The late afternoon sun threw a shaft of light across his cheek like a guillotine blade. "The visions," I said. He waited. "I am being consumed."
"Rene?"
"I broke it off with him," I snapped. Father Held tried to conceal his startlement. "I'm sorry. It's just that the visions wouldn't stop, and Rene kept getting angrier, the more I told him... He called me a liar, and said that I had never loved him." My throat constricted; I put my hand across it and paused. I would not endanger myself by crying. "But he didn't remember how I loved him in the beginning. God, I was so happy I was... numb. I'd been chasing him for months, without even knowing. But he knew. He knew! And he let me do it for a long, long time, so that when he finally agreed to go out with me exclusively, I was starving." I could not mask my bitterness, but the guillotine blade didn't move.
"He wouldn't even kiss me before he decided," I continued. "He thought being on a kissing basis with more than one woman was dishonest. I respected that. It made me forget how we'd argued about premarital sex. He didn't see it as wrong. I did, even though I'd done it before. So when he accepted me, I assumed he had changed his mind. But as we found out later that evening, both of us had assumed that about the other.
"The tenderness drained from his face as he realized I still saw things differently, and he was transformed from my greatest longing to my worst dread. My transformation was likely the same for Rene: from the image of love to the rejecting mother, withholding affection in the guise of another woman.
"We argued, and as he cooled toward me, my arguments grew fainter. 'Where's your mercy?' he yelled. 'You're more interested in your own self-righteousness than you are in love. Have mercy on me and on yourself, and God will have mercy on you.' So I condemned myself as merciless, and resolved to see things his way. It was easy, since most young people not only have premarital sex without compunction, but find those who won't stupid and old-fashioned.
"We made love that night. It makes me feel like an idiot to admit this, but I cried right in the middle of it. I did it so quietly Rene never knew."
"Why does it make you feel like an idiot?" asked the priest.
"Because I had no right to cry at that point. I made my choice, and I had to stick by it. How could I play the victim if I walked willingly into it? I don't know if you could even call it seduction, since we conducted all our arguments with logic, even if it was self-serving logic."
"Even reason can be seduced," he said.
I bowed my head in glum agreement. "Then here's the story of a reasonable seduction."
The next time Rene and I met, I had done more rationalizing about sex, and I was looking forward to it. We had dinner at a nice place uptown, and as both of us were anxious to go to his apartment, we went to the subway station and caught the train.
We were about halfway there when he took my arm and hustled me off the train. "Aren't we going to your place?" I asked.
He gave me a strange look. "Yeah," he said, as if he were going to add, so what's the problem?
"So why are we getting off here?"
"Because this is the right stop," he said, raising his eyebrows.
But it wasn't. It was the Broadway-Lafayette stop in Manhattan. Rene lived in Brooklyn.
"Okay," I said. I didn't know what else to say. We went out of the station.
"What's the matter?" he asked me. "You seem tense all of a sudden."
"This -- I -- we're not at the right stop," I stuttered. "This is still Manhattan."
"This part of Brooklyn just looks like Manhattan."
"Come on. I know this is Manhattan. Don't you see Our Lady of the Assumption up ahead?"
"Not unless she's relocated to a brownstone," Rene snorted, and I didn't know what to do then, so I just shut up.
We went up the street, and turned down the path to Our Lady of the Assumption. "Why are we stopping here?" I asked nervously.
He whirled around and stared at me. I hastily decided to make the whole thing into a joke. I gave him a big smile. His look softened. "Come on, let's go in," he said, and put his arm around me while he dug for his keys.
"They won't fit into the lock," I blurted out; big smile again, to reassure him.
"You're right," he answered, "because I think I left them in my apartment. Let me ring the super." He pressed the parish house buzzer. My stomach lurched as I saw the sexton's face at the window. What's he going to say? I wondered.
The sexton opened the door, squinting. "What do you need this time of night?"
"Left my keys in here," smiled Rene. "Sorry to bug you." We went in.
"Quite all right."
I wanted to ask the sexton whether this was Our Lady of the Assumption, but I thought how stupid it would sound, how bewildered the sexton would be.
"Close the door tight when you leave," he said, and disappeared.
The hallway was dark, Rene invisible. I called him twice and was about to call again when I felt his arm around me. I jumped. "Come, my love," he whispered, and led me to a dimly lit doorway.
In his hand were skeleton keys to all the church doors, a small silver one for the sanctuary. He unlocked the door, then took me in his arms and kissed me. "Let's make love," he said, motioning me in. I stood there, frozen.
"Still feeling scruples?" he asked, with a comic, exaggerated sigh. "If it makes any difference, tell you what: I'll carry you over the threshold."
"It's going to take more than this," I muttered as he swung me up, clumsily.
"It's just guilt," he said, tottering in. "Down you go. There. As you come up with new doubts or guilt, we'll just talk it over."
I couldn't stand it anymore. I exploded, "Damn it, Rene! This is the sanctuary! We can't do it in here! It's bad enough I have to, but I won't do it in the sanctuary, of all places!"
"The sanctuary?" Rene echoed. He licked his lips. "Felish, what in the hell are you talking about? You've been acting distant all evening, and I want to know what's going on."
"Can't you see where we are?" I asked. "You got off at the wrong stop, you brought us to O.L.A., and now you really want to prove yourself by fornicating in the sanctuary. You seem to think this is your apartment building or something." I was losing steam even as I spoke.
He looked at me, silent, his face frozen in incredulous fury, eyes wide, lips tight. He drew a great breath, and I fell back, anticipating violence.
His mounting anger shrank to disdain. "Did you think I was going to hit you?" I gave one fast nod. "I would never hit a woman." He paused. "I think you should go home now. I can't deal with this tonight. You can call me up as soon as you want to discuss this sanctuary business, but not tonight. I'm just too angry." He opened the door. I went home, too benumbed to care. When I got home, I prayed desperately for discernment. What had this evening meant?
The next day Rene called. "I'm sorry I yelled at you," he said. "We weren't connecting last night. We have to communicate better, I guess."
"I'm sorry too," I said. "I prayed a lot. Let's not have something like this interfere with our love. We don't always see eye to eye, but we have to expect that."
"Yeah," he agreed. "Want to get together tonight?" I said yes. "Pick you up at six-thirty."
I kept praying through the day: God, let me see it his way. Let me be able to love him as nobody has yet loved him. Oh God, forgive me....
Six-thirty brought Rene. We walked from work to the train. Again, we got off at the Broadway-Lafayette stop.
I fought my panic. If this had been anyone but Rene, I would have laughed it off as a joke. But Rene was not Mr. Practical Joker. He took sex too seriously to risk it over a dumb joke. He really did believe we were getting off at the right stop.
O.L.A. rose ahead of us. "Got my keys this time," said Rene, and pulled them out of his pocket.
Skeleton keys.
I grabbed Rene's face and kissed him hard, shaking like crazy. Surprised, he responded with a little groan of delight, and we kissed outside of O.L.A. Then we turned down the path to the parish house. In my brain echoed: Just love him; it doesn't matter what you see; just love him. Remember, mercy.... Underneath the echo: Maybe I'm going nuts. Maybe we are at his apartment, and I am suffering delusions. Rene's right.
At the bottom of all thoughts cried a voice: But I see this.
I maintained my self-control until we reached the sanctuary. We entered, and he beckoned from the chancel. I followed him, legs wobbling. It wasn't just sex in the sanctuary; it was also whether I had become some kind of paranoid-schizophrenic.
He went to the very back of the chancel, opened the gates, and slipped behind the screen where the altar was. "Come on," he said.
I laughed and cried and stammered. He came out, took my hand, and pulled me behind the screen. The altar, immense and white....
"Still feeling guilty?" he asked, knowing full well.
"How'd you guess?" I answered, and fell on his shoulder, giggling hysterically.
"We don't have to do this if you don't want to," he said, gently pushing me off him.
"Yes, but then you won't love me anymore."
"No, I'll always love you. But I won't let myself go out with you without having sex. I tried that before with my old girlfriend, and it's too painful. If you don't accept my physical love now, you don't accept me."
"So if I told you no, you would leave me?"
"That's right," he said. "You knew that when we started."
Have mercy, I instructed myself silently, and unbuttoned my blouse. He helped me take it off. I shivered.
"Cold?" he asked. I was. Winter in the sanctuary. "I like to keep the place a little cool. Keeps the air from getting stuffy. But don't worry, I'll warm you right up." I pressed my lips into a pale smile. He flung my skirt into a corner. "How do you unhook this?"
"Let me," I said. I reached behind my back, gave the bra a twist and relieved it of its duties for the night. He ran his fingertips over my naked body and through my hair, removing hairpins and barrettes. I helped him undress, then sat on the floor.
"Don't feel you're worthy enough for the bed?" he said jovially.
"Bed?" I was nonplussed. He hoisted himself up onto the altar.
"Bed."
I swallowed hard. This is some kind of test, I thought. But it's anyone's guess whether it's a test of my faith or my sanity.
"God will not strike you down," said Rene. He descended from the altar and helped me up. The altar was dreadfully cold, and I made little hissing noises as my bare flesh came into contact with it.
He looked at me, interested, mildly annoyed. "I'm cold," I explained.
"You're always cold. Why do women get so cold all the time?"
"I don't know, Rene. Why do men get so hot? Cold, hot... what's cold to one person is hot to another." He wrapped me in his arms, and we kissed. He laid me down. The cold made the skin on my back crawl, but I held my tongue. Rene slid onto me, and my spine ground into the cold marble. "You're hurting me," I said lamely.
"Sorry," he said. "What am I doing?"
"You're pressing me into the... hard..." I mumbled. He clucked his tongue, muttering futons.
"I'll try to support my weight," he said. "Spread your legs a little more."
I lost track of the logistics. Something far above me had caught my eye. Lying on the altar I had a good view of the church's vaulted arches, and something fluttered near the top. It was white, like a dove; but it was growing larger, and its movements more hurried. Rene entered me, and the white thing disappeared.
I forgot about it while we were making love. The cold and the pain in my spine didn't matter now. Though the pain worsened, it complimented the pleasure, the gulf between the two sensations heightening each. I came, screaming ecstasy and torment. Outrage and satisfaction mingled within me, as if suffering during ecstasy had paid for it.
Rene lay next to me, spent. The exaltation had left me, and there was only pain. Rene had slipped into a wordless state of release.
Wings fluttered high above. The white presence had reappeared, falling turbulently. Its three wings flopped in different directions, a helpless, sodden motion which nauseated and frightened me.
"Rene," I said, gripping his hand.
"Quiet, honey, you're ruining it." He stirred somnolently. He liked me to lie still by him after sex, not speaking, not moving. Not thinking. Even the footfalls of my thought would intrude.
I turned from him, looking upward. Wings flapped in my ears. I didn't know how it could escape Rene's attention, unless he couldn't hear it, and if he couldn't, then I was hallucinating. I faced the whirling blur, and two terrible eyes burned down at me.
Two unmerciful eyes.
I am insane, I thought. I flung my arm over my face; I would not scream. The thing could have torn at me with its talons, and I would have died without a sound, so that Rene would never know my insanity.
"I don't believe in you," I whispered to it. "I am not in the sanctuary, not on the altar. This is a bed. I am warm. I am lying with Rene in his apartment, staring at the empty ceiling!" My voice had risen above a whisper. I started over in silence. "Rene doesn't believe in you either. I see as he sees. If I told him about you, he would know I was crazy. So I do not believe that you exist."
I wanted so badly to say to Rene: Protect me. But he would say: against what? If I explained, he would be angry at my guilt, my "unwillingness" to see things his way. So lies would keep us together; the truth would condemn me of guilt, if not insanity, and I would be rejected.
"I know what you're going to say, Father: it's better to tell the truth even if it means rejection. That way, people will know who you are, and some will accept you. But people want lies. Lies are straight, clean and easy, and truth is complicated and ugly."
"I'll take ugly, then," he said. The sunlight had washed away the guillotine blade. "Did the winged creature disappear?"
"Not then," I said, and continued:
My eyes were closed. I didn't dare to move. The air churned above me like horrible breath. Then the sound stopped.
My stomach burned, as if the white thing had burrowed into it. I opened my eyes. It wasn't there.
I groaned. The pain immobilized me; I appeased it by staying still.
Rene had fallen asleep. I lay on the cold block of marble, the pain keeping me awake. Finally I drowsed, and awoke to Rene's cheerful voice. "We have to get up. Try not to take too long getting ready."
"Where are we going?" I asked.
"To church," he said. I almost laughed.
I collected my clothing, strewn around the altar, and put it back on. It was cold and damp. I shuddered.
"What's wrong?" asked Rene.
"I think I'm catching the flu," I answered. My sight was cloudy, and my whole body ached, especially my stomach.
"Do you still want to go to church?" he asked, concerned.
"Oh, yes," I said sincerely. Curiosity overcame pain -- I wanted to see if mass was going to be held at Rene's apartment.
We left O.L.A., walked to the Broadway-Lafayette station, and took the train downtown. Five stops away from Rene's apartment, we got off the downtown train and switched to the uptown platform.
"These transfers are a waste of time," grumbled Rene. "I hate waiting for the second train."
"Yeah," I said absently. The uptown train arrived, and took us back to the Broadway-Lafayette stop, where we had gotten on. We walked up the street, back to O.L.A. This time, we entered the sanctuary by the narthex door. It was filled with people now, and the organ was playing.
We sat down. I had expected calm, because Rene and I were seeing alike: I had rejoined the sane. But I hadn't, really. Evil was growing inside me. I looked at the people in the congregation. They were so confident, even people with troubles, fortified by the singing, the praying, the silent kneeling.
I didn't belong there.
I felt not fortified, but weakened; not happy, not confident. I sang hymns next to Rene, my voice drowning in his strong tenor. He didn't notice when I stopped singing.
We knelt to pray. I sank down on the floor of the pew, not out of piety, but fatigue. The prayers droned on below my thoughts. I looked towards the graceful roses of stone embedded in the high ceiling, and remembered the burning eyes. Unmerciful eyes.
Deep within me, something cold twisted, took root. Fed on me.
God has turned his face away from me. A distinct thought, not a mysterious voice. But something in me was eager to hear it. To believe it.
And I was afraid.
I didn't show it. I got up when the others did. I mouthed the words, crossed myself. Greeted Rene with a holy kiss, gave him the Peace. Took the Eucharist. Showed up at Social Hour. I felt all of my smiles coming out wrong, gangrenous. If people noticed anything, they kept silent. I wasn't grateful for that, though. I was playing a game: listen to me, but I won't reveal what's wrong. I wanted to express myself without expressing myself, avoid the shame.
"What shame?" asked Father Held.
"My insanity..."
He leaned back in his chair. "Felicia," he said, his brow creasing. "As you tell me what you have left to tell, don't call yourself insane anymore."
"But you don't know what happens next," I said, and I couldn't stop my eyes blurring. "You're going to know how fucking twisted I am...." I put my hands to my face and let myself cry, although it would awaken that which fed on me. My intestines contracted.
He said, "Talk, and I will listen. And I will never tell anyone else what I hear today. Do not judge yourself. Just tell what you saw, and how it made you feel."
"But Rene...."
"If it helps, tell it as if Rene were insane."
I fought this. Then I began again:
Rene and I kept going out. I warded off the pain by reinterpreting all I saw into Rene's reality, disbelieving myself. I developed a taste for doing what I was unwilling to do, the only way I could make the pain in my viscera fade. Doctors found nothing wrong -- physically. I would have called it an incipient ulcer, but for the teeth gnawing me.
Eventually it ate away at me even when I was talking myself into Rene's viewpoint. Seeing things Rene's way hadn't killed the creature; it had strengthened it.
Rene noticed how I tottered around like an old lady, how pale I had become. He made sad, worried jokes about how long I took in the restroom. I fended off his questions with codewords, because he wanted a physical reason for my agony -- not a metaphysical one. I knew he would display compassion, but feel disgust for "only my guilt."
One day I ran out of codewords, and told him the truth about the creature.
Rene looked grim. Sighed. "How can I help you get over this?"
"I don't think you can," I said, surprising myself.
"Oh?" he said, turning his eyes on me. Unmerciful eyes. "Why is that?"
"You won't believe me," I said.
"What won't I believe? Try me."
"The sanctuary...."
He rolled his eyes, saw me lose my nerve. "Go ahead."
"Rene, I really don't want to tell you. I don't think you'll understand. I don't see things as you see them."
"You've made that pretty clear," he said. "But didn't you say once that shouldn't get in the way of love?"
"You're right," I floundered. I couldn't look him in the eyes.
"So why don't you communicate with me? Just try."
I told him about our first evening: the subway, the sanctuary, the altar.... the white thing. Rene started out with a half-smile of amusement, and by the time I had finished, looked stricken. "This isn't a joke you're playing, is it, Lish?"
I said no. "You really see that stuff?" I nodded. "You haven't told anybody else about this, have you?"
"No."
He breathed a sigh of relief. "You must be under a lot of stress these days."
"You don't believe me."
"My God, Felicia," he shouted, "do you believe yourself? You know this stuff is all in your mind, don't you? Why would I take you to the sanctuary to make love to you? And the white thing -- no sane person sees that! Listen. I'm going to take you back to my apartment. I'll take care of you. You can call in sick in the morning." He took my hand. I followed. I didn't want to, but I couldn't trust myself anymore.
We took the train. I buried my face in his coat so no one could see me, how crazy I had become. We got off at the Broadway-Lafayette stop.
The thing growing inside me bit at the confining walls of flesh. I groaned, and clutched at Rene.
"This is the right stop, Felicia. Damn it! Can't you wait to make a big scene until we're in my apartment?"
"Rene, please...." He didn't know that I was used to getting off at whatever stop he said, or why I was groaning. It angered me.
"If we don't get off here, we're going to end up in fucking Coney Island!" he hissed, and dragged me off the train. "I suppose O.L.A. looms ominously in the distance now?"
"That's right," I said, dropping all pretenses of sanity. "Stop squeezing my arm. I'm not going to run away."
"All right. Now listen to me, Lisha. We're going to beat this thing. But you have to be in there with me fighting. You tell me whatever you see, and I'll tell you what it really is. Now. You said we're outside of O.L.A. We are actually walking down Eighth Avenue in Park Slope, Brooklyn. There are a lot of brownstones. The ones on this block have little stone angels above the doors. The house we just passed has a big lion sticking out its tongue. See it yet?"
"Stop treating me like this!" I yelled. "I don't give a shit how crazy I am. You can't talk to me like a three-year-old!"
"At least a three-year-old knows what the real world looks like! Just try!"
"All right. I see the big lion. I see the little angels. I see Daddy's house. I see Dick and Jane run. Now will you leave me alone?"
He pulled me down the little pathway to the parish house, unlocked the door, and shoved me in. He slammed the door behind himself. "You're being pretty obnoxious to someone who's trying to keep you out of Bellevue's psycho ward," he said.
"I have feelings, Rene," I replied. "Can't you take care of me without reminding me of how sick I am?"
He relented. "Okay. I'll take care of you. No more lessons for now." He led me into the chancel, in front of the altar rail. "Wait here. I'll bring you some medicine." He saw my bewilderment. "You're on my couch, okay?" he advised me.
"It's the altar rail," I said, realizing how ridiculous I sounded. "But thanks anyway."
He went out of the sanctuary, and came back carrying a coil of rope.
"Rene..." I said warily. "What do you have there?"
"Medicine," he replied.
"It looks a lot like a rope to me," I said.