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Works and Days

That was a great portion. As much as I despise Thom I hope he can make things up with Russell and stop feeling like a loser. Life is too short. So Chayne is hosting Thanksgiving? This should be interesting. Excellent writing and I look forward to more tomorrow!
 
Chayne is a RELUCTANT host and Thom and Patti are a reluctant family. Things should be very interesting indeed. Patti's doing her psych work, and Thom's busy having sex.
 
For the first time in months, the Geschichte Falls branch of the Lewis family met in the house on Breckinridge Avenue.
“Thom’s going to move into the house for Thanksgiving?” Jackie raised an eyebrow.
“Both of our families are coming,” Patti said, “and they’re used to having dinner here. It would be stupid for your family to come and Thom not be present. And my family’s going to wonder where the hell we are?”
“So basically,” Jackie assessed, lighting her cigarette, “You all are going to pretend to be together. I’m going to pretend to be happy with Chip. John’s going to pretend not to have a crush on me. Patti’s going to pretend her sister is sane. I’m going to pretend that I actually like Kristen, she’s going to pretend to like me. And to top it off, Mom’s going to pretend she’s still thirty-five years old?”
“And,” added Russell looking at his parents, “we’re going to pretend to be one happy, united nuclear family.”
“But we are happy,” Thom said. “Just not... when we’re together.”
Russell raised an eyebrow at his father, who tried to smile.

It was Wednesday afternoon and there was enough chill in the air for Russell to wish for his brown parka. When he got to 1735 Breckinridge Avenue, he wanted to keep walking, not because he didn’t want to be in the large faux Tudor, but because the day was so beautiful with the trees that were not yet bursting with color, still a thick, rich green.
It was strange to be in the large bedroom that overlooked the Corley’s yard and had the little balcony. It was dust free, clean, and Russell realized his mother must have cleaned up. He collapsed on the bed, blinked at the ceiling a few times and was surprised to wake up in a darker room, with the last of the sun slanting through the west window and a ring at the doorbell, and then laughter. Russell sat up in bed, listening to the conversation before he decided to go downstairs.
“Oh, my God!” he heard his Aunt Jackie, and then a familiar voice, “Jackie! Aw, Jackie!” and there was the noise of children.
It must have been Uncle John.
John Mc.Larchlahn was the only man beside Chayne that Russell had ever broken into the a run for, and he came down the hall, and then down the stairs to where his mother, Jackie and John stood in a clump surrounded by three towheaded children shrieking and running circles about them.
“Russ!” John looked up at his nephew. “Let me get a look at you. God, you’ve grown!”
Russell flung himself into John’s arms, and the older man tried to pick his nephew up, but almost failed.
“Huge!” he grunted and put him down.
John Mc.Larchlahn did not resemble his sister. In fact, he looked more like Thom than anything else. He was only a little taller than his brother-in-law and he was dark complexioned with full red lips, full chin and full nose, full smile, and dark lashes over coal dark eyes. He was, like his three fair children, blond, but his hair was darker, and to the sides, where it was shaved, it was almost brunette. John resembled his and Patti’s mother, whom—it was reputed—had Italian blood in her, though she wasn’t admitting it.
“Patti, who does Russell look like?” John asked. “Jackie?”
“I always thought he was a changeling,” Jackie shrugged.
“He looks like Dad,” Patti said. “Only attractive.”
“He doesn’t look anything like Dad,” John differed. His sons were tugging on him, “Enough, boys,” he said gently. They ignored him and he ignored their tugging.
“Red hair, green eyes,” said Patti, “Pale skin. Yes he does. He just isn’t shaped like a potato the way Daddy is. And he’s got Aunt Devon’s build. The same build Mary and Laura have.”
“Great Russell, you’ve look like half the women of the family,” John grinned at his nephew wolfishly.
“Stop John,” Patti chided. “He looks like Dan.”
“Shit, he does!” John realized.
Russell had given up on remembering names. When both families got together, they talked about cousins no one had seen for years, far flung branches of the family that had once been together. “And a little bit like Laura’s boys.”
“I’ve never seen Laura’s boy’s.” John said.
“Yes you have...”
Russell knew who Laura was. She had grown up with his mother and her siblings in Chicago, once he’d even seen her children and her husband when Patti had brought Thom and him to a dinner in Chicago, but he didn’t really remember them or just how Laura was related to his mother. So he looked at Jackie, as if to say, “I know who you are, though,” and she shrugged.
Russell felt a pull on his trouser pocket, heard a roar, and looked down, “Hey, Frankie!” he said to his cousin.
“Rushell!” Frankie shouted up, proud of himself for no apparent reason.
“Wassup, Russell!” Tommy yelled up, and Russell was about to answer when the other little boy laughed and ran into the kitchen.
“Aunt Patti! Aunt Patti!” Ross shouted up, “Cookie!”
“Whaddo you say, Ross?” John reprimanded the boy.
“Please, Aunt Patti. Cookie!”
“I think,” Patti allowed, “we can manage a cookie or so.”
“Can we manage a little more than that, Sis? I’m starved.”
“You know we don’t cook the night before Thanksgiving. We’re gonna be in the kitchen all night as it is.”
John kept staring at her. “Alright. Get the phone book and we’ll order a few pizzas. I’ll get the money from Thom when he comes in the house.”
“You strapped, Sis?”
Patti looked at John puzzled and then said, “No.”

As Thom came in the house through the front door. John got up to greet him and their was a roaring in the driveway near the kitchen door as a motorcycle roared into driveway with a sputtering stop.
John and Thom stopped in mid embrace, eyebrows raised. Russell and the kids looked at each other. Jackie and Patti looked at each other wisely, and then there was a knock at the door, and through the panes they saw him before Patti let him in.
Thom cleared his throat and prepared to say the name before his sister said half in scorn and half in admiration, “Finn!”
“Sis!” Even when he opened his mouth wide and grinned, Finn Lewis seemed to be mumbling. “Bro,” he gave a sideways grin to Thom. “Hot Mama,” he murmured in Patti’s direction, clapping her ass, “Little Russ.” John and his chidlren were, “Peoples!”
Finn was ruddy liky his sister with the dark Lewis hair. Though one wouldn’t have known it because he was dressed from head to toe in studded leather, had an unlit cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth and shades that almost never came off, he was, like Thom, regarded as being breathtakingly handsome. He was twelve years younger than Thom though, and unlike his brother, Finn was tall. He was ten when Russell was born, and Russell’s middle name had been given in honor of him because he’d been so attentive to Patti.
It was not the shades or the leather or his attractiveness beneath the leather that anyone took notice of though. It was the short woman who hung on Fenian Valerie Lewis’s shoulder. Shorter than Thom and, most probably, older.
“Thissis Meg,” Finn smiled and maintained the singular feat of keeping the unlit cigarette in the corner of his mouth while chewing on is gum and chucking the woman under the chin. “She’s got great tits, right?”
“Aw baby,” the brunette laughed and kissed him on the mouth, “You say the sweetest things.”

Frank, Denise and Sara Mc.Larchlahn arrived the same time as Kathleen Lewis. Both of Patti’s parents were actors, though admittedly not very good ones, and so was Kathleen, so they all entered the house with a flourish, in the midst of the second pizza. Kathleen, being the worst actor, made the best entrance, sweeping in and crying, “Darlings!” while Thom leaned over and asked Jackie where the hell Mom had gotten a British accent from.
“She’s from Caton West Virginia for God’s sakes!”
“Thom stop—”
“Jaclyn, darling!” Kathleen said, breathlessly. “You look heavenly.”
“Right back at you, Mom.”
“It’s nothing a little exercise—”
“And Miss Clarol—”
“You’re a wicked one, Jaclyn. Patricia, you look delicious. Russell! Ah, Russell!”
Kathleen Lewis was short and wide as a minute. Her hair was still blond by just the auspices Jaclyn had pointed out, though the tanning booth had made her skin a little more Samsonite than it should have been. She wore the same shades as Finn. Kathleen Lewis always made him feel like the only grandson, and then he realized that despite all of her children, he was the only grandchild though—looking at Finn—he suspected there were unclaimed countries left in the wake of wherever his bike had gone.
After Kathleen, Russell went be swallowed up by his other grandparents. Frank did resemble a potato. He had no chin and no one had any clue what he was ever talking about. Sara’s hair was still brown, and she did have John’s face. Even as she was doting over Russell, and Frank, cackling reached into his pocket to give Russell money.
“Don’t spoil him, Frank,” Sara was saying while she handed Russell a folded checked.
John’s boys came downstairs shrieking, “Grandma! Grandpa!”
Monetarily they were simpler to placate than Russell, pleased by a shiny quarter pulled from behind the ear.
Denise lagged behind and had to wait for Patti to come and greet her. Now it is said that there is “one in every family” and Denise Mc.Larchlahn was the one in this family. She and Patti were of a height, indeed they could have been twins except that Denise actually had Russell’s luminous green eyes. She was blond, and she was sullen and she was two years older than Patti.
“Hi, Denise.”
“Hello, Patricia,” Denise could suck the pretended joy out of any friendly overture her sister tried to make. The newest of her crises had been going on for a year and a half, namely that her worthless husband—and everyone could agree on the fact that he was worthless—had left her high and dry and she had had to return to her parents’ house. Denise Lewis never left her attic bedroom, and she would never have children. She had been reputed to be barren. Now it turned out that Todd was the sterile one. But now Todd was gone.
“Oh, you must be Kathleen, I’m so pleased to meet you,”
“Charmed,” Kathleen smiled, waiting for the woman to continue.
“I’m Meg Rice. I’m with your son.”
Kathleen looked from Finn to Meg and then asked, “Do you babysit him, dear?”

The genders were separating. The television was on in the living room, and the women were beginning to migrate toward the kitchen to begin the long process of baking. There were a few who flitted from company to company. Meg, who never felt comfortable with women, Russell who could not believe he was becoming a man, and the boys who went in the direction of the most attention before settling down to nap under the table.
Thom saw headlights flash outside and a car rumble up the driveway, and he and John went to the door.
“I can’t believe it took Reese so long!” Kristen was saying before anyone could say hello. Reese made to say something, but the other men clapped him on the back, welcomed him in, and Thom said, “Hello Kristin!”
Kristen found her way to the kitchen, followed by Reese who thought the only polite thing to do was greet the women before sitting down with the men.
“Oh, my God, he’s so cute!” Meg declared.
“Kristen,” Patti said levelly.
“Kristen,” Jackie said.
“Darling!” cried Kathleen who was doing damage to a carrot.
“Who died and made you British, Mother?”
Kathleen only raised an eyebrow at her oldest child as she leaned against the counter. Kristen was tall and witch eyed with very long, gold brown hair, and she was dripping in the jewelry Reese Keillor, he short, blond, Norwegian husband had put her in. Though they’d been married nearly twenty years, they had no children. Jackie always said that Reese’s semen froze to death the moment it entered Kristen.
“Jackie, are you still doing that art thing?” Kristen asked, arching an eyebrow.
“Yes,”
“How... pleasant.” Kristen smiled and reached into her handbag for a cigarette.
“Still single?”
“No, not at all,” Jackie plastered on a smile. “Chip will probably be here tonight.”
“Oh dear,” Patti murmured.
“Chip?” Kristen pronounced the name like an ice chip hitting the ground. “Is it serious?”
“It’s…” Jackie sought for a word. “It’s going along.... nicely. I don’t know.”
“Well,” Kristen murmured lighting her cigarette. “That’s our Jackie.”
“Reese how are you?” Jackie talked over her sister to the little man from Minnesota in the grey business suit.
“Oh, I’m—”
“My God, I thought we would never get here!” Kristen went on. “Reese was driving so slow.”
“I’m sure it wasn’t completely Reese’s fault,” Kathleen said, “The highways must be crowded.”
“And all the way from Minnesota,” Reese went on.
“But if he’d gotten off of work on time,” Kristen said. “That wouldn’t have happened. I mean, really, I don’t think he had to work at all. But he just can’t keep away from the office. You know men. He’s just like Thom, isn’t he Patti? Work. Work. Work.”
“How else will he keep you in all that jewelry?” Jackie wondered, raising an eyebrow.
“Excuse me?” Kristen looked at her younger sister.
Patti cleared her throat and thought to herself that it was going to be a very long night.

MORE AFTER THE WEEKEND
 
Well this Thanksgiving seems to be getting awkward very fast! I don’t know if Patti, Thom and Russell pretending to be a happy family is really working but at least they are trying to keep the peace. I don’t know how this gathering is going to work out but I am very interested to see what happens! Great writing and I look forward to more in a few days!
 
John and Jackie have a talk, Kristin hears some things she wasn't ready for and Kathleen has a little chat with Thom.


The last strike came at about ten o’clock when another motorcycle rumbled into the driveway and there was a knock at the door. Knowingly, Jackie answered and Chip kissed her on the mouth and squeezed her ass.
“So this is... Chip?” Kristen smiled out of the side of her mouth and Jackie thought of decking her.
“Yes,” she smiled back at her sister. “This is Chip.”
“Delighted,” Kathleen extended a hand. Chip smiled and mumbled something. Kathleen Lewis smiled and said, “Why, yes.” but Patti could tell that her mother-in-law was mystified and Sara said whispered to her daughter, “I’m glad these aren’t my kids,” though, looking to Denise, she realized she didn’t have much room to speak.
“I’m going to introduce him to the men,” Jackie said.
“Doesn’t everybody know him?” said Patti.
“Just Thom and Russell,” Jackie navigated Chip into the next room.
“This is Chip,” she said, showing him to the ones who had never seen him. John, Frank, the three boys, Finn, Reese. They all said hello, but something thumped inside of her when John smiled and said, “Hey, Chip, good to meet you.” She didn’t exactly know what she’d expected to happen.
What she should have expected was Finn and Chip to start talking. They were mumbling and chuckling to each other about God only knew what and soon, Jackie shrugged and went back into the kitchen .
“It makes sense,” Kristen said, filing her nails. “Great minds think alike... and incidentally, so do the not so great.”

“Jackie!” she heard her name hissed as she walked down Breckinridge, and she stopped.
John caught up to her, jogging and then chuckling as he stopped beside her and the two of them began to walk at a comfortable pace.
“I thought we weren’t going to ever get to talk,” John said. “And now you’re going home.”
“Well, the foundation for dinner’s been laid out. All Patti’ll have to do in the morning is throw the stuff in the oven, or take it out of the freezer, and she’ll be finished. And now I’m finished. That was enough family to last me till Christmas.”
“Ah, God,” John rolled his eyes comically, “we’ve gotta do it all over again in another five weeks!”
“I’m serious, John,” she laughed and punched him in the shoulder.
“Me too,” John told her. They remained silent while walking, turning down Goodwin.
“One of us had better say something,” John said at last. “I mean, I don’t come all the way to Geschichte Falls just not to talk to you.”
“You came for me?” Jackie pretended to doubt this, to be unimpressed, and asked herself why she always pretended with John.
“Yes,” he said earnestly, turning her around and looking at her. For a second there was almost no distinction between the fourteen year old boy she’d met at Patti and Thom’s wedding, and the thirty year old man standing before her.
“Jackie, I missed you so much.”
She sighed and smiled. “I missed you too, John.”
“I’m not getting to sleep tonight. It’s too many people, and Russell said I could have his room, but I think he wants it to himself. I didn’t want anyone in my room when I was growing up.”
“You had your own room?”
“I was the only boy.”
“I didn’t have my own room until Kristin went off to college.”
“Kristen...” John shook her head.
“She’s a bitch,” Jackie commented tersely.
“Poor Reese.”
“He should beat her. Wanna come to my place? We’ll make coffee and talk all night. Half the night’s gone anyway.”
“Yeah,” John said. “I think I’d like that. Is Chip going to be by later?”
Jackie stopped in mid stride. “Look, John, it’s not even like that. Chip lives at his own place and keeps his own genitalia in his own pants. Besides, he’s running around with Finn.”
“That is weird.”
“Not weird,” Jackie disagreed. “Appropriate. What’s weird is how I keep attracting men like Chip.”

“So whaddo you think about all this?” John asked Jackie, sitting down on the couch beside her, his hands wrapped about his coffee mug.
“All of what? Life, liberty, the Cuban Missile Crisis?”
“All of which came before we were born. No,” John shook his head. “Do you know what Mom said to me tonight? She said, Patti too, that makes three strikes, the whole family’s out now.”
“Are you serious?” Jackie frowned, leaning forward.
John nodded.
“I’m sorry, how could she say that to you?”
“She didn’t mean it to sound that way. She was just trying to be funny, but Mom and Dad both have off humor.”
“It wasn’t your fault about Kim.” Jackie said.
“She left me,” John affirmed, “for a tennis instructor so tan he looked like luggage. But still... It’s like, what’s the point? The only married people I know are my parents, your sister and Reese, and Thom and Patti. We met each other at their wedding. We were kids then. Russell’s almost grown and their relationship’s dead Mom and Dad are crazy and Reese and Kristen... who the hell wants a marriage like that?
“I mean... is it illusion? Is love and romance and all that shit... Is it just shit?”
Jackie, on the other end of the couch, watched John’s dark eyes watching something not in the room, his lips open.
“I worked on that marriage,” John told her. “I worked. Do you think it works? Marriage...? Love.... Sometimes it all seems so useless.”
“Did you ever love Kim?” Jackie asked.
“Of course—”
“Were you ever... in love with her?”
John looked at Jackie. He put the mug down on the steamer chest.
“I... I gave my virginity to her. We were together for a long time.”
“That’s not even an answer,” Jackie turned away almost in scorn and lit a Carlton.
“I don’t know that what you’re talking about exists, Jackie,” John said.
“That romance, that head over heels love, that... in love stuff. I dated Kim. I was committed to her, I saw the future in her. I had the future in her, and then she left.”
John stopped talking. He could see Jackie almost flint eyed, staring out of the window, but he knew she wasn’t looking at Royal Street.
“Well...” she spoke at last. “We’re you ever in love with me?”
Jackie heard John suck in his breath, and she turned back to him.
“I’ve been waiting for sixteen... almost seventeen years to ask you that. Did you ever... feel anything for me?”
When John wouldn’t say anything, Jackie spoke. “I know what you’re talking about. In love. Because I know what it is to be in love, and I know what it is to settle.
“Chip is settling. That’s exactly what he is. I never found the person that I could do more than settle for. I never dated the person that made bells go off in my head, who excited me. And I’m thinking that partially that’s because I didn’t think I deserved it.”
“And now?”
Jackie paid more attention to her cigarette than the question. Then she said, after some consideration. “I’m starting to think... that a lot of people complain about the bad shake life gives them, but it’s us... We give ourselves the shake and I deserve the best shake I can get. I mean, if we’re all responsible for each other’s souls, then we’re all responsible for our own soul more than any other... and we’ve got to do right by ourselves... do the best thing for ourselves and... And I’m rambling.”
“No,” John smiled, and put up a hand. “Keep talking. I like it when you talk, Jackie. Jackie?”
“Yes?”
“I was twenty-two when it happened,” John said. “I think it’s really the reason I married Kim. You know how it is... or maybe you don’t. I was an altar boy and everything. We were a good Catholic family and I didn’t do things like that, so I figured that when I did I should marry the girl it happened with. But... I wasn’t in love with Kim. And yes, Jaclyn. I didn’t really have to think about it... I was in love with you.”

Russell, who always slept lightly, awoke to John trying to open his door as noiselessly as possible. In the dark his uncle took off his baseball cap his sneakers and jeans, and then the large plaid shirt that Russell planned to make off with and crawled into bed in his boxers.
“Your feet are so cold,” Russell hissed.
“I thought you were asleep.”
“I was.”
“Well take this.”
“Ow! I’m not joking your feet are cold! Stop jabbing me with your toes!”
“I never got to have a little brother,” John explained.
“Well you’re not gonna have one now, John. I wanna go to sleep.”
“You wanna talk?”
“I just said I want to go to sleep.”
“I just thought you might want to talk. About your parents.”
“I try not to talk about my parents.”
“Oh, Russell. Your mom’s my sister. She’s the best big sister in the world. And your dad’s like the big brother I didn’t get to have. I love them both, Russell, and I know you do too.”
“It seems to me,” said Russell, sitting up. “That it’s you who needs to talk more than I.”
“More than me.”
“That’s what I said.”
“No, you’re supposed to say more than me. Not more than I.”
“Really? Grammar at one a.m.?”
“It’s two-thirty, and you seriosuly don’t want to talk about it?”
“Not right now. John, I live with it. I don’t get them. I never even bothered to try to get Dad until a little while ago. I don’t know up from down. I don’t knoq what I’d say. The divorce is taking a long time. Mom’s dating some guy—”
“She is?”
“Yeah, and the thing is I like him a lot. He’s really great for her but I don’t believe anything’s gonna come of it right now. And Dad—” Russell stopped. His mouth was going ahead of his mind.
“Thom? Thom what?”
“John, you can’t tell anyone. And that means Mom. But the week after Mom threw him out he fucked this old flame of his. She came up to visit and he spent the whole weekend banging her. Like Mom didn’t even matter. And I’m not mad at him for it... That’s the weird thing. It’s like I’m starting to like him, and I never knew he loved me until recently. Now I know he loves me, and I’m not sure I like the feeling.
“So, now that I’ve gotten all that off of my chest, how ‘bout you tell me about you and Aunt Jackie?”
“Oh now, Russell. It was a nice time. We talked. That’s all.”
“Oh, fuck you! Don’t turn into Uncle John right now after you wake me up and make me tell you... stuff. Tell me. Are you all going to get together.”
“She’s dating someone.”
“Chip’s a loser and she knows it. Jackie can do better than Chip any day of the week. I bet she just has him so she can say she has someone.”
“Russell!”
“Am I wrong? Com’on, John, this is getting tired, the two of you pussy footing around. You’ve been divorced for almost three years now, and you didn’t have any business marrying Kim.”
“I loved her.”
“Bullshit!”
“Russell, wash your mother out. You’re still a kid.”
“Bullshit, John. You married her cause you screwed her. I might not be that old, but I’ve know you my whole life. You drop a lot of hints. The two of you were never in love and, incidentally, I always hated Kim. Jackie did too.”
John stared at his nephew in the dark.
“Of course she did,” Russell went on. “Kim Bayle had moved in on her turf.”

Kristen Keiller stretched and rose from her bed. Reese was snoring lightly on his stomach, his hands clutching the pillow. Whatever people might say about the two of them, it couldn’t be denied that with the exception of Patti’s strange parents, they were the only people in the house who knew how to keep a marriage together. He didn’t look much older to her than he had when they’d first met. Kristen wondered if she did. She wondered for what seemed a long time before her bladder reminded her of why she was up, and she pulled on the light nightgown and left her bed to go down the hall to the bathroom. As she was entering, she heard noise from across the hall.
There was a fierce growling and then she heard a stifled voice crying, “Oh, God, Finn, you feel so damned good inside of me. Oh, Finn! Oh, Finn!”
And now Kristin could heard the bed springs creaking.
“Daddy!” Meg sighed. “Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!”
“Good God,” Kristin muttered, closing the bathroom door and preparing to relieve herself.

In the darkness of the living room, Thom lay on his back on the couch, gripping the blankets around his neck and looking at the ceiling while he heard the thumping and the bed springs creaking frantically. He was sure it was Finn. But what if it was Kristin and Reese. They had to... sometimes. The toilet flushed. He wondered if Patti and her Chuck ever did it. Was it like that? He pushed Liz out of his mind and jumped to himself and Patti. Once upon a time... There had been passion. Half laughing, half oversexed by the sounds above him, Thom threw together the most ridiculous pictures of people fucking. He realized, suddenly, his hands were in his jogging pants, and a little afraid, he pulled his hand out.
He did it just in time.
“Thom?” he heard the whisper and thought he was imagining. Then he heard it again.
“Hello?” Thom whispered into the air.
“It’s your mother,” said the British accent.
Thom sat up. His mother was standing over the other end of the couch.
“Scoot your feet back,” she said, the accent fading into something more Appalachian, and he did, and his mother sat down.
“Oh, Tommy, we never talk. Don’t scowl like that. You’re so handsome until you scowl.”
The ceiling stopped thumping.
“Thank you,” Kathleen Lewis said to the quiet ceiling.
“A mother can only do her best. She wants her children to come out... Happy, wise.” Thom saw his mother shrug in the dark. “In the end I could only do my best.”
“Your best was more than good enough,” Thom told her.
“When you were a little boy, I had your father—who was just another little boy himself—to take care of, and Kristin—who was spoiled and mean and embarrassed of everything. And I would feed you. You were the sweetest baby. It was easy to forget you had needs. Until I’d smell you.”
Thom looked at his mother, waiting for a point.
“You would crap in your diapers and never say a word. You’d just sit there and not make a complaint. For the longest time I thought something might be wrong with you. But you were just... not able to express yourself, afraid to or something. All through your growing up you never ever said what you needed to. You were always such a closed book. And then we came up here to live with your uncle. And although you never said anything, I knew how you felt. I knew it because you are the only little boy I’ve ever known of who could lose a Southern accent.”
“Mom—”
“Just listen to me, Thomas. When you found Patti I was so happy. I fell in love with her. She excited you. She had this hold over you no one else ever did. But I worried because she was an open book. She was full of passions and I wondered if one day she wouldn’t exasperate you... or you exasperate her. And Thomas, I’m going to stop talking after this, but I have to say, you have an amazing capacity for being in pain and smiling through it, of not being able to let people love you, and if you still love Patricia, you need to tell her that before it’s too late.”
Kathleen patted her son’s cheek, kissed him and said, “Goodnight, Baby Boy,” and then got up and went back upstairs,

leaving Thom to sit in the dark and wonder.


MORE TOMORROW
 
That was a great portion! Lots of heart to hearts and true feelings revealed. I hope John and Jackie end up together. Even if Thom does still love Patti I don’t see them ending up together. Excellent writing and I look forward to more tomorrow!
 
Everyone did have a lot to say. Jackie and John needed a real talk, and Thom certainly needed his mother's words of wisdom. What he will do with them is what we will see soon enough.
 
Patti was up only a little before the sun. The kitchen was filled with a weak grey light. No Felice and Jackie this morning. Well, there would be a Jackie later. In her hands she carried the old silver coffeemaker Mom had brought from Chicago. There was a tradition. The first large pot of coffee was communal. After that the regular coffee pot was put out in the living room for the men, and the women set to the serious work of preparing the dinner.
Russell, Kristin, Reese, John, the three boys, Jackie—which meant Chip, Finn and the stray woman of the week, Mom and Dad, Kathy, and Denise, who was frequently so bitter that she passed out of memory and Thom—who needed to pass out of memory, or maybe just pass out. Not that many really. And that much food was not really needed and really not that much help to prepare it. Seven women in the kitchen at once when it was said that more than one cook spoiled the soup, and Patti realized that most of them didn’t really do anything. It was a time to talk, to be. It was good to be with the girls, to feel like a woman among women every once in a while. Good and discomfiting at the same time because there was really no telling what one of them would ask.
As she scooped the coffee into the basket and turned on the water faucet, listening to the shoot of cold water hit the tin sink, Patti realized that she was even happy about Kristin and Meg. Somehow they all mattered. Somehow all the women being here mattered. She wondered if the men felt this sitting around watching the football game. She wondered what Russell felt. Part of her wondered if he shouldn’t have stayed at Chayne’s house for Thanksgiving.
The kitchen door swung open and it was Thom, hair rumpled, in rumpled tee shirt and boxers, face rumpled as well, bottom lip jutting out.
“Good morning, Thom.”
She didn’t feel the way around her soon to be ex-husband she expected to. She felt uncomfortable, awkward.
His “Good morning!” was marred by a yawn. She couldn’t really tell how he felt as he shuffled to the sink, took out a glass and filled it with water before she could fill the coffee maker.
“My God, Thomas, you look horrible!”
Patti never thought she’d be grateful to see her older sister-in-law. Kristin’s hair was in a white snood, she was certainly wearing make up, and Patti thought to herself that Kristin Keillor must never look bad.
“Reese kept croaking about how he needs a glass of water,” Kristin excused her presence, waiting for Patti to fill up the coffeemaker before filling the second glass. “All men are such babies.”
“Give Reese a break,” Thom told her, finishing off his glass and going to the little side bathroom from the kitchen. “You act like he’s so incompetent,” Thom shouted back and the two women could hear him pissing. Kristin refrained from drinking her water at this sound, and the coffeemaker began to percolate.
“It’s not Reese. It’s all men.” she said. “Men are incompetent. My husband’s a man. Therefore my husband is incompetent. I believe it’s an Aristotelian syllogism,” Kristin shrugged and went up the back stair.
“I believe it’s an Aristotelian syllogism,” Patti heard Thom mimic and almost laughed. The toilet flushed. No one could piss as long as Thom.
“Bitch,” she heard Thom murmur, making sure to look around for his older sister before pronouncing the judgment.
“Patti, wake me up when the coffee’s finished.”
“Wake up your own damned self,” she muttered, reaching into her housecoat for her Bensen and Hedges.
“PMS must be in the water,” Thom muttered to himself going back through the dining room as the swinging door closed on him.
Patti was going to ignore this, but suddenly she was seized by a fit of rage, and she reached into the drawer beside the sink, pulled out the metal soup ladle, and charged to the living room, bashing Thom square in the back of the head before he could get back on the sofa.
“What the fuck!” he groaned clutching his head.
“That,” Patti said, “is for thinking you know something about PMS.”
And then she turned around and charged back into the kitchen, the door swinging behind her.

By nine o’clock they could get down to business. The men were gone from the kitchen. Jackie had finally come, Patti was through half a pack of cigarettes. They were finishing touches needed for the cakes, Black Forest and simple yellow cake with chocolate frosting. Kristin had insisted on making another cake herself.
“It’s to compensate for her lack of homemaking ability when she’s actually at home,” Jackie explained cracking open a beer.
“At least I have a home to make—” Kristin began.
“Girls,” Kathleen chided. “Girls. And Jackie, it’s nine o’clock in the morning.”
“Mom, it’s five o’clock somewhere.”
“Did Chip teach that to you?” Kristin asked, her eyes staring grimly at the bowl she worked the mixer in. “Or can he tell time? Speaking of time, What time did he finally get back to you? Or did he get back to you?”
“Kristin,” Kathleen chided in a drawl. Patti said nothing. She was going over her to-do list. The sweet potato pudding had been put together last night. It needed to be baked a little before dinner, along with the macaroni, two kinds—Grandma Mc.Larchlahn’s recipe, and Kathleen’s. That meant they’d have to start baking almost immediately and use the microwave frequently and all the heating trays in the house.
“Oh, Mom, I’m not worried about Kristin,” Jackie confided. “If I hadn’t had sex since the last ice age—”
“Oh, I’m sure Chip grabs you by the hair and throws you on your stomach!” Kristin was beating the cake batter all the more mercilessly.
“He doesn’t, but I’m sure it’s exactly what you need.”
“Oh, how would you know what I need?” Kristin demanded, scooping the batter into the first cake pan. “And who are you to inquire into the life of my bedroom?”
“There’s more life in a morgue than in your bedroom,” Jackie said.
Kristin clamped her mouth shut and continued to pour the batter into the cake pans.
“And it just proves...” Kristin thumped more batter into the last pan, “that you don’t know anything—about what makes a relationship—which is why, I suppose, you’ve never had a real one.”
“If the choice is between me being single, and me living up in the North Pole with a man who’s so whipped all he can say is yes dear, no dear, harder? Faster? I think I’ll take what I have now,” Jackie said.
Kristin prepared to say something, but just then, for the first time, Patti heard her own sister speak.
“Are you always this much of a bitch?” Denise asked, grating carrots.
Kristin blinked at her.
“I’ll never understand,” Denise went on. “I gave my husband everything. He took it and left. You give yours grief. He stays. I guess life is random.”
Kristin continued staring at her sister-in-law’s sister. They were the same age. Denise stopped grating the carrots and finally said, “By the way, you forgot to grease those pans. If you don’t take all the batter out you’re gonna make a really shitty cake.”
“Denise!” Sara reprimanded her daughter as she entered the kitchen.
“Excuse me,” she cleared her throat and kept slicing. “A really fucked up cake.”

“I had thought we could all go down to the fishing hole,” Frank said, readjusting his glasses.
“Granddad, there isn’t a fishing hole around here,” Russell said, taking a sip from his coffee mug.
“Russell, there’s Lake Chicktaw,” Thom reminded him.
“Nope,” Russell said as if this negated the lake’s very existence.
Thom didn’t pursue it as the UnderDog balloon came sailing past Macy’s department store.
“Is there even such a thing as male bonding?” Russell wondered.
“I think that we’re having male bonding right now,” his Grandfather said, preparing to wax profound. “Wherever men come together to share minds, there is bonding, a great fusion of souls in one common unity....”
Russell tuned his grandfather out, and Finn came down the stairs, just pulling a tee shirt over his hair chest.
“Good morning, peoples!” he murmured.
“Young man, you’re getting up awfully late,” said Frank.
“I didn’t go to sleep till awfully late,” Finn said. “I had business to attend to.”
Russell watched his uncle thrust his groin in and out and wink at them all before putting back on his shades and sticking an unlit cigarette into the corner of his mouth.
John shook his head and told Ross, “Why don’t you and the boys run into the kitchen. Are we all going to Mass this morning?”
“I think so,” said Thom. “We usually do.”
“I’ll ask Patti,” John said.
“Russell, I didn’t know you drank coffee,” Thom said.
“I didn’t,” Russell said, a little surprised at his cup himself. “Everyone else was doing it, so...” he shrugged. “And I didn’t know your were smoking again.”
“Everyone else was so,” Thom copied his son. “But don’t you start. It’ll stunt your growth.”
“Was Mom hitting you in the back of the head with a ladle what stunted yours?”
Thom’s eyes flew wide open.
“It’s all over the house. You told John. He told me. Aunt Kristin says you probably had it coming,” Russell said, getting up and going into the kitchen.
He and John were both there when Meg came down the back stairs, still in a nightie that ended right below her hips, cold cream plastering her face.
“Good morning!” she cried.
United in disgust, Jackie and Kristin both turned a look on Meg.
“I’m ready to help now. What should I do?” she demanded.
“Uh...” Patti drew a blank.
“You could put some damn clothes on for one,” Denise said.
Patti said, “You can restir the macaroni before I put it in the oven.”
Sara looked at her daughter.
“She has to do something,” Patti muttered.
“Dad wants to know if we’re going to church or not?” said Russell before John could speak.
“Of course we’re going to church,” Sara said sharply. “It’s Thanksgiving. We have to thank God. That’s what it’s for.”
“Sometimes,” Patti confided in Jackie, “I think Thanksgiving exists just to make you thankful for the other three hundred-sixty four days of the year you don’t have to go through all this.”
“Three-hundred sixty-three,” Kathleen said. “Don’t forget Christmas.”
“But there’re presents to make it better,” Jackie said.
“You’d better call the church—or call Chayne,” said Patti, “to find out what time everything is.”
“Three hundred-sixty two if you’re Scottish,” Kathleen went on. “I remember when I was a little girl, my grandparents celebrating New Years... Hogmanay. We were so poor, but there was more laughter and festivity than in five of our Christmases and Thanksgivings put together.”
“I have to know,” Meg said, finishing up mixing the macaroni as Sara eyed her dubiously, and the younger woman threw her elbows on the kitchen table. “What is Thom like?”
“Excuse me?” said Patti.
“I mean is he....” Meg smiled and blushed, “endowed? I wanted to know if it was genetic. A Lewis thing. Because Finn is huge!” Meg made an impossibly large gap between her hands indicating Finn’s size, and Kathleen’s eyes opened as Sara, sensing violence, reached over moved the cutlery from her fellow mother-in-law’s reach while calmly finishing off the icing for a Bundt cake.
Patti smiled and said, “I don’t know if it’s genetic. Jackie, how big is your penis?”
“Enormous,” her sister-in-law replied, and continued smoking.

“No answer,” Russell told John as he put down the phone.
“We’ll just go over and see if he’s home,” said John. “He’s probably busy planning Thanksgiving at his house.”
“That’s right. Half of Lothrop County’s supposed to be coming.”
They drove over and found half of Lothrop County double parked before Chayne’s house and the house next door. Running up the stairs and entering the front room, they found Chayne in a suit, walking to and fro his house while cousins milled about putting out China and laying out the insults.
“Of course there’s a Mass today,” Chayne looked at Russell incredulously. “In about an hour, and you’ve got a solo in it. Remember?”
Russell’s eyes widened. “Oh my...”
“There’s a Wideness in God’s Mercy,” Chayne reminded him. Beyond them they could hear Janna saying, “How do I keep getting pregnant?” and Pethane answering, “B being a ho.”
“Well, most of the time at least.:” Chayne modified.
“Twelve o’clock Mass! I forgot. Later Chayne,” Russell ran out the house. John said goodbye and followed his nephew.

Russell finished his solo that ended in a long alto note he was proud to still be able to hit. Below he could see the church filling, and Liz Ford lighting the candles on either side of the altar. Bill Nugent, the altar boy, was putting incense in the censer, and then walking the west arcade back into the vestibule under the choir loft.
“That was great,” Chayne whispered, and then went to Russell’s place after telling the choir.
Above the bells began ringing. Once, twice, three times. Twelve times. They silenced. The reverberation of their bonging settling through the bricks of Saint Adjeanet’s.
“That’s our cue,” Chayne said and went to the west stair, the one that led, not into the church, but the vestibule. He made sure the choir in its gold and green robes was in proper formation, Russell at the fore, the tenors in single file beside the altos, the basses alongside the sopranos and then sent them downstairs. Geoff Ford was waiting for them between Bill Nugent and Tina Yoast, their censors swinging, heavy with gold and sweet smoke. Betty Long held the lectionary in her tired hands. Chayne in his suit tiptoed downstairs, saw them all lined up. ran back up and told Hannah, “Start now.”
The first thunderous notes of “We Gather Together,” blasted from the pipes and touch of Hannah’s small fingers and tiny feet, and Chayne watched the choir glide into the church, singing to the little thunder of the congregation rising to its feet.

We gather together to ask the Lord’s blessing;
he chastens and hastens his will to make known;
the wicked oppressing now cease from
distressing
sing praises to his name--he forgets not his own!

Thom Lewis was surprised that he was still at the head of the table. Patti was at the other end. Sara had suggested that she sit next to Thom, but her daughter had thrown her such a look that Sara only smiled and said, “Nevermind.”
Thom cleared his throat, folded his hands and said, “I think we should all say something we’re grateful for. You know, go around the table and each say a blessing.”
“Like on Oprah?” Meg said joyously.
Thom frowned at her.
“I think they were talking about that on Oprah,” Meg went on. “Or maybe it was “Little House on the Prairie. Or something like that.”
“Or something like that,” Kristin repeated.
“Well, I guess I’ll start,” Thom said, putting on a happy face. “I’m grateful to have my whole family around me on this day.”
“Are you really?” Russell whispered.
“Yes, I am,” Thom said to his son with a little irritation. “And now why don’t you tell us what you’re grateful for?”
“I can’t,” said Russell, who was in the middle of the table. “It would mess up the rotation.”
“Well, then I guess it’s my turn,” said Kathleen. She said more or less the same thing as Thom. Among the most memorable Thanksgivings were Meg’s:
“I’m thankful for such a big strong man with such a big strong—ouch, who did that?”
Jackie’s: “I’m grateful that I’m not a bitter, controlling pre-menopausal bitch who has her husband tied to a string.”
And Denise’s: “As soon as God gives me something to be thankful for. I’ll thank him.”
After which Thom could only raise eyebrows, smile, blow out his cheeks and say, delightedly, “Amen,” then cross himself.
Watching his father, Russell had a sort of admiration for the man who tried so hard, clinging to—despite all contrary evidence—the belief that a smile which ignored all indiscretion could save the day.
“Oh, Reese, you don’t need that,” Kristen told her husband as he reached for the mashed potatoes. “Have the broccoli instead. Less starches for you.”
“Jackie, you know you don’t need that broccoli,” Chip told her as she reached for it. She gave him a sharp look, and Chip confided in Finn. “It makes her gassy.”
Jackie turned immediately red and exchanged a glance with John as Finn nodded and said, “Yeah, I remember when we were kids, and you’d get a little bit of roughage into her. You know what else makes her gassy?”
“Finn,” Kristin’s voice was sharp.
“Yeah, Sis.”
“Firstly, never call me that. Secondly, shut up and pass the turkey.”
“Next year,” Kathleen was saying,. “We will deep fry the turkey.”
Kathleen and Sara had been having a debate about baking or deep frying the turkey that had lasted a long time, Sara’s chief argument being that it sounded greasy and disgusting, until Patti had finally pointed out that they didn’t have a deep fryer or the forty gallons of vegetable oil it took to undergo such an enterprise, and finally Thom had stepped in and decided to barbecue the turkey for a bit of change.
“Reese, don’t eat so fast.” said Krisitn. “Man,” Finn said, which actually sounded like. “Meeeeeeeeennn, why you let her boss your around like that? Don’t you know a lady needs to be kept in line?”
“Really?” Jackie set the full force of her gaze on her brother, who gulped, and then at the encouraging chuckle of his much too old girlfriend said, “Really. Man, you need to stand up,” to the small blond man with the patient face and the military haircut. “You can’t be letting her tell you everything, running your life namby pamby.”
At this Reese stood up, and for a moment Thom thought he would clock his brother, and in that moment, he wished he would. But he only folded his napkin, pushed in his chair and marched upstairs.
Kristin looked after him and then turned savagely on her younger brother.
“Fenian, I blew your nose, bathed you, wiped your ass, fed you and left home when you were four. I didn’t like you then, and I don’t like you now.”
“Ooooh, you think you’re so big!” Finn stuck his tongue out at her. Chip let out a laugh, which made Jackie grab him by the arm and drag him into the kitchen.
“Whaddid I do?” Chip whined as Kathleen said, “Finn, that’s enough. Lay off the drugs.”
“You’re so old is what you are,” Finn went on.
“Patricia,” Denise’s voice rang out from where she sat beside her sister, though once she’d caught everyone’s attention she seemed, in fact, to be very quiet. “Could I make an observation?”
“Go right on ahead.”
“I know what I said about her,” Denise pointed to Kristin as she was turning to go upstairs after her husband, “but,” pointing to Finn and then Meg, “He’s a brain dead smoked out moron with the IQ of a cup of instant coffee, and she’s an old slut with a makeup kit I haven’t seen sense Grease.”
Denise sat back down.
“That’s all,” she said. “If I have anything else to say, I’ll let you know.”
“We’ll be waiting,” Thom said, shaking his head.


TOMORROW, THE CONCLUSION OF THE CHAPTER, AND MORE BOOK OF THE BURKING
 
Looks like the veneer of happy families isn’t holding for Thanksgiving which was expected. I am glad Russell and the choir did well in church and his solo went good. Great writing and I look forward to the conclusion of the chapter tomorrow as well as The Book Of The Burning!
 
The Lewises almost seem unwilling to keep up the front of a being a happy family or happy individuals for that matter. It's almost as if things are crumbling apart, and maybe that's a good thing.
 
THE CONCLUSION OF THANKSGIVING


“Reese,” Kristin said. “You come back down here this instant! We are having a family affair, and you’re dawdling around instead of being social. I swear—”
Kristin shut up. Reese had been digging around in the suitcase and now he stopped and his blues eyes shot her a look she forgot they had.
“You swear what?” he said, his voice flat, one eyebrow raised.
Reese left the suitcase, closed the door firmly and shut the lock.
“We’re going to talk now,” he said. “And you’re not going to swear a thing.”








“Whaddid I do now?” Chip groaned.
“Get out.” Jackie told him in the kitchen.
“What?”
“I said get out. Chadwick, I can’t explain what you did this time, but I can tell you you’ve been doing it all the time, and now it’s time for you to go.”
“You wanna fuck that John guy, don’t you? Don’t try that stare on me again,”
“Chadwick—”
“And quit calling me that.”
“It’s your name.”
“Alright then, Jaclyn!” Somehow the name didn’t sound as bad he’d planned for it to.
“Firstly,” said Jackie. “I’m not going to do anything to anyone. Especially to you. Secondly—”
“You sound like your bitch of a sister. Firstly, secondly, thirdly—”
“Secondly, I’m not going to argue about this. I want you to leave.”
“Jackie.”
“Now.”
“Jack—”
“Now,” she said, this time a little more gently. Which made Chip know she was serious, because Jackie was always loud and bombastic. That hardly meant anything.
He left, Jackie sighed, feeling a loss and not exactly sure of what she was losing.
“Goodbye, Chadwick.”
As Jackie pushed open the kitchen door it hit something and she heard a shot and stared at John, rubbing the side of his head.
“Sorry, Jackie,” John said, and smiled at her.


“Oh, my God,” said Kristin, sitting up in bed an hour later. She reached for her cigarettes, but Reese took the pack first as he sat up beside her, pulling up the covers around his waist.
“I haven’t seen you like that in... years.”
Reese lit the cigarette, inhaled, exhaled, gradually.
“Do it again,” Kristin urged.
“What?”
“Take a drag. I forgot you did it so well, you should never have quit smoking.”
Reese obeyed her.
“Are you turned on by me, now?” he asked her.
“I think,” Kristin said, “I was turned on the moment you closed the door and got that look in your eye. I forgot what that used to do to me.”
“Does that mean you want me to be aggressive more often?”
“One step at a time,” Kristin said. “Am I really that much of a bitch?”
“Kristin,” Reese began in a soothing tone, crushing out the cigarette. He was looking for a good way to say it. Finally he said, “Yes.”
Kristin sighed. “I don’t remember it always being this way.”
“It wasn’t,” Reese lay down in the bed again. He lay on his side and began to stroke Kristin’s arm, catch a tendril of her honey-brown hair.
“I think it’s my fault, largely,” he said reflexively. “Kristin, you’ve always been... take charge. That’s what I loved about you. We used to have... Christ, we used to have the biggest grudge matches, but I got tired of fighting you. I got tired of trying to match you so...”
“You let me be a bitch.”
He reached up and touched her chin, tilting his face toward her. “I let myself be a coward.”
They were silent a while, and then Kristin spoke.
“Do you remember,” Kristin said laughing a little. “when we were younger, and you would come into the bedroom in your Marine uniform and—”
“It would make you red!”
“It did,” she laughed. “And I would undress you one article at a time. Until all you had on was the hat.”
“And we would see how long the hat could stay on...” A lurid smile ran across Resse’s face.
“Not very long as I remember,” Kristin whispered, the same smile crossing her face as well.

Kristin came downstairs as the family slept in front of the roaring television, pretending to watch the game and Patti was loading the dishwasher. Sara and Kathleen had come into help, but Patti had thrown them out wanting this little bit of time to herself.
“I’ve been...” Kristin said, “detained.”
“I know exactly what you’ve been,” Patti smiled into the dishwasher she kept loading. “Your spare room’s right above the kitchen.”
Kristin blushed.
“Look at you,” Patti said, surprised. “You look. My God you look more than a decade younger. Reese must be amazing.”
Kristin said nothing, but sauntered over to the kitchen door. She pushed it open and looked out across the dining room to the living room where Reese was sitting.
“There’s just something about a short man....”
Patti put the dish towel over her shoulder, turned on the washer and joined Kristin in her reverie. Thom was smoking again, and Patti didn’t give a damn what the Surgeon General said, it was downright sexy.
“It’s like...” Kristin tried to describe it, “all that manhood harnessed into this one compact thing. And he looks like he’s half your height but he can pick you up, and at the same time so cute and so... ohhh...”
Patti was watching Thom inhale, his thumb and index finger holding the cigarette, its tip turning red and orange, then dull grey. His mouth opened to exhale the smoke going around his brown eyes, his brows, his thick hair. He looked a little tired. With an invisible finger she traced the lines of his face.
“Oh my God!’ Krisitn interrupted Patti’s tracing.
“What?” Patti came back to reality.
“You’;re checking my brother out.” she hissed as the kitchen door swung shut.
“I am not,” Patti tried to laugh and felt herself turning red.
“Liar!”
“I was just,” she said to Kristin’s laughter. “I was just going down Memory Lane. You were talking about short little passionate men and the only man I’ve ever had is short and little so it follows... I was just thinking about years ago when Thom was working at Denny’s and he got off late and I had to come pick him up. He was closing. No one was there and he was all in white, white pants, white apron, white cap. He closed the blinds and threw me on the table and oh, my God! It used to be like that all the time.”
“Maybe there’s still a chance,” said Kristin.
“No, Thom’s thirty-eight years old. His table throwing days are over.—”
“No, Patricia—” Kristin said, her eyebrows lowering.
“I mean a chance for your marriage. The problem with you all—”
“Yes,” Patti said warily.
“Is probably that you never hit him in the back of the head with a ladle until today. I think the two of you give up too easily.”
“I think….” Patti began, covering up her smile.
“That I’m always right?” Kristin smiled.
“God, no. But you’re right this time. Actually, you’re right a lot of the time.”
Kristin kissed her sister-in-law on the cheek.
“Patricia, that’s all anyone can hope for.”

THAT CONCLUDES PART ONE OF WORKS AND DAYS. AND OWING TO THE LATE HOUR, WE WILL POST THE BOOK OF THE BURNING TOMORROW
 
That was a great conclusion to part one! Some sex was had as was some frank and needed conversations. I am excited to see where this goes next and that was some well done writing!
 
Some sex was had, some conversations too. Several much needed reunions, and now maybe we can have some fresh starts.
 
TONIGHT WE BEGIN PART TWO OF WORKS AND DAYS




PART TWO


THE WORKS
AND DAYS
OF
HANDS


NINE

THE
SECOND COMING
OF
ELIZABETH FORD





This was a day for rain. Friday morning after Thanksgiving was just the right time for a slow thunderstorm.No one had really expected it. It came toward them late in the night with winds picking up as Chayne said goodbye to Wynns and Princes, kissed his mother goodbye and reminded her to call when she and Graham were home. By one in the morning the sky shuddered with lightning, an at first inperceptiable on and off of electric in the sky.
Now was the grey green morning or muffled thunder and rain against the windows, and now, as much as Chayne had loved having Faye and loved Russell, it was good to have his house on his own. Not alone, no, not alone. It had been around twelve, after everyone was gone that Chayne had watched a truck pull up. He wasn’t sure it was stopping in front of his house, but then it did, and he knew the truck and he was surprised when his body gave an involuntary shudder. Ted Weirbach stepped out of the truck, looked around, took in his breath and looked like her was gathering his courage. The lanky, sandy haired man went up the walk and up the stairs and Chayne opened the door. He stood there, his cap in hand, literally.
“Hi,” he said.
“Hi, Ted.”
“I thought about coming by earlier, but I knew your family was here.”
Chayne was about to say,” You could have come anyway,” but instead he said, “Don’t stand out in the cold. The wind is picking up.”
“I thought about coming over all day,” Ted said. “I thought of calling, but calling first seemed sort of… So… I just came over.”
Ted was a man of poems, and perhaps, of classroom lessons for third graders. He was not a great speechmaker.
“I’m glad you came over,” Chayne said.
The whole of the living room seemed to be trembling. Ted looked like he was about to twitch out of control, like this had taken everything in him, and Chayne felt that familiar humming in his body so he pulled Ted’s face down and kissed him and then, as if this was all the permission Ted needed, the taller man put his hands firmly on Chayne’s shoulders and led him to the couch. Sometimes it was like this, where things happened quicker than planned, They didn’t make it to the bed or turn out the light. As the rain began that made love on the sofa, a slow bucking tangle of arms and legs, heads in shoulders, hands caressing. By now they’d been together a few times and Chayne knew and loved the aggression that overtook Ted once he knew was accepted and the passion, which seemed to far from the gentle school teacher that over took him once their clothes were removed.

In the morning, in his room, Chayne closed his eyes and almost with the slow rhythm of the thunder, Ted, the blankets down from his beautiful body, fucked him him as he lifted his thighs and drew him in. While rain pattered, he pulled Ted down and wrapped his legs around him and they moved like one small creature, in a meditation of joy, Chayne’s hands in his hair, Ted’s mouth on his while he became harder and settled down deeper.

“I get so shy,” Ted whispered when they lay together in the comforting dark. A little light shined. It was fro mthe kitchen where the coffee pot was beginning to percolate, and it had bent down the hallway to give the alst of its dim self to right outside of the room.
“And then when I come here I feel… safe.”
Ted’s voice was quiet and deep, and they lay under the covers, Ted’s longer, larger body hot and comforting while Chayne spooned him.
“Safe,” Chayne kissed the back of his neck.
Ted groaned a little and stretched, yawning, his whole body going stiff and straight, and then he curled back into Chayne.
“It’s hard to overestimate how important it is to feel safe.”

The storm had settled into a steady pitter pattering of rain as they stretched out together.
“Should I go before everyone wakes?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe. Yes. I don’t want to be confused.”
No, he said, stretching and pushing back the covers. “Or have to say too much too soon.”
“I don’t even know what we’re supposed to say.”
He didn’t either, and so as he pulled his pajama bottoms on and tried to tidy his hair, he said nothing at first.
When he spoke he said, “We don’t want to confuse Russell.”
“It’s not Russell I’m worried about,” Patti said, propping her head up as she reclined on an elbow and pushing her curls from her face.
“And by the way, what the hell was this?”
“I thought,” Thom pulled his tee shirt on, “it was us getting back together.”
“It was us having sex,” Patti said. “That’s not getting together. Talking things out. Making a stab at having a life again is getting together. A spur of the moment… romp.”
“Did you actually say romp?”
“Is not getting back together.”
“Which is why we’re not going to tell anyone.”
Patti looked troubled.
She said, “Not tell anyone in this house.”
Thom said, “What about that guy you’re seeing?”
“What?”
“Com’on, I know you’re like seeing one of Russell’s teachers.”
“He is not Russell’s teachers, and, yes, I need to talk to him.”
“Are you sleeping with him?”
At the look on Patti’s face, Thom said, “I’m not judging. I don’t have a right to? I’m just asking, cause if you are, you owe him the truth.”
“And you own whoever you’re boning the truth too,” Patti said.
When he looked at her this time, she said, “Of please. You think you’re such a surprise to me. But whoever she is, don’t hurt her.”





Chuck knew something had changed that Saturday night when he went out with Patti who, for her part, felt like nothing less than a slut for having slept with this man and made a place in his bed, something she hadn’t even done with Thom until she’d married him, and then stand here and tell him that she owed Thom a second chance, that they were going to try to make it work. She prayed to God Chuck wouldn’t see through her, know she’d already cheated on him by sleeping with her husband. Blessedly, he didn’t ask.


“NEXT MONDAY!” Geoff cried in the Blue Jewel over the music.
“Well, that’s good, isn’t it, Big Brother?” Liz said, patting her brother on the shoulder.
“I don’t want another priest,” Geoff said. “I want,” he added, disconsolately jabbing his spoon into the empty bowl, “another piece of pie.”
“Really?” Jewel raised an eyebrow, reaching for the bowl.
“What, am I getting fat?” Geoff asked her. Before she could answer, he touched is stomach. “I am getting fat.”
“Will that be ala mode?” Jewel asked.
“Yeah,” said Geoff.
“Well, Geoffrey,” Chayne spoke, at last. “You know, this can be a good thing. Evervirgin has four priests and—I believe—six deacons. All we have is you. You could use a rest.”
“What if I don’t want a rest?”
“Looks like you’ll be getting one anyway,” Chayne remarked dispassionately, sipping on his beer.
Around them they heard people clapping and, looking up, they all clapped for the band as they came off stage and Jewel, lifting her finger, ran to the stage and then shouted in the microphone, “The Comets’ll be up to do a second set in the next hour. Let’s have another hand for the Comets, Woo! Woo!”
She then down and skirted through the tables of clapping people. By then Diggs was sitting with Chayne, Father Ford and Liz, pleased and hamster faced.
“You all are really great,” Liz was telling Diggs.
“Oh, we’re even better with a singer,” Diggs told Liz. “Chayne, are you going to get up and sing with us?”
“Oh, I don’t know if I want to tonight.”
“Come on, Chayne.”
“I’m tired. Too bad Russell isn’t here or else he’d be right on stage.”
“Well,” Diggs said, suddenly, “if you don’t get up and sing, me and Ted won’t get up.”
“Really?” Chayne looked at Ted.
Ted gave an entirely too senister look and Chayne said, “You’ll pay for this.”
“Probably,” Ted agreed.
“Oh, get up!” Liz stopped, realizing how loud and insistent she was. “I mean, come on Chayne!”
Chayne looked sharply at Liz, then archly at Jewel, and his friend shrugged at him.
“I love to hear the Comets play,” Liz said, “and I love hearing you, Chayne.”
“Looks like you’ll be singing,” Jewel observed.

MORE ON THE OTHER SIDE OF SABBATH
 
Nice to get back to this story! I did not expect Patti and Thom to sleep together, at least they aren’t getting back together. I am glad Chayne has some good people around him. We all need that. Great writing and I look forward to more soon!
 
THE SECOND COMING OF LIZ FORD

TWO


The door buzzed four times. Geoff from his easy chair called out, “It’s open!”
It buzzed again, and Liz, leaving the kitchen, headed for the door saying, “Here, I come. Oh, hello. Geoff, you’d better come to the door.”
“Oh,” Geoff folded the newspaper, got up and came to the door to greet another man in a fedora and great coat. He was carrying two suitcases, and Geoff noted the Roman collar.
“You must be Robert Heinz,” said Geoff, making way for the priest to enter and sit his bags down.
“And you must be Geoff Ford,” the new priest shook Geoff’s hand vigorously.
“Let me help you,” said Geoff, and he took one bag and went up the stairs before Robert Heinz.
The upstairs of the rectory was a narrow hallway. To their left as they came up was the bathroom and rounding it they passed Geoff’s room that overlooked the church and then came to a new room, the window overlooking More Street, grey and wet in December.
“This is yours.” Liz said. “You get to look out at More Street. This is a great view. See the desk here, you can look down and see all the kids passing by after school, cars driving by while you write in your journal. If you keep journals.”
Geoff’s brows were furrowed as he listened to his sister.
“I really like this,” Robert said, looking around the room that was actually quite drab in the gray of the day, “I’m sorry, I didn’t get your name.”
“I’m Elizabeth Ford,” Liz said, giving her hand to the priest who shook it.
“Related to Geoff, here?”
“She’s my sister,” Geoff ducked his head.
“Oh, you live around here?”
Liz looked to Geoff for an answer.
“She actually lives right here. In the rectory. With me.”
“I sleep in that last room, the one that overlooks the garden and the school playground.”
“Oh,” Robert said noncommittally.
“She used to sleep here,” Geoff said. “She thought you would prefer this room, though.”
He wasn’t going to let his sister go unappreciated.
Liz only blushed and nodded.
“Well,... why, thank you, Liz—Elizabeth?”
“Liz,” she said. “I,” she turned to her brother and then included Robert in her gaze. “I need to go to the church now. The seventh graders are coming so we can practice some songs for the school mass on Friday. New ones, you know. With Christmas around the corner and all. Good to see you. I’ll see you tonight,” said Liz, and she disappeared down the hall to her room, and then came out a few minutes later in her blue coat and pom pom topped hat, waving and trundling down the stairs.
“So,” said Geoff turning from the picture of his departing sister, “can I get you something? Coffee. Tea? Food? Did you have a long drive?”
“Ah no... Yes,” the new priest smiled politely. and shook the cobwebs out of his head before blowing his cheeks out. “That would be really nice right now. Something to drink. Coffee.”
“I’ll go make some.”
“Ah,” Robert Heinz looked around, his mouth open a little. “Great. I’ll get settled while you do that. I’ll be down in a few minutes.”
“Great.”
Geoff felt strangely relieved when he was out of the presence of Robert Heinz and a little unnerved by the fact that from now on he would be living here, inhabiting what had been, until now, family space.
When Robert finally came down he was in sweatpants and a hooded sweatshirt. He stood in the middle of the ugly harvest gold and orange and brown living room, feet planted wide apart, sniffed the air and pronounced the coffee good, and then went in with Geoff to make himself a cup.
“So, I guess you want me to tell you some things about myself,” Robert Heinz assumed and Geoff, nodding, said, “That would be nice.”
“Let’s see,” Robert said taking a hand through his hair. Geoff noted—against his will—that not only was Robert Heinz open and unassuming, he was tall and dark and very handsome. “Firstly, I prefer to be called Bobby, none of that fancy Robert stuff.”
“Oh, okay,” Geoff tried to smile and sipped from his coffee.
“I went to Holy Cross.”
“Not the college in South Bend?”
Robert—Bobby—laughed, “Oh, the Rudy school. No. Holy Cross in Boston. The bishop said you went to the Rudy one though.”
“Yes,” Geoff smiled over his cringe. “But I went on to Notre Dame.”
“Yeah, that’s right. Holy Cross priests!”
There was something about the way Bobby said this that irked the particular Holy Cross priest sitting before him.
“I’m a Jesuit, you see?” Bobby said.
“I’ve heard they’re a hard order.”
“Yeah, we’re supposed to be the cream of the crop in the priesthood.” Robert began to disinterestly rattle off Latin. and then, to Geoff’s dismay, switched back to English.
“You speak Latin?”
“All priests speak Latin,” Bobby said.
“You can converse in Latin?” Geoff specified.
“Oh, yeah, it’s something I taught myself in high school. Had the free time you know?”
So he had been a dork in high school? Of course, it’s why he was a priest now.
“I mean,” Bobby went on, “between wrestling and water polo and the intramural basketball team, then choir and LaCrosse... Wow,” Bobby furrowed his brow. “I guess I was more active than I thought.”
“I was never... very active in high school,” Geoff confessed. “People liked me. The teachers did, I mean.”
“The teachers weren’t always that gung ho on me,” Bobby told him. “I remember Father McCafferty protesting me getting the Homecoming Crown. And I still became a priest anyway! Looking back it was just that he didn’t think someone should win two Crowns in a year. Other people should have a chance. I guess he was right—”
“You had two Crowns?”
“Oh, yeah,” Bobby went on. “There was Homecoming and Prom King senior year and then I was Prince of junior court the year before. I’m pretty sure I just got that because I was class president. Isn’t it silly how much store people put in trite stuff like that?”
“Yeah. So leaving high school behind...”
“Aw yea, you probably want to hear about the more recent me.”
“At Boston College.”
“Yeah, that was hard. Seminary really kicked me.”
“Yeah, me too, it’s like no matter how hard I tried,” Geoff said, sitting. “Don’t get me wrong. I did well, but I was always a little resentful of the guy at the top of my class. You know? I mean, did you ever resent the guy at the top?”
Bobby smiled and looked a little sick for a second.
The smile fell from Geoff’s face and he said, “Let me guess... You were the guy... at the top of your class.”
Bobby pushed out a high laugh. “Well, someone’s gotta to be!”
“Yeah,” Geoff said, nodding. “Yeah. Someone does.”
“So what time is Mass this evening?” Bobby asked.
Geoff looked at him oddly. “Oh, we never have an evening mass.”
“Why not? I think people would like that. A little celebration around God’s table after a hard day at work,” Father Heinz rapped on the table and gave a dazzling smile.
“A bit of fellowship.”
“I’ve never been able to get people interested in more than the midday mass, and then with all my duties in the parish, I’m pretty tired too.”
“Well, that’s all right. I’d be tired if I was you. You’ve done a valiant job with this parish. I tell you what? Give me the parish directory and I’ll round up a crowd for a five-thirty mass. I want to introduce myself to the people as soon as possible.”
“All right,” said Geoff going to his desk by the large window over the porch that overlooked More Street where the yellow school bus was pulling up, “but don’t be to upset if you don’t get very many people.”


“I want to thank you all for coming this afternoon,” Bobby said, spreading his purple robed arms over the congregation. “We’re so near Christmas. Really, only a little more than a week off, and I find myself in this new place, but not a strange place among a family I didn’t know until now. I suppose I’m only a little more surprised to be here than all of you who may have gotten my phone call or heard from word of mouth about the new priest in town. I want to tell you that we should thank God right now. Right now, in our midst he is reenacting the very miracle of Christmas. How in an unlikely place, an unlikely couple found their way into a shelter from the cold. Just a stable, just a cave the way this is just a building of mortar and stone. But there was born the family of God and light of the world. This evening, after such a long and tiring day, I want to invite you to come here and enjoy your family, the shelter from the cold. Christ is born here. His light glowing as surely as it was two thousand years ago. I invite you. He invites you to come and dine and be renewed. My brothers and sisters....”

“It was a beautiful sermon, Father,” Jackie Lewis was shaking Father Bobby’s hand as she headed out the side door.
“I’m glad you could come, Jaclyn.”
Geoff, beside Bobby, marveled that he could know Jackie Lewis’s name so quickly. What kind of trick was this?”
“Oh, and Hannah, I want to thank you for playing organ on such short notice.”
“Thank you, Father,” she said beside her husband, “for such a wonderful Mass. I wonder why we never did a five thirty before.”
“You always said—” Geoff began.
“Well, we’ll see you on Sunday, Father, Come on, Will.”
In the midst of tugging at her her husband’s sleeve she said, looking startled, “Oh, Father Geoff, we didn’t even see you,” while right behind Geoff popped Bill Dwyer, declaring:
“Father Bobby, that was the best Mass I’ve ever attended....”


MORE TOMORROW
 
That was an excellent portion! Great to see a different side to the world of this story and more Liz! Wonderful writing as always and I look forward to more tomorrow!
 
I'm glad you think so. It certainly is time to expand some things and meet other people, get into some new heads. And certainly great to see Liz, though I' pretty sure I eventually changer her name to Ann to make things less complicated since Thom also had a Liz.
 
“Don’t you just love a lively congregation?” Bobby asked Geoff at the table that night as Liz brought the food to the table.
“I wouldn’t know,” Geoff commented, dumping salt onto his food.
Liz sat down at the end of the table facing the kitchen, the two priests were in the middle of the long table, facing each other.
“Don’t you think we should all say a blessing before we just rake in the food?” Bobby asked.
“Oh, yes,” Liz smiled brightly. “Certainly.”
“Lord Jesus,” Bobby said, looking up at the ceiling, eyes closed, “we just want to thank you for this wonderful meal our beloved sister Elizabeth has prepared for us, and for our rising and our lying down. For every good thing. I especially want to thank you for the wonderful family I’ve found at Saint Adjeanet’s, and my new brother Geoff, whom I pray I might be a worthy helpmeet too. In your holy name we do ask blessing on this food. Amen.”
“Amen,” Geoff muttered, picking up the salt shaker.
“You know, Geoffrey, all that salt’s not good for you,” Bobby said.
“He just likes to give it flavor,” Liz told Bobby.
“Oh, Liz, let me in the kitchen tomorrow, and I’ll help you learn to bake the food a little longer and season it. That way we won’t have to use all that salt and ruin your gracious culinary attempts.”
Liz wasn’t sure if she should feel praised or insulted, but was leaning toward insulted.
“So, Geoff, is there any part of church administration you want me to take over?” Bobby asked. “Just think about it. You don’t have to tell me now.”
“I’m not sure I could tell you now.”
“It’s just that—can I confess something?” Bobby leaned closer as if there was someone to hide this from, “I have a passion for youth ministry. Especially working with young men. After eighth grade, when they’re not altar boys, it’s so easy to lose them.”
“Ah,” Geoff sounded as if he were just waking up, “Most of the young men of our parish go to Our Lady of Mercy, the high school a few blocks down Kirkland.”
“Wow, I should probably run down there tomorrow and talk to the people and see if I can speak with the boys. I’d like to start a basketball team. I love B-Ball. You wanna help. Geoffrey?”
“No, I don’t think so,” Geoff said lamely, turning the broccoli around with his fork. “I’m not much good at... B-Ball.”

It would be good to sleep.


When the alarm went off in the dark and Geoff Ford’s palm smashed it to silence, his first thoughts, blinking at the ceiling were, “It’s only Tuesday!”
He pushed this thought aside. He could smell the coffee Liz had started and he groped for his Liturgy of the Hours.
Geoff stumbled down into the living room to get his cup off coffee and sit down in his chair and pray the Hours. The door flew open and in ran Father Bobby drenched in sweat.
“Good morning, Geoffrey! Man, it’s great, just to commune with the Almighty when no one else is really up. You’re missing it, Geoff.”
The priest took off his sweatshirt and tee shirt and Geoff felt immediately inferior. “Time to hit the showers.” Bobby Heinz ran up the stairs.
Liz Ford came out with the cup of coffee on a white saucer.
“Just the way you like it,” Liz said
Geoff ignored his sister and went to the mirror over the bureau across from the dining room table. He studied himself. It was impossible, in the very little light he tolerated this early in the morning in the dining room, to really see himself, and he knew that better light would be a harsher judge. His non-descript hair, some times flatteringly called golden brown, was still sticking up. His lips were small, he detected a touch of a double chin, and a dimple under his lip that made him look fat. He tried to smile and make his blue eyes sparkle. They were supposed to be his best feature, but they did nothing for him right now. Liz watched her brother, patting down his hair, patting down the unrelieved roundness of his own stomach and becoming displeased with the plumpness of his hands.
“Geoffrey, what’s wrong?” she said at last.
“Liz,” he said at last. “Do you think I’m attractive?”
“Yes, very.”
“What do the people think of me?”
“People?”
“You know,” said Geoff. “The parish.”
“They love you.”
“They love the new—Bobby.”
Upstairs they could hear the shower water running and Bobby singing “Stormy Weather,”
“They loved his Mass yesterday,” Liz said. “They haven’t stopped loving you.”
They were both quiet for a while. Geoff pressed his fingers together and then sighing said, “Do you think that it would be possible...”
“Yes?”
“To take an... unofficial poll.?”
“What?”
“Go around and just sort of ask people how they feel about me?”
“Geoff, that’s so silly!”
“I know. I know.”
And because Liz Ford was silly, she did it.




“Hannah Decker opened the front door and looked sideways at Liz.
“Why dontcha come on in, Liz?” she said. “It’s so cold. What’s up?”
Liz Ford was looking ridiculous in a purple pom pom hat and carrying a notebook her cross eyes were staring at. She laughed, snorted a little, and said:
“No, I’m just here for a second. I’m taking a poll.”
“Okay.”
“You know the new priest?”
“Father Bobby!” said Hannah. “Oh, my God he’s so great. And if he smiled in the middle of the night it would make the sunrise. He is so hot! If he wasn’t a priest the things I would do to that man—”
“Ey, Hannah!”
She shushed up and turned to see Will was at the door, face perplexed, belly sticking out.
“Oh, but you know he’s nothing compared to my baby,” she patted her husband’s face. “There’s my daddy bear. Growl for me! Come on now.”
“Will looked at Liz Ford, then at his wife. He growled, bit her, and went back into the house.
“Mama’s gonna tame you in a few minutes she laughed back, confiding in Liz, “Honey you’d never believe it, but he’s a hurricane in the sheets. It’s like going to Disneyland. Space Mountain!”
Hannah blushed, remembered herself, and said, “We were talking about the new priest.”
“Actually,” said Liz, “we were talking about my brother.”
“Oh.”
There was a vague look on Hannah’s face, as if she’d forgotten who Liz Ford’s brother was. Then she said. “All right, honey, what did you want to say?”
“He wanted—I wanted to know... what you thought of him.”
“I suppose he’s good enough. Think of him how?”
“As a priest? Is he a good priest?”
“He’s no Father Bob—hold on, I didn’t mean it that way.” Hannah stopped, folded her arms over her breasts and said, “Some people are flashy and wonderful and stir up big crowds. Some aren’t. Same with priests, I guess. Geoff just isn’t flashy. But he’s a good enough priest... I suppose.”

“It’s open!” Patti said, waiting for her next client as she stopped in the middle of hanging the green boughs around the living room.
“Liz?” she looked incredibly perplexed to see the unattractive little woman in the middle of her living room.
“Hi, Patti! Good morning!”
“Liz!”
Smile plastered to her face, Patricia Lewis climbed down from the ladder and said, “Can I help you?”
“Why yes, I’m taking a poll.”
Patti, eyebrow raised, waited for further explanation.
“You see, Geoff—my brother...”
“Father Ford?”
“Yes. He wants to know how he’s doing. What you all think of him?”
“Is this about the new priest and everything?” Patti murmured.
“Were you at the mass the other day?”
“No.”
“Busy doing things?”
“There was this delightful pack of Benson and Hedges I needed to finish. He shouldn’t have called on such short notice. Anyway?”
Geoff wants to know... If people like him? How people feel about him.”
Patti eyed Liz incredulously.
“You mean to tell me Geoff Ford is having a popularity contest?”
“I wouldn’t call it that...”
“Then I don’t know what you would call it, but... You tell your brother he’s just a priest to me and—God forgive me—in the last thirty-eight years a priest has always pretty much been a priest to me. He’s no worse and certainly no better than all the rest.”

That evening Geoff didn’t ask Liz anything about her poll, which largely resulted in the whole parish saying either, “We’re indifferent to Geoff Ford,” or “The new priest is really great, but we’re indifferent to Geoff Ford.” Liz kept on pushing Bobby to say more, spend as much time as possible with Geoff so that her brother would not be able to find the time to ask what she had learned. It depressed Liz and for once her food was good. She thought maybe she should be depressed more often. This reflected badly on what the parish thought of her brother, and made Liz wonder what they thought of her.
As the mashed potatoes were coming to an end, she was inspired. Liz realized that there would be one home from which good comment would come, and good council, a house always brimming with laughter and a solution to depression.
She still had not polled Chayne Kandzierski.

Liz did not knock because she knew there was no need. There was no noise coming from inside the house, but the lights from the windows seemed to tell of cheeriness. No one was in the living room, but Chayne and Russell, Jackie, Felice, Diggs and Jewel and Shannon were chatting softly in the kitchen while Ted, his long legs in front of him as he leaned back in a chair, was playing the guitar. The other night after Chayne had sung, Ted had said, sounding far more forward than she remembered him, “And how are you going to make me pay?”
“You’ll see,” Chayne said.
Nut now they all looked up at her in amazement and Chayne said, “Liz?”
“I’m taking a poll—” she started, but Jackie, gushing smoke out of her mouth said:
“Patti told me about it today.”
“Poll?” Chayne had not heard of this.
“It’s like,” Liz started and was at a lack of words. She looked to Jackie.
“It’s a popularity poll,” Jackie said.
“My God!” muttered Chayne. “Because of the new priest?” Liz, embarrassed, nodded her head.
“He’s really good,” started the shaggy headed Diggs, and then he humphed because Chayne had kicked him under the table, and amended, “but he’s no contest for our Geoffy.”
“Chayne,” said Liz. “Could I talk to you for a moment...? Privately?”
Chayne nodded, then got up, rounded the table and came to Liz who still stood at the entrance to the kitchen. They went into the living room.
“Have you met the new priest?” she asked him in a small voice.
“Is he... a jerk?” Ted asked, leaning over his guitar.
“He’s the nicest person on earth. He prays beautifully. He’s starting a basketball team for youth outreach. He gets up before dawn to pray and run eight miles. He speaks fluent Latin, was top of his class in seminary, went to Holy Cross in Massachusetts and won the Homecoming and Prom King Crowns back in high school, not to mention he was class president every year and he’s very tall, very energetic and extremely good looking. He’s been here two days and the parish is already three times as efficient as it used to be. He’s memorized half the congregation’s names and everybody loves him.”
“Bastard,” Chayne swore in earnest, shaking his head for Geoff Ford.
“I wish you would talk to Geoff.”
“What? How did it get from the new priest is wonderful to Chayne Kandzierski should talk to Geoff?”
“I think he’d listen to you?”
“Really? Well, that’s a shame because I try not to talk to priests... There’s something unnatural about them.”
Ted sniggered and covered it up by pretending to sneeze.
“But you knew Geoff before he was a priest. Remember back in college?”
“And he was unnatural then! Unnatural boys become unnatural men. Unnatural Catholic boys that can’t get dates on Friday night and have something to prove to the world become priests.”
“Oh, Chayne!”
“Oh, Liz, please don’t make me have a heart to heart with your brother.”
Liz cocked her head and gave what, on an attractive person might have been called puppy dog eyes, but on Liz was considered a valiant attempt at manipulation. Chayne had to admire it.
“You’re going to make me have a heart to heart with Geoff,” he concluded sadly. “I think I would rather castrate myself with a plastic spoon from Dairy Queen.”
“Oh, thank you, Chayne,” Liz threw her arms around Chayne, who couldn’t help but notice how musty she smelled. “And I have another favor?” she whispered as he set her down.
“No!”
“Chayne. I’m feeling bold tonight. I asked one I might as well ask for something else?”
“I’m a genie now?”
Liz didn’t answer that. She just gestured into the kitchen and said, longingly, “I think he’s so cute, Chayne.”
Since there were six people in the kitchen, four of them women and one of the males under twenty, he assumed Liz was looking at his hamster faced, disheveled haired friend.
“Diggs?”
Liz nodded, smiling widely and blushing so that Chayne thought she was almost cute.
“Do you think you could talk to him for me?”
Chayne looked blankly at Liz.
“”Just....” said Liz. “Think about it. For me?”


TOMORROW: THE BOOK OF THE BURNING
 
That was a good portion! Great to see the new and old characters interacting. Poor Geoff, it sounds like the new priest is getting much better reviews then he ever got. I am glad Chayne agreed to talk to him. Excellent writing and I look forward to the Book of the Burning tomorrow!
 
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