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At least he’s talking.
“What do you want to confess?”
He’d anticipated another long pause, but the man set off immediately.More animated now, off-script.
“I was in Bangor.Three months ago today.June fourteenth.I was there on business.I stayed in a hotel by the river.Just a couple nights.”
Confessions ran along fixed grooves, and after thirty years of hearing them, Father Thomas felt fairly sure which direction this particular train was headed.Downtown.The hotel bar.A girl.
“It was a nice hotel, very clean.”
“Clean” because he feels dirty…
“What’s your line of business?”Father Thomas asked.Sometimes, going back was the way to go forward.
“Auto parts,” said the man.And then, hastily, “There’s a lot of people there who are down on their luck.You know?By the waterfront.There’s a camp under the Washington Bridge.People with their belongings in shopping carts.It’s ah – ” He cleared his throat.“It’s very sad, Father, how many people are living like that.”
“Yes, it is.”
“And they’re usually not bad people, Father.They’re not there because they deserve to be.I ah – ” Another pause, a sniff.“I talked to this guy down there.He was an ex-Marine, Iraq.Got injured, IED, shrapnel in his knee.Cashiered out, started taking medication for the pain.”
Another familiar tale.
“I bought him breakfast.”
“That was kind.”
“I meant it kindly,” said the man.Then there was more silence.He seemed to have lost his thread.
“What did you buy him for breakfast?”
“He showed me his tent.All neat inside, everything rolled up tight, like in the military.He told me his name.Matthew.”
“A good Bible name,” said Father Thomas.“Do you want to give me yours?”
“My name?”echoed the man.Another silence.Then a sigh as he said, distantly, “Oh, it’s Mark.”
Father Thomas could have made a crack about Matthew, Luke, and John or said, “I’m Father Thomas,” but for some reason, he kept silent.There was something about that answer, the odd, distant way it was given, the sigh… He didn’t like it, although he didn’t understand why.
“It sounds like you showed kindness to someone,” said Father Thomas, briskly taking charge.“So I’m wondering what you really have to confess.”
“In the afternoon.I mean, it was the evening.Six or seven.Early evening, still light.”
Mother of God.
“Yes?”
“I saw him again and I said hi.And he – he recognized me but he was changed.”
“Changed?”
“Different.In his eyes.Like a screen had come down.Only I didn’t realize it.I’d already decided I wanted to help him, see.So I gave him fifty dollars.And I –” The man swallowed.“I held it out to him and he took it.Two twenties and a ten; he screwed them up and threw them at me.He said, “I don’t want your pity!”He was high.High on drugs or drunk.And he said, “Take your fifty you fucking queer and shove it up your ass.””
The words sat there in the space between them.It was not the first time he’d heard them, by a long stretch.But still.
“What did you do?”
“I’m ashamed to say, Father, but I cursed him back.The F-bomb.”
