That’s right. Today is another opportunity for me to mess up. Or get things straight. Which way I’ll go, I don’t know. It’s a toss of the dice. Between the donations bucket and myself stands an abused Christmas tree. I found it abandoned in Pioneer Park. A motherless tree with no decorations on its emaciated branches. Apart from the tarnished gold star fastened to its balding crown.
I’ve been talking to it for hours. “Do you need water? Some presents underneath you? Or boys and girls to smell your bittersweet fragrance?”
I hurl the tambourine in the air. Without looking, I catch it behind my back. The .25 pops out of my cummerbund and clatters onto the sidewalk. Two pigeons inspect the gun, pecking at the barrel. I threaten them with the tambourine—the filthy, loveless birds fly off to El Pueblo’s garbage dumpster.
A tiny crowd has gathered to watch my routine. Two tourists from Germany named Roland and Greta.
They drop a dollar in the bucket. Roland says in heavily accented English: “You are authentic, Pastor.”
Greta takes my photo with her cell phone. Inspired, I break off knee drops and full splits. I fall into the Swim. I execute the Funky Chicken. I throw the tambourine in the air again. I do a double-take: Sugar Child is leaning against a parking meter, puffing on a cigarette.
Wherever Sugar Child has been in the last twenty-four hours, it wasn’t around here. But in some other dimension where there is no oxygen. She is thin, the weight loss centered in her face. A spotty, wan face drawn with the ineffable knowledge she’s leaving this world quicker than it’s trying to keep her.
She models a pair of mismatched cardboard slippers, the kind you get in the Salvation Army detox unit. Her dingy sweatpants are held up with a bungee cord, over which hangs a blue work shirt. Robbed of the wig, her hair is nubby.
I catch the tambourine on its downward flight. I raise my arms in an unspoken prayer. I’m not asking for money now. I am not asking for anything one human being can give to another. I’m asking for more than that. I want every power in this universe, every wind, every ray of light that comes to rest upon this desperate land, to have mercy on Sugar Child. To give back what’s been taken from her. I am asking for joy in a world beyond redemption. For whatever can be conjured from the ordinary, to renew this tired earth.
When I’m done praying, I look at Sugar Child. As if I’ve been hallucinating, she’s gone. Greta stops taking my picture. “Pastor? You seem perturbed. Are you all right? Yes?”
Her accent is thick, but less pronounced than Roland’s. I respond with pure organic silence: no, honey, I’m not all right. Far from it. I am in a wilderness.
Roland and Greta bid me a rousing goodbye, promising to send a postcard from Germany. It’s a perfect time to get lunch, maybe at the soup kitchen in Pioneer Park. Even better, I can visit the public library restroom.
I look at my newly adopted Christmas tree. A tree so brave and fucked up, I cannot help but love it. I brace myself against a trash can. I nod with my eyes half-closed, the sun on my face.
I glance at my hands—they’re shaking uncontrollably.
I’m jarred from my reverie by a homeless wino. He’s pushing a lopsided baby carriage piled high with a sleeping bag, a slew of decapitated Barbie dolls, and two shoeboxes bulging with plastic jewelry. A shorthaired cat sleeps on top of the pile.
The wino himself is enrobed in a black long-sleeved collarless dress. On his head is a gaudy blue-and-red scarf held together with a yellow safety pin. His hair is long on one side, shaved to the scalp on the other side. He removes a pint of port from the purse hanging around his neck. Uncapping it, he takes a slug, then dries his lips with a sleeve.
“Pastor, I want that Christmas tree. It ain’t yours, is it?
I like it. I like it a lot.” He soaks me up with his one good eye; the other orb is so wall-eyed, it stares at the sky. “And no disrespect intended, Pastor. But your robe’s been massacred. You can’t go around looking that way.”
“Pretty bad, huh?”
“The worst. A disgrace to your office.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t have money to fix it.”
“That’s no excuse.”
I’ve neglected to sew my robe’s rents. I’m embarrassed by how disheveled I am. But the more the robe disintegrates, the freer I become. By the time it’s completely unwearable, I’ll be a free man. It’s a perverse thought. I don’t want to pursue it. I steer the conversation back to the tree.
“You want the tree?”
“Yeah, I do. Let’s negotiate. I’ll give you a Vicodin for it.”
“I could use a good buzz. Is it fresh?”
“Straight from the factory.” Digging in his purse, he extracts a once-white chalky tab that has seen better days. He proffers it to me. “It’ll fuck you up.”
“You gonna give me a refund if it doesn’t get me high?”
“Don’t sass me.”
I look at the Vicodin. I look at the cat asleep in the baby carriage. I look at the pickup trucks chugging in the street. I mull over the wino’s offer.
“Keep the tab, my child. The tree’s all yours.”
The wino walks away with the Christmas tree. For once, I’m at peace with myself. I have been defrocked—a decisive blow to my self-esteem—yet I remain a servant of the people. The lambs in the street. I must avenge their hunger. I must slake their thirst. I must try, and try again.