Deviation (6 page)

The comment confused her. “Shit beetles?”

“Yes. Those disgusting little bugs that feed on
shit. Much as we do, all things considered.”

“You mean dung beetles?”

“Precisely. Those are the ones. In the eyes of
god, there is no difference.”

She thought about it. “You're saying that god
values the lives of people and of dung beetles equally?”

“I'm saying he values neither. But yes, they
are one and the same to him. To god, we're all shit beetles.”

She had to laugh at the absurdity of it. She took a
quick drink of beer. “Okay. So you're saying I should only
care what god thinks, and that he doesn't care either way?”

“I'm saying that you're worried too much about
the reaction of your fellow man, about the invented authority of
man, and that you don't need to be. Man has no real authority. Man
only has authority if you, as a free human being, allow him to.
Personally, I do not.”

“But... the cops will still throw me in prison
for murder, whether I grant them the authority to or not.”

“Not necessarily. With human beings, everything
is a game.”

“I'm not sure I understand.”

“You will.” Father Frank finished off his
beer. “Can I get you another one? Something tells me we're
just getting started here.”

Dianne quickly guzzled the last of her Pabst. “Yes,
please.”

“One thing I definitely don't understand,”
Dianne complained, “is that sometimes you talk about god as if
you serve him, and dedicate yourself to his will, and other times
you talk about him as if you don't even believe he exists.”

“Ah, the mysteries of life.” Frank
cracked open a fresh Pabst Blue Ribbon and drank mightily from the
can.

Dianne took several gulps from her own. “So
you're leaving me in the dark?”

Frank shrugged. “We're all in the dark, Dianne.
If you're asking me whether or not god exists, the answer is I
don't know. The only logical answer anyone could give you is that
they don't know, because they can't know. No one can. If god
wanted us to believe in him, he could easily give us a reason to.
But he doesn't. On the other hand, if he exists and for some reason
doesn't want us to believe in him, he could just hide and ignore us,
which seems to be the most you can expect from him.”

“So... you're not sure if you believe in him,
but if you do, you believe he's kind of... uninterested in all
this?”

“He'd have to be.”

She thought about it. “Either that or he just
strongly dislikes us.”

Frank smiled and lifted his can. “Now you're
thinking. I've come to the same conclusion many times. Why else
would innocent children die of cancer? Part of some master plan?
It would have to be one hell of an evil plan, wouldn't it?”
He took a long drink.

“It's probably more likely that he just doesn't
exist, isn't it?”

“Sure, but
that doesn't mean he doesn't. Or
she
doesn't. Hell, god could be a camel spider for all anyone knows.”

Dianne laughed. “Wouldn't that be something?”

“It would be. All those wasted prayers. I'd
like to think that if there is a god, he's just letting all this
play out and pretending not to notice. Letting things shake out
naturally, you know? And then dealing with us each in turn after we
die. Shoveling out rewards, or casting us to burn in hell,
depending on our behavior. But it's a comic book idea. It's fairy
tale nonsense. God either doesn't exist or doesn't care. And
either way, what difference does it make?”

Dianne nodded, lost in thought. “I guess so.”

“Not very encouraging, is it?”

“It is and it isn't.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning it's nice to know you're not going to
be held accountable for everything you do here. That would be kind
of scary. But at the same time, it would be nice to know there was
some sort of meaning behind all this. If there's no god, nothing we
do really matters.”

“Ah, but you're forgetting one thing, Dianne.”

She puzzled it over, drinking some more beer. “What?”

“You're
placing too much importance outside yourself.
You're
what's important. You're the miracle. You exist, no doubt about
it, and that's what should interest you. There is plenty of meaning
if you want there to be.”

“But no afterlife. No eternity.”

“You're assuming. Do you really need god for an
afterlife? Or for eternity? Or is that just what you've been led
to believe by your fellow man?”

Lost in thought again, Dianne didn't answer.

“You don't need all the answers, Dianne. Which
is good, because there's no way to get them. The best thing that
you can do is to realize that god, if he's there at all, is not
controlling you. If he's there at all, he's allowing you free will.
Free everything, really. And I believe it's important to respect
that, and to respect what he's given you.”

“But if he doesn't exist, he didn't give us
anything.”

“That's irrelevant. We exist, and we have...”
He gestured with both hands. “...the whole world. It's ours
as much as it's anyone's. You have as much right to it as anyone
else. In the eyes of god, we're all the same, be that good or bad
or somewhere in between. And the fact that he ignores us we should
take as a blessing to do as we please.”

Dianne drank some more beer. “I'm not sure any
of this makes sense.”

“It does make sense. The issue here is that
you've killed a man. You feel bad about this because you're
assuming that you've done something wrong. But all you've done is
to save your own life, and god has no problem with that. He doesn't
care. You probably step on bugs or swat flies every once in awhile,
and kill them, too. It's the same thing. We're all little bundles
of protoplasm, bouncing off things and reproducing. A shit beetle
or a human being, it's all the same to god.”

“Okay. So
you're saying that I don't need to worry about being judged by god.
For anything. But I still have a dead body in my apartment, and I'm
still a... a
murderer
...
oh, god...” She began to visibly tremble.

“Relax. We're all murderers. Even birds and
Giant Chinese Salamanders. It's part of being alive.”

She looked at him.
“We all kill bugs, but this is different. At least to me.
You have no idea what it feels like to... to have
killed
someone...”

“And there you go, assuming again.”

She stared at him, her stomach in knots. “You...
you've killed before?”

Frank shrugged and took a sip of his beer. “Perhaps.
Perhaps I had no choice, much as I believe you didn't. Or perhaps
I did have a choice. It doesn't really matter. What matters is
that my actions have not caused me to be admonished by god. Neither
have yours.”

Dianne was astonished. “Who did you kill,
Father?”

Frank leaned back in his chair, sighing heavily.
“That's a rather invasive question.”

She flinched as if struck. “I'm sorry! I
didn't mean --”

“It's okay. But let's get back to your problem.
Your problem is that you're worried about what you've done, not
necessarily because it's immoral, but because it is illegal. Your
problem is the police, not god.”

She nodded. She didn't remember why she'd brought up
god in the first place. “Yes. What should I do?”

“What do you
want
to do?”

Dianne hung her head. Sometimes it seemed as though
Father Frank knew everything, and other times it seemed as though he
just made things up as he went along. “I want the body to
disappear,” she said softly. “I don't want to get into
any trouble with the police.”

Frank was nodding again. “Let me ask you this.
Is that really what you want? Or is that what you feel like you're
supposed to want?”

She thought about it. “It's what I want. I
want to be over and done with it.”

“Why?”

Dianne sighed. “Why wouldn't I?”

“You're not thinking, Dianne. Not really. God
has given us the gift of free will, and of free thought, and yet so
many of us refuse to even attempt to use them. Are you really
telling me that you want things to go back to the way they were
before you ever met this Cliff character?”

“Yes. I want my old life back.”

Frank guzzled some beer. “Tell me about this
life, Dianne. What does it consist of?”

“I'm not sure what you mean.”

“Where do you work? What do you do?”

“I told you, I'm a data entry clerk. I work for
a company called KBS Industries, downtown.”

“And you like it there?”

She shrugged. “Not really. It's okay. It pays
the rent.”

“Dianne... the reason I asked you what you want
is because I want you to really consider your options. Think about
your life, and about who you are. Think about the time you have
left here, in this world. Is working at KBS Industries, and
inputting data for them, really your true calling?”

She thought it was a silly question. “Of course
not.”

“Well then, please think. Tell me what you
really want. Don't hold back. I'm not suggesting for one minute
that you can really have what you want, or achieve whatever it is
you may desire, but for the sake of our little conversation here,
try to tell me what it is that you truly want to do with your life.
We both know it's not to be a data entry clerk in downtown
Milwaukee.”

The statement caused her to smile, and she quickly
lifted her beer and took another drink. “I guess I've never
really thought about it in that scope before.”

“Think about it now. This is an opportunity for
you. Remember, it's your world. God has given it to you. And it's
your life. What would you like to do with it? God doesn't care.
He wants you to do whatever you want.”

The room was silent as Dianne considered the question.
She realized that she'd never in her life really considered what
she wanted. “It's kind of pointless, though,” she
concluded. “I could never do what I really want to anyway.”

“Stop shitting on yourself, Dianne.”

She looked at him, feeling slightly offended. “I
didn't realize I was.”

“You are. And
I know you well enough by now to know that you're better than that.
Far better. You're one of the most capable people I've ever met.
You're young and you're free and you have your whole life ahead of
you, and the world is
yours.
And you're telling me you want to wake up in the morning and spend
your day sitting in front of a computer monitor, typing in endless
lines of information that have absolutely no meaning to you, in
exchange for what? Twelve dollars an hour?”

She frowned. “Ten fifty.”

Frank laughed. “Come on now. What do you
really want?”

Dianne drained her beer. “Another Pabst.”

“That's the
spirit!” Frank got up at once and brought them each another
can. Once they were opened and they each took another drink, he
leaned forward and studied her. “Anything, Dianne. What do
you want from this life? From this world? It's a question very few
people ask themselves, unless it's already too late. For you it's
not late at all. For you it's just the beginning. You can really
live.
”

She took a deep
breath and sat back in her chair. “For the sake of answering
the question honestly, I guess what I really want is to just do
whatever the hell I feel like doing at the time.
All
the time.”

Frank was grinning. “Keep going. I was afraid
you might tell me you wanted to be a lawyer.”

“Hell no! I suppose I wouldn't really want a
job at all. Or that shitty little apartment. If it's really my
world, I think I'd like to see it. Not just go home to the same
four walls each day, but really see it. Travel. All over the
place. See what there is to see, and do whatever I want.”
She sipped her beer. “I've been rooted to the same spot for
26 years, and I think it sucks.”

“You're finally being honest with yourself.”

“That's true, but it's still not realistic. I'd
need money, and I don't have any. To get it I need to work, so my
crappy job downtown is still going to be necessary. So is my shitty
apartment, and right now there's a dead body in it.”

“You're tying a rope around your own neck.
Forget the body. And forget money. Did the Indians need money when
they traveled the country on horseback, doing whatever they damn
well pleased?”

“Probably not. But there was nothing to buy.
Or rent to pay. Or health insurance.”

“Fuck health insurance. Open your mind.”

She took another long drink of beer, regarding him
casually. “Maybe it's time for the Wild Turkey again.”

Frank sat up straight. “Would you really like
some?”

“I think so. I'm kind of hungry, too.”

“That's good, Dianne. Tell me what you want.
I'll show you, we can make it happen.”

“Maybe just some of that bourbon for now.”

“What about a little meth? Are you up for it
yet?”

Dianne smiled. “You're crazy. You know that,
right?”

Frank's expression was very solemn. “I'm glad I
met you, Dianne. But your perception is a little bit skewed.
You've become accustomed to crazy. I'm very much sane.”

She took another long drink. “I'm glad I met
you too, Father. But I'm starting to think you might be a bad
influence.”

“Bad influence indeed. I'm going to save you,
Dianne. I promise you that. If it's the last thing I ever do, I'm
going to save you.”

His words soothed her. Was he really offering to
protect her? It almost seemed like too much. “Thank you,
Father.”