“I’m born from chaos and adopted by obscurity,” she says cheerfully. “That’s close enough to Chicago for me to love those dogs and devour them.”
We cut across the quad. The wind has knife-edges today; it makes the last leaves rattle like paper prayers. Pru pulls me into a narrow street where the buildings lean toward each other like old women gossiping. The hot dog place is a walk-up window two blocks from campus—year-round Christmas lights, a chalkboard menu that threatens to crumble in a stiff breeze. Steam ghosts up from the grill, carrying mustard and onion and something neon that should not be a food and absolutely is.
She orders for both of us because she learned early that if she leaves me blank space I will fill it with duty. “Two dogs dragged through the garden, fries, and a Coke that could clean a battery,” she chirps at the kid in the paper hat. Then to me, softer, “What did the Mother want?”
I look at the laminated picture of a hot dog with more opinions than most bishops. “To remind me who pays for the new roof and what I have to do in order to earn it.”
Pru’s eyebrows do a sympathetic dance. “Donation drama. Excellent. We love when salvation comes with a plaque.”
“And with the reminder of a sit-down because of my mistakes,” I add. The words feel unreal out here, standing at a window with a tip jar that says BUN MONEY in sharpie. “Friday. With the Shannons.”
Her head snaps. “The Irish Shannons?”
“Yes.”
She whistles. “Spicy. Mob drama.”
“Potentially bloody,” I say.
“I prefer spicy,” she repeats, undeterred. “And what, pray tell, is our girl’s role in this…culinary melodrama?”
“Be quiet. Be pretty. Be present for the appetizer and then disappear so the men can congratulate each other on how very good they are at rearranging chairs and territory, I guess.”
She narrows her eyes. When Pru gets protective, she does not get quieter. “And why the sudden hustle to appease your benevolent overlords?”
Because I was seen. Because the sanctuaries I pick are made of wood and men and rules I write on my tongue with the one night of freedom that I stole. Because I said yes and meant it and the world wants to turn that into a ledger entry.
But I don’t say any of that.
I stare at the fog of my own breath, then cut her a look. “St. Brigid’s on Halloween,” I say at last. “They didn’t like that.”
“They?” She leans in like the word is a secret hiding in my collar.
“The Mother. My father.” I swallow. “Nico. The sexton. A camera.”
Pru goes still. With Prudence, still is rarer than profanity. “You were in the church, though…alone?”
“No.”
“Ca-at.” She sings my name like a threat wrapped in delight. “Tell me you were not alone in a church at midnight with a ghost.”
“I was not alone in the church at midnight with a man, not a ghost.”
“The kind with a pulse and hands?” She bounces once on the balls of her feet. “While I was waiting right outside? Oh, my God, tell Auntie Pru everything. I need all of the details, you dirty little devil-angel, you.”
Our food arrives. She hands me a dog loaded with sport peppers, tomato slices, a pickle longer than my attention span. We claim a wobbly table under the strings of lights. Pru watches me like she watches fireworks: ready to cheer and ready to run.
I take a bite to buy a second. The bun surrenders. The mustard makes my nose prickle. “I went to pray,” I say. “And he was…there.”
“A priest?” she asks, gleefully horrified.
“No!”
She fans herself with a napkin. “Well thank God for small not-felonies. Details.”
I set the hot dog down and wipe my fingers very carefully, one by one, like there’s an order to honesty I can respect. “I wanted…something…before I signed it all away,” I say. “He has this thing he does every year on Halloween night.” I hear how that sounds and don’t fix it. “We…met in the confessional.”
She inhales a gasp so big the lights should flicker. “Cat. Caterina. Cat-of-Nine-Crimes.”
