I’d try to speak with Father McNamee through the locked bedroom door, asking if he needed assistance, but he only said, “I’m okay. Riding out the downswing. Just need to be alone.”
Like when Wendy was on the couch, I attempted to take care of Father McNamee the best I could, leaving grilled cheese sandwiches or ramen noodles by his door, which he sometimes ate in the middle of the night and sometimes left cold and untouched for me to take away in the morning.
I’d knock on his door before every meal and ask if he wanted to join me in the kitchen, but he would hold my eye for only the briefest of seconds before he looked away in silence. Sometimes he was in bed; other times he was standing, staring blankly out the window.
He wouldn’t talk at night either or take a walk with me or even listen to the birds’ symphony over morning coffee.
After a day or two of this, I began to worry.
I went to Saint Gabriel’s to seek help from Father Hachette.
I found him in the church office, playing solitaire on the computer, looking rather bored. As soon as Father saw me, he said, “Why weren’t you at Mass, Bartholomew? Your mother would be gravely disappointed in you.”
(Do you think that his using the word gravely to describe my dead mother’s theoretical disappointment was in poor taste?)
It’s true that Mom would not want me to miss Mass, and since I didn’t have a good answer for him, I tried to change the subject. “Father McNamee is not well.”
“Edna told me about your attempt to save her daughter,” Father Hachette said. “Quite dramatic. Quite dramatic indeed.”
“Why are you smiling?” I asked.
“I’m not smiling,” he said, even though he was clearly grinning, as if he knew a secret and enjoyed keeping it from me.
His yellow teeth looked like petrified pieces of corn, and the way he was looking at me made the wrinkles in his face appear deeper than usual—so cavernous, I wondered if he had to clean them with a Q-tip.
The little angry man in my stomach woke up and got to work.
“Are you not worried about Wendy?” I asked.
“Actually, I’ve been to visit her and Adam. Edna came with me. The four of us had a very good talk just yesterday.”
“You did?”
“I prayed with them. We had a productive back-and-forth. Wendy confessed to me afterward, here at the church. Let’s just say, to ease your conscience, Bartholomew, things are looking up for our young mutual friend. So do not worry too much about her.”
It was hard to believe Father Hachette was able to do what Father McNamee could not. Also, I knew he shouldn’t have told me that Wendy confessed, because confessions are confidential. It was like he was bragging—like he wanted me to believe he was a better priest than Father McNamee. Father McNamee would never have bragged like that. Never. Nor would he have betrayed the confidence of a parishioner.
“Is she really okay?” I asked, thinking Adam should have been the one to confess, not Wendy, and wondering exactly what Wendy had told him. Did she mention the hurtful things she’d said the last night she stayed in our house? How much did Father Hachette really know?
“She’s wrestling with her soul. Adam is too. They have a lot to sort out.”
“He’s evil, you know. He beats her. Didn’t you see her bruises?”
“People are not evil or good. It’s much more complicated than that. Much.”
“How could it be complicated when a man hits a woman repeatedly?”
Father Hachette looked down at his desk, took a cigarette out of a hard pack, tapped the filter twice, and lit up. “Why did you come here today, Bartholomew?”
I understood that he wasn’t going to talk about Wendy—and to be fair, maybe this had to do with keeping what was confessed confidential—and so I said, “How can I help Father McNamee overcome his depression?”
Father Hachette frowned, blew smoke out the corner of his mouth, back over his left shoulder, and said, “You should come to Mass, Bartholomew. You should continue what you and your mother have always done. The routine of our shared faith will save you. In the end, the routines will save us all.”
“Yes, I will. But what about Father McNamee?”
Father Hachette held my gaze for an awkward moment, and then he said, “Let me guess. He’s drinking heavily. He’s claiming God abandoned him. He’s sulking alone in a room and emptying his guts into a toilet nightly? That’s his ritual. Mountaintops and valleys. That is his pattern. And I bet he blames you for not hearing God’s voice—for not providing him with divine instructions. Am I far off?”
He was not far off, as you know, Richard Gere, but it didn’t seem like Father Hachette was going to help me today.
“I don’t understand,” I said. “You told me to come to you when I needed help. You came to my house specifically to offer your help. Was that a lie?”
“I’m glad you came, Bartholomew. Saint Gabriel’s is your spiritual home. But you need to work on yourself. You need to grieve for your mother and then begin a new life without her. God can help you accomplish this task.”
“But you don’t want to help Father McNamee? You’re not interested in his depression?”
“It’s like trying to fight a hurricane with your bare hands—punching at wind and rain. Only a fool would try. You need to wait it out. Trust me. I have some experience with this. Father McNamee will right himself eventually. He always has in the past, anyway.”
“Then why did you come to Mom’s house and offer your help?”