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Until today, I thought the most unusual funeral Mass I’ve said was for the woman who tried to kill Helen.
“Will there really be no one in attendance except Mrs. Roderick?” Dominic asks me as we vest for the service.
I pull my alb on and brush my hair back into place with my fingers. “Yes, Dominic. That was her request.”
I reach into the closet for my cincture, the braided rope I tie around my waist as a reminder of my commitments as a priest.
“I know the members of the Acutis Society are disappointed,” Dominic says. “We all loved him.”
“Yes,” I say, holding the cincture in my hand and looking back in the closet. “Dominic, did you happen to move the cincture I usually use?”
“Excuse me, Father?”
I hold up the cincture I have. “There’ve been two in the closet the entire time I’ve been here. The one I usually use is a little longer than this one. It fits me better, if you see what I mean?”
Dominic says nothing, even as I look down at my pudgy stomach. Honestly, ever since Martin told me to get more exercise to control my blood pressure, I’ve lost some inches. But my stomach’s still there.
“I have not touched your cincture, Father,” Dominic says. “Perhaps Father Wayne took it by accident?”
“Maybe,” I say, continuing to look at the closet. “Well, in any event, I’m sure it will turn up. Can you go out and make sure everything is ready?”
“Of course, Father,” Dominic says. He turns on his heel and marches out of the sacristy.
I look at the cincture again, then the closet. Shaking my head, I tie the rope around me and finish vesting for the funeral Mass for Deacon Derek Roderick.
***
The funeral Mass proceeds smoothly, in spite of its unusual nature. The only thing unusual–aside from the congregation of one–occurs just as I’m beginning. The door to the side aisle opens slowly, and Helen slips into a back pew.
The service proceeds quietly, with no music and only a very short homily. While I agree that it is better to praise people when they are alive than after they’re dead, Linda’s insistence on keeping the Mass as short as possible still rankles a bit. I use the few minutes I have time to draw attention to how much Derek meant to the people of Saint Clare’s and to me personally. Knowing that Linda has already heard most of what I would say, I try to draw a connection between his generosity to her as a husband and to us as his extended church family. Through all of this, she sits impassively, looking straight ahead.
Helen slips out before communion. At the conclusion of the mass, Dominic leads us with the crucifix, followed by Linda carrying Derek’s ashes. When we reach the door, Dominic excuses himself, leaving me alone with Linda.
“Thank you, Father Tom,” she says. Taking an envelope out of her pocket and handing it to me, she adds, “Please accept this. I appreciate all you’ve done.”
“Of course, Linda,” I say. “If there’s anything else–”
“No, there’s nothing,” she says quickly. “I’m sure Helen will let me know if they ever catch the person responsible for his murder.”
“Can I get you a cup of coffee or something?”
“No, no,” Linda says. “I need to get back to Baltimore. Thanks again.” With that, she leaves through the front doors of the church.
I don’t know exactly what I was expecting, but it was not this.
***
I meet Helen at the police station around 4 p.m., and together we drive to the Myerton Inn. The manager very generously allowed us to check out late, so we go up to our hotel room for the last time and grab our luggage.
“I tell you one thing, Tom,” she says as I hoist her suitcase into the trunk of her car with the others, “I won’t miss hotel rooms or staterooms for a long time.”
I slam down the trunk lid and say, “Well, remember, we still have a week of our honeymoon to take some time.”
She steps forward and wraps her arms around me. “Oh, I know. But I’m leaning towards a cabin in the woods somewhere.”
“Dan’s cousin owns one up in Pennsylvania he said we could use,” I say with a grin.
“Ah, no, thank you,” she says, shaking her head. “I know all about that cabin and his cousin Andrew.”
I laugh and pull her closer. Kissing the top of her head, I say, “Good point. Well, Mrs. Greer, shall we go home?”
“I’ve been waiting to do that for months,” she sighs. “Yes, let’s go.”
We pull out of the hotel parking lot and head towards Saint Clare’s. The hotel is about a fifteen-minute drive from the church, so we’re not on the road for very long before I see the Church in the distance. But as we get closer, I notice something peculiar.
“Helen,” I say, pointing out the window. “Look.”
She peers over the steering wheel. “Well, it looks like we have a welcome committee,” she says.
A large crowd has gathered on the church lawn in front of the Rectory. “Anna didn’t mention anything to me about this,” I say.
“It’s probably supposed to be a surprise,” Helen says. She pulls into the driveway, and the crowd moves closer to us. We get out and are greeted by Catherine Conway, two of the Trent children, and Martin Maycord’s niece Lucy holding a banner that says, “Welcome Home, Fr. and Mrs. Greer.” The crowd erupts in cheers and applause. One of the things I first notice is that Dan’s there, balancing on crutches under the watchful eye of Miriam.
Not knowing what else to do, we smile, and I motion for the crowd to quiet down. “Thank you, all of you, for this great welcome. Helen and I are happy to be back in town, and are really looking forward to spending our first night as husband and wife together in our home.”
The crowd applauds, and I try to go to the trunk. Bill Brandt, the head of our Knights of Columbus chapter, stops me. “Let us get your luggage, Father,” he says. “You and your bride go inside and get comfortable.”
I start to protest, but another Knight pulls me away and gently pushes Helen and me toward the front door.
That’s when things get weird, because they begin to follow us. I am suddenly frightened by tales I’ve read of community treatments of those newly married, and I hope no one here has any medieval ideas.
Anna opens the front door and says excitedly, “Welcome home, you two. We have a big surprise for you upstairs.”
This does nothing to allay my fears, but with Helen’s hand firmly in mine, I begin what seems like an unusually long climb up the staircase.
The first thing I notice when we reach the landing is that my bathroom is gone.
I mean, as in not here anymore.
I’m positive it was here when I left two weeks ago.
“Helen,” I say with confusion, “My bathroom is gone.”
“What?” she asks, heading for the closed door to my–I mean, our–bedroom.
“Helen, stop. Look. This is where the bathroom door is supposed to be. But it's not there.”
We both pause, looking at the wall. I’m about to touch it to see if it's real when I hear Anna shout from the bottom of the stairs, “Oh, for heaven’s sake. Open the bedroom door.” Still somewhat confused, we do so.
The very first thing I notice is that the ugly rust-colored shag carpet is gone. It's been pulled up to reveal the hardwood floors underneath, polished to a high shine that reflects the lights from the new chandelier above. There’s a fire in the fireplace that I was always told didn’t work, and new blackout blinds with white sheers in the windows.
“Tom,” Helen whispers, tugging on my arm “Look.”
I gasp. There’s a four-poster king-sized bed standing where my iron framed double bed used to be. Helen walks over to it, almost in a trance, and begins tracing the intricate carving on the wood posts.
“Tom,” she says in a hushed whisper, “Look at this.”
Carved on each post are different scenes from the marriages in the Bible. First, there’s Adam and Eve, naked and unashamed before they chose to believe they knew better than God. Then there are Issac and Rebekah, who won his heart by showing herself willing to serve even a stranger. There’s Ruth and Boaz who, like Helen and me, found love together after years of loneliness, Finally, there’s Mary and Joseph, whom God chose to parent Love Incarnate.
But the footboard and the headboard are the grandest showpieces. On the former is the wedding at Cana, which Christ himself blessed with his first miracle. On the latter is the wedding supper of the Lamb, still awaiting us in heaven.
The bedspread itself is a simple white affair, obviously chosen not to compete with the bed. But folded across the foot is an old-fashioned quilt that reminds me of one my grandmother had.
“It's called a Wedding Ring pattern,” Helen whispers, again unwilling to break the sanctity of this moment. “But look, Tom. Look.”
She’s pointing to the center of each ring, where a family’s name has been carefully stitched. There’s one, with Dan, Miriam, Catherine, JP, Max, Andrew and Helen Joan encircling the large letters spelling out Conway. Another, Trent, with so many names they barely fit. There’s one, Maycord, with Martin and Mae along with Martin’s nieces and Aunt Louise. Even the Acutis Society contributed one, Nate and Gladys’ names prominent along with some of the other members. As best I can tell, every family in the parish is represented.
Helen’s spread the quilt and is admiring the squares. “Tom,” she laughs as tears begin to flow, “there’s one from Nick and Nina, and here’s Clark and Vivian. Oh, and here’s one from the department–look at the squad car.”
“Everyone we love,” I mutter, “and who loves us.”
I look around, still amazed at the transformation. Someone has refinished the antique dresser used by decades of priests who lived here before us and there are gorgeous wool rugs on either side of the bed and between the fireplace and the reclining loveseat.
“Tom,” Helen gasps. “Look at this.” I turn around and see her pointing to an alcove across the room from the fireplace.
“Dear Lord,” I whisper in amazement. It’s our own oratory, complete with a crucifix that I recognize from the attic. It has been beautifully repaired and hangs over a small altar with a wide kneeler in front. On the left hand wall is the framed painting of Jesus, the Divine Mercy, one of the last works done by Bethany Grable, that Helen gave me last Christmas.
We stand there in awe, just staring, until I say, “Wait a minute. This wall’s been moved. There’s no other way they could have put this here. And this door is new.”
I open the door in the center of the wall next to the oratory, and enter a spa-like wonderland. There is an oversized walk-in shower, tiled in shiny new white tiles. What appears to have once been an elaborately painted Victorian dresser has been converted into a marble top vanity with two sinks. Above it hangs an exquisitely framed mirror that allows us for the first time to see the shocked looks on both our faces.
Unsure what else to do, we both burst into joyful laughter and begin hugging and kissing and dancing to beat the band. It's only then that I hear Anna clear her throat.
“So you like it, then?” she asks in her usual deadpan way.
“We love it,” I cry as we both rush to her with hugs and kisses. “But what? How?”
“Let me show you one more thing, and then we’ll go downstairs where we can all explain.” She walks across the room to one side of the fireplace and opens the double doors on what used to be a small closet to reveal a tiny built-in kitchenette. There’s a dorm-sized refrigerator under a small counter that houses a Keurig with a collection of drink options. Anna opens the refrigerator to reveal it is well-stocked with our favorite beers. Above is a cabinet filled with a few mugs, glasses, and bowls and many of our favorite snacks.
I look at Anna sheepishly as she says, “Oh, yes, we found your little snack and beer stash when we began the renovations, so I figured we’d better give you a proper place to store it. Now, everyone is waiting downstairs to find out if you two like it or not.”
We follow her downstairs to find the foyer and the living room packed with people from the parish. We stand on the bottom landing and, pulling myself together the best I can, I say, “We are so very, very grateful for all this. But I don’t understand how you managed it?”
“Well, Father Tom,” Tim Cooper, an architect responsible for several projects including the new St. Francis Education Center, says as he steps forward, “Anna contacted me not long after you two got engaged. She asked me to come and inspect the Rectory because she had noticed some staining on the walls that she felt might be part of a bigger problem. As soon as I got a good look at the plumbing, I realized it was the original, put in almost a hundred years ago. The only reason it had lasted as long as it did was because only one person ever lived upstairs at a time over the last half century or so. You and Anna both using it had weakened the pipes, and they were beginning to sprout pinhole leaks.”
“From there,” Anna says, taking over the story, “I got in touch with the Archdiocese. Their housing consultant reviewed Tim’s findings and agreed that the upstairs plumbing needed to be replaced. They gave us a figure for funding this project, and I asked Tim to draw up some plans to reconfigure the space upstairs to make it more suitable for a married couple. Then Bill talked to the Knights about what was going to be done.”
“Father,” Bill says, picking up the story, “you may remember that Burt Kelly’s brother owns a big contracting business out of Baltimore. Well, he is always working on some new luxury community or another, so he agreed to get us all the bath fixtures for cost. That meant the Archdiocese covered all the cost of the new bathroom. Anna and I were up here one day–”
I can’t resist shooting him a sly grin.
“Talking about the project,” he rushes to assure us as several quiet giggles work through the room, “and I couldn’t help but notice that pitiful excuse for a bed frame. I guess it was OK for a priest committed to suffering, but it was no place to bring a bride.”
I can see Helen blushing out of the corner of my eye as silence falls on the room, and people seem to want to look everywhere but at us. “So I went back to the Knights,” Bill continues. “You remember, we carve toys every year for the needy children, so we had all the tools and skills we needed. After getting some instructions from an Amish carpenter of my acquaintance up in Lancaster, the next thing you know, we had carved the bed. Then all we needed was a good mattress. And let me tell you, Father, that Sleep Better we got is top of the line. I mean you can adjust it to all sorts of different positions and–”
I feel the urge to see if maybe I can stamp my foot hard enough to cause the floor to open up under me when Anna comes to the rescue. “And then the Ladies decided to make a quilt and new drapes and here we are.”
“Well,” I say, barely able to find my voice, “We can never begin to tell you how incredibly grateful we are for all of this.” I look at Helen as I conclude, “I don't know when or if any other priest will ever be allowed to marry, but I know that not one of them will ever do so in a parish as loving and supportive as Saint Clare’s. We love each of you so much and look forward to serving you for many years to come.”
The crowd applauds, then Dan announces loudly, “Since this many people in this space obviously constitutes a fire hazard, everyone needs to head home now before the bride and I have to start issuing citations.”
Everyone laughs at this, and Helen and I manage to make it to the door, where we hug and thank everyone as they leave. Anna is the last one and says quietly, “I left you two some dinner in the oven and stocked the refrigerator. Have a wonderful evening.”
We thank her and kiss her goodbye, and then begin our first night in our new home, committed to doing as we were told.