Good Graces - Lesley Kagen [113]
“Thally?” Wendy comes up behind me and cups her hands under my arms and lifts me up to my feet. She lays her head on my shoulder and gives me a gentle honey bear hug. I can smell fish sticks and fruit on her T-shirt when she gives me a couple of hard pats on the back. “Don’ cry. Don’ cry, Thally O’Malley,” she says, licking the tears off my cheek. “All better now.”
We stay there together, rocking back and forth like we are slow dancing under the darkening sky. The wind pushes a piece of trash across the playground and the swings are twisting and the flagpole is making a clink . . . clink . . . sound. It seems like we are in each other’s arms forever until I realize I gotta do something and even longer before I figure out what.
“Wendy?” I whisper.
“Yeth?”
“I wanna play a game, do you?”
“Yeth, Thally,” she says, unlocking her arms.
I pick up the rhinestone tiara that got knocked off when she tackled Father Mickey and set it back where it belongs on her shiny black hair. “We’re gonna play hide-and-seek. You remember that one?”
She nods really fast, but she doesn’t. Every single time we play a game I have to go over the rules with her.
“Go into that little nook.” I point to the part of the school where I was supposed to hide and wait for Father Mickey. “I want you to put your hands over your eyes and start countin’ very, very slow and I’m going to hide and then you can come find me.”
“Then thwing?”
“Yup . . . then we’ll swing.”
“With laugh.”
“And witch laugh. Go on now.”
This time Wendy does exactly what I tell her to do and while she’s counting around the corner with her wide face in her chubby fingers, “One . . . free . . . nine . . .” I squat down and push with everything I got. When he flips over . . . Father’s face . . . he still looks so handsome.
I know what I’m about to do is against the law. You’re supposed to tell the police if someone dies, even if it’s an accident. I also know that according to the Church, I’m committing a sacrilege. Horrible as he was, Father Mickey deserves a proper burial. But this isn’t the first time I’ve examined my conscience. I’ve spent countless sleepless nights questioning what’s right and what’s wrong. I finally decided that knowing bad from good isn’t always so black-and-white. I mean, there are times when you know you’re about to do something that maybe you shouldn’t so you stop yourself, but there are other times when you know you’re committing a sin but have no choice except to go full speed ahead. You can’t always pick what’s right. Sometimes you can only pick what’s less wrong.
This is one of those times.
I can’t leave Father Mickey here to be found in the morning by one of the old neighborhood ladies. When he doesn’t show up for eight o’clock Mass, they’ll come storming up to the rectory. The police will be called in and all sorts of questions will be asked. Dave will remember that after the fish fry, Troo and me stayed up here for her religious instruction. My sister will be cool, but when Dave questions me, I will put up a good fight at first, but the love I have for him will eventually win out and I’ll confess everything. In nothing flat, what happened here tonight will fly through our neighborhood.
No one will believe me when I try to explain that what Wendy did was an accident. No matter how hard I try to convince our neighbors that she didn’t mean to murder Father, that she was only trying to save me, I know what will happen. They will not watch Wendy’s loping run or hear her funny way of talking or remember her swinging at the playground with her blouse off and smile to themselves the way they do now. Our neighbors won’t even feel sorry for her. Every time they look at her, all they will see is the girl who ended the life of the best pastor we ever had. Her picture will be in the newspaper and on television. She might even have to go to jail or reform school. I can’t let that happen. I won’t. Mongoloids don’t live as long as the rest of us and over my dead body is Wendy Latour spending whatever time she’s got