The Trilogy of the Void: The Complete Boxed Set

by Peter Meredith

  "Will, smarter people than the two of us have been trying to put the concept into words since love was invented."

  The sadness that would come to define half of his waking life, replaced the anger, and tears sprang up in Will’s eyes, but there was a smile on his lips. "But only you would try to describe it scientifically." He sniffled loudly and went and sat down next to her on the bed. The mattress settled deeply under his weight and the springs creaked noisily.

  "Though trajectories are mathematically based, there are enough variables in this case for me to accept your 'science' assertion." Seeing his blank look she added, "Love is a trajectory of sorts. Picture the average teen romance." She caught up one of her ever-present notebooks. "The passion is fiery, but generally brief, without consideration for any of the obvious variables, so…" She drew a shallow arc on an empty page and it ended in a small explosion. "Its demise and subsequent crash are virtually guaranteed. Note however the trajectory did not go very high and thus none of the individuals are likely to be too hurt. Now, picture mom and dad’s relationship."

  "I’d rather not thank you very much," he responded. His tears had stopped, but still lay heavy on his eyelashes. Talitha looked at her brother and smiled at his little joke and her smile held love for him.

  "Ok, take your mind out of the gutter," she said while drawing a circle, which Will guessed represented the earth. She then drew a line that at first arced high, but then leveled so that it wound around the outside of the circle. "This is mom and dad’s trajectory. They've attained orbital velocity," she paused and grimaced slightly. "I think I went too far with the science terms with that. What I mean to say is that due to their passion and inertia they will never crash. Their love will easily overcome all of the obstacles or variables that might otherwise cause them to crash."

  "What kind of variables are you talking about?" He sniffled again. The calm rational way Talitha was going on caused him to start to relax.

  "Oh, the variables are too many to count let alone name, but consider, what causes most relationships to fail? Don’t count sluts or… what is the term, in common parlance for the male version of a slut?" Talitha seemed genuinely interested in the answer.

  "I think the term you are looking for is Boy or Man," he answered with a smile and she laughed and punched his arm.

  "No I’m being serious, they don’t use the term Gigolo, do they?"

  "By they, do you mean normal kids, unlike you?" Will asked.

  "Yes," she answered expectantly.

  Will shook his head and smiled at his odd sister. He realized he was beginning to feel like himself again, and this immediately made him feel sad as if he didn't have a right to feel that way. "Other than jerk, there really isn’t a term."

  Talitha looked unsurprised. "I thought as much, another double standard." She sighed and then continued, "Where was I? Oh, the trajectory for every relationship, successful or not, begins the same way: Interest I, excitement E, and passion P- these all give impetus or energy to the relationship, which we will mark with an L for lift." She marked a curved line with a short equation, I+E+P=L (Lift/love).

  "But every romance faces degradation in its velocity which reduces the lift. This could be a rumor of cheating C, or a boy," here she eyed her brother with an eyebrow cocked, "being grounded for poor grades G, or even pressure Pr from friends or family. Do you understand?" she asked holding up her notebook with the equation written on it: I+E+P-(C cheating + G grounding +Pr pressure) =L. He had been following her just fine until she held up her notebook.

  Will had to pause a long while to try to read the tiny notes along the curved path.

  "Yes, but Lisa and me had all the right…uh plusses? I mean we had more lift or is the L supposed to be Love?"

  "First off, it's Lisa and I," she explained with great patience. "Second, the L really means both, the trajectory is the relationship and the L is either lift or Love and is what moves it along. Now as for your trajectory, many plusses, as you call them and very few obvious negatives, would suggest a long lasting relationship. However, take a look at your and Lisa’s intended arc." She drew another circle and from that she traced a high arc that carried well around it. Next, she drew a second arc that kept very close to the circle itself.

  "Can you guess which is your arc? Lisa wants to let your relationship go as far as it will take you. But your arc suggests a fling or a summer romance."

  "This is crap!" he fired back. "Your assumptions are baseless."

  "Really? What did you tell Lisa you wanted to do after high school?" Will didn't say anything but looked away and she continued, "You told me you wanted to go to the Coast Guard Academy and with dad's help you were 90% likely to get in and in fact, I know the paperwork is being prepared. But you told her you didn't know what you wanted to do. Pretty much the most important decision you might ever make and you keep her out of it."

  "Look, I’m damned either way. If I tell her I'll be lucky to see her two months out of the year, for the next four years, do you think she'll want to stay with me?"

  "Mom stayed with dad for his last three years at the Academy. That should be her choice, not yours." Talitha was just getting started, "When was the last time, if ever, you bought her flowers for no special reason?"

  "I uh…"

  "At birthdays and holidays you act as if you have to buy her gifts, you should want to, simply to make her happy." Talitha looked as if she could go on but Will didn't want her to.

  "Am I really that bad of a boyfriend?" He had thought he had been pretty good to Lisa, but looking back, he wondered why she ever loved him.

  "Actually you're a great boyfriend." Talitha stated this as if it were a fact. This caused him to look at her in confusion. "You're a great person Will. Fun, handsome, sweet, smart…well kinda," she added with a grin. "But I think it became obvious to Lisa that being a boyfriend is all you'd ever be." His face clouded over in anger at this, but she went on, "Lisa, I'm sure isn’t looking for marriage at seventeen, but she knows she'll want more, eventually. And it's my conjecture that she believes eventually you'll tire of her and dump her."

  "But I won’t!"

  "You say that, but your actions keep her at a safe distance. You love Lisa, I can tell. But you're not committed to your relationship. It's not enough to love her, you have to love the fact that you're in love. Right now, you love a girlfriend, but girlfriends will come and go, unless you commit to the relationship as well. You have to ask yourself if you even want that kind of relationship. There's no saying you have to."

  Will didn't know the answer then, but over the next week, he came to realize that he did. Despite the waves of confusion that washed back and forth over him, he discovered he did want Lisa, not only in his life but in his future as well.

  However, she would have nothing to do with him and in fact seemed to disappear off the island completely.

  Every day he went by the Burger King, lurking about near the pinball machines, but not once did she show up for work. At night, he went to their bench by the seawall, strolling as casually as possible back and forth, feeling like a fool for doing it, but not being able to help it. Eventually he summoned the courage to go to her apartment, something Lisa had begged him never to do. He knocked on her door a couple of times, however there was never an answer.

  He worried that she had gone to stay with her uncle, something her little brother did every summer to get away from their mom, but Talitha had a grapevine of sorts through Brian, and knew Lisa was still on the island. He tried to get messages through to her but was rebuffed, and he became frightfully angry over this, but then almost immediately became despondent and apathetic.

  His part-time job and the rigors of preparing for M-day helped keep him occupied somewhat, but they were stopgaps and even with them, he would still find himself suddenly in tears or punching a wall in anger. His mind seemed constantly on Lisa and the world became grey and indistinct at the edges, as if nothing else mattered. The actual move-in day was terrible s
ince he had to pass by her place and their old haunts, time and again. Each trip brought fresh pain to him and he was glad in the late afternoon when all there was left to do was to move the countless boxes up the many, many stairs.

  By the next day, his energy deserted him and still there was so much to be done. After endless hours of drudgery, he was desperate to go out and resume his search for Lisa, but was forced instead to go next door for dinner with the Harris family. This proved to be the most frightfully dull and annoying experience of his life, outside of school that is.

  The day after that, June 4, started well but finished in a chaos that nearly ended forever any chance he had at getting Lisa back.

  2

  The priest was right on time for dinner, in fact Will wondered if he had been lurking outside waiting for his cue from the Jern's grandfather clock. Right after the first of its six chimes Father Alba knocked loudly and importantly on the front door.

  Katie, who was excitedly expecting company zipped across the floor in front of Will to open it, but upon seeing the unassuming priest in his all black attire, choked back the memorized greeting she was about to give. Her pretty face became clouded by a combination of confusion and impatience; it was obvious to her that this was not the dinner guest.

  "Yeah?" she asked absently as she danced to the left and then to the right searching for the real dinner guests. When she didn't see anyone else, she turned back to the priest. "Who are you?"

  "This is our dinner guest, Katherine." Her father's voice held firm tones that caused Katie's ears to perk up. "And you need to answer the door properly and greet him as you have been taught." She turned to Commander Jern, who had been coming down the stairs and at the sight of her father's stern face, she broke out her most winning smile.

  Turning back to the bemused priest, she dropped into a deep curtsy. She had practiced a formal greeting with Talitha for part of the afternoon and everyone in the house had been curtsied to, at least three times. She dipped her head demurely and the pink ribbon that kept her blonde ponytail in place drooped in front of her eyes. Her hands held the edges of the white sundress and her tan, skinny little girl legs crossed perfectly.

  "I am...ah, a pleasure to welcome you into our home, uh Mister..."

  The priest gave a low bow in return. "Father Alba."

  "Father?" Still in her deep curtsy, her pretty face contorted in confusion, she pulled her head around to her own father. "Isn't your daddy in heaven...and this is definitely not Granpy." She gave the priest a suspicious look. "Are you jerking my chain?"

  Commander Jern made a tired little noise, "Ugh." It was all Will could do not burst out laughing and he turned slightly away to hide his smile.

  The priest straightened from his bow and he had a smile of his own, which he directed at the little girl. "No. No, I am not anyone's, ah, daddy. Father is my title."

  A small dawning of understanding doused Katie's suspicions and she asked, "You mean your bigness?"

  The priest looked confused and a little surprised at this question and subconsciously put his hand to his large stomach. "No, Katie," William said. "He doesn't have rank like a commander or a captain. What he has, is similar to the term principal, like Principal Flannery at your school."

  "Oh," she said in deep thought but still in mid-curtsy. "It is a pleasure to welcome you into our new home...Father Albert."

  She had just straightened from her curtsy, when the priest said kindly, "It's Father Alba."

  She immediately dropped back down into the curtsy again. "Father Alba."

  "Yes. Yes. Good." Father Alba smiled at Katie and patted her on the head almost shyly but then moved toward Will. "Will! Look at you. Look at you!" He reached out and shook Will's hand with great vigor. "I haven't seen you in church for a while, tsk. Although I did see your Miss Lisa, and she seemed fairly upset, yes fairly upset." A sad nod of his head, accompanied the second utterance of the phrase. Will tried to look calm but his intestines suddenly twisted themselves into knots. The priest continued, "I know things could be better for her at home. Please ask her to come by and see me, just to talk."

  Will knew that he was the real problem with Lisa, but said, "I will, Father," in an almost inaudible voice.

  "Good. Good. Commander Jern, it's so nice to see you." He then gave Will's father a manly and hardy handshake.

  "Thank you for coming," the Commander said and then paused. Will wondered what the polite greeting was to someone who had invited himself to your house for dinner. His father went on, "I want to apologize for the way I ended our last conversation. I was abrupt and I should not have been."

  "No worries, no worries," the priest responded. "The spaghetti smells great! But since it's not quite done, why don't I bless the house while we wait? Will, there's a large box on the porch. Can you please bring it in, but be careful! There's a pie in it."

  Will went for the box, wondering how the priest knew that dinner would be another twenty minutes. He was equally puzzled at what a house blessing was. He'd never heard of one, but at the smell of the pie, his stomach rumbled loudly and he hoped it wouldn't take long.

  "Thank you, Will. Please put it down just here, in the foyer." The priest reached into the large box and brought out a brightly polished silver brazier and a lighter. Lifting off the lid of the brazier, he lit what looked like brown sugar cubes, which began to smoke slightly. The aroma of the incense struck Will almost immediately. It was sharp and interesting and he found himself sniffing lightly in a dog-like manner as his brain attempted to interpret the smell, to define or categorize it. "We will just let that cook for a few minutes." Father Alba set the brazier aside.

  "That stinks!" Katie had been trying to get a look inside the box and now she pulled back holding her nose, "P.U.!"

  "Maybe you should go into the kitchen if it bothers you," her father said.

  Her curiosity was too great. "No, I'm ok. What's all this stuff for anyway?"

  "I'm going to bless the house," the priest explained. "This is done when a family moves into a new home. I'll ask the Lord to watch over your home and all of you who live there."

  "Oh." Katie's brow furrowed with deep concentration. "Who's this lord guy?"

  Father Alba laughed loudly. "The Lord is God."

  "Katie, Father Alba is a priest," William added.

  Before Katie could ask her next obvious question, Father Alba looked down into her face. "A priest is someone who represents God and prays to God on behalf of the people of his church. Do you understand?"

  "Sure," she said, not understanding at all. "What does prays mean?"

  "Well now, praying is speaking to God." Father Alba seemed quite content answering Katie's questions and Will knew that unless stopped, she would ask questions all night. His stomach rumbled loudly again.

  Katie appeared skeptical again. "You talk to dead people? Are you jerking my..." A quick guilty look to her father stopped the impertinent question.

  The priest looked puzzled as people often did when speaking to Katie. "Katie, God is not dead."

  "Yes he is. Daddy said so." The priest and William exchanged a quick look and William opened his mouth to say something, but his mouth just hung open like a broken screen door swaying slightly. Katie spoke for him, "He says Heaven is where dead people go when they die, and God is in Heaven."

  She suddenly brightened. "Hey, do you also talk to dead animals?"

  This question had never been put to the priest before, judging by the bemused and bewildered look on his face. Before he could even think to ask what Katie meant, she continued excitedly, "On- a-cuz, I had a goldfish that died and mommy said that Pumpkin...that was my goldfish's name...on-a-cuz he was fat and not gold at all, but really orange...and he died, and mommy said that he went to Heaven to be with God and Granpy Jern." She paused and her face was hopeful.

  Catching on, Father Alba became thoughtful and sad. "I'm sorry but I don't speak Goldfish. Now, now we had better get on with this blessing before your brother's rumbling be
lly gets any louder."

  He picked up the slightly smoking brazier by a long silver chain that hung from its top. This he handed to Will. "Just swing it gently to give it a nice airflow." He then reached into the box and brought out a crucifix. It was a foot long and the ornate figure of Jesus looked to be made of pewter. He gave it to Katie. "Now you can carry this without dropping it, right?" She nodded and eyed the person nailed to the cross with interest. Next, from the box, came a stylish silver bucket and surprisingly it was half filled with water. Lying in it was a long silver handled cylinder, which had a rounded end. "With your permission, Commander Jern."

  William had the tiniest smile straining at the corner of his mouth, but said expressionlessly, "Please. By all means."

  Father Alba made the Sign of the Cross and proclaimed loudly, "Peace be with this house and all who dwell here. Blessed be the name of the lord. Amen..." He turned to Will and Katie, "Please say amen."

  "Amen," Will responded.

  "Amen?"

  Ignoring her question, the priest continued, "When Christ took flesh through the Blessed Virgin Mary, he made his home with us. Let us now pray that he will enter this home and bless it with his presence..."

  Somewhere along the way, Talitha joined them in the blessing of the house. She stood well back and watched with the uncanny way she had. His sister claimed not to have a photographic memory, but Will was sure that she would later be able to recite every verse the priest had said as he went from room to room.

  At the entrance to the basement, the priest hesitated just the slightest before going down and it was the only part of the house where he did a blessing in the hall as well as each of the rooms. Will noted that there seemed to be something going on between the priest and his dad. William eyed the man with that fantastic perception he shared with Talitha. The scrutiny encompassed every action and word, right down to nuance and pronunciation, but Will couldn't see what it was his father was looking for.

  The priest for his part seemed nervous under that close stare and while in the boiler room glanced with great frequency over his shoulder at the door where William stood. But whatever was transpiring between the two men, ended when the blessing was completed and they climbed the stairs to eat.