Original Prin

by Randy Boyagoda

  No one said anything. Beards were furiously scratched. A stream of swear words in Biblical Greek cut through the silence.

  “Then with your permission, perhaps it’d be best to hear directly from our prospective suitors,” said Wende.

  She stepped away from the podium and smiled at everyone, including Prin. The stocky Chinese man took over. He explained he was the CEO of a building company that specialized in “wraparound lifestyle for the golden years.” He proposed purchasing and then converting UFU’s last remaining building into Toronto’s best elder-care assisted-living facility, with the professors staying on to offer “fun,” “stress-free” classes and workshops to residents.

  The Arab man spoke next. He told the faculty he was actually an alumnus of UFU from the late 1970s who, after a successful career in business in New York, had returned to his native Dragomans to accept a position as a cabinet minister with the transitional government that had been formed after the end of its civil war, “the brutalities of which, I needn’t tell you about, I am sure,” he said.

  Everyone murmured sympathetically in the hopes there wouldn’t be a pop quiz about Dragomans’ civil war, or about Dragomans itself.

  The Minister proceeded into a long and—if you weren’t worried about losing your job—moving story about visiting refugee camps around the country, and about meeting one young woman in particular, Mariam. She’d grown up in a Dragomans village, where people of different faiths had lived together in harmony for centuries. Once the extremists arrived, however, the village was destroyed, and Mariam and her family, who were not Muslim but part of an older religion, had gone into hiding in the mountains behind their burned-down home. They were found. Her brothers and father were taken in one truck. Her mother and sisters were taken in another. She never saw any of them again. She was the oldest daughter and was promised to one of the fighters. He traded her to another man for engine parts. That man was kind and left her at a refugee camp, which is where the Minister found her.

  “I asked her what she wanted to do with her life, now that peace had returned to our land. She told me her father always wanted her brothers to become engineers and so, because she had been spared, she wanted to be an engineer too, for all of them, and, my friends, for the glorious future of our beloved Dragomans!”

  The Minister waited in vain for applause. Finally, after much heated debate amongst a group of professors, the leader of the faculty association raised his hand.

  “Thank you. That’s very moving. We hope you succeed. But, well, sorry, but, well, what’s this have to do with us?” asked Professor Bergermaster.

  “Everything!” the Minister said.

  Still no damned applause.

  Wende returned to the podium and explained that the government of Dragomans was interested in opening a new university but at present it had no professors. Hands went up and she said there would be no faculty transfers. Hands went down. Instead, this proposed new university was in need of a school in North America that, in exchange for generous, long-term funding, would offer online teaching and grant degrees to its students, and also, when security conditions allowed for it, send one faculty member a month to offer an in-person lecture. Wende said she’d accompany the first faculty member.

  Prin was sure she looked at him when she said this.

  10

  After much more furious beard-scratching and Greco-Biblical imprecating and impassioned invocations of assorted codicils to various university-governance documents, the professors grumbled their agreement with the plan.

  “And now, to ensure the integrity of this work, we require representation from the faculty,” Fr. Pat said. “I know everyone already does so much, but please, consider volunteering for this. All our futures depend on it.”

  “I agree, but I’m already doing curriculum committee.”

  “I agree, but I’m already doing grade appeals and academic integrity.”

  “I’m doing the review of the Senate minutes review protocol draft.”

  “Well, I’m doing high school and community outreach.”

  “I’m doing the young alumni.”

  “I’m doing students with mental-health challenges.”

  “I’m doing students with disabilities.”

  “I’m doing international students AND I’m doing the friends of the library.”

  “I thought I was doing the friends of the library.”

  “There’s so many, we can do them together if that sounds fun.”

  It appeared that every faculty member was already doing something, or someone, on behalf of UFU, except Prin. He agreed to return to work early and to do the Chinese property developer and also do the Dragomans Minister. Wende would help.

  The meeting was adjourned. Fr. Pat introduced the Chinese developer and the Dragomans Minister to the slower-moving professors and to Sister Contra Melanchthon’s shortbread while Wende walked across the room to greet Prin. She cocked her head and wrinkled her eyes and smiled expectantly. Had she smiled that way, years before? He didn’t remember. He couldn’t, or at least, he wouldn’t. He got up, eased around the table, and they hugged like brother and sister porcupines.

  “So, Prin, it’s been a long time,” she said.

  “Indeed. I’m sorry your situation in Montana didn’t work out,” he said.

  “Don’t be. It was a terrible job in the middle of nowhere. But this new work is endless, I’m making a lot more money and travelling all over the place. I’m single, still, and don’t even have a cat. I wouldn’t mind one, but that’s one cliché too many, right?” she said.

  “Your resistance to cliché continues, I see,” he said.

  “As does your very careful wording when you’re nervous. But why are you nervous now?” she asked.

  “I’m not,” he said.

  She leaned in and her teeth flashed in a sudden smile.

  “I’ve asked you that question before. Remember?” she asked.

  “No. Would you like some shortbread?” he said.

  “That conversation we had, after … Don’t you remember?” she asked.

  “No,” he said.

  This was no lie. He only remembered it after she asked him. He started saying Hail Mollys to forget. Hail Marys.

  “Okay, Prin. You don’t want to play. That’s fine. But look, unfortunately for UFU its situation has brought me here, but I’m glad to see you again,” she said.

  “Would you like to see a picture of my wife and kids?” he asked.

  He held his phone in front of him like the very shield of heaven. She studied the image of Molly and the girls beaming and giggling on a ferry bench, going across to the Toronto Islands the summer before.

  “Same old Abelard. The worrying little Catholic boy. I think you can say you’re glad to see me too and not lose what you think of as your soul. And because of this project with UFU, you’ll be seeing more of me,” she said.

  Wende was still smiling, but a little sourly, or at least she might have been wearing sour apple lip-balm, he thought. She used to. It left a sharp, sweet taste on your lips.

  Wende kissed him lightly on both cheeks before he could step back. Then she gathered her things and walked out of the room, firm and full in her slim black pants. He looked and looked away, his soul full of sour apples.

  11

  After the faculty meeting, Prin walked past the subway and into an old city church. It was far enough away from campus that none of the priests from UFU would be there. Its copper was long gone green, its stone spires soared with help from red steel posts, and its alabaster angels and supplicant saints had been host to generations of pigeons but still they stood, still they smiled and beckoned.

  The church was hemmed in on one side by an even older-looking small-motor repair shop, and on the other by a bar and magic-supply store called Swizzle Styx. He had come in only to take a m
oment before the altar, to kneel and think and pray and wait for a small tremble, for some kind of answer.

  What have I done, Lord?

  He had looked as she’d walked away, yes, but he had looked away. But then he did not take his moment before the altar. When he saw, in the dim back corner beside the tray of guttering votives to St Jude, that the little red light was on in front of the confessional, he went there instead. The span of one old lady’s shriving wasn’t long enough to let him decide what it was, but there was something he needed to tell. It was something. Wasn’t it? He ducked in through burgundy velvet curtains and knelt down.

  “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. Maybe. At least, I think so,” Prin said.

  “Well. This is interesting,” the priest said.

  “I’m not trying to be interesting,” Prin said.

  “You’ve come to confession but you’re not sure you have anything to confess. I’ve been sitting here for three hours, first with the executive committee of the parish women’s council and then with the grade-three class of Pope Francis Elementary. It’s been all hardness of heart towards daughters-in-law who make boxed cakes and kids putting plastic in the compost bin on purpose. Like being stoned to death with popcorn. You’re not sure if you’ve sinned, which suggests to me you’ve done something that makes your heart restless. So tell me, is your heart restless?” the priest said.

  “Well, Father, I signed up for a certain committee at work,” Prin said.

  The priest sighed.

  “You must be from the university,” the priest said.

  “I am, and yes, perhaps I can speak more clearly, in light of your somehow sensing that I’m a professor,” Prin said.

  “I can certainly sense that. Alright then. Please continue,” the priest said.

  More popcorn.

  “And do you mind if I put it in my own language?” Prin asked.

  “I’m sure I’ve heard worse, my son,” the priest said.

  “Okay. Well, part of the matter troubling me, Father, concerns the counterposing imperatives of my personal and professional vocations, the feeling that fulfilling one might undermine the other—”

  “So you work too much and you think you should be at home more but then you can’t provide as much or as well. And the sin is?” the priest asked.

  “No, Father, it’s more that any reasonable interrogation of the interior movements that informed my agreeing to serve on a particular committee in light of the external representative on the same committee—”

  “Do you hear that? What’s it sound like?” the priest asked.

  Prin listened to the sound. It was small and insistent. The youngest child in a family of sounds.

  “It sounds like…”

  “It sounds like me tapping a key on my watch, yes?” the priest said.

  “Oh. Yes, right. I’m sorry for taking so long. There’s no one else waiting, as far as I know, but I appreciate you might want to go. Sorry, Father,” Prin said.

  “No! Don’t apologize. I’ll be here all night with you if need be. But you’re enjoying your professorizing too much. I’ve certainly heard worse language in here, but not by much. Let’s clear it away. Let me help you with that. Listen again. What’s that sound like?” the priest said.

  Tock tock tock

  Prin suddenly wanted just a fast absolution and some Hail Marys. But at least this priest was trying to help him name his sin, if sin it be. Had the priest been younger and more Filipino, like Prin’s usual confessors in the city, he would have told Prin that Jesus loved him no matter what, then giggled, then told him that for his absolution he should call his mother every day for a month. Then giggled.

  “What else?” the priest asked again, still tappping.

  Tock tock tock

  “It’s constant, um, and sounds like, well yes, a key on a watchface. But also, perhaps, like someone checking the ice before walking on it?” Prin said.

  Tock tock tock

  “Or … someone tapping on a window … is it supposed to be God tapping on the window of my soul?” Prin asked.

  “It sounds, from far off, as far off as you might be right now, like someone hammering nails into a man’s hands and feet,” the priest said.

  “Oh,” Prin said.

  “And the sound’s coming from far away, and it’s going on and on, and you’re sitting here, far away, wasting all that time He spent like that, like this, for you. Talking and talking because you’re afraid to say anything real. Now, what did you do? What did you do, to Him?” the priest asked.

  Prin wanted him to stop tapping. He wanted to leave the confessional and go home and hug Molly and email Fr. Pat that he’d rather lose his job than serve on a committee where he’d have to spend time with Wende.

  But wait. What did it matter? Even if he wanted to, and he did not want to, he just didn’t want to be in a situation where he might want to, but even if that happened, he couldn’t do anything.

  He really, actually, technically, couldn’t.

  Was his diminishment part of God’s plan for him, for all of them? Did he get prostate cancer so he could chastely work closely with his ex-girlfriend and save his job and his family while also helping a Middle Eastern orphaned Christian girl go to school?

  Was this the twenty-first century saint’s life that God had suddenly made possible for him?

  Prin had all of this in his heart but, in truth, while she remained lithe and firm after all these years, he hadn’t felt anything when he saw Wende or when they had hugged or when she had pecked his cheeks or even when he had thought about that lip-balm. He thought about it again, just then, in the confessional.

  Nothing!

  He actually didn’t care if she still wore it. Because in none of this had he felt felt, even when he had looked at her walking away and then looked away. And even if she’d also looked at him, and she had, for a moment, she definitely had… what did it matter? People look at each other all the time. He’d just been worried he might have felt felt. But he hadn’t. He didn’t. And he couldn’t. And he never would. He could tell all of this.

  He could go home and tell Molly all of this. Tell, not confess.

  Because he had Molly! He had been granted Molly, who didn’t visit innovative business solutions upon the poor professors of failing universities. Who had always said far more than merely Whatever you think is best, dear. It was only his hard heart, his hearing that had made her out that way. Well, she did say it sometimes, sometimes a lot, but she was far more than that. In fact, seeing Wende today, Wende’s life as it was, today, helped him to this.

  Where was the sin in such discovery?

  There was no sin, only gratitude!

  “Thank you, Father. I think you’ve helped me understand my situation. I apologize for taking up your time like this, but I actually have nothing to confess,” Prin said.

  “Really? You’re sure? In the twenty years I’ve been tapping my watch in the confessional, you’re the first person to hear it and not confess anything,” the priest said.

  “Well of course, of course I have some sins. What about, so, let’s see, yes, a lack of charity towards my loved ones, and also vanity and pride. Also, sometimes… when praying the Our Father, of saying ‘Our Father, who art in heaven, Han Solo be thy name’” Prin said.

  “I like the old Star Wars movies. The new ones feel like toy commercials set to Wagner. But those are your same-old sins, son. They can’t be what brought you in here. Has whatever it was truly passed?” the priest asked.

  “Yes,” Prin said.

  “Very well. You know your mind, your heart. As does God. If whatever it was returns, you know where to find me. My name’s Father Tom, and I’m usually here because I’m usually the only one here, the only one left. For your penance, say five Our Fathers—proper Our Fathers—and now make an act of contrition.”

/>   12

  Molly met him at the door in sweatpants. He hugged her with a force fit to shatter a porcupine. She laughed and hugged him back. But she couldn’t pull away. Prin held her so long that the children left their crafts and colouring books and crowded into the threshold. They tugged on their parents’ legs and pushed on their elbows, trying either to join the hug or figure out why Daddy was hugging Mommy for so long. Molly was wondering the same. Every follow-up appointment since his surgery had been fine.

  Had someone called from the doctor’s office?

  Was there news?

  “Prin, is everything okay?” she asked.

  “I’m happy to see you, to see all of you!” he said.

  He proposed skipping the Instant Pot for a night and going out for brick-oven pizza, to cheers all around, and picked up around the house while Molly changed. When they got back from the restaurant, he insisted on putting the kids to bed on his own while Molly had a glass of wine in the living room.

  “Prin, now I’m really wondering what’s going on,” she said.

  He joined her on the couch, smiling and studying her big blue eyes, the forever rose in her cheeks. She wasn’t slim, she was gaunt. She wasn’t sleek, she was cold, whereas Molly was warm and full and waiting to find out what they were celebrating.

  “Like I said, I’m happy to see you, to see all of you,” he said.

  And he didn’t even mean it that way! Or rather he did, he was happy to see all of her. He remembered hugging Wende. Then, as now, it was crinkly and poky, like carrying a bundle of brush.