by Nicole Baart
But the emergency wasn’t what Abigail expected. There was nothing she could do to prevent it, nothing she could have done to anticipate it.
When Hailey finally mustered the strength to say the words, they struck Abigail with such force she gasped for breath. She choked so hard that her roommate jumped from the top bunk of their bed and caught her as she collapsed.
“Abby, Mom’s dead.”
By the time I made it home, it was getting late. My apartment was dim and filled with long shadows. I stood with my back against the door, the strap of my purse barely clinging to my limp fingers, and listened to the hum of the refrigerator. There was a digital clock in the sleek, stainless steel door, and as I watched, it blinked from 8:44 to 8:45.
Eight forty-five. Had it been twelve hours? Had half a day passed since Hailey climbed into her bathtub—fully clothed, with her hair tied back and her makeup in place, her lips full and soft and shining with berry-scented gloss—and pulled the razor across her wrists? It didn’t seem real. It couldn’t be real.
But I knew it was.
“You’re selfish,” I whispered into the fading light. As if she could hear me. Where was she? Purgatory? For all her failings, from the day Hailey decided to go forward with her confirmation, she never once stopped praying to and believing in the God she clung to with all her might. Maybe her penance over those years had been enough to cover this one last indefensible sin. Or was Hailey’s suicide unpardonable? How could God forgive her if she was unable to repent for this final, deplorable act of transgression? Though I knew that many would count her past the point of pardon, everything inside me rebelled at the thought of my sister in hell.
“Oh, God,” I breathed into the stillness, his name an implicit prayer. “It’s up to me, isn’t it?”
I had intermittently attended a handful of different churches since the first year I lived in Florida, but something about this staggering circumstance demanded the solemnity of my youth. A Bible and a well-used but recently untouched book of prayers were collecting dust in the bottom drawer of my dresser. I grabbed them both and added to the pile in my arms the glass-beaded rosary that hung from the corner of my armoire mirror.
As I crept back to the living room, I could not help but stoop beneath the weight of my own inadequacies. I believed in God, but I had too many doubts and
questions to consider myself very spiritual. What was I supposed to say? What was I supposed to do? A deep ache for my mother emptied me like a long exhalation. She would know.
I sank to the floor in front of my coffee table and laid the books on the spotless glass in front of me. But the rosary I held in my hands, tumbling the edged glass beads between my fingertips as if I could coax the sound of her prayers from their smooth angles. It was comforting somehow, to hold what she had held, to roll the blue green glass against my fingers and hear in my mind the echo of those words that played a quiet soundtrack throughout my youth. I didn’t realize that I was crying until the beads were suddenly hot and wet, almost slipping through my desperate hold.
Passing the back of my hand over my mouth, my nose, I reached for the prayer book. Mom had written all over it, inscribing prayer requests, reminders, and notes across the empty margins and nearly filling every bit of blank space. When I opened the pages, it released a bit of her, a scent maybe or the remnant of a decade-old memory that made my lips pull into the faintest imprint of a smile.
“I wish you were here,” I said and was startled by the sound of my own voice.
On the inside cover of the small, leather-bound book, Mom had copied an eight-step process and labeled it “How to Pray the Rosary.” Most people at St. Mary’s considered the rosary pretty old-school, but with each year that passed, my mom seemed to sink deeper into the tradition and ritual of her youth. Maybe she began to feel a certain kinship with her grandmother as she aged. Or maybe she felt as if she had no choice but to invoke a higher power.
I ran a heavy thumb over the smudged lines of her penciled words. The Apostle’s Creed was followed by Our Father, then three Hail Marys and Glory be to the Father, back to Our Father and through the whole process again. . . . I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to remember. But I didn’t. The phrases were jumbled and dim, as if I were staring across a great distance without the aid of my contacts. I would have to read every single one.
Tucking the cross of the rosary in the soft flesh of my palm, I used my forefinger and thumb to pick out a single bead and began. I didn’t know if I was praying my sister through purgatory or praying for a miracle. I didn’t know if I
was wasting the air around me on useless ramblings or if each word had the power to release the very breath of life.
When a decade of beads had passed beneath my hands, I whispered the prayer that my mother had copied in her book: “O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell, lead all souls to Heaven, especially those who have most need of your mercy. Amen. Amen. Amen.” I said it again and again and again until it faded of its own accord. Amen.
So shall it be, through the mercy of God. “Be merciful,” I whispered. I didn’t know if I was asking for Hailey or for me.
XII
The days passed quickly, and Abigail became adept at spiraling through the inelegant dance that was her relationship with Tyler. At times she drew close to him, steeling herself to probe for the answers she sought, to learn why he left Hailey and how and when. But then he would come on to her or make some offhand observation that would fill her with such revulsion, she’d pull away to nurse the fury that made the air feel electric whenever he was around.
Abigail wanted to hurt Tyler. She wanted to love him and leave him or make his life miserable or ruin any relationship he embarked upon. Whatever it took to break his heart. To make him pay for what she assumed resulted in the death of her sister. But revenge turned out to be easier said than done, and Abigail found herself illogically frozen. So instead of making plans, instead of calculating with any amount of certainty what she hoped to accomplish in British Columbia, she merely went through the motions. She lived her new life because it was all she could bring herself to do.
Working for Eli meant that Abigail was rarely at a loss for something to occupy her hands or her mind. Her work schedule was rigorous, and Eli made sure that she was never bored when they worked alone together on weekday mornings. Contrary to his country-bumpkin visage, Eli turned out to be a full-fledged historian, a dabbling philosopher, and a would-be theologian. He had an endless supply of questions and topics hot enough to make Abigail forget herself and get lost in his musings.
Sometimes, while Abigail was busy with her head in a barrel, Eli would abandon bottling entirely and wander over to regale her with his theories and reflections. Leaning against a newly washed
barrel, he’d pepper her with questions, then fall into a long monologue about his own belief system, ideas, and speculations.
Abigail wasn’t opposed to Eli’s loquaciousness. In fact, she welcomed his company and the authoritarian way in which he communicated his opinions. He gave her a lot to think about without asking too much in return. It was just enough to keep her mind planted somewhat firmly in the now, leaving little freedom for introspection into either her future or her past.
“What’s with this purgatory thing that Catholics believe?” Eli drilled her one morning late in June. “I learned about it in social studies when I was a kid growing up in Washington, but what with the Reformation and all, you guys don’t still believe in that stuff, do you?”
“I’m not a Catholic anymore, so I don’t know why you’re asking me,” she said.
Eli frowned at her. “You’re one of the guys. And you’re a former Catholic, so you still count. Spill it: what’s with purgatory?”
Abigail ignored him and picked up her hose. Training the nozzle inside the barrel, she depressed the handle and sent a jet of cold water against the cleaning solution–soaked sides. A fine mist rose out of the opening and lighted on Abigail’s arms, her
cheeks. It made her sneeze.
“Don’t think you’re getting off so easy.” Eli raised his voice over the thunder of water. “I have questions and you’ve got answers.”
“What makes you think I have answers?” Abigail shouted back. “I was a nominal Catholic at best.”
“You’re a smart girl,” Eli countered. “You know your stuff.”
Abigail finished up in the barrel and then directed her hose at the floor. She helped the water along its path to the drains in the middle of the slanting cement, making sure she got a little too close to Eli’s feet so that she sprinkled him with some of the frigid spray.
“Hey!” he yelled, leaping backward.
“Sorry, just doing my job.”
Eli reached over and took the hose from her. He tossed it on the ground and then crossed his arms over his chest in challenge. “You’re done here. I need help labeling this morning.”
With a shrug, Abigail followed Eli to the counter where they hand-labeled special bottles. There was a machine that did most of the large orders, but whenever Thompson Hills produced a particularly special or rare wine, all the bottles were labeled by hand—Eli’s hands. For these extraordinary vintages, Eli employed a graphic designer who made the labels look exquisite, one-of-a-kind.
Abigail surveyed the tall, slim bottles and the flat stacks of newly printed labels. They were adorned in what looked like a pencil sketch of a woman’s slender back in blurred, charcoal lines. She was looking over her shoulder and holding a delicate wineglass in her outstretched hand. The glass was just about to tip.
“Pretty,” Abigail commented.
“It’s our first ice wine,” Eli told her. “I’m very proud of it. We even got our VQA stamp of approval, and that’s not easy to do with ice wine.”
Abigail knew that VQA was the Vintners Quality Alliance and that Eli would never dream of selling a wine that didn’t have their sign and seal. Thompson Hills may not have been considered one of the finest wineries in the area, but Eli made a point of doing absolutely everything by the book. But though she knew this small, obscure fact, Abigail had never heard of ice wine before.
“It was an accident, you know,” Eli began without waiting for her to question him. “Ice wine, I mean. They say that in the eighteenth century a German vineyard owner was away on business during harvest-time. Well, if he’d had even an ounce of sense, he would’ve known that he’d come home to a frozen vineyard. Lucky accident though, I guess, ‘cause rather than abandoning the crop, he harvested the frozen grapes and processed them anyway. Winter wine.”
Eli held up a bottle, letting the light refract through the garnet-colored liquid inside. It did seem icy to Abigail, like the frozen-juice mess of holly berries on the driveway of her childhood home. She remembered how she loved to step on the fallen fruit and how Lou yelled at her for it. The sudden burst of angry red against the snowy, sable-shadowed concrete was worth it every time.
“We’ll see how it goes. It’s a lot of work.” Suddenly he glanced at Abigail. “Maybe you’ll be here in the fall and be able to participate in a midnight harvest with us.”
Abigail didn’t squirm visibly, but a strange look must have crossed her face because Eli’s eyes narrowed. For a moment Abigail was sure he knew more than he let on, that he suspected her intentions at Thompson Hills were less than mundane, little more than temporal.
But then it passed. Eli looked away and changed the subject. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten about the purgatory thing.”
“Oh, I knew you hadn’t.” Abigail sighed, though she was actually happy to reclaim the less personal ground of corporate theology. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything.”
“There’s not much to say.” Abigail grabbed a bottle and a label and closely watched Eli’s hands go through the motions as she talked. “Purgatory is neither heaven nor hell. It’s a place between, where souls destined for heaven go for the purification of their sins. A place of absolution, of paying the price.”
“There’s a price for sin?”
“It’s called satisfaction. Like you’ve taken something from God, and he has to be repaid. The debt has to be satisfied.”
“So purgatory is the place where you go to atone for what you did wrong. It’s the step before you’re allowed to enter heaven,” Eli concluded.
“In a nutshell.”
“What about forgiveness?”
“God always forgives the truly repentant, but there will always be consequences for our actions, too. Those consequences have to play out.”
Eli cocked an eyebrow at Abigail. “So if I cheated on a test when I was a kid and wasn’t caught, I’ll have to sit in detention in purgatory?”
Abigail glared at him good-naturedly. “You’re being obtuse on purpose. Forgiveness requires true repentance and repentance has to be more than a feeling. ‘Penitential acts are the real fruits of repentance,’” she quoted. “Hey, I remembered something from Sunday school!”
Eli grumbled an enigmatic reply, and Abigail couldn’t tell if he was laughing with her or at her. After a moment he muttered, “I knew there was a reason I wasn’t a Catholic. Who needs purgatory? I can’t help thinking that this life is purgatory—a place to work out our penitence.”
“But what if you don’t work out that penance on earth?”
“In the case of, say, a sin you were not sorry for?”
“Or one you were unable to ask forgiveness for,” Abigail finished, surprising herself. This was dangerous ground, this seemingly innocuous early morning conversation.
“I thought that’s what the prayers of the saints were for. Isn’t that why you guys light candles and pray for family members who have died? Isn’t it your job to help them out of purgatory?”
“It’s ultimately up to God. But you’re right; it’s the responsibility of the living, too.” She didn’t realize that her hands were inert, clutching the bottle and wrinkling the lovely label until Eli cleared his throat. “Sorry,” she said quickly, trying to smooth out the sepia-toned paper.
Eli wrenched it from her and threw it away. “I want my labels perfect.”
They worked in silence for a few minutes, Abigail forcing herself to focus on getting a few labels just right. Flawlessly straight. Faultlessly flat. She was struggling to erase the talk of purgatory from her mind, of sins unforgiven and contrition without conclusion, of sins yet to come and unforgivable, when Eli broke the stillness.
“Do you believe in it?”
“Excuse me?”
“Purgatory,” Eli clarified. “You said you’re not a Catholic anymore. Do you still believe in purgatory?”
Abigail dragged her thumb over the top half of a label, pressing out an air bubble and sealing the seam. “I don’t know,” she said, unable to stop herself from responding, although all she wanted to do was forget that he ever brought up such a weighted topic. “I guess I’d like to believe that God can see past what we’ve done to understand why we did it. Maybe our reasons should count for something.” Out of the corner of her eye, Abigail watched Eli regard her.
“I’m a relatively new believer,” he admitted, “but this whole purgatory thing doesn’t seem very grace filled to me.”
“It’s not about grace,” Abigail said quietly. “It’s about judgment.”
†
Though Eli usually loved to talk about things that kept Abigail on her toes, there were some days that he was quiet, lost in his own thoughts, and stubbornly tight-lipped. On those days, Abigail held her counsel and did her job without wavering from her task unless Eli specifically instructed her otherwise. She tried to keep out of his way, but every once in a while he would very intentionally stroke his surly mood by prying into Abigail’s personal life.
“What are you doing for Canada Day?” he asked her one morning after they had worked in detached silence for well over an hour.
“Canada Day?” she repeated, completely nonplussed. “When you live in Canada, isn’t every day Canada day?�
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Eli didn’t crack a smile at what Abigail was sure he realized was a joke. “It’s Canada’s birthday,” he said snappishly. “If you’re going to live in this country, it would serve you well to learn a little about it.”
Abigail didn’t apologize for her ignorance—she figured that when Eli was in one of his moods, he didn’t deserve her regret—but she did ask Paige about the holiday.
“It’s the day Canada was officially recognized by the British government as a commonwealth,” Paige recited, her eyes glazing over. Then she perked up. “It’s like the Fourth of July without the backyard fireworks.”
“We never did fireworks in the backyard,” Abigail said, feigning offense. “It was always bottle rockets and Roman candles on the driveway.”
“Exactly.” Paige jabbed the air with a mock angry fist. “But at least we get a day off. A bunch of us are going boating. Do you ski?”
Thinking back to the handful of times that Abigail could claim to have ever set foot on a boat, she found Paige’s question almost humorous. “Uh, no,” she said, using her tone to convey just how strongly she felt about participating in water sports.
“Baby,” Paige teased. “Come anyway. There’s a water tube built for two. We’ll pair you up with just the right guy and then make sure to toss you on a corner. Insta-romance.”
Abigail put her finger to her lips as if to shush Paige. “Enough. You’re not talking me into it. I like to keep my feet in the vicinity of dry ground.”
“You’re missing out,” Paige singsonged.
“I don’t care,” Abigail singsonged back.
Part of the reason why Abigail wasn’t interested in Paige’s holiday invitation was her suspicion that Tyler would be one of the bodies taking up space on the boat. When it came to Tyler, she tried to walk the careful line between subtle flirtation and avoidance, and Abigail was convinced that spending uninterrupted hours with the object of her obsession would result in the balance being tipped—with potentially devastating consequences.
