Blood Orange (42 page)

fter the AA meeting Lexy went to coffee with the two women
.who had introduced themselves at the coffee urn. She was surprised they asked her to join them. The collar intimidated most people. But they were both lapsed Catholics and curious. They wanted
to know the differences between the Catholic and Episcopal
churches. They’d each had more than enough to do with male
priests and asked how it was for her. Did the men respect her? Did
the congregation know she was an alcoholic?

“If you ask me, half the Catholic clergy needs AA,” Marnie, a
schoolteacher, said. “Drink and the cloth go together.”

“‘Specially if you’re Irish,” said Annie, and this started them
talking about their Irish families, about their mothers and fathers,
drunk uncles and maiden aunts who sipped sherry all day, and how
eager they had been to leave home, get married, and start the cycle
all over again.

Lexy listened with half her concentration turned inward. Where
her fingertips had touched Dorothy, the whorls of Lexy’s prints still
buzzed electrically. Marnie was speaking of her parents and all the mistakes they had made. “In the end, though, you gotta forgive
them. It’s plain stupid not to.”

“Once you’ve had kids yourself-“

Marnie groaned, and she and Annie laughed, sharing whatever it
was they knew by virtue of having been mothers that Lexy never
would.

When women had first been ordained in the Episcopal Church
the problem of what to call them had seemed insurmountable.
Father was out, of course; and even the standbys Reverend and
Pastor had masculine associations in the minds of most people.
Ultimately the women Lexy knew had accepted Ma’am or, more
commonly, just their first names. Lexy was glad no one called her
Mother Neuhaus. She had never wanted to be a mother, and the
honorific was so inappropriate it would have embarrassed her with
its connotations of, if not maternity, wisdom and sanctity.

For the first time in many years she thought about her aversion
to motherhood and felt the smallest pinch of regret followed by an
uncomfortable tightness in her stomach. Would she be more tolerant if she had children? Would she understand people betterDana, her mother?

Lexy still had not told her mother that Micah was dead. His
body remained in the funeral home waiting for her to decide
whether to tell her mother a palatable lie or the truth and watch her
suffer. Lexy felt meanness in her like nausea. She threw down
money to cover the bitter coffee and sweet churro, said good-bye,
and hurried out of the restaurant.

As if by leaving, she could escape herself. She had been touched
by God beside Dorothy’s bed, but that was only the beginning, the
door opening. She had to take the steps, walk through into whatever waited beyond.

The air was cool and damp, and she raised her face to it, wanting
to be washed clean. As she drove through the dark city, her
mother’s image sat beside her. The red and green lights at intersections blurred and doubled and tripled. She blinked, but her eyes
filled again, and the tears rolled down her cheeks, unstoppable. She
understood how hard most people tried to do the right thing, how
often they were like her and made a mess of their lives despite the
good intentions.

You’ve got to forgive them, Marnie had said. It’s plain stupid not
to.

Whatever Dorothy had done to earn her daughter’s resentment,
it had been, in the end, pointless. It wasn’t necessary for Lexy to
know what caused the rift between Dorothy and Ellen Brownlee;
she knew it was as pointless as the anger Lexy had felt against her
parents for so long that she could not remember a time when it was
not a part of her. The lateness of the hour, the caffeine buzzing
through her system, and the otherworldly experience at Dorothy’s
bedside combined. For the first time Lexy saw her mother as a child
of God, one of the billions of souls struggling in billions of ways to
reach the light.

Lexy had read the Gospels and tried to memorize the Psalms,
she had preached and counseled, and ten thousand times she had
asked God to forgive her trespasses as she forgave those who trespassed against her. But she had never really understood that the
prayer meant she must not just say she forgave, not just say the
words and then pretend. She had to forgive. If she wanted God to
forgive her, this was the bargain, the deal, the demand.

Instead of driving home to Pacific Beach, she took the
Washington Street exit off Interstate 5 and turned left on Gold finch. It was after two A.M. now, and Bella Luna was shut down
tight. There was no one on the Mission Hills streets. She could have
walked there wearing a suit of gold and been unchallenged.

A safe neighborhood, Dana had called it. And then, as if to prove
the point, Lexy saw her running down Fort Stockton, wearing her
gray sweats and a hooded T-shirt. For years afterward, Lexy wondered if she would ever have gone to Dana’s house to ask her forgiveness had she not seen her that night on the street. And if she
had stayed away, would she have been able to move beyond her
anger and self-loathing? Dana’s sudden appearance seemed an indication that God meant to help her through the door and support
her in the hard times beyond.

She turned her car into the curb, braked, and put it in Park. She
got out and stood by the open door. Dana slowed to a stop. The
night was cool enough that her breath condensed in the air between
them.

Lexy said, “Sit with me, will you?” If Dana said no, she would
ask again. She would beg if she had to.

When they were inside with the windows up, the space almost
smothered Lexy. She quickly rolled down her window and rested
her head on the back of the seat. She wished it could be like when
she was with Dorothy and the right words had come to her without
effort. Instead she had to struggle through her apology to Dana,
muffing words, and sometimes the sentences barely made sense
even to her.

When she finished Dana stared straight ahead. The silence had
weight and texture and took up space.

Lexy tried again. “I wish I could say that I said what I did because I was in shock and I didn’t mean any of it. But I want to try to
be honest here. I knew what I was saying, and I meant every word. That’s what shames me the most. There’s something in me, Dana,
that can be so cruel and unforgiving. I wanted to hurt you. If I
could’ve killed you with words, I would’ve.”

She cut her eyes to the right, gauging Dana’s reaction. Her
friend’s strong little chin was set hard.

“I have so much rage in me, Dana. It’s why I see the therapist.
It’s been there a long time, it goes way back. Micah had his depression. I was the angry one.”

“But a lot of what you said was true,” said Dana. “I am a liar, and
I did cheat on David. In a way, what happened to your brother, that
was my fault.”

“You know, Dana, if it hadn’t been you it would have been
something else. He was never stable. And even so there’s no excuse
for the things I said. I’m a priest.” Anger was not a sin; it was part of
the human condition. Except when it took pleasure in another’s
pain. Then it was a very dark thing. “You’re the best friend I ever
had.”’

“Me too.”

They watched the empty street.

Lexy said, “I want you to know what’s happening with me. I’m
going to get Micah cremated, and then in a couple of days I’ll take
him up to Wyoming and tell my mom what happened. I think I’ll
spread his ashes over the Tetons. He loved those mountains.” She
paused until she could speak without tears. “But first, tomorrow,
I’m going to ask the bishop to replace me at St. Tom’s.”

“No.”

“I’ve got to get away, Dana, and we both know that if I’m gone
for six months or a year Father Bartholomew can’t handle the
church. The bishop’ll appoint an interim who can manage the job.”

“I don’t want you to go, Lexy. The last couple of days I haven’t been able to stop thinking about what happened between us, and
apart from everything else, I just hated to think we weren’t friends
anymore. You’re like my sister.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“And I want you to know … about the kidnapping … I forgive
Micah for that.”

“How can you? It was a terrible thing. Nothing you did can excuse that.”

“I don’t excuse it. You’re right, it was a terrible thing. But I do
forgive him.”

She and Dana moving along parallel but independent lines had
reached the same destination. Lexy smiled, thinking of the people
who said there was no God.

“I played my part, Lexy. I did wrong, and he did wrong in return. But he brought her back, and he never harmed her. I saw her
laugh today, at Imogene’s. Laugh and twirl and play games. She’s
going to be all right. But what I did…. You said I broke his heart.
That can’t ever be made right.” Dana reached for Lexy’s hand.
“Don’t leave St. Tom’s.”

Tears filled Lexy’s eyes. “You don’t know how much it means to
me to hear you say that. But, there are things you don’t know-shit,
I barely know them myself. I have a lot of work to do before I’m fit
to be a priest again.”

“No, no, you’re a wonderful-“

“In seminary there was stuff I never talked about, feelings I had
about my family and myself and Micah. I thought I didn’t have to,
that the collar and being sober would make the bad stuff go
away…. Well, I was wrong, and now I need to get myself straight
with God.”

“Will you stay in Wyoming?”

Lexy laughed. “I might need to do penance, but that’s asking a bit too much. I’m going back to the retreat house in Warrenton if
they’ll have me.”

“For how long?”

“As long as it takes, I guess.” Lexy yawned. “Then I hope the
bishop’ll let me go back to St. Tom’s. He might not. You know he
can be a real hard-nose sometimes.”

“I’m going to miss you.”

“You have Bailey and David.”

“Maybe.” Dana’s head fell back against the headrest. “I don’t
know any more about anything than you do, Lexy. And I’m so tired
I can’t even begin to think about it. When I do it’s like I’m on the
bottom of one of those football pile-ons. There are four threehundred-pound linemen on top of me.”

“If there’s anything I-“

“We’ve talked. It’s up to him now.”

In the shadows of the front seat they sat with too much to say
and most of their energy gone.

“I’ll drive you home.”

“Let me make you coffee and French toast.”

Lexy laughed and rubbed her eyes. “Dana Cabot’s sinful French
toast. I thought I’d never taste it again. And coffee. Yes, coffee.
God, that sounds good. Do you have any half-and-half?”

Dana smiled. “A full quart.”

“Bliss,” said Lexy with a sigh as she turned the key in the ignition and shifted into Drive. “And after that I’m going up to your
guest room and climb into bed and sleep until noon. Can I do
that?”

“C)f course you can.”

.n early December on a clear, cool day in midweek, Dana and
.Bailey went shopping at the nursery opposite St. Tom’s. The
owner’s big Rhodesian ridgeback was there, standing guard beside
the seedling trays. Bailey put her hand out, knuckles first, as she had
been taught, and the long pink tongue swiped it. She giggled and
hid behind Dana.