The church of Ulcanus stressed the importance of confession. Their priests like to say that secrets are weapons the wicked can use against the otherwise righteous. Now, I’m not sure if I endorse the church but I can vouch for one thing. Secrets are fantastic weapons.
We walked into the church sometime around two in the afternoon, and the place was pretty much empty. It’s not like it was a deli or something. A church is probably the last place a person wants to be on their day off. Nobody wakes up at seven in the morning on a Saturday and says, yeah, I want to sit on a hard bench for two hours in a non-air-conditioned room with a hundred other sweaty people. You go because you believe you have no choice.
Murals of ancient battles were painted between every ceiling beam, and statues of the seven stances of virtue marked every third pew on either side of a long and wide red carpet while the seventh statue, by far the largest, loomed high above the pulpit. All of the statues were of men posed in a stage of sadness. The one behind the pulpit depicted a man cupping his face in the palm of his hands.
There was a conversation coming from the confessional, so I did my best to ignore what was being said. We sat in a pew nearby and waited, and in a few minutes the curtain to the confessional opened. A middle-aged elf in a tailored grey suit power-walked from the booth to the front doors with his head down.
Incense assaulted my senses and made my eyes water after I drew back the curtain and entered the confessional. The light was swallowed up behind me by the curtain and only a shaft of light illuminated the wall. It carved out the shape of a man. His face looked droopy, like the shadow of a slowly melting man. Through the window, I could make out a black veil which covered his face. A black nylon cap covered his cleanly shaven head. He reminded me of a novelty condom I won at the boardwalk last year. It was plastic figurine for your key chain. There was a pickle man in the condom with little thin arms and fat cartoon hands. That was a pretty good description of the priest, actually. He had all these brown moles on his cheeks which looked like plant bulbs about to bud under the nylon. The veil was pulled back revealing a rummy, ruddy face that protruded and bulged through an opening in front making his face look like the top half of a muffin.
“Hello father.” I closed the curtain behind me and sat on a tiny bench. As my eyes adjusted to the dark, the priest’s face became clear. He was old, like someone’s grandfather. His nose was a fat, blood vessel flecked bulb of flesh dangling from a collapsed nose bridge. “This is my first time… Doing this.”
“What do you seek to unburden yourself with?” The priest replied.
He said it like he was just repeating what the home office told him to say to every new customer. It was hurried and matter of fact. I expected this moment to be much more intimate but instead it felt like I was going to be buying something soon. I expected disdain. A part of me really wanted to be hated.
“I’ve been thinking about someone from high school lately? She was someone I kinda… Well, I wasn’t very nice to. Every now and then the memory will just pop into my head, and it’s so vivid that it’s like I’m living through it again. All I can do is shout the memory away. I’ve got a lot of debt on my soul, and I’m not totally sure it should be forgiven.”
“Ulcanus doesn’t forgive, but he will unburden you. Take sin into himself and make it his own.”
“Does he? Can he? No matter what?”
“Yes.”
“But how do I forgive myself?” I watched the priest carefully.
“Is forgiveness what you need, or is it something you want? What difference does forgiveness make if the sin is no longer yours?” The priest said.
“I guess that’s why that guy that just came out before me look so relieved. He just got done dumping all his problems in your lap. That makes you a sort of saint, don’t you think?” I watched for a change in his expression, but I got nothing. He just sat there, arms crossed, staring off away from me into the darkness.
“Son, do you have something to confess?” The priest seemed to be getting anxious already, and I hadn’t even started to confess.
“Sorry father. I’m just a little nervous is all.” I sat there thinking about what I was doing, why I was doing it, all that. I couldn’t think of a good reason to stop so I just kept going. And you know what they say about secrets. They aren’t secret if everybody knows. “So… Okay. I was about thirteen. I used to go to one of those kinds of schools that used to bus people in from all over. Real diverse crowd, you know? Which means you get into a lot of fights, form cliques, do you know what I mean?”
“Yes, go on.”
“Well, I was one of those kids that listened to rock music. Had long hair, plaid button downs, all that shit… Sorry, stuff.”
I watched the priest sit silently in the dimly lit cubicle beside me, but he seemed oddly un-swayed. He seemed like he as hard as wood. A soldier of god braving stories of depravity through a ten-inch window. I doubted my story would even elicit a response, but I wanted him to look at me like I was the most disgusting human he had ever met.
It would’ve lent a great sense of irony to the whole charade.
“I only had about three friends in that school.” I continued. “They were two guys like me that no one else wanted to hang out with. There was this one girl. Her name was Sarah. I thought I had it bad, but Sarah didn’t have any friends. She had this gimpy little walk where she would bob up and down on one side, all hunched over, looking at her feet. One of my friends used to follow her around school imitating her walk. I laughed. I mean, I laugh even to this day, but I always feel bad after. It was nice at the time to be the one dishing it out for once instead of being the one taking it all the time.”
I sat on that thought for a moment and really turned it over in my head as the priest listened. I had never said any of this out loud before. The thoughts had lived inside a corner of my head for so long that they were gathering dust. I just happened upon the memory on my way to the church as I was searching for something worthwhile to confess to. Memory is like that. The moment you find something hidden you haven’t thought about in a while, and you dust off the pictures and thumb your way through them, they tend to stick with you for a while until you put them back where you found them.
“And you wish to confess to this?” The priest said, breaking the silence.
“Yes and no. Just bear with me. We had this talent show near the end of the year. I had done the one last year and really embarrassed myself. I didn’t know what to do so I made like I was removing my thumb,” I reenacted the illusion for him through the window, but he never looked over. “Anyway,” I said, deflated. “It was a disaster. The teachers basically made people clap for me. It was fucking brutal… Sorry.”
The priest sighed but didn’t respond.
“Sarah goes up on stage and whispered something into the microphone that no one could understand and hobbled over to the piano. She was so shy…”
I took a breath and thought about the blurry Sarah from my memory. There was a feeling I hadn’t felt in so long. It felt like someone had a rope tied around my lungs and was tightening it whenever I tried to speak. I remembered her being cuter than she probably was which seemed to make the memory even harder to relive.
“So, there she was behind this piano, and she started playing. I looked over and my friends were giggling, and a part of me wanted to join in. But I got this sinking feeling. I looked over to my friend Daly, and he was whispering something to a friend next to him. I could see he was planning something. I always remember moments like those in slow motion because I was thinking at that moment that I should have said something. Like, I should have at least tried to talk him out of whatever he was about to do, but I couldn’t. I just sat there…
“Then Adam, this other kid popped up out of his seat and yelled out. Hnnnnnnnggggg! Like a retard, you know? Loud enough for Sarah to stop playing. She just sat there on that bench in front of the piano… Frozen. The whole crowd was silent and looking at us and within maybe twenty seconds half of them were laughing. All two, maybe three hundred of them. That’s when I realized everyone was looking at us. Meanwhile, I was looking at Sarah, and she was looking back at me. Dead at me.” I could picture her face in that moment as if it were happening again.
“I can’t take my goddamn eyes off her, father. As much as I want to, I can’t do it. I can see from where I’m standing she’s about to cry. I can tell. Then Adam slaps me in the chest and looks at me all cockeyed as if I’m the asshole for not laughing. So… I laughed.”
I stopped when I remembered her eyes. Those trembling wide blue eyes staring down at me. When she ran off the stage, I felt like such an asshole. She didn’t deserve what she got from us. She was just on the wrong end of the pecking order. I was in that confessional for a reason, and I was sure Benny, my partner, was getting tired of me drawing this all out.
“How do you do it, father? How do you forgive yourself?”
“Well,” The priest said after a short pause. “I’m not as experienced as you—”
“But you’ve done things, right?”
“We’ve all done something we regret.”
“So how do you forgive yourself?” I let my voice drop down lower for emphasis, and I watched as the priest shifted on the bench.
“I confess.”
His voice was sounding raspy and ragged. It was a sound I knew well. Everyone starts out that way as they try to figure out if they’re in danger.
“And that works?”
“I wouldn’t be a priest if I didn’t believe it did. Trust me. You’ll feel better now that you’ve said it out loud.”
A slight breeze blew the curtain open momentarily, and the daylight in the church receded behind the sound of neglected, metal hinges squealing. The church doors slammed shut, and that seemed to startle the priest who was clearly not expecting the sound. There was a silent moment where neither of us spoke.
I came closer to the window frame and stared into the priest’s eyes.
“Do you have anything you want to confess to me?” I said.
I could see the fear coating the surface of his eye. It was wet and trembling.
“What is this?” The priest’s voice was tremulous. His mouth hung open, shaking, and his jowls swayed slightly.
“This is confession.” I stared on.
“I don’t know what—”
“Yeah you do.” I said.
The priest leaped to his feet and swung open the curtain only to find Benny, who was the size and shape of a wall, standing between him and the exit. I opened the curtain in my cubicle and revealed myself to the priest. My appearance takes people by surprise. Long, curly brown hair, three-piece suit, and a well edged, short cropped beard. My mother used to tell me I had delicate features but those are all gone now. Years of fighting have taken a toll on my nose and eyebrows. The priest stood there staring at me with his face shaking like he had come down with a case of delirium tremors.
“Take a seat.” I pointed to the rows of benches just outside the confession booths.
Benny stepped backward exactly one step and held out a ham sized palm to show the priest where to sit. With some hesitation, the priest minced his way to the pew and his long, black, silky robe swished with every step.
The priest sat down with his back to me and peered around his shoulder from the corner of his eye. “I don’t have any money,”
“Oh, you got plenty of money, father. We’re not here for that.”
“What do you want then?” His voice took on a higher pitch as the anxiety began to wear away at his composure.
“You’ve got the look of a man who is confronted with a choice,” I said. “A choice like, do I just sit here and see what these guys want, or do I try to run? Or are you thinking about fighting?”
“Listen, just take whatever you want. Ulcanus will forgive you.”
“See that?” I nodded to Benny who was standing beside the priest. Benny looked down at him with a subtle smirk creeping into the corners of his mouth. I sat down behind the priest. “He’s trying to bribe us already.”
“Then…” The priest stammered. “Tell me what you want.”
“I want a confession.”
“What am I confessing to?”
“You mean you can’t think of one little thing to confess to? Nothing?”
“We all live in sin—"
I interrupted him. “Come on now. How about this? Tell me about the worst thing you’ve ever done. Look at me when I talk to you.”
The priest turned around slowly but never looked me in the eyes.
“I’m going to be honest with you,” I said. “I don’t want to hurt you. Nod your head if you understand me.”
The priest nodded.
“But I will if you make me. So, most important rule is, don’t lie to me. Got it?”
The priest nodded again.
“What’s the most fucked up thing you’ve ever done?”
Our eyes locked and as they did, I felt my eyes twitch, and my skin became warm. The priest looked at Benny as he stepped closer, and his face screwed up as he tried to stifle a sob.
“I…” The priest tried to catch his breath. “I’ve done things…”
“What kind of things, father?”
The priest looked down at the ground with his arm draped over the back of the bench. A tear fell down his face and exploded into a tiny wet dot on the floor.
“To children.”
“What kind of things, father?”
“Please, don’t make me say it.”
“It’s not real until you say it out loud, father. Go on.”
For every moment the priest bought with his silence, my patience thinned. In these situations, it’s all I can do to keep from beating a confession out of people.
“I touched them.”
I smiled. “Where did you touch them, father? Like, on the hand or something? Don’t sanitize the truth. Let it set you free!”
The priest sucked in air in short, stammering bursts.
“Their private parts.”
“Their private parts? You mean dicks? Vaginas? What? I need specifics.”
“Both.”
“Both!” I laughed and looked at Benny who was unamused. “He’s a playboy, this guy.” I leaned in with my elbows on my knees and my chin in the palm of my hands. “Did you like it?”
The priest leaned away as the sobs came and soon he was a blubbering mess. “I…”
“Aye aye. Yeah, I think you did. Think you still do, too.” I took a moment to take him in. Just moments ago the priest was sitting stoic in his dark little box judging all the sinners and now... Well, when confronted with his sins, he fell apart. Just like everyone does. It was kind of disappointing. “You’re doing good.” I patted the priest’s shoulder.
The priest breathed in, composing himself. Stuffing his sadness away.
“Just one more question, and we’re done. Okay?”
The priest nodded slowly, never taking his eyes off me as he leaned back.
“Did you ever make them touch you?”
The priest stared into my eyes and began to sob. He tore himself away from my gaze and faced the front of the church, slowly bending over to place his head between his knees.
I looked to Benny and nodded. “I guess that’s the answer.”
I pulled a garrote from my pocket with a silver metal handle attached to each end and stood over the priest. He was reciting a prayer to himself when the wire went around his wrists and neck and constricted. I yanked the priest and pushed with my foot on the back of his pew. He rocked back violently and screamed.
The wire drew blood from his wrists, and I would have noticed if I hadn’t closed my eyes. In cases like this I create pressure in my skull like an artificial yawn, and the world goes fades out into what I can only describe as the sound of wind rushing in from a car window.
“Benny!” I opened my eyes and saw what was happening. “Deal with his fucking hands, dummy!”
Benny bent over and tried in vain to grab the blood slicked hand that yanked back and forth, as the priest struggled, trying to free himself. Whatever Benny did worked because I could feel the wires tighten as the priest’s voice soon squeaked from existence. His tongue hung from his mouth like a turtle leaving its shell and darted in and out as he tried to lap up air into his throat. It’s never the choking that gets you. It’s the lack of blood to your brain that kills you. The sound of his body hitting the floor was the last sound that anyone would ever hear the priest make.
Benny and I left through the back exit of the church and exploded out into the sunlight. We didn’t speak until we were on the highway heading back to Fishtown.
Benny looked at me and then back to the road ahead of him. He weaved in between cars eliciting long, angry beeps. He kept looking at me, and I could sense he wanted to ask me something but was afraid to.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing,” Benny replied.
“Bullshit. You keep looking at me.”
“Nothing, Jim.” A long moment went by, and I could feel that he was queuing up a question but as to when he was going to fucking ask it, that was anybody’s guess. “I was just wondering.”
“About what?”
“About that girl you were talking to the pedo about.”
“Sarah? You were listening?”
“I was right outside the fucking curtain. What did you expect me to do? Cover my ears?”
I sighed. “What do you want to know?”
“What happened?”
“She ran off stage, crying.”
Benny laughed. “That’s fucked.”
“Yeah.” I looked out the passenger side window as little drops of rain dripped down and swallowed up other drops becoming fat and falling away from view. “I just remembered why I was thinking about her.” I leaned back in my seat and adjusted my suit jacket.
“Why is that?”
“She died yesterday. Saw it on my codex.”
“You’re friends with her on codex?”
“Ain’t nobody friends with her anymore. She probably didn’t even remember me. She just accepted anyone that sent her a request, I imagine.”
“How’d she die?”
“Some muscular thing. Shit just ate away at her over time like rust.” I smiled. I have a habit of smiling when I’m uncomfortable.
“What are you smiling about?” Benny asked.
“The priest was right.”
“About what?”
“I do feel better.”
x
