Martin Moran - The Tricky Part: One Boys Fall from Trespass into Grace

For
Henry Stram
And for my parents,
Martin and Carol

I HAVE LEARNT THAT THE PLACE WHERE T HOU ART FOUND UNVEILED IS GIRT ROUND WITH THE COINCIDENCE OF CONTRADICTORIES, AND THIS IS THE WALL OF P ARADISE WHEREIN THOU DOST ABIDE .

Nicholas of Cusa,
The Vision of God

A T THE END of the second-floor hall of a small Catholic school, a sixth-grade boy stood transfixed in front of a wooden statue of Saint Sebastian. Hed passed it for years but lately found he was drawn to stop and study the three-dimensional story, the pierced flesh, the life-size proof that youve got to go through hell to be a saint. The boy tried to imagine the soldiers of the Imperial Guard and the events that might have brought them to this moment, stringing their bows, taking aim at their compatriot. And Sebastian? He looked so beautiful, the boy thought, with his rock-star hair and melancholy face. How is it that he stood there tied to a tree, plugged with arrows, and took it with such grace? The martyrs plight, his swimmers body, his loincloth drooping from hip to wounded hip, gave the boy a deep, unlocatable twinge.

One day, the principal came upon him staring at the statue.

It was a gift, she said, her little buzz of a voice startling the boy. From an alum who lived in Italy. Beautiful, isnt it?

He nodded but then looked back at the saint and whispered, No.

Why do you say that? the nun asked, untangling the magnifying glass from her crucifix, both of which dangled from silver chains around her neck.

The boy grimaced and pointed to a waxy trickle of blood running along the sinews of Sebastians left calf.

Oh, dont worry, dear, hes not in his body here. Hes already flying back up to our Lord. She reached up to clear a cobweb from the arrow stuck in Sebastians thigh.

How do you know?

Oh, we dont know, she said. We believe.

For a moment they stood side by side, nun and pupil, gazing up at the suffering soldier.

Come along, mustnt be late, the sister said as she turned and hurried away, leaving the boy alone to ponder this thing. The being bound, but flying.

Book I
FALLING

M ARCH 28, 2002. Its Holy Thursday. Thats Catholic for three days before Easter, and Im in Las Vegas. Ive come from my home in New York City to visit my father. Were at Vons, a fluorescent grocery store roughly the size of Manhattan, waiting in line to pay for pork chops. Theres a bank of slot machines near the exit clanging away, and I find, as I do each time I come to this desert city, that Im in shock to think its here Dads retired and will likely die.

There, on a rack in the checkout line, on the cover of Time magazine, is a gray and ominous drawing of the back of a bishop and these words: Can the Catholic Church Save Itself? The headlines of the scandal are everywhere at the moment. Its an uprising, the body of Mother Church erupting with such force that the shock waves are reverberating, at long last, all the way up to her head. Cardinal Law will resign before the year is out. I reach for a copy of the magazine.

Jesus, thats been goin on for a thousand years, my father says, jutting a finger at Time. Did I ever tell you what happened to your aunt when she was little?

No, Dad.

Father Murray, the basement of St. Bedes. I dont know what went on, but thank God the janitor happened by. I never knew anything about it until your aunt refused to let Murray say your grandmothers funeral mass.

I say to my dad, Wow, but nothing else, because suddenly Im riveted by a photo, page twenty-eight, of Father Kos and a Dallas boy, age twelve, who killed himself at twenty-one. I know the story of Kos and his altar boys; Id cut every clip of it from the papers in 98 and stuck them in the thick file I keep under my desk. Id read about the young men whod gone to court and were awarded millions and the promise of a public apology from the Archdiocese of Dallas. I can recall the New York Times photo of them, handsome and courageous in their suits and ties, sitting at a table, along with one stricken mother who was there on behalf of her deceased son. Id seen all this but Id never, until this moment, seen the faceGod, the faceof the boy who shot himself dead. His tiny-toothed smile, the light in his eyes, are absolutely haunting. Hes in altarboy frocks, all white, and the arm of the man with the Roman collar is slung behind his slim shoulders.

Do you want me to buy that for you? my father asks. I look into his kind old face and wonder, again, what it would mean, what it would be like, to tell him the story.

No thanks, Dad, Ill get it.

This story that will not let me go.

April 1, 2002. Easter Monday. Ive left my dad in Vegas and Im in Los Angeles to visit my goddaughter; maybe pick up some acting work. Im headed south, or possibly east, in the haze of the Hollywood Freeway when my cell phone gives three bleeps. A message. Maybe a job. One hand firmly on the wheel, I press voicemail, put the thing to my ear.

Marty, its Bob C (I hit the brake. The SUV behind me honks). I got your letter saying youd be traveling West. Id dearly love to see you. Im at the Veterans Hospital in LA. Heres my number....

I take the next exit and come to a stop in the glare of a 7-Eleven parking lot, stunned that hes alive, that my letter actually found him.

Id lost all track of Bob. Id spoken to him once, by phone, nine years before when I was on a visit to Denver, my hometown. Id sat, I remember, on the edge of my mothers bed, next to the phone, possessed suddenly by the idea of contacting him. My fingers had trembled as I dialed the number Id just searched for and found. I was shocked when he picked up right away. We had a curt conversation: It does no good to dwell on the past, hed said. Ive made my peace with God. I hope you do too. Then hed given me his address, saying that I should write. Numb, Id jotted it down on the back of a housepainters business card that was sitting on my mothers nightstand and stuck it in my wallet. Where it remained until, a few weeks before taking this trip West, gripped again with the idea of finding him, I called once more. Disconnected. No address. No further information. He must be dead, I figured, or moved long ago. Id waited too many years. I mailed a note anyway with a Please Forward to the old addresssome little town in California. I never imagined Id hear from him, let alone that wed ever be in the same place at the same time.

I pick up my cell and half dial him, hang up. Half dial, hang up. Come on, I tell myself, do it. Just do it. He answers on the second ring:

Hello.

The pitch, the tenor of his voice enters my body like a lance. Him, after all these years. Him, reduced to a little human hum across a wireless. Very businesslike, we arrange to meet.

Thursday, April 4, 2002, the morning of the meeting.

My old high school friend, Jodi, prints out directions from her house in North Hollywood to the Veterans Complex off Sepulveda Boulevard. Good luck, Mart, she says. Wring his friggin neck for me.

Jodi is quick to fury on this subject, which always sets me to wondering about anger. My own anger, whatever, wherever it is, feels lost or buried somehow in complicity, I think. As if having wanted, allowed, has squelched any right I have to wrath or innocence. I remember when I first told Jodi all that happened, she looked at me with such pity that I blurted: Hey, doll,