Bwack.
I remember the priest at Father Szyszynski's funeral who had stared through my veil as he handed me the Host, as if my features were familiar. And I remember the sentences printed carefully on a banner beneath the coffee table on that last day, before Nathaniel stopped speaking.
PEACE BE WITH YOU, FATHER O'TOOLE. PEACE BE WITH YOU, FATHER GWYNNE.
Tell me what he told you, I'd asked Patrick. Father Glen.
Maybe that is what Patrick heard. But that isn't how Nathaniel would have said it.
"He wasn't saying Father Glen," Nina murmurs to Patrick. "He was saying Father Gwynne."
"Yeah, but you know how Nathaniel talks. His L's always come out wrong."
"Not this time," Nina sighs. "This time he was saying it right. Gwen. Gwynne. They're so close."
"Who the hell is Gwynne?"
Nina rises, her hands splayed through her hair. "He's the one, Patrick. He's the one who hurt Nathaniel and he's still, he could still be doing this to a hundred other boys, and-" She wilts, stumbling against the wall. Patrick steadies her with one hand, and he is startled to feel her shaking so hard. His first instinct is to reach for her. His second, smarter response is to let her take a step away.
She slides down the side of the refrigerator until she is sitting on the floor. "He's the bone marrow donor. He has to be."
"Does Fisher know about this yet?" She shakes her head. "Caleb?"
In that moment, he thinks of a story he read long ago in school, about the start of the Trojan War. Paris was given a choice to be the richest man in the world, the smartest man in the world, or the chance to love another man's wife. Patrick, fool that he is, would make the same mistake. For with her hair in knots, her eyes red and swollen, her sorrow cracked open in her lap, Nina is every bit as beautiful to him now as Helen was back then.
She lifts her face to his. "Patrick . . . what am I going to do? "
It shocks him into a response. "You," Patrick says clearly, "are not going to do anything. You are going to sit in this house because you're on trial for a man's murder." When she opens her mouth to argue, Patrick holds up his hand. "You've already been locked up once, and look what happened to Nathaniel.
What do you think's going to happen to him if you walk out that door for more vigilante justice, Nina?
The only way you can keep him safe is to stay with him. Let me ..." He hesitates, knowing that on the edge of this cliff, the only way out is to retreat, or to jump. "Let me take care of it."
She knows exactly what he has just vowed. It means going against his department, going against his own code of ethics. It means turning his back on the system, like Nina has. And it means facing the consequences. Like Nina. He sees the wonder in her face, and the spark that lets him know how tempted she is to take him up on his offer. "And risk losing your job? Going to jail?" she says. "I can't let you do something that stupid."
What makes you think I haven't already? Patrick doesn't say the words aloud, but he doesn't have to. He crouches down and puts his hand on Nina's knee. Her hand comes up to cover his. And he sees it in her eyes: She knows how he feels about her, she has always known. But this is the first time she has come close to admitting it.
"Patrick," she says quietly, "I think I've already ruined the lives of enough people I love."
When the door bursts open and Nathaniel tumbles into the kitchen on a whirl of cold air, Patrick comes to his feet. The boy smells of popcorn and is carrying a stuffed frog inside his winter coat. "Guess what," he says. "Daddy took me to the arcade."
"You're a lucky guy," Patrick answers, and even to his own ears, his voice sounds weak. Caleb comes in, then, and closes the door behind him. He looks from Patrick to Nina, and smiles uncomfortably. "I thought you were visiting with Marcella."
"She had to go. She was meeting someone else. As she was leaving, Patrick stopped by."
"Oh." Caleb rubs the back of his neck. "So . . . what did she say?"
"Say?"
"About the DNA."
Before Patrick's very eyes, Nina changes. She flashes a polished smile at her husband. "It's a match,"
she lies. "A perfect match."
From the moment I step outside, the world is magic. Air cold enough to make my nostrils stick together; a sun that trembles like a cold yolk; a sky so wide and blue that I cannot keep it all in my eyes. Inside smells different from outside, but you don't notice until one of them is taken away from you.
I am on my way to Fisher's office, so my electronic bracelet has been deactivated. Being outside is so glorious that it almost supersedes the secret I am hiding. As I slow for a stoplight I see the Salvation Army man swinging his bell, his bucket swaying gently. This is the season of charity; surely there will be some left for me.
