Light and Wine Page 3

  It was just like that, like stepping into sunlight.

  “Salve, Father Marc,” she singsonged as she passed with her friends.

  Good morning.

  I contained my elation in a smile that was all hers.

  “Good morning, ladies,” I returned, nodding.

  Just like phone calls that were kept light, it was more than enough.

  I was far too thankful to be impatient.

  Freshman Religion and the advanced Latin class afterward passed easily. I looked forward to our tutoring session at her house tomorrow afternoon, and mass Wednesday morning, and every chance I could think of seeing her again.

  Standing from my bed, I cross my humble room to my window once more and stare out into the dimly lit garden of Dutch crocus and bloodroot. Early Stars of Bethlehem glow in the moonlight, decorating the dark with little yellow blooms.

  After my final class of the day was finished, I returned here with exams to grade for what I thought would be my first truly restful night in ten days’ time. I was halfway through them when my phone rang.

  It was Lacie’s father, and I leaned back in my chair as I answered, curious.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Theodore. How are you?”

  “Afternoon, Father Marc. I’m well, I’m well. I have your field day order ready and was hoping you could come by and pick it up from the house around dinnertime? I could use a hand lifting some furniture into the van once it’s empty, if you don’t mind.”

  The warm anticipation of seeing Lacie again rushed through my stomach, up into my chest and around my shoulders.

  “I’d be happy to, Timothy. I can leave in an hour, if that’s alright.”

  “Perfect, I’ll just be heading out then. Julia and Lacie should be home if I’m a few minutes late.”

  Adhering to decorum, I finished exams and grabbed my coat and scarf before I left, but even as I dressed for the early spring cold, I knew there was no way it could touch me. I was afire with the thought of being near to her in her home.

  And then.

  And then …

  Leaning my weight against my right arm on the window frame, I rub my eyes with my left hand. Years of unfulfilled yearning stirred and strengthened by this afternoon’s confession rolls through me. Silent and unabated, it settles in my chest and palms and hips, and makes every cell of me yearn for precious love.

  Moving my hands from the window frame and my eyes as I open them, I run my fingers through my hair and close them over the back of my neck. I press my lips together and pace to my desk, then back to my window, to my closet and to my desk again, keeping my fingers interlocked over the back of my neck.

  The want to just press down against where longing concentrates, aches. It’s confounding, how strong the need to touch is, but I don’t.

  Leaving my coat behind, I grab my papers and walk outside just as I am.

  My students’ tests rustle in the late March bluster, their fluttering and my footsteps the only sounds between here and the church. The office there should be empty, and a more neutral place to focus on finishing my work.

  With a deep inhale of nightfall’s frosted air, I gather the concentration to suppress physical reactions that memories of Lacie bring. I pull oxygen deep into my chest, and my brightened pulse starts to slow its hum. I swallow, easing my grip on the papers in my hand, and my limbs begin to relax.

  Inside the church, the scent of frankincense lingers in the silent air. Crossing myself as I approach the apse, I pass through the vestry and up a few stairs toward the back of the building. In the office, I settle myself behind the wooden desk. Back straight, red pen in hand, I redirect my eyes to exams.

  The change of scenery helps.

  For a while.

  My eyes and hands grade recollections of irregular Latin verbs, but my heart and soul are in Lacie’s room at her mother’s house, my boots sinking helplessly into the softness of cream carpet and my chest swelling around the sound of her pounding heart.

  I wish I could have stayed there, holding her and listening to her. I wish I had told her how badly I missed her and how frequently I’ve thought of the way we parted the night before she left, how it’s been like walking on shards of regret for haste I allowed.

  I’m just about to sip some water and return my thoughts to my students’ work when my phone rings.

  And I know in every part of me, before I even see the screen, who it is.

  Sitting back in my chair and bringing a deep breath into my chest, I set my pen down and bring my phone to my ear.

  “Hi, little gospel,” I answer, the corners my mouth curving up.

  She hums before she replies, “Hi, Father.”

  I hear her shifting, and wind maybe, and thin staccato, like footsteps.

  “How are you?” she asks.

  “I’m …” Pausing, I sit up straight. My smile stays as I try to pick the best and most honest words.

  “You’re …?” She drags it out, waiting and curious.

  I clear my throat.

  “Missing,” I reply, thankful for this moment and wanting it to last. “I’m missing you.”

  What I’m certain now is wind blows harder and our connection is muffled for a second.

  “I miss you,” she says.

  I press my phone slightly closer, and through broken signals, I still hear the light stepping sounds.

  “Where are you right now?” she asks.

  “In the church office. Where are you?” I ask, pressing my phone slightly closer, straining to hear her better over the breeze. “Are you alright?”

  “Yes,” she answers, nearly too quickly. “No, well, yes, but …”

  “What’s wrong?” I sit even straighter, closer to the edge of my chair.

  “Nothing’s wrong. I’m okay, just …”

  The pattern of steps stops.

  “I know it’s late, I just … There’s more that I need to …” She pauses again, and I know she’s seeking courage for candor. “Will you hear my confession?”

  The muscle that keeps life coursing through me skips, and the extra half-beat makes my chest feel tight. Nodding even though I’m alone, I stand.

  “Of course,” I tell her, holding the phone to my ear as I walk toward the door without a thought.

  All instinct.

  All love.

  “Where are you?” The sound of my own footsteps along marbled ivory tiles replaces the silence of hers. “Do you need me to come get you?”

  “No,” she says, and it hits me. I feel it in my beat-filled chest and in my spine. I feel it in the roots of all that I am.

  She’s already here.

  My quick-beating heart opens, and Lacie fills my pause with the most sincerely uplifted voice. “Come let me in?”

  My steps quicken to a jog, through the low-lit walnut carved hallway, down the half flight of stairs without touching the bannister.

  Pushing open the door to the sanctuary, cutting in front of the chancel and moving quickly up the aisle between pews, my muted footfalls thump along burgundy carpet until I reach the back doors. Cold wind and starlight flood in and over me as I open them and find the same love that brought me to this place, standing right in front of me.

  Dressed in her white peacoat with a knitted cap to keep out the chill, Lacie’s still holding her phone to her ear.

  “Please,” is all I can whisper, my pulse pounding swift warmth in my ears as I hold the door and step aside to let her in.

  Smiling, she enters, unbuttoning her coat and removing her hat as I close heavy oak behind us. Light pink boots that come no higher than her ankles clack along the narthex floor as she steps further inside, and as she removes her coat, the hint of flowers always surrounding her swirls with the crisp scent of her soap in the incense imbued air.

  “Thanks,” she says, draping winter white wool over her left arm, standing before me in a cream-colored skirt and sheer dove grey sweater. Its wide collar bares both her shoulders and permanently present pale pink rosary
beads while precious knees peek out from under delicate layers of tulle.

  “Is this okay?” she asks, looking at me and then around the dimly lit entryway. “Me being here, I mean, right now …?”

  I lean away from the door and offer the bend of my arm.

  “Absolution isn’t beholden to time or place,” I tell her gently, my pulse echoing in my ears as she takes my arm. “Your reason for being here supersedes any precepts.”

  Lacie ducks her head a little as we walk, and loose wisps of dark brown fall around her face.

  “Thank you,” she returns. The clack of her steps into the sanctuary slip into harmony with my own, and my gratitude deepens. She gives me her coat when I hold my other hand out for it, and as I drape it over my free arm, soft, small, chilled fingers find my palm. My favorite of all God’s gifts takes my hand, and the contact flows through all of me, singing in my veins like red wine.

  I can’t help placing a chaste and singular kiss on her crown as we walk.

  We’re silent, but in reverence. The one I love most has called me out of faith, and fulfilling her open, wholesome needs, manifesting the trust she has in me to communicate with Our Father, fills me so deeply with ardor that the backs of my eyes feel lit with it.

  I’ve never wanted to do my best for anyone like I do for her, with Him.

  When we reach the confessional, I brush my thumb along the top of her hand, and bravely wide eyes lift to mine. Rings of hazel shine with devotion, and she lets go of my hand before turning to open the door.

  I take a breath to orient myself as I close it after her and exhale slowly as I hang her coat on the hook inside my side of the booth. Even before I close my door, notes of clean gardenias mixing with old wood are upon me, illuminating my sense of right with the scent of meaning and purpose.

  Sitting down on the bench, I slide the small door between us open, revealing a finely ornate black screen. I don’t let my eyes linger, but a glance through small cross shapes finds Lacie radiant in shades of glowing white.

  “Forgive me, Father,” she begins, softly engulfing me with significance as she makes the sign of the cross.

  “It’s been—” She stops for a breath, and I fill my lungs with the same air as I look to the carpet. “It’s been a few hours since my last confession.”

  “May the Lord direct your heart into God’s love,” I welcome.

  “I … My last confession was incomplete. I failed to mention my greatest sin …”

  My chest tightens, and I close my eyes.

  “I’ve placed my trust in fear instead of love. The other night … I was embarrassed. I wasn’t sorry. Well, I was, but I … I never meant for it to be the way it was.”

  Holding a steady breath, I knit my hands together between my knees, gripping and locking knuckles. I feel His nearness, wholesome and warm, but the want to reach out and assure her for myself is undeniable.

  She sighs, and the smallest exhale drifts from her side of the shared, split-in-half sacred shelter.

  “Right guy, wrong moment, I guess,” she says.

  Swallowing, watching her fidget through the screen, I tighten my hands as my heart swells and its beats deepen.

  “I was afraid. It’s so big. It’s so much … When I’m with you, I feel like this can’t be real. Like what we have feels more than real … Greater than …”

  Tucking loose tendrils of dark hair behind her ear, she shifts. Her voice is shaky but her tone is certain when she speaks again.

  “I feel you in my heart,” she says. “My heart never, ever doubts what I feel when we’re together.”

  Between bare truth and unconditional grace, the corners of my eyes nearly leak. I’m older, physically bigger, stronger, and the feeling between my ribs is overwhelming. I know exactly what Lacie means by greater than.

  “It was wrong of me to—” She stammers between the tiniest click-slips of rosary beads. “To be afraid of what God’s blessed me with. To try to …”

  She sniffles, and I know the tears aching at the corners of my eyes have fallen from hers, and I want so much to go to her side of this booth and gather her to my chest.

  “It was wrong of me to run from you. I needed to step back, to see for myself, but … not the way I did. Not like that.”

  Leaning nearer to the screen between us, tear tracks shine and glossy wide pupils glint in the low light.

  “I’m so sorry, Father.”

  Through little wrought iron crosses, I hold the most earnest eyes.

  “I was impatient,” she says with a sniffle, looking down. “I’ve been selfish and I’ve been hesitant to accept God’s will.”

  Breathing as steadily as I can around the pulse-beats in my throat, I return my eyes to my hands and listen patiently, abiding every ounce of aching to reach and hold.

  “I let fear choose for me. The fear of not having, and then the fear of having too much … I’m sorry for my doubt and my haste. I’m sorry I rushed and left.”

  Everything within me and all around me moves as she continues. The air is and I am lighter, warmer. I feel God’s love as surely as I feel the floor under my feet and Lacie’s earnest repentance in my ears. He is here, and He is absolution, and He is moving through me, for her.

  “I’m sorry with all of my heart for these sins and for the sins I cannot remember,” she says in finishing. “I want to embrace God’s will with my whole soul.”

  “The Lord God never leaves you, little flock.” I feel more than hear my voice come up from my chest, steadfast and assured. “He is pleased to give you the kingdom.”

  Through the screen, Lacie opens her heart further still, and glows as she allows the most sacred of voices to move through her, too.

  Through Him, we’re laced together.

  “There is no fear in love,” I tell her quietly. “For His perfect love casts out fear.”

  Wholly overcome behind closed eyes, the sound of her prayer calls me back.

  “Dear God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee. I detest all my sins because I dread the loss of Heaven and the pains of Hell, but most of all because they offend Thee …”

  Her Act of Contrition flows from her, through me, around us both with all knowing, all powerful, always present presence, and I breathe in. It’s all I can do.

  “I firmly resolve with the help of Thy grace to confess my sins, to do penance, and to amend my life.”

  As she finishes, I make the sign of the cross with her. Our eyes don’t meet through the screen, but I feel her. We’re still laced together, one in Love.

  I find and steady my voice in fervor. “Glory be to the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”

  The tears she’s letting leak press her limits. I can feel relief rolling from her in the small space between us, brimming with the need to surrender completely to God’s will.

  “As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,” she says with me. “World without end. Amen.”

  Completing the prayer in the thinnest whisper, she stands, stumbling over her shoes with a quickness as she opens the door. A sob chokes out of her as she seeks a pew, and when I emerge, my purest proof of God is on her knees. Shoulders trembling, face upturned with eyes closed, melodic murmurs pour from her lips as tears slip.

  I almost fall right where I stand.

  Between sacred phrases and awed, apologetic words, behind clasped together hands, her chest rises and falls with small gasps, and I swear I can feel her tender, honesty-opened heart beating in my own ears.

  In my hands.

  In my blood.

  In the deepest part of myself where He resides like a flame, I feel her.

  And not only does it keep me from falling, but it carries me to her where she kneels. Her heartbeat is so strong, so all-around and all-within both of us that her penance doesn’t falter as I turn down the pew she’s in. And when I’m near enough …

  All our time apart, all our time together, all the years of my life that I’ve ached and searched and yearne
d for love, open for the Holy Spirit, and I surrender myself, too. Just as she has.

  It makes me bow.

  And bend.

  Placing my left knee next to Lacie’s, I drop my right along the outside of her right and fold my arms over hers. I cover smaller hands with mine and rest my forehead on her shoulder, and feel more one with my calling than I ever have. Her whispers of His words burn slowly through me, and I feel like the sun the first time God lifted it up.

  “Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven,” she weeps, shimmering like every color of the spectrum, melted together and shining.

  She’s light.

  And I’m warmth.

  As she finishes her prayer, the vehemence stiffening her posture ebbs away, allowing me to feel her weight.

  “Amen.” She breathes, her head falling back, soft brown hair spilling over my shoulder. Shifting her hands to the outside of mine, she brings both our right hands up to her forehead, beginning a slow sign of the cross.

  With our voices in perfect harmony, we dedicate ourselves anew. “In the name of the Father—”

  Her hand trembles as she guides me, and I recover hers with mine. Nestling little fingers between my own, I guide her holy gesture.

  “And of the Son,” we intone in unison.

  I secure her hand in mine as we finish the sign of the cross over her palpably deepened heart. It echoes through the sanctuary as we whisper, “and the Holy Spirit.”

  Together.

  “Amen.”

  With our hands still clasped over her heart, she brings her left up to press them closer, and the rhythm pulsing beneath skin and bone pounds like an annunciation. The side of my face is near enough to hers that I can feel the warmth of her cheek and the pace of her breaths. Her shivering has ebbed, but what was overwhelmed shaking is now a subtle and unwavering hum. She’s vibrating from within, like her veins carry incandescence instead of blood.