to get something off whatshername, that fat broad next door. Now she’s not answering. Can you gimme something?”
“I don’t have anything.”
“Don’t bullshit a bullshitter. All those rich people you drive around, they must have all kinds of good stuff on ’em.”
Behind Ben’s head, the car’s blackout partition rolled down and the sound of thumping club music invaded the driver’s seat.
One of the hedge fund managers staggered on his knees to the spot behind Ben. “You wanna get in on this?” He put his arm through the window and offered a palm full of coke. “Got a lotta pussy back here.” His nose and upper lips were dusted in white powder. His tongue flicked and he smacked his lips.
Ben looked in the rearview mirror: a woman was holding the edge of the moonroof as she gyrated, her clothes being removed by one of the men. Kitty-corner to her, a second woman, wearing nothing but silver platform shoes, held the opposite edge of the moonroof as a second man knelt and lapped at her crotch.
Deep in the back, it was a tangle of tongues and holes and limbs.
“What’s going on there?” the old man said. “You at a goddamn party or what? You talked to your brother? Damn kid needs an attitude adjustment. If he doesn’t straighten out, he’s going to land himself in jail and I’m sure as hell—”
“I gotta go.” Ben hung up. In his side mirror, cop lights flashed blue and red.
He was about to pull over, but the patrol car flew up the outside lane and disappeared around the next corner. He glanced over his shoulder at the man with the coke. “No thanks,” he said. “Looks like you guys got it covered.”
“Sure?” The guy put his empty hand on Ben’s shoulder, gave it a little squeeze. “Come on, man.”
“Keep up the good work,” Ben told him. The guy backed off and Ben rolled the partition up. He drove toward the water.
At the end of the night, he dropped all eight of them out front of the Grand Marquis. Sitting in the car under the hotel portico, he watched them traipse into the lobby. He looked at the uniformed doormen, the bellhops and valets, and wondered what the likelihood was that any of them would turn down free coke. Or pussy.
He glanced at his reflection, the bloodshot eyes, the bruise-colored bags. Can’t sleep? Join the club. He picked up his phone, checked the recent calls. No one.
They tipped him two hundred tonight. He’ll give Maggie half. He’ll call her and tell her about this fucked-up ride and the coke and the guy’s hand on his shoulder. He’ll ask how she’s making out and offer to stop by.
The phone buzzed. Cola.
Ben hit the Bluetooth. “Hey, man.”
“As-salamu alaykum, my brotha. You workin’?”
“Just dropped ’em off. You talk to the old man lately?”
“Are you kidding? He calls me every day. Tell your old man something nice. Something from when you were a kid. I didn’t do so bad with you boys, did I?”
Ben paused. He couldn’t tell if Cola was bragging or complaining.
“He sure was Robo-trippin’ tonight.” Cola meant the old man’d been chugging Robitussin DM again. “Hey, wanna meet me at Denny’s? I could go for a Grand Slam.”
So there’s Ben at the end of another shitty Saturday night, sitting in the window booth at Denny’s, mouth full of pancake and gloom. Been an hour since he heard from his brother and he’s too tired to wait much longer. Going on five in the morning, but nobody in here’s been to bed yet.
Finally he sees Cola coming up the sidewalk, skinny and pale under the streetlights. His brother shoulders his way through the diner’s front doors and stands there, squinting under fluorescence. He swipes his hair back. It’s always hanging in his eyes like a kid’s.
Cola spots Ben in the window booth, shakes his head no, and heads to a table farther in.
After a minute or so, Ben hears, “Psst.” He’s too tired for punk brother shit right now. So he just sits and looks out the window, watches a couple of the night’s last stragglers stumble against the dark windows of his curbside limo and then knock on the glass before they wander off.
From over his shoulder, another “Psst. Ben!”
He can feel Cola wiggling in his seat the way he did when they were kids. He pictures that diner they stopped at off the highway. Twenty-five years ago. He was ten and Cola six. The old man had finished his second beer and had gone to take a leak when the waitress set three plates on the table. House rules: no eating without Dad. Dad took forever. Probably had a bottle in there, busy making his bee
rs into boilermakers.
Cola got fizzy with waiting. Quit screwing around, Ben told him. But he didn’t make him stop.
Tongue between his teeth, Cola picked up his plate of spaghetti and balanced it on the point of his knife. He gave the plate a spin and wound up with the whole writhing mess all over the table, the floor, and himself.
The old man hauled Ben outside. “That’s my money he was dumping on his head! Little shit-for-brains—you just sit there?” Slap in the mouth.
No saving face. The face is the first to know.
That was then. Here’s Ben and Cola in a whole other diner, twenty-five years later, and nothing’s changed much. A whistle shoots from the space between Cola’s front teeth until Ben finally looks over. Cola coaxes him with a jerk of his head.
Ben watches a waitress pause to fill Cola’s cup. Cola looks at the jut of her hip. She’s young enough that even stiff brown polyester looks half-decent. She’s lingering for an excuse to push that flop of hair out of Cola’s eyes, take him home and keep him for a pet. Forget it, girlie, Cola’s too busy trying to spin plates.
Ben wipes his mouth, picks up his jacket, and schleps to his brother’s booth.
“Why’d you sit at a window?” Cola says. “I can’t be all exposed like that.”
“Exposed? Who’re you, Al Capone?” Ben takes a seat. “You must owe someone a real chunk of change this time.”
“I’ll pay ’em back next week.” He sets his tongue between his teeth as he dumps sugar into his coffee.
Ben shrugs. “Tell them to get in line.”
“It’s no joke. Dudes were waiting outside my place last night. Had to stay at Vera’s. Man, you look like shit, brother. You still not sleeping?”
“How much are you into them for?”
“Eight grand.”
Ben stares.
“It was a sure thing. OxyContin. Buddy had a shitload of it.” Off Ben’s confused face, he murmurs, “It’s like morphine.”
“I know what it is.” Ben blinks, waiting. “What are you playing at this crap for? I thought you had a construction gig.”
The Crooked Heart of Mercy Page 3
