Conceived Without Sin (44 page)

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"What just happened? What did you tell him?" Donna asked.

"I told him that I would never speak to him again if he dumped Ellie," Buzz said, melancholy in his voice.

"Oh, Buzz," Donna said, her own sadness creeping up, surrounding her like the chill in the air. "Why
does life have to suck all the time?"

She began to cry.

He put an arm around her shoulders. "It doesn't have to suck, Donna. We can find joy in sadness."

"That doesn't make sense," she said between sobs.

Buzz's eyes were dry.

"I don't know if it makes sense or not. I may have lost my best friend just now. But I know he did the right thing. There's always joy in that. I know you, Donna; you would
never have had anything to do with Sam if he dumped Ellie the day before her wedding."

"Don't be so sure, Mr. Buzz," she said weakly.

"Oh?"

"Oh nothing. You're right. Something got into him. It's all my fault. We were looking at each other… he got confused, that's all."

"Don't blame yourself," Buzz told her. Her tears had subsided.

After a long while, she said, "Ironic, isn't it? He could have
had me any time he wanted. Now he can't. Ever."

Buzz was silent. He sensed she wanted to tell him more.

"I'm going into the Poor Clares next month," she said with resolve, lifting her head and shoulders. "Sam didn't know. If he did, none of this would have ever happened. He was about to abandon Ellie over a ghost."

"Donna! The Poor Clares! Why didn't you tell me?" There was a small hurt in his
voice.

"I tried to tell you. You were so happy about going to Fatima that I wanted to wait until after the wedding. You were so happy about the wedding, too! I didn't want to distract you.

"Oh, there were a million reasons that seemed so important an hour ago. Now they seem stupid. I didn't find out that they accepted me until a week ago. I was hedging my bets, thinking I could change my mind
and only my parents would know that I chickened out. Boy, was my timing lousy."

"You can say that again," Buzz said automatically.

"My timing was lousy."

He laughed lightly.

"Donna?"

"Yeah," she said, looking up at him from her cradle in his arm.

"I love you, you know," he said sadly.

"Yes, I know. It's the latest fad."

A heavy silence ensued.

Donna spoke first. "I don't think Ellie will ever
know how tempting it was to tell her what Sam said to me on the balcony."

"What stopped you?"

"I don't know. It wasn't one thing." She paused. "I gambled that you were trying to talk sense into Sam. The Poor Clares. God's grace. Mostly, though, it was Ellie. She's been so nice to me lately. She's a good girl. I was wrong to judge her so harshly when I first met her. Did you know that she went
to confession with me this morning?"

"You're kidding! That's wonderful. What happened?"

"Last night, I told her I was going into the Poor Clares. She asked me if she could get me a gift or something. I asked her to go to confession and she agreed. She met me at Saint Chris this morning. I called ahead and arranged for Father to be in the confessional and everything. She hadn't gone since she was
a freshman in high school. You know how it is nowadays."

"Amazing."

"Yeah."

"I mean, it truly is amazing," Buzz added. "There's probably a million girls like Ellie, good-hearted and broken like the rest of us, even though it doesn't show on the outside, who would go to confession if somebody just invited them."

"I disagree," she said kindly, slowly shaking her head. "You have to have friendship
first. If I asked her last month, I'm certain Ellie would have politely declined my invitation.

"We just started warming up to each other. A lot of it has to do with my decision to be a Poor Clare. She must have felt it, or her guardian angel told her soul or something like that. Or at least that's what I thought. Sam was no longer between us."

Buzz contemplated her point.

"So you're saying the
real problem is that there aren't enough good Catholics making friends with people like Ellie, who was never really given the fullness of the faith. "

Donna nodded. Buzz had a sudden thought.

"Will they let me visit you when you go into the convent?"

Donna's heart sank.

"No. I'm giving you up. And everything I love in the world. For a greater love. After tonight, I'll never doubt my vocation again.
But you'll be in my heart, you know that."

"I know that," he said, finding joy in sadness. "Let's get out of here. It's getting cold. And I hate country clubs."

"Me too."

4

Buzz was not familiar with the East Side, and decided to pick his way north through side streets to I-90. The Shaker Heights area was a maze of winding curves. It was dark. He became disoriented, then lost.

"Where are we?"
Donna asked fifteen minutes later. "Oh, there's an exit for 271!"

"We've gone east!" Buzz exclaimed, exasperated.

Donna sighed. The emotions of the night, and the late hour had brought a bone-weariness to both of them. She rested her head and closed her eyes.

There was construction on 271. The highway was practically devoid of vehicles. Buzz watched the orange drums whisk by his little car. The
effect was hypnotizing. He took mental snapshots of the idle construction vehicles parked randomly in the work zones to keep himself alert. Then, jutting out dangerously close to the driver's lane, he saw a large, oddly-shaped machine. He recognized it. It was a cement cutter, with a large, round saw blade…

He bolted wide awake.
Cut it down!

The words electrified him.

"Donna? Donna! Wake up."

"Wha?" she asked drowsily.

"Wake up. This is important."

The urgency in his voice was like a slap.

"What is it? Are we in danger?" She sat up and rubbed her eyes.

"No. Not us."

"What are you talking about?"

"Sam. Tell me, what would you do if you were Sam, and you had an evening at the Garden Club like he just had?"

Donna was confused. "I don't know."

"Would you pray when you got home?" The pitch
of his voice rose almost maniacally.

"Yeah, I would pray…" It hit her.
I
would pray.
"But Sam doesn't pray. He doesn't know how."

"You wanna know something, Donna? Tonight wasn't like Sam. Did you notice that? Sam wasn't Sam. It wasn't like him. There was an edge in his voice when I talked to him on the balcony that I've never heard before. I even said to him, 'You don't sound like Sam.' Something
fishy was going on."

"What are you driving at?" Donna asked, following every word carefully.

"Maybe something evil got to him…"

"You're giving me the creeps, Buzz."

"Good. The poor guy. He's been spun around in circles. It must have taken a lot out of him to say what he said on the gazebo. You could tell his heart wasn't in it. I bet he's getting pounded from every direction right now. All alone."

"We've got to do something. The wedding is–the wedding's hours away! Oh Buzz," Donna's voice had a sudden tone of despair. Buzz noticed it.

"Relax," Buzz said, smiling in the dark.

"Huh?"

"Come on, little one. Get with the program. Where you goin' in a month?"

"The Poor Clares?" Donna guessed weakly.
Enough with the riddles!
Her heart leapt out for Sam, reaching into the darkness beyond the highway.

"And what do the Poor Clares do?"

"Pray!"

"They don't just pray, little one, they intercede. They
intercede."

He turned his eyes from the road and looked at her. She saw the joy in his eyes under a passing lamp from above.

Buzz felt like crying with joy!

"Stop with the riddles, Buzz! What's going on in that crazy, beautiful head of yours?"

They came out of the construction zone. A huge yellow arrow
blinked in front of their car, directing them toward I-90.

"Don't you see it, Donna? Sam's not Sam? The night before his wedding. Us getting lost! We were supposed to get lost! Damn! I mean, Praise God!

"Strap on your seat belt, Little Poor Clare. We're going to Fatima after all! Only we're not going to Fatima. We're going to Lourdes instead! Right now!"

Cut it
down!

She felt the acceleration
as Buzz unconsciously put pressure on the gas peddle in his excitement. He was out of breath. It gave Donna a chance to solve the riddle.

The Lourdes Shrine,
clicked in her head.
It's the next exit!

"There's a big-ass ugly old evil thing pinning our
friend
to the ground," Buzz continued, finally calming down. "Somebody's gotta cut that sucker down. The battle is not over."

Donna was now fully
caught up in his enthusiasm.
Everything matters,
she thought.

"Everything matters," she said with a clear voice.

Buzz heard her calm battle cry and was instantly worked up again.

"That's it! Everything matters! The Lourdes Shrine! Stuff by the side of the road! The world! I love the world! I love the guy in the electrical socket! If only everybody could see what we see every day, my sweet, lovely,
little one!"

His eyes were filled with tears. His voice was cracking with every word. She never loved him more than at this moment.

My crazy Buzz!

She fought back tears.

Somebody's got to stay sane if we're gonna pray.

"Buzz, you just get me there alive. I'll pray enough for the both of us."

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The wrong-hoop dream came back to Sam with a vengeance that night. In desperation, after waking
up for the third time, he went to the kitchen and gulped down four aspirins and a beer.

He fell off into a fitful sleep.
I'm marrying the wrong girl. I'm marrying the wrong girl. I'm marrying the…

In the dream, he was wearing nothing in a jungle garden. Snakes everywhere. He heard something moving in the bushes. The hair rose on his skin…

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Donna ran to the grotto.

She threw herself down
on the kneeler, oblivious to the chill and the dewy moisture on the railing. Her dress felt more plastic than ever. She looked up at the plaster statue of the Immaculate Conception, and it disappeared from her view.

In its place, she saw Our Lady in her mind, as she always did, and asked, like a child asks:
Please, Mother, I have a friend. I've told you about him so many times. Take care of him
tonight. His name is Sam. You know him. He doesn't know how to pray. I offer you these roses for him.

She pulled the rosary beads from her pocket. She had worn them in over the summer, in preparation for her own wedding.

Next to her, Buzz prayed like this:
Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. Sam. Sam. Oh, I don't know what to say! Just cut that nasty, ugly thing out of Sam's life. Right now! And if you don't
want to listen to me and I don't blame you because you know I'm just a broken-down drunk, then listen to this little one, Donna, right here next to me.

"Let's start, Buzz," Donna said softly. Her voice was as peaceful as his had been manic minutes before.

"Sure, little one."

For the next forty-five minutes they prayed a full Rosary, in their own ways; he with blind faith, feeling nothing; she
with visionary faith, feeling everything.

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God allowed Sam, who had no faith, to see the monster. It was a prehistoric dragon. The thing had red-black, coarse leathery skin. It hurtled like a lance through the giant, scaly green leaves.

Sam was paralyzed, like a deer in headlights. His feet sunk into the bubbling muck. He tried vainly to pull them out of the mire.

The evil thing came to
him. Towered over him. Breathed on him.

From the bottom of Sam's diaphragm a primal cry of complete, unfettered fear rose through his body.

But from his lips there was no word.

The enormous jaws opened, gushing saliva and mucus, thick teeth-razors ready to rip him to shreds, preparing to pull his head from his torso as unbearable heat–dragon's breath–engulfed his silent scream…

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The enthusiasm
and concentration of Buzz and Donna's prayers faded as time, cold, fatigue, and repetition weighed down upon them. They both felt it.

Are we crazy?
he questioned.

Are we being silly, chasing dragons that don't exist?
she wondered.

It all mattered.

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The jaws closed on Sam, and he was slain by his nightmare. Then he resurrected into another dream. His eyes were closed.

He smelled grass.

He inhaled slowly, deeply. The scent was–perfect. He lingered on the fragrance of roses and lilacs–balanced.

He opened his eyes and found himself sitting by a pond, his feet in cool water. He was wearing Levis and a perfectly clean white cotton T-shirt.

He looked around. As far as he could see was a harmonious natural beauty: verdant fields and rolling hills, roses and lilacs everywhere. Tall strong
oak trees climbed the sky; they were ageless, as if no mere man could cut them down…

…then he heard the music. It was simple music, melodic and balanced–harmonious.

He knew the instrument's name. It was a lyre.

He heard a boy's voice drifting over the fields, singing. He could not make out the lyrics. Sam did not see the boy, but knew the boy could hear him.

"David, come closer," Sam said peacefully.
"Sing for me."

Sam knew the boy was a king.

Who is the queen?

The boy, still unseen, began to sing, his voice embodying strength, wisdom, youth, and above all, balance, for in this place, all things mattered.

Sam heard this song:

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, he leadeth me beside the still waters, he restoreth my soul.

He guideth me in paths
of righteousness for his name's sake.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil, for thou art with me, thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.