LaRose(75)

Emmaline asked, unexpectedly, How are you?

Priests don’t get that question, or not in the way she asked it. He raised his eyebrows. He laughed, weirdly bubbly, maybe in a frightening way.

Don’t ask, he said, abrupt.

Why not?

Because.

His heart jolted to life, ridiculously banging against his ribs. He put his hand on his chest to calm it down.

Something’s bothering you, said Emmaline.

No, I’m fine.

Really? Because you look disturbed, said Emmaline. Excuse me.

No, really. Sorry. I am fine.

His ploy was feeble. He regretted it.

Emmaline turned away. She and LaRose walked off holding hands. Her thoughts slowed. Why had she asked that question? Why had she turned away when he deflected it and gave a bullshit answer? It was exactly what priests were supposed to do. Keep their personalities subservient to their service. Endure whatever God gave them to endure without complaint. Was a priest ever not fine? Who could tell?

Father Travis watched them go. He had studied his feelings regarding Emmaline. This wasn’t about his vows. It was about her family, her and Landreaux, the fact that he had counseled them, married them, baptized their children. They trusted him to be all things except, actually, human. Be all to all in order to save all.

Thanks, St. Paul. Better to marry than to burn, and this burns. But she’s the only one I’d ever want and she’s already married. So take the heat! Just live with it, he told himself, you fool.

She had asked him how he was, said that he looked disturbed. How pathetic that such an ordinary question and simple observation should make his heart skitter.

Father Travis shut down the gym lights. It was his shift for the Adoration of the Holy Sacrament. He padlocked the door and walked over to the church, entering the side basement. He walked through the lightless dining hall toward the faint glow in the stairwell. Popeye Banks was nodding off in the pew, and startled when Father Travis jostled his shoulder. He stumbled out, yawning, put his hat on at the door, and called good-bye. Father Travis sat down on one of the comfortable memory-foam pillows he’d bought for the people who kept the Adoration going 24/7. Then the dim hush, the arched vault, the flickering bank of candles, and his thoughts. But first his hands, shaky. His chest was stopped up. His breath weak. He put his hand to his chest and closed his eyes.

Open, he said.

He always had trouble opening his heart. Tonight it was stuck again. It was a wooden chest secured by locked iron bands. An army duffel, rusted zipper. Kitchen cupboards glued shut. Tabernacle. Desk. Closet. He had to wedge apart doors, lift covers. He was always disappointed to find a drab or menacing interior. To make a welcoming place of his heart was mentally slippery work. Sometimes cleaning was involved, rearrangements. He had to dust. He had to throw out old junk to make room. It was all so tedious, but he worked at the project until he had the whole damned lot of Emmaline’s family in there and could slam it shut, exhausted, with Emmaline in the center and safe from him.

Emmaline and LaRose got in the car and pulled out onto the road home. Kids always say what’s on their minds while you are driving.

How come you changed my school?

Do you like Mrs. Shell?

Yeah, course, but how come I’m still with you?

You mean not going back to Peter?

And Nola, and Maggie. How come?

Because. Emmaline said it carefully. Because I want to keep you with your family, with us now. I miss you too much. She glanced over quickly at LaRose.

Your dad, your brothers and sister, they miss you too. They know I’m keeping you.

He was staring out the windshield, his mouth slightly open, transfixed.

Is that okay with you, my boy?

He took a moment. He was thinking how to put this.

You just pass me around, he said. I’m okay with it, but it gets old. Problem is, Nola, she’s gonna be too sad. It might be death if she gets too sad, Maggie told me. Plus Maggie and me, we’re like this. He put two fingers together, the way Josette did. We keep her mom going when she can’t get out of bed and stuff.

Everything that LaRose said shocked Emmaline. He’s a little man, she thought. He’s grown up.

So I gotta go back there, Mom. I like Mrs. Shell. She’s not picky. But I need to go back to Dusty’s family.

You remember him, Dusty?

He’s still my friend, Mom. I got his family on my hands, too. So can I go back?

Really, my boy?

She thought she’d better stop the car and throw up. Plus her head hurt suddenly because her boy remembered Dusty, spoke of him with such immediacy, felt this level of responsibility. It was too much to put on him, but there it was.

Yeah, Mom, it’s too late to go back on your promise.

She did pull over, but just put her face in her hands and was too overwhelmed to cry. Anyway, she never cried. That was Landreaux’s job. He cried for both of them. Emmaline tried to cry, tried to well up just to get some relief. But she was Emmaline.

LaRose patted her arm, her neck.

It’s okay, you’re gonna make it, he said. If you just get going you’ll feel better. One step after another. One day at a time.

LaRose was used to mothers’ despair and these were the words that Peter used with Nola.



LANDREAUX DROVE HIS son to the Ravich house. He could see that the change in routine had made LaRose anxious, and restoring the old order was the right thing. Still, Landreaux had trouble letting LaRose go. He hugged his son just before LaRose swung out of the car with his pack on his shoulder.