Aaron Biehn kept tugging at the collar of his shirt. It was his favorite T-shirt, bright yellow with squiggly monsters drawn on it and the name of the band Lido Beach. It was his favorite, but it felt too small on him now. He was choking.
You have to tell someone, Kim Bauer had said. Tell your dad. He’s a police officer. He can do something.
What if no one believes me? What if I can’t prove it, or what if I have to tell… to describe what he did?
Aaron shuddered again thinking about that. He wanted to forget that it had ever happened, but it was there, the guilt in his mind, the horrible feeling in his body, every time he thought about the Mass or said his Hail Marys or went to confession, which his mother insisted they do each week.
He knew he couldn’t tell his mother. She wouldn’t believe him. She was a devout Catholic and very active at St. Monica’s. “The priests are the apple of God’s eye,” she always said, copying the phrase from her mother, Aaron’s grandmother, who lived in Dublin. And if she did believe him, she’d be crushed.
But Dad was different. He was a Catholic, too, but more because his parents had been and it pleased his wife. He was sure his father would believe him, but he was afraid he would be ashamed. Don Biehn was big on self-reliance. He had always made Aaron deal with elementary school bullies on his own, rather than telling his teachers.
But Aaron had to do something. The thing of it… he wasn’t sure what to call it; was it guilt, or a vile memory, or terror? Whatever it was, it lived in him like a snake wriggling inside his body. Its head lived in his chest, gnawing at the bottom of his heart. Its tail resided at the very bottom of his spine and wriggled there, sending shivers up his back and making his lower half feel somehow cold and wet.
Aaron tugged at his shirt again and walked into the den where his father was watching Survivor. Aaron sat down next to him on the couch. His father, tall and lanky like Aaron was clearly going to be, punched him in the shoulder absentmindedly and kept watching.
“Dad…” Aaron began.
“Yep,” his father said, eyes still on the television. There was a good-looking girl in a bikini walking along the beach.
“I… I need to talk to you about something.” He paused. His dad nodded. “It’s… about church.”
“You gotta go, pal,” Don Biehn said. “I’m sorry about that. You and I will both hear an earful from Mom if you—”
“Not about that. Dad, it’s about Father Frank. It’s about the priests.”
Don Biehn glanced sidelong at his son. “They’re not perfect, Aaron, no matter what they think. Don’t ever let them fool you. Forgive the expression, but don’t take everything they say or do as the gospel truth.”
Aaron blushed. “Um, yeah. Okay. Thanks, Dad.” He turned away.
His Holiness Pope John Paul II, the Vicar of Rome, washed his hands after using the bathroom in the cloister of St. Monica’s Cathedral. Such acts had humbled him during the course of his many years as leader of the Catholic Church. Each year on Holy Thursday, he washed the feet of the poor, and that was supposed to remind him that Christ himself had practiced such humility. But, though he never would have admitted it aloud, the practice had taken on too much of the feeling of ceremony, of show. He did not feel humble on Holy Thursday, he felt like an actor.
But these human acts, these needs of the body that had not ended when he was made Pope, and indeed became more difficult as time passed, constantly reminded him of his frailty. There was a Zen saying he had always liked: “Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.” He liked that.
There were those among his cardinals who would have frowned at his use of the Zen maxim, but he was a pluralist, this Pope. Through all the years of his religious life, from altar boy to Pontiff, he had never forgotten the original meaning of that word catholic—of or concerning all humankind. All humankind, he thought, and he believed. His belief in the one true church was deep, of course, but he refused to turn his heart or his intellect away from the rest of the world. He had studied deeply of Islam and Judaism, but also of Buddhism, Hinduism, and other, less popular beliefs. Though he dwelt within the profound understanding that a man’s soul could be saved only through Christ, only through the church, he refused to exclude those who failed to accept this fact.
The Pope walked gingerly out into the small hallway and thence to the sitting room, each step a quick but careful feat of engineering for his ancient body. His once-straight spine had long ago curled like the pages of a well-read paperback. His knees hurt. His hands were gnarled as the bark of pines back in his childhood home of Krakow.
It is only the body, he said to himself in several of the languages he spoke. It is only the body.
Cardinal Mulrooney was waiting for him in the sitting room. As the Pope entered, Mulrooney stood. The Cardinal towered over the shrunken Pope.
“Your Holiness,” Mulrooney drawled.
“Your Eminence,” the Pope said in his distinctly accented English. “Was the reception well attended?”
“A full house, Holy Father,” Mulrooney said. He placed strong emphasis on the titles, like a man uncomfortable with them, grasping them firmly to maintain control. “The papers will carry a good story about the event.”
The Pope tottered over to a chair and sat down, and Mulrooney swept toward a seat opposite. “That is quite an achievement,” the Holy Father said, his tiny eyes glittering, “despite your disapproval. And your attempts to undermine the Unity Conference.”
The tiniest quiver ran along Mulrooney’s thin lips. He cursed himself inwardly. This was the Holy Father’s latest weapon, and he should have been better prepared. John Paul gave the appearance of a doddering old fool. He often used this facade to lay traps for those he mistrusted.
“You are mistaken, Holy Father,” Mulrooney said at last. “I am as much a supporter of your peace efforts as any—”
“I am old, Your Eminence,” the Pope said impatiently. “I don’t have time for games. Nor do I have the interest I once had.” His face had collapsed in on itself, a caved-in melon. But his eyes gleamed out of the wreckage like two bright wet seeds. “You disdain my efforts. You disdain me.”
Mulrooney smoothed the hem of his black shirt. “Your Holiness, it was you who chose to hold the Unity Conference here, in my diocese. You insisted.”
“The United States is the logical place to begin,” John Paul said wearily. “And either New York or Los Angeles was the logical city.” The Pope sighed. “War is coming, Your Eminence. War of a kind we have not seen before. Someone must defuse it, and I intend to put the full power of the church behind the efforts of peace.”
Mulrooney felt the Pope’s words resound in his chest. Even in his failing years, John Paul was a powerful orator. A man did not become Pope without mastering the tools that bent others to his will. “But some of those you want to make friends with are the enemies of the church. I don’t know how we can make peace with enemies.”
“There is no point in making peace with friends, Your Eminence.”
Mulrooney scratched his nose to hide his sneer. There was no use debating with this old man. The truth was, as unsupportive as the Holy Father thought he was, Mulrooney’s true animosity went much, much further.
John Paul seemed to read his thoughts. “I wonder, Your Eminence, if this is the extent of your rebelliousness, or if we are only scratching the surface?”
Something clutched at Mulrooney’s stomach. He ignored it. “Your Holiness?”