The Confessions (2 page)

“I’ll start then,” Ballard said. “Ten Commandments. Have you broken any?”

“I’m still not honoring my father.”

“Considering what I know about your father, that you haven’t murdered him in his sleep counts as honoring him in my books. You’re a priest so I’m fairly certain you’re keeping the Sabbath. I’m a little afraid to ask this question, but that’s why we’re here. Your Eleanor?”

“Yes? My Eleanor?”

“Are you sleeping with her?” Ballard asked.

“No.”

“Do you want to?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sleeping with anyone?”

“No.”

“Have you since your last confession?”

“No.”

“Are you hurting anyone?”

“Once a week if I can make time for it. There’s no intercourse.”

Father Ballard exhaled. “That’s a relief. I can take a full breath now. Give me a moment. I’d like to have a few of them.”

“Take as many as you need.”

Ballard stopped mid-step and took three deep breaths.
Thank you, Lord, for this small miracle,
he prayed with each breath.

“I was afraid of this,” Father Ballard said when his heartbeat had settled into its normal rut. “You in a church in a small town. The women must fall all over themselves for you.”

“It hasn’t been like that,” Marcus said as they resumed walking again. “No one has tried anything, flirted to excess, or attempted to seduce me. No one but Eleanor.”

“She’s pursuing you?”

“Like the proverbial hound of Hell.”

“Passionate type. My kind of woman.”

“Girl.”

“Girl?”

Marcus took a breath. “She’s 16.”

Father Ballard stared at Marcus. “Please tell me you’re joking.”

“I haven’t touched her. I promise.”

“But you want to. And she’s 16.”

“I’m not an ephebophile, Stuart. If she were my age I’d be a much happier man. But she’s not. That doesn’t stop me from wanting her anymore than it’s stopped her from pursuing me.”

“You’re being sexually pursued by a 16-year-old girl.”

“Yes, and she’s quite tenacious.”

“How tenacious?”

“She snuck into my office and masturbated on my desk.”

Ballard whistled, impressed.

“That’s tenacious.” Father Ballard considered his options. He could laugh, cry, or punch Marcus in the face. He decided to laugh. “Is this the worst of it? She’s 16, she’s tenacious, and you want to fuck her.”

“I’m in love with her.”

“That scares me more than anything,” Ballard said.

“Love scares you?”

“No. You being in love scares me.” Ballard led them down a shady path. “I remember those first few months after you joined the order. Marcus Aurelius himself could have learned a thing or two about stoicism from you back in those days. In public. In private, however? In my office…”

“I was a shipwreck,” Marcus admitted. Good. Marcus had a bad habit of forgetting he was mortal. Good that he remembered his past moments of weakness. Even better that he’d admit to them.

“You told me about your father and your sister and what he did to her and what she did to you. You told me about your mother, about what happened to her and how she was taken from you. What happened to you could have destroyed you, could have destroyed any man. But none of that broke you. You fell in love with a boy at your school, and he left you—”

“And I fell apart.” Marcus said the words simply, but Ballard knew it took superhuman effort to say them. The ghost of old pain lingered in his voice. He’d never met the boy Marcus had loved, but he knew so much about Kingsley from Marcus’s confessions that Ballard fancied he could identify the man in a police line-up if he had to. Getting the truth out of Marcus had been like prying a stone from a child’s hand only to force the fingers apart to see the diamond on his palm. Ballard remembered prying those diamonds from Marcus’s hand…

I never in my life dreamed I would want another boy. Then I saw him—his dark eyes, dark brown hair, and olive skin…

Father Ballard…what if I never see him again?

Kingsley kissed me first. I punished him for it, because I was too scared to kiss him back. I thought if I started kissing him, I would never stop.

What if I never kiss him again?

Kingsley used me as a pillow. I loved waking up to find his head on my chest or my stomach or my back. He has long dark hair and he laughs when I pull it. That’s how I’d wake him up, tugging on his hair. The best days were the days his laugh was the first sound I heard.

What if I never hear it again?

I was cruel to him because he liked it and because I loved it. When I told him he was beneath me, I only meant…I wanted him beneath me. Always.

He left me. And he never came back.

“I know you fell apart,” Ballard said, the echo of Marcus’s long-ago confessions still ringing in his ears. “I’m the one who put the pieces back together. I loved you then. I love you more now. I can’t bear the thought of seeing you go through that again. The only thing greater than your ability to inflict suffering is your capacity to experience it. You are taking a huge risk. I’m not talking about your career now. I’m talking about your heart.”

“What isn’t a risk? Birth comes with a death sentence. Every breath I take could be my last. I know loving her is a risk,” Marcus said, his strong jaw set and determined. “But I can’t walk away from her. No one is taking care of her right now. Someone has to.”

“So you are going to sleep with her?”

Marcus paused. “Not until she’s older.”

“Glad you’re thinking this through so thoroughly,” Father Ballard said. “I feel much better now. Let’s wrap this up and have tea.”

“You’re angry.”

“Of course I’m angry. You’re in love with a 16-year-old girl in your parish, and I’m not supposed to be angry?”

“That isn’t why you’re angry.”

Ballard turned and faced Marcus. “Don’t do this to me. Keep your eyes out of my head. I know you. I know what you are.”

“You know what I am because I told you what I am. And I can’t turn it on and off with a switch. I can read you the same way I can see the tree to our left and the graves on our right. You’re angry because I’m going through with it and you didn’t.”

“I’m not discussing her with you today,” Ballard said, meaning every word.

“You are, whether you mean to or not. She’s in everything you say to me. I hear her like you’re speaking with her voice. You loved her. She loved you. You chose the Church. She left. And you have never forgiven yourself. You can take your regret out on me if you want, but don’t pretend it’s your piety talking.”

Father Ballard prayed for a miracle. All he needed was eight more inches of height so he could properly finish Marcus off. They were in a cemetery already. Good place to commit murder.

“Was it really worth it?” Marcus asked and Ballard heard the compassion under the question. “Choosing your vows over the woman you loved?”

“No,” Ballard said. An easy answer to a hard question. “I thought it was the right decision at the time. Thirty years later…no. It wasn’t worth it. I could have married her, become a deacon. But I was scared. The Church was my home. It’s still my home.”

Marcus fell silent. Ballard had learned long ago to leave him be when silent. Whatever came after the silence was always worth the wait.

“I had a dream last night,” Marcus began at last. “I dreamt I was in a desert and I saw a man and a boy standing by a large rock. The man was the boy’s father. I don’t know how I knew it but I knew it, the way you know things in your dreams.”

Ballard nodded, not speaking, waiting for Marcus to go on.

“And the father was weeping because he had a knife in his hand and he was going to kill his son.”

“You were dreaming of Abraham and Isaac.”

“I was,” Marcus said. “But in the dream I didn’t know who they were. I didn’t realize I was in a Bible story. It felt real. The sun on my face, the sand in my eyes.”

“God commanded Abraham to kill his son. A hard passage for any believer.”

“I watched the man raise the knife over his son’s heart. I awoke with a start when he brought the knife down. I felt the knife in my own chest, Stuart.”

“That must have been terrifying.”

“It should have been, but it wasn’t.” Marcus shook his head, seemingly dumbfounded by the experience. “I felt this deep sense of joy.
It was only a test
… I heard those words ringing in my head like a bell.
This has been a test
.”

Ballard smiled. “It was a test. God ordered Abraham to kill his own son Isaac—‘whom you love.’ I never forgot those words. The moment Abraham is fully willing to kill his son for God, when he’s bringing the knife down, that’s when the angel stops his hand and saves Isaac. Or rather, he saves Abraham. Saves him from having to kill his own child. But Abraham proved he was willing to make the ultimate sacrifice by killing his only son. God proved He was willing to kill His only son too. But God went through with it.”

“I’ve never told you this,” Marcus began, and Ballard had a feeling there was much Marcus had never told him. “But the night before my ordination I read that passage in Genesis. I was Abraham. Kingsley was Isaac. If I took my vows and became a priest, it would be like putting a knife through my love for Kingsley. And I had to be willing to do that. I invited him to my ordination. Did you know that?”

“Another thing you never told me.”

“I sent the letter to his grandparents’ address in Maine. I thought if anyone could find him, it would be them. Something told me he would be there at my ordination. He would come. I believed it so thoroughly I thought I saw him in the back of the church.”

“Why did you invite him? Hoping he’d stop the wedding this time like you wish he’d done the last time?”

Marcus laughed, a mirthless laugh but a laugh nonetheless.

“I needed to prove to myself I loved God more than Kingsley. When I took my vows, I was certain he was there, watching me. I made my vows anyway. I chose God over Kingsley. I brought down the knife.” Marcus stopped speaking again. Ballard saw his jaw clench. “The letter I sent came back to me the day after my ordination. Both his grandparents had died. Kingsley had left no forwarding address. He hadn’t been there after all.”

“But it doesn’t matter. You thought he was there. You could have walked away from the Church, from the priesthood that very day and you didn’t. You passed Abraham’s test.”

“It’s a sick, sadistic thing to order a father to kill his son, isn’t it?” Marcus asked. “I’ve played my share of mind games but I would never go so far. Even I have my limits.”

“Sadistic is the word for it. God in the Old Testament wasn’t anyone’s pal.”

“What if God’s still like that? What if He’s still playing games with us? What if the vows are a test? Will we give up wealth, freedom, marriage, and sex for His sake? What if we do and then along comes an angel with black hair and green eyes and green hair and black eyes and says, ‘This was only a test. You passed. Put the knife down.’ ”

“And come to bed?”

Marcus smiled. “She would say that.”

“You and I both know that’s wishful thinking. I’ve been a priest a long time, long enough to know the vows are far more for the Church’s sake than God’s. It’s not a popular opinion but more of us believe that than we’re willing to admit. One century the sun revolves around the Earth. The next century the Earth revolves around the sun. We’re making it up as we go along.”

“So what do we do? The Church says the sun revolves around the Earth so we force ourselves to believe it?”

“Of course not. We believe what we know to be true. But we do so very quietly. If you truly believe you and her belong together…who am I say to you’re wrong? If you think you are no longer beholden to the vow you made, then break it. But…”

“Break it quietly.”

“For your sake, her sake, and the sake of the Church. Please no more scandals. My heart can’t take it.”

“Why do they do this to us?”

“Good reasons? They can send us anywhere without having to move whole families. We can get closer to people because there’s no wife or children at home to get jealous of how much time we’re spending with the sick or the scared. Bad reasons? The Church wants to control its clergy. Control the cock, control the man. We fall in love, get married, have children…suddenly we have something in our lives more important than the Church.”

“So much for being fruitful and multiplying.”

“You want to have children with her?”

“She’s the freest spirit I’ve ever encountered. I would never burden her with a child. She is a child and always will be. Child-like, not childish.”

“That’s not an answer to my question. You told me about her, not about you. Do you want to have children with her?”

“I have the standard male biological urge to father a child. Considering who and what my father is, who and what I am…”

“You would make a wonderful father.”

“I am a Father. That is enough for me.”

“And that girl you love is God’s child. Don’t ever forget that. She was His before she was yours, and she’ll be His during and after.”

“I won’t forget.”

They walked in silence for a time, past a hundred graves or more. Someday Ballard would be in a grave and all that would be left of him on this Earth would be the memory shared by those who knew him. Miriam…he’d leave her with too few memories. A thousand whispers. A hundred embraces. A dozen nervous phone calls. And not one single night together in his bed. He should have spent at least one night with her. It was all she’d asked. He’d made love to her a thousand times in his mind, taken her endlessly in his heart. Why hadn’t he had the courage to let his body go through with it? One night and he couldn’t give her that. He could have given her a good memory to cherish. Instead he’d only given them both a void in the shape of one night with the woman he loved.

“Tell me what she’s like,” Ballard said. “Convince me she’s worth you risking your entire vocation over.”

“What do you want to know? Height? Short. Hair color? Black.”

“What do you see in her?”

“She…she makes me laugh. I feel human with her. I don’t feel human very often, but I do with her.”