Kirstin Valdez Quade - Night at the Fiestas - Stories

She thought of Collette’s grim warning that alcoholics never recovered. Had Father Paul spent the past twenty-eight years craving self-destruction, pulling back at the last minute each time? Maybe with Father Leon here to share duties, he’d let himself go — just an occasional sip at first, and then everything slid out from under him, leaving him to retreat into this insane story, paranoid and ashamed with his stash of empties.

Crystal flushed with irritation. Why couldn’t Father Paul just admit that he’d fallen off the wagon? Why this elaborate ruse? All that hoopla over being late, as if his minor sins needed so much more forgiveness than Crystal’s major ones, as if Crystal were expected to screw up, whereas it was a big fucking deal when he did. He couldn’t help proving to her just how bad she was, lording it over her, shoving it in her face. It wasn’t enough that she’d had to humiliate herself in confession? She had to humor him, too? “I’m going to get Collette,” she said.

“No! You can’t leave.” His voice dropped again. Father Paul reached for her arm, but she dodged his touch. “You have to help me. I’ve helped you.”

Crystal stepped back, looked around the room. “Okay. Fine. I’ll throw away your suitcase.”

Gladness lit through her at the prospect of escape. She’d walk briskly across the carpet, rolling the suitcase behind her, like a businesswoman at the airport. Down the back steps, and then she’d be outside in the cool day, free from the oppressive hush of the rectory, free from Father Paul and whatever demons had caught hold of him. “It’ll be okay,” she promised. The cheer in her voice was genuine. “Maybe get a bite to eat, splash some water on your face.”

He looked her up and down, his mouth tense. Some new emotion had shifted his expression — dissatisfaction that he hadn’t convinced her of Father Leon’s treachery, perhaps, or disappointment at her eagerness to leave.

“Why do you keep avoiding me, after all I’ve done?” Now he was looking not at her but at the sun-faded framed poster above her shoulder: the Pietà, a souvenir from someone’s long-ago trip to St. Peter’s Basilica. “You know,” he said calmly, “Father Leon doesn’t like you.”

“I know,” she said, though she hadn’t known, not exactly.

“He said we should let you go. He didn’t want you sitting in the front office.” Father Paul straightened now, oddly pleased.

Earlier, then, when Father Leon had glared at her from behind his desk, he hadn’t been merely irritated at the interruption; she saw now that he’d been horrified by her messy fecundity. No real surprise, but, still, Crystal had let herself believe that her body didn’t matter. She’d let herself believe that it was irrelevant to her work, that she was safe here and forgiven.

The real surprise, though, was that Father Paul wanted to hurt her. Courteous, heedful, absurd Father Paul. Father Paul, who saw pain in every face and gesture, whether it was there or not, wanted to hurt her, and that was what stung. She’d thought she could disdain Father Paul’s kindness, and that it would somehow remain intact: unconditional, holy, and inhuman. Astonishing that she had been capable of such faith.

“Well, who does that man think he is, telling us how to do things? I defended you. I put myself on the line for you.” His tone was wheedling. “I gave you the Santo Niño, too. Did you know the Santo Niño was my mother’s favorite?” He stuck out his chin, defiant. “Once a week she went to the Santuario in Chimayo. Used to walk there every Good Friday.”

“It was nice of you to give me the card,” Crystal said, regarding him with loathing. “I appreciated that.”

They stood facing each other, and time held steady. All her speculation, and Crystal didn’t know the first thing about this man. Then Father Paul bent suddenly at the waist, gasping like a sprinter.

When he rose, his face was purple. He backed against the wall, pushing against it with his palms as if it might relent and absorb him. “Forgive me. I never should have said any of that.” He slid to the floor. His black pants tugged up, and his head drooped to his knees.

“I forgive you.” Her voice was cold.

“Forgiveness,” Father Paul said, as though the word disgusted him. “Forgiveness is a drug, too. Believe me. You can forgive and forgive until you’re high on it and you can’t stop. It’ll numb you as much as any of that stuff.” He extended his foot and kicked the suitcase, which tipped, spilling bottles onto the carpet.

Crystal had the drowning sense that she’d lost track of what they were talking about.

“I know you don’t like me,” Father Paul said, looking up at her.

And what could Crystal say? Don’t be silly. Of course I do. And then there she’d be, lying to a priest.

She should leave, go back to the office and pretend that none of this had happened. Instead, she crossed the room and sat beside him.

“Please just hold me?” He looked at her as if asking permission, and when she neither gave nor withheld it, he leaned into her and rested his head on her shoulder.

She might have expected to be filled with a deep, sexual revulsion, but she wasn’t. She didn’t touch him, but she didn’t push him away, either. Instead, Crystal placed her head against the wall and waited.

Inside her, the babies stirred. She remembered the weekend and the icy horror that had swamped her when she realized how she’d put them at risk. She remembered the ultrasound stills, how she’d studied them, straining to connect the images to children, to her children, children who would come to shape her life. “Have you picked names?” the guy had asked Saturday night. She’d pretended to be asleep so that she wouldn’t have to lie. Where were her instincts? Where was the biological imperative to keep them safe? There must be some blockage, some deep damage that left her so cold.

Crystal saw herself standing on that ratty street at dawn, waiting for the cab to take her away from her mistake. But instead of the cab it was the Santo Niño who would find her. The soles of his shoes would be worn away, his little toes poking through the leather. He would take Crystal’s hand in his pudgy one and lead her home. It was a lovely notion, and Crystal almost allowed herself to sink into it.

But no. Crystal saw that she had misunderstood. In giving her the Santo Niño, Father Paul hadn’t meant that He would save her . And he hadn’t meant that the twins would save her, either. Even Father Paul, with all his hope, knew better. Instead, he’d been offering the prayer that the Santo Niño might save those babies from whatever Crystal was bound to do to them.

Father Paul’s head was heavy, and she could smell his scalp: a warm, sour smell. For a moment in confession, she’d believed that he could absolve her. And, even now that he was diminished and trembling and possibly insane, part of her still believed.

“I don’t even talk to them,” Crystal said.

Father Paul took a deep, shuddering breath, like a child calming himself after a long cry.

The sun filtered through the lace curtains above their heads. The window’s reflection was a mottled square of light on the glass of the framed poster, obscuring the image.

Crystal saw that who she was didn’t matter to Father Paul, that in his mind she’d turned into something else completely. Mary Magdalene, maybe: the whore who instead of washing His feet Cloroxed the bathroom. Or the Virgin up there on the wall, holding her dead adult son across her lap. Father Paul’s own mother, even. And, for reasons she didn’t understand, Crystal didn’t resent this. Maybe later she would; maybe in a day, or in an hour, she’d feel compromised and used, and would hate Father Paul for it; but right now it seemed so easy to sit with him. The relief was astonishing, that Crystal could be the kind of person who might meet another person’s need.