Roger didn’t come to the store, though Paul showed, and he knew less than we did. His reaction to the news was the same as ours: utter disbelief. I tried to find Roger, but couldn’t, and the store was busy with people buying things they didn’t need in order to get information. Most asked me because I know Brother David best, but I either shrugged and rang them up, or I sent them to the correct line.
At one-thirty, Sharla walks to the door and locks it. Two people pound on the glass, and she crosses her arms and glares until they leave.
“Thank you,” I say. One more question, whispered so as not to be overheard by the newly posted guards at the door, and I might have lost it.
Sharla manages a weak smile as she passes. “I’m going to get my kids early. I’ll see you at the Oval?”
I nod. Benny is paler than ever—even his hair looks pasty—and he grimaces before he walks out the door behind Sharla. Indy exits the aisle where she stocks packaged snacks they found at 59th Street, rubbing at the bags under her eyes. I saw my own dark circles in the mirror earlier, and I look the same, if not worse.
I grab my things and stare longingly at the adult section. If I wasn’t pregnant, I’d drink anything to dull me for whatever is about to happen. Peach schnapps mixed with crème de menthe. You name it, I’d drink it, just to take the edge off this fear.
“Ready?” Indy asks. She’s pulled down her hat and wrapped her scarf around three times to hide her face.
I put on my hat and scarf, then link my arm through hers. We pass Ed and Ginger on our way out. “Lock up?” I ask them.
“Might do some shopping first,” Ed says.
This is a game to him, a lark. I should punch him right in his stupid face, but I say, “Save some for the rest of us, will you?”
He grins wider. “Maybe I’ll find April something that’ll make her real grateful.”
Outside, in the cold gray light, Indy whispers, “I’m going to murder him, Sylvie. I swear I’m going to murder all these motherfuckers.”
“Yes, we are,” I whisper back.
She breathes out. Our feet move along the path at a normal pace, though everything feels slow and dreamlike, from the dark branches waving against the gray sky to the people making their way to the Oval in the distance.
We round the last building. Brother David stands in the bed of a pickup truck in the center of the Oval garden. People have already gathered, and we can’t get close, but Brother David picks us out in the crowd. His smile is grim and resigned, and that scares me most of all.
We stop at the back of the throng. Paul comes up behind us, then Micah and Rissa, April and Lucky. May makes her way over with Emily, Chen, and Jin. I take Jin from her arms and hold him to my chest. Whatever this is, they’ve made babies come to watch.
“They have Lincoln,” Micah whispers. “I don’t know why.”
I think I do, and I watch as he’s led across mulched earth to the truck. Walt picks him up to deposit him in the bed, then climbs to stand beside him. Lincoln’s face is pink, streaked with tears. He turns to view Brother David, but Walt spins him to face in our direction.
“Something very grave has come to light,” Walt calls out, and the crowd silences. His face is all sympathy as he watches Lincoln, and his hand grasps Lincoln’s shoulder. “This boy, and very likely many of your children, were led to believe Father David was a friend. That friend took advantage of them in the worst way possible.”
Gasps come from many. A few heads shake with righteous indignation. Ten feet in front of us, Sharla sucks her teeth and crosses her arms, unconvinced, and I like her more than ever. Yesterday, I thought we’d have no problem rallying people to leave. Now, I’m not so sure, especially since they’re so quick to believe something that flies in the face of all rational evidence.
“You may have heard him speak about taking the children somewhere safer than here,” Walt says. “It was a lie to get them where he wanted. The Lexers are thawing and all the food in the city is gone. This is the safest place, with three meals a day and gates to protect you.”
Walt inclines his head. “Did this man touch you?” he asks Lincoln. Lincoln attempts to peer over his shoulder, but Walt’s hand tightens. “Don’t be afraid. Tell them.”
Lincoln watches the sky over the crowd and nods. The people mutter. Brother David stares straight ahead as quiet outrage becomes a loud buzz.
“We used to have laws to protect us from pedophiles,” Walt shouts over their voices. “Though I always thought the death penalty should be the only option. Times like now, I’m thankful justice can be done.” He spins to Brother David. “Do you have anything to say for yourself?”
Brother David moves his eyes from the horizon to Walt. There’s compassion in them still, though all I feel is a burning hatred. “No,” he says.
I don’t know why he doesn’t scream out his innocence, but he must have a reason, and I hope it’s that he has a plan. Walt dips his head at the muttering crowd in a There you have it, folks manner. He helps Lincoln to the ground, where Lincoln stands with slumped shoulders. Micah and Rissa are at Lincoln’s side seconds later, and he throws himself into their arms.
Tai hops in the driver’s seat of the pickup. The crowd follows it along the dirt to the path, then out the inner gate to First Avenue Loop. We’re herded behind them by two men I don’t know well, but whom I will be sure to see dead before this is over. Jin struggles in my arms. I put his head under my chin, my hand on his silky hair, and make shushing noises that quiet him, though they do nothing for my own distress.
The pickup stops at the outer gate. We move around the crowd toward the side of the truck. Brother David sees us coming. The shake of his head is subtle, but his eyes tell us clearly to stay away. To not risk implicating ourselves.
I clasp Jin tighter. I can’t cry here, where I’ll be seen, not if I want to keep on with this mission to rescue StuyTown. But I’m not sure I do. So many believe Walt. It’s in their body language, in the way they stare at Brother David with disgust. They can have Walt and his safety. They can go down with the ship for all I care.
Kitty pushes her way through until she’s at the side of the pickup. She stares at Walt, her mouth an upside-down U, and then turns and lifts a wrinkled hand to Brother David. “Bless you, Father.”
Exclamations rise from the mass of people. Brother David squeezes her hand and nods, his lower lip quivering beneath his beard.
“You’re sure you have nothing more to say? Maybe in private?” Walt asks. “Confession is good for the soul.”
Brother David shakes his head slowly. He searches the crowd until he finds me, and his smile speaks of the times we’ve discussed love and suffering and a heart so aflame it’s willing to die for others. I hoped he had a plan to live, but now I’m sure his plan is the opposite.
I choke back a sob as he turns to Walt. “No mercy,” he says.
“Indeed,” Walt replies, his smile cold.
But Brother David wasn’t talking to Walt. He was talking to me.
The solid metal opens, revealing Lexers at the bars of the second gate. They reach inside with shredded fingers, their teeth clinking against iron. Debra is there, shirtless, with matted auburn hair. Marshall. Veronica. So many faces I recognize, slavering for a meal.
“Maybe you’ll make it,” Walt says. “Let’s see how you run in that dress.”
Brother David acts as if Walt hasn’t spoken. He shakes off the hands of his guards, climbs to the top of the pickup’s cab, and steps onto the brick wall. Then he faces us, his kind eyes a beacon of decency and virtue. If anyone is truly watching, his innocence is more than apparent.
“Execute judgment and righteousness,” he says, “and deliver him who is oppressed out of the hand of the oppressor.”
His voice doesn’t tremble. And neither does the rest of him before he falls into the Lexers beyond the wall.
106
We’ve come to our apartment, speechless about what happened. How quickly it happened. I can’
t cry. I can’t do anything but sit on a chair and watch the others cry. Or, in the case of Paul, slam things in the kitchen. Open a cabinet—slam. Close the cabinet—slam. Set his cup of water down—slam. Drink and slam it down again. He does it until the sound of shattering glass fills the silence. Indy rises from the couch and goes to him. Through the pass-through, I see her touch his arms, his face, before she pushes back his hair and speaks softly. All at once, he’s in tears, his giant body folded onto hers.
Micah and Rissa enter with Lincoln, who rushes to me. His face is pink and swollen, and he wipes his runny nose with his sleeve. “He didn’t do that, Sylvie.” His voice is wild. “He said to say it, but he didn’t do that. I swear.”
My heart aches at his anguish, and I take his sweet freckled face in my hands. “I know he didn’t. I never doubted him, not for a second.”
He nods, sniffling. Rissa wipes her eyes and takes him by the hand. “Let’s find something to eat. It’s Sylvie’s house, so you know there’s candy.”
She leads him away with a reassuring smile. At her age, I was on my own, in college and working, but I was having fun, not consoling small children who’d been forced to help murder their caretaker. She’s risen to the occasion with a grace beyond her years. I know Micah sees it by the way he watches her with a kind of awe, the same way Eric looks at me. Rissa’s not the only one who’s fallen like a ton of bricks.
I get to my feet. “Why did Brother David have him say that?”
“He told him to do what Walt said,” Micah whispers. “I’m not sure. Walt scared him enough that he won’t talk about it, and no one seems to know details. Did Roger say anything?”
“I haven’t seen him since this morning.”
Roger was absent from the entire spectacle. He knew what would happen, and he didn’t warn us or give us a chance to save Brother David. Every time I think he’s on our side, he shows me he’s not. He doesn’t know which side he’s on.
Maria, Grace, Eli, Harold, Brother David. It will never end unless we stop it. I’m tired of waiting. “I’ll be back,” I say.
The Oval is silent except for the groans and hisses of a zombie. I follow the sound to the inner gate on Avenue C Loop, knowing what I’ll find before I see it, though it’s no less horrifying for that.
Brother David is strung up on what remains of the old fence inside the loop wall. Arms stretched out and tied to iron, feet bound together. Almost crucified. I’m positive that’s not a coincidence. His eyes are dull silver. He snaps his teeth, struggling at the rope that binds his torn and bloody habit. His fingers are filthy and marred with bites. They’ve made him into a monster, first figuratively and now literally.
A few dozen residents look on, and I can’t tell if they’re horrified at the Lexer in their midst or at the taking of Brother David’s life. Sharla grabs her son’s and daughter’s hands to lead them away, throwing a dark look at where Walt admires his handiwork with a group of his people. He sees me coming and motions me to his side before he faces forward again. “I think I’ve made clear the punishment for diddling kids. It might seem harsh, but we have to protect the children.”
I nod, though protecting the children would mean not bringing Lexers through the gates. It would require not scaring them. If they haven’t already, they’ll see this in the morning on their way to school. They’ll know the kind man who never hurt them was punished, and they’ll live in terror that anyone could be next. Maybe that won’t be a coincidence, either.
“We shouldn’t be that surprised,” Walt says in a jokey tone. “He was a priest, after all.”
I force myself to speak, to smile. “True.”
If hate were a weapon, Walt would be dead on the ground. So would I, for that matter, because I hate myself for standing here and doing nothing. I’m awash in loathing, and I feel sorry for The Parasite, who’s known nothing but anger and fear and tension, and it hasn’t even made it into the world yet.
Walt speaks words I can’t hear over the rushing in my ears. Brother David snarls and bites at empty air with teeth still devoid of human flesh. They’re going to stay that way if it’s the last thing I ever do. My fingers itch to finish him off, and I eye Walt’s holster. I need one bullet, that’s all. But Regina is behind me and Tai to my right. I’d be dead before I moved two steps.
I stare at the ground instead of at Walt’s gun or Brother David. “Have you seen Roger?”
“Now that you mention it, no. You know Roger, he’s probably drunk somewhere. He was never very good on the follow-through. Maybe you can check on him?”
“Sure,” I say, and walk away.
After an hour of searching, I find Roger in his old apartment, sitting at the table with his head in his hands and a bottle of liquor in front of him.
“Coward,” I spit. “You’re a fucking coward. You let him be killed, and you don’t even show up to face him?”
Without lifting his head, Roger slides an envelope across the table. It’s addressed to me. I rip it open, unfolding the paper within to find neat handwriting.
Dear Sylvia,
By now, I’m gone. If Lincoln lied for me, as I insisted he should, he must be hurting. Tell him thank you, and that I love him, and please don’t let him carry that burden of guilt alone. Don’t blame Roger, either. He’ll need your encouragement to do what must be done.
It’s strange to know how you’re going to die, and I’d like to say I’m not afraid of that part, but I am. I remind myself that even Jesus was afraid in the garden, and I’m only human.
I take the paper to the window, my throat aching at the memory of our first meeting, where we stood at the stained-glass windows of his church and discussed this very subject. A tear runs down my cheek, and I blink to clear my eyes before I read the rest.
I hope that this isn’t in vain. Maybe that’s vain of me, no pun intended. (Are you smiling? I thought you, of all people, would appreciate a little wordplay.) But don’t we all hope for a life that benefits the greater good, even if our death is what achieves it?
Say a prayer for me. Or watch the sunset. Better yet, watch the sun rise. A new day will dawn, I just know it.
Your friend,
Bucky
I knew I’d grown to love the handsome, funny priest with the purest heart I’ve ever encountered, but I didn’t know how much I’d miss him. The dam inside me bursts, and I stand in the gray light and sob because he died as selflessly as he lived, and because he always knew just what to say, and because I’m so afraid it was all in vain.
I dry my face, fold the paper carefully, and tuck it into my pocket. Maybe I should toss this evidence of our friendship, but I refuse to let his final words go. There are lines I won’t cross in order to remain true to myself, and perhaps this is one of them.
“We found Coby last night, in Midtown,” Roger says, head still in his hands. “He gave up Brother David. He held out as long as he could, but he wanted it to stop.”
Cold creeps up my spine at his toneless words. I would like to live forever in ignorance of what Coby wanted to stop. “What else did he say?” I whisper, ready to run to our apartment and fight our way out.
“That Bridget knew. He said he spoke to you, but you didn’t know what he was talking about.”
My body wilts with overwhelming relief. Had Indy and I not played dumb, we’d be dead. “Were the others with him? Was Noli there?”
“Yes.”
“What happened to them?”
“Do you really want to know?”
I shake my head, though he can’t see. We never had that drink with Noli. I wish we had. I wish she’d waited for us, though there’s no guarantee this won’t be our fate, too.
Roger stands from the table with his back to me, pushing the bottle aside. “I didn’t drink any, in case you were wondering. I still might, though.”
Honestly, I don’t blame him, though we can’t afford him heading into a drunken spiral. “I’m sorry I called you a coward. Brother David said it wasn’t your fault.�
� I’m fudging the truth—though Brother David said not to blame Roger, to encourage him, all of this is Roger’s fault.
“He asked my brother to let everyone go. He promised no one would stay. Said you’d cross the water at the next freeze and never come back. He said Walt could watch them until then. Watch you leave. Said he was appealing to Walt’s better nature.”
I imagine how Brother David’s eyes must have shone as he gave Walt the choice to redeem himself. To be that one sinner. I wonder if he was surprised when Walt didn’t take it, or if he knew what the answer would be and pressed on regardless. Likely the latter.
“My brother laughed. He thought Brother David would crack under the pressure of telling everyone he molested kids. All he had to do was give up people here, the ones who were helping him, so he wouldn’t die in disgrace.” His laugh is short. “He underestimated him.”
I nod. Walt doesn’t understand that some things are more important than yourself. “But why didn’t Brother David tell everyone he was innocent? Why didn’t he fight?”
“Walt said if he said anything, fought him at all, he’d send Lincoln over the fence. He’d disappear at night, and everyone would think he tried to run from the shame.”
Walt’s cruelty leaves me speechless. I know it was an easy decision for Brother David to make, but that didn’t make the rest of it easy.
Roger turns with a shuddery breath. “I wanted to get him out. I asked my brother to put him in Quarantine to buy us some time.” His eyes flood with tears. “I’m sorry. As usual, I failed.”
I think of the note: He’ll need your encouragement. Of what Walt said only minutes ago: He was never very good on the follow-through. I walk to Roger and force myself to open my arms. He comes into them willingly, his chest quaking with sobs. “He underestimates you, too,” I say. “I hope you know that.”
The City Series (Book 3): Instauration Page 72
