I Am the Messenger (14 page)

“Yeah, and one guy keeps asking me for my jacket.”

“Really?” He shakes his head. “God knows why. No taste, I suppose.” He drinks.

I look down at my arms. “Is it really that bad?”

“Nah.” He speaks earnestly now. “I’m only messing with you, son.”

I examine the sleeves again and the material next to the zipper. The black suede is almost worn through.

An uneasy quiet gets between us. It tells me it’s time to get down to business. I think maybe the father can feel it, too, and the expression on his face is of curiosity, yet patience.

I’m about to speak when an argument breaks out in one of the neighboring houses.

A plate smashes.

Screams jump over the fence.

The fighting intensifies, voices slam, and doors shout shut.

The father notices my concern and says, “Just hang on a sec, Ed.” He walks to the window and opens it wider. He yells. “Can you two do me a favor and calm down!” He persists. “Hey, Clem!”

A murmuring crawls to the window now, followed by a voice. “Yes, Father?”

“What’s going on over there today?”

The voice answers. “She’s getting on my nerves again, Father!”

“Well, that’s obvious, Clem, but what about—”

Another voice arrives. A woman’s. “He’s been up at the pub again, Father. Drinking and doing all that gambling!”

The father’s voice becomes reverend. Honorable and firm. “That true, Clem?”

“Well, yeah, but—”

“But nothing, Clem. Stay in tonight, okay? Hold hands and watch television.”

Voice 1: “Okay, Father.”

Voice 2: “Thanks, Father.”

Father O’Reilly comes back to me then, shaking his head. “Meet the Parkinsons,” he says. “They’re bloody useless.” His comment shocks me. I’ve never heard a priest talk like this before. In fact, I’ve never spoken to one at all, but surely they’re not all like this.

“Does that happen often?” I ask.

“Couple of times a week. At least.”

“How do you live with that?”

He simply holds out his arms, motioning to his robe. “That’s what I’m here for.”

We talk for a while, the father and me.

I tell him about cab driving.

He tells me about priesting.

His church is the old one at the edge of town, and I now realize why he’s chosen to live here. The church is too far away for him to really help anyone, so this is the best place for him. It’s everywhere, on all sides and angles. This is where the father needs to be. Not in some church, gathering dust.

Sometimes I wonder about the way he speaks, which is confirmed when he explains the church to me. He admits that if his church was any kind of shop or restaurant, it would have closed down years ago.

“Business no good lately?” I ask.

“The truth?” The glass in his eyes breaks and punctures me. “Shithouse.”

That’s when I have to ask him. “Can you really talk like that? Being holy and all?”

“What? Because I’m a priest?” He finishes the dregs of his coffee. “Sure. God knows what’s important.”

It’s a relief at this point that he doesn’t go on about God knowing all of us and the rest of that particular sermon. He doesn’t preach, ever. Even when we both have nothing more to say, he looks at me with finality and says, “But let’s not get caught up in religion today, Ed. Let’s talk about something else.” He turns slightly formal now. “Let’s talk about why you’re here.”

We stare across the table.

Just briefly.

At each other.

After a long drawn-out silence, I confess to the father. I tell him I still don’t know why I’m here. I don’t tell him about the messages I’ve already done or the ones still left to do. I only tell him that I have a purpose here and that it will come to me.

He listens very intently, with his elbows on the table, his hands together, and his fingers entwined beneath his chin.

A while passes until he knows I have very little else to say. He then speaks very calmly and clearly. He says, “Don’t worry, Ed. What you need to do will certainly arrive in you. I’ve got a feeling it has in the past.”

“It has,” I agree.

“Just do me a favor and remember one thing,” he says, and I can see he’s trying not to be too typically religious. “Have faith, Ed, all right?”

I search the coffee mug, but there’s none in there.

He walks me out of his house and up the street. Along the way, we come across the cigarette, money, and jacket scabs, and the father rounds them all up and gets them together.

He says, “Now listen up, boys. I want you to meet Ed. Ed, this is Joe, Graeme, and Joshua.” I shake all their hands. “Fellas, this is Ed Kennedy.”

“Nice to meet you, Ed.”

“Hi, Ed.”

“How’s it going, Ed?”

“Now you guys remember something.” The father speaks sternly now. “Ed here is a personal friend of mine, and you’re not to ask him for cigarettes or money. And especially not for his jacket.” He flashes me a quick grin. “I mean, look at it, Joe. It’s an outrage, isn’t it? It’s downright bloody awful.”

Joe agrees with gusto. “It sure is, Father.”

“Good. So we understand each other?”

They all understand.

“Good.” The father and I progress to the corner.

We shake hands and say our goodbyes, and the father’s nearly out of sight when I turn around upon remembering his brother. I run back, calling out, “Hey, Father!”

He hears me and swivels.

“I nearly forgot.” I stop running and stand about fifteen meters in front of him. “Your brother.” The father’s eyes reach a little closer. “He said to tell you that greed hasn’t swallowed him yet.”

The priest’s eyes lighten then, with a touch of regret poured gently into them. “My brother, Tony…” His words are soft, and they hobble toward me. “I haven’t seen my brother in a long time—how is he?”

“Not bad.” I say it with a confidence I don’t understand. Only gut feeling tells me it’s the right answer, and we stand there now, among awkwardness and the rubbish.

“You all right, Father?” I ask.

“I am, Ed,” replies Father O’Reilly. “Thanks for the concern.”

He turns and walks away, and for the first time, I see him not as a priest.

I don’t even see him as a man.

At this moment, he’s just a human walking home on Henry Street.

Complete contrast now.

I’m at Marv’s place, watching
Baywatch
with the sound down. We don’t care about the plot or the dialogue.

We’re listening to his favorite group, the Ramones.

“Can I put something else on?” Ritchie asks.

“Yeah, put Pryor on,” Marv says. We even call Jimi Hendrix Richard Pryor these days. “Purple Haze” starts up, and he says, “Where’s Audrey?”

“I’m here.” She walks in.

“What’s that
smell
?” Ritchie asks. He cringes. “It’s familiar.”

Marv knows, without doubt, and he points a finger at me. Accusingly. “You brought the Doorman, didn’t you?”

“I had to—he was looking lonely when I left.”

“You know he isn’t welcome here.”

The Doorman’s at the open back door, looking in.

He barks at Marv.

The only person he barks at.

“He doesn’t like me,” Marv points out.

Another bark.

“It’s because you give him dirty looks and put shit on him all the time. He understands, you know.”

We argue awhile longer, but Audrey breaks it up by dealing out the cards.

“Gentlemen?” She clears her throat.

We sit down, and I pick up.

In the third game, I pick up the Ace of Clubs.

Father O’Reilly,
I think.

“What are you doing this Sunday, Marv?”

“What do you mean, what am I doing on Sunday?”

“What do you think I mean?”

Ritchie says, “I swear you’re a goose, Marv. I believe Ed is simply asking if you’re busy this Sunday.”

Marv points at Ritchie now. He’s all hostile today because I brought the Doorman along. “Don’t you start on me, either, Pryor.” Now he looks at Audrey. “And you can keep quiet, too.”

Audrey’s astonished. “What the hell did
I
do?”

I interrupt. “Anyway, not only you, Marv—all three of you.” I place my cards on the table, facedown. “I need a favor.”

“Like what?” says Marv.

They’re all listening now.

Waiting.

“Well, I was wondering if we could all go”—I let the words hurry from my mouth—“to church.”

“What?”

“What’s wrong with that?” I argue.

Marv tries to recover from the shock. “What the hell do you want us to go to church for?”

“Well, there’s this priest, and—”

“He isn’t one of those Chesters, is he?”

“No, he isn’t.”

“What’s a Chester?” Ritchie asks, but he gets no answer. In the end, he doesn’t really care and forgets about it.

The next person to speak is Audrey, finally bringing some reason to all of this. She says, “So why, Ed?” I think she’s figured out that this smells a lot like the Ace of Clubs.

“The priest’s a nice guy, and I think it might be good, even just for a laugh.”

“Is
he
going?”

Marv motions to the Doorman.

“Of course not.”

And Ritchie’s my savior. He might be a dole bludger and a gambler and have the shonkiest tattoo in the world on his arm, but he’ll agree to almost anything. In his typically affable way, he says, “Why not, Ed. I’ll go to church with you.” He then adds, “For a laugh, right?”

“Sure,” I say.

Then Audrey. “Okay, Ed.”

Now to Marv, who knows he’s in a delicate situation. He doesn’t want to go, but he knows that if he refuses he’ll look like a proper bastard. He finally lets the air out of his lungs and says, “God, I can’t believe it. I’ll come, Ed.” He laughs, unhappily. “Church on Sunday.” Shaking his head. “Christ.”

I pick up my cards. “Exactly.”

Later that night, the phone’s ringing again. I don’t let it intimidate me.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Ed.”

It’s Ma. I breathe a sigh of relief and get prepared for the barrage. I haven’t heard from her for a while, so she must have at least a fortnight to a month’s worth of abuse to level at me.

“How you going, Ma?”

“You rung Kath yet? It’s her birthday.”

Kath, my sister.

“Oh shit.”

“Oh shit’s right, Ed. Now get your arse into gear and ring her.”

“Right, I’ll—”

The phone line’s dead.

No one can murder a phone call like my mother.

The only mistake I made was not thinking quickly enough to ask Kath’s phone number, just in case I can’t find it. I’ve got a bad feeling I’ve lost it, which proves to be true once I’ve scoured every drawer and every crack in the kitchen. It’s nowhere, and she isn’t in the book.

Oh no
.

You’ve guessed right.

The dreaded return phone call to Ma.

I dial.

“Hello?”

“Ma, it’s me.”

“What is it now, Ed?” Her sigh tells me how fed up she is.

“What’s her number?”

I’m sure you can imagine.

Sunday shows up, quicker than I thought.

We sit near the back of the church.

Ritchie’s happy enough, and Audrey’s content. Marv’s hungover—drinking his father’s beer again—and I’m nervous for some reason I can’t pinpoint.

The church really only has about a dozen people in it besides us. The emptiness of it is kind of depressing. The carpet is eaten with holes, the pews look morose. Only the leaded windows look sacred and holy. The other people are old and sit hunched like martyrs.

When Father O’Reilly comes out, he says, “Thank you all for coming.” For just a moment, he looks a beaten man. He then notices the four people up the back. “A special welcome to the cabdrivers of this world.”

His bald patch glistens from a glint of leaded-window light.

He looks up to acknowledge me.

I laugh, the only one.

Ritchie, Marv, and Audrey all turn their heads to stare at me. Marv’s eyes are bloodshot something terrible.

“Rough night?” I ask him.

“Shocker.”

The father gathers his thoughts and scans the audience. I can see him mustering the strength to carry this out with vigor. Father O’Reilly reaches deep. He begins his sermon.