Pie Town - Lynne Hinton [22]
“That’s right,” she responded, slapping her thighs, thinking about her home state, her hometown, deciding not to take the trip down memory lane. “So, you never told me where you’re headed,” she reminded him.
“Pie Town too, I guess,” he answered. “It’s one of my three parishes, and I figured I would start there. It’s the one with a parish house.” He loosened up a bit as they drove down the highway.
“You’ll live alone?” she asked.
He nodded. “That’s usually the way it works. A few of the ladies in the church cook and clean, but unless there are sisters in the parish, nuns, I mean, then I live in the house alone.”
“You get a whole house to yourself and a cook and a maid?” Trina asked, her tone one of surprise.
Father George considered how his arrangement must sound to a layperson. “I guess that’s about the way of things,” he answered.
“Damn,” Trina responded, without seeming even to notice that a curse word had just escaped her lips. “That’s pretty sweet. Last place I lived, there were three of us sharing a two-room apartment, and that’s the most space I’ve ever had. When I was kid, we always had a bunch of people staying around, sleeping on the floors, on the sofa, on the back porch. Then, in the foster homes, well, there were so many kids in those houses, you were lucky just to have a place to sit at the table to eat.”
George didn’t answer. He just glanced over at his passenger, wondering about her upbringing, wondering from what circumstances she had emerged. “So, Trina, how old are you?” he asked, trying to sound fatherly, trying to erase the discomfort in his voice as well as in his thoughts. There was something about the girl that troubled him.
“Twenty,” she answered. “Not that it really matters.”
“Why wouldn’t it matter?” he responded.
“I think age is just a way we use to judge people. You hear how old somebody is, and based on their answer, you decide that they must be a certain way. If we never knew the ages of each other, maybe we wouldn’t be so, I don’t know, critical.”
“But sometimes the age of a person does tell us a lot about them. A twenty-year-old hasn’t had the same experiences as a forty-year-old. She hasn’t seen all the things that an older person has.” He turned to Trina, suddenly remembering himself at twenty, not so many years before, remembering parts of his youth he had tried to forget. He turned back to face the road.
She studied the priest. “I figure I’ve seen more than most forty-year-olds. I figure I’ve seen more than most anybody.” She pulled at the seat belt stretched across her lap, lifting it away from her body.
“Aren’t you going to be hot wearing that black outfit out here?” she asked, changing the subject.
Father George glanced down at his shirt and pants. He hadn’t really thought about any alternatives to the orthodox attire he was given. Priests in Ohio, at his home parish and at seminary, wore only black pants and a black shirt. They had robes and other clothes for particular services and events, but on most days a priest wore his black. “I’m sure I will be comfortable where I reside and work,” he replied.
“You’re not from around here, are you?” she asked. “What, the Midwest maybe, huh? You’re too pasty to have grown up in the desert. You got a snakebite kit and water bottles?” she asked. “Boots?”
Father George smiled. “I thought it didn’t matter where you’re from,” he teased. “I thought it only mattered where you’re going.”
She nodded, enjoying the banter. “Well, that’s true, but if you’re not from here, there are things you have to learn pretty fast or you won’t make it.”
“Yeah, and what are those things?” he asked.
“Boots are better than shoes when it comes to stepping on rattlesnakes. It’s bread, not water, that takes the sting out of spicy food, and never give up your water rights or leave home without a gallon of it in your backseat.” She stretched her right arm out the car window.
Father George turned to the young girl and thought about her instructions. “You learn all this from experience or