Mrs Bonello found him last Tuesday. In his bedroom. As she was getting his sheets.
Tuesdays were laundry day in the Cardona household, and she was the housekeeper. Mr Cardona went for long walks on Tuesday mornings, through the fields, down to the cliffs, and back again. He’d be gone for hours, so Mrs Bonello would have time to make coffee and breakfast before he returned. The rattling of the front gate opening would wake her as he departed. A convenient arrangement. She knew she could take her time preparing breakfast. Not taking her time to make a nicer breakfast, but merely to sneak in a cigarette or two. She would never smoke around Mr Cardona. Mrs Bonello knew she smoked the same cigarettes as his old friend, the priest, did and knew how much the smell of burning tobacco reminded Mr Cardona of the time they had spent together.
That Tuesday it was the sun coming through the curtains that woke Mrs Bonello. She made these curtains a few years earlier using old lace Mr Cardona’s grandmother crafted herself. She died when he was a child and had owned a lacemaking workshop in town. Mrs Bonello insisted Mr Cardona call her Carmen, even though she knew he never would, and so Mr Cardona weakly suggested she call him Luchino, even though he didn’t really want her to. Everything was an impeccable formality with Mr Cardona, and his suggestion she address him with his first name was purely an attempt to not seem like cold stone—he was glad she maintained this honorific formality, even if it was simply a habit she hadn’t shaken from her previous work at the de Piro household.
She opened his door. Barely a ray of light came through his thick curtains. He was still laying on the bed. She asked why he hadn’t gone out, and complained that they would both be having a late breakfast because she hadn't been woken up. She knew he wouldn’t like that, for after his walk and breakfast he usually worked on his music, and he would fidget at the piano when he was rushed and didn’t eat enough. Only a few weeks earlier, she would have expected him to respond to her complaints with some sharp, cutting remark, something like “Oh, well, at least I don’t spend the night reading the tosh in the local rag and need someone else to wake me up in the morning,” and then ten minutes later apologising profusely for his insolence against his most dear housekeeper, insisting that in fact Mr Cardona should be cooking Mrs Bonello breakfast. But he never became short with her anymore. Now, (or before last Tuesday, she supposed) he just shrugged at such disruptions and inconveniences. He no longer minded or cared, like he used to, when the espresso was too weak, the milk not hot enough, no pink flowers in autumn, never a glass of rosé after 7 o’clock. He used to complain that the coffee was too “grainy”. Mrs Bonello had no idea that one could be picky about the fineness of the grind until she came to the Cardona household, but in the weeks leading up to last Tuesday she couldn’t do anything wrong. It was fine. Everything was fine.
The curtains were always pulled tightly shut in his bedroom. She questioned him again and his vague shape, hidden under the blankets, didn’t respond. He wasn’t moaning like a child which he usually does when he is sick. “Aren’t you boiling hot under there?” She opened the curtains, and the morning summer sun filled the room. “What are you doing? Help me open the windows, there’s mould growing on the ceiling because you never open them.” She had tried to scrub the mould off earlier but the only ladder Mr Cardona had was too short. No matter, she could barely carry a tray of crockery, let alone climb to the top of a ladder. She turned, and finally decided she would rip the sheets off him, if that’s what it took to earn his response. It was as she pulled at the quilt that she realised.
Mrs Bonello had gone to the priest first, Luchino’s old friend Father Jude.
She supposed it was up to the priest now what happened to Mr Cardona’s old room. He laid right under that spot of mould (though she did not believe a patch of mould was what drove him to end his life). He must have planned it to be all very dignified, covering himself with the blankets and whatnot. That was how he was. Nothing was ever out of place.
Green silken cloth lay on the mantelpiece. Pink embroidery danced across its shimmering surface. Pearls and tiny mirrors woven into the fabric reflected the light of the crystal glass chandelier, which was further refracted by the tiny purple amethysts, milk quartz and fiery garnets, collected by Luchino, which decorated the room. These magnificent shards of light lit up the room before being quickly absorbed by Father Jude’s black Jesuit cassock. Old Earl Grey leaves crumpled at the bottom of the indigo-coloured clay cups, collecting dust on the deep-red, lacquered coffee table. A smoky, woody odour clung to everything. The only sound that could be heard was the wind rustling the citrus trees planted along the perimeter of the house. A deep indent was left on the couch as Jude stood up, rosaries rattling as they swung from his cincture. A pair of painted cranes looked down at him from their branch high on the wall, watching him leave the room.
The cream kitchen walls were decorated with tapestries. On the bench a pomegranate rotted, its skin turning a stony grey. A few unwashed dishes and glasses with flakes of dried red wine still remained on the dining table, beside an almost-empty bottle of shiraz. “I haven’t done a clean since he died,” Carmen had mentioned in passing, “It's pointless now.” The walls in the hallway, down to the garden, were lined with portraits of old family members whose names had been long forgotten. Their smoke-darkened faces gazed absent-mindedly at something just past the viewer. “You rush past them everyday, forgetting they’re here, even who they are…. Then, every so often, just as you're about to walk out the door, you see an emerald ring or a turquoise broach in the corner of your eye,” said Jude. “You turn, and realise that after all these years, despite the grime caked to the paint, turning their skin brown, these faces haven’t lost a fraction of their brilliance.”
“ I suppose. You pay far more attention to this house than I ever have.” Luchino replied, cleaning his glasses with the underside of his tie.
“Well, should I not? It is a beautiful house. I think it's the nicest in the village.”
“Indeed.” Luchino sighed. “I am an ungrateful sinner and undeserving of my inheritance.”
“Please.” Jude rolled his eyes, taking Luchino’s hand in his, kissing his neck. “Let's go for a walk.”
The red and blue stained glass door filled the hall with squares of light. The priest checked his watch. “Carmen?” The housekeeper rushed in. “Emma, Luchino’s cousin, will be here in a few hours. I will take breakfast in the garden and then I will help you clean the house. It is in an absolute state.”
“What should I make?”
“Whatever Luchino would have for breakfast on a Friday morning.”
“Espresso, that I would make, and then he always went to the bakery down the road and came back with pastries.”
“I should’ve known he would indulge himself on a Friday. I will have a coffee and a piece of toast. Just butter is fine.” Jude said, sitting in the wrought iron garden chair, by the matching white table. Leafy crawlers had begun to climb up the legs of the table and chairs, while the water in the fountain had become stagnant and green. The housekeeper came, carrying her breakfast. The matching plate and cup were blue china, the kind one felt nervous holding, as if they would shatter under the slightest pressure.
“The fountain water is full of mosquitoes and algae now. He never showed me how to clean it or get it running. He always did that.” Mrs Bonello said.
“Perhaps the mosquitos are rejoicing.” Jude replied. “Now they can sire children freely. If only you knew how green it was before I was ordained. Luchino certainly turned inward after that.”
“How so?”
“I suppose he decided this house was actually worth caring for, not for the property value, but simply for the sake of beauty. Perfect coffee, thank you Carmen.”
···
Emma was meant to come and stay with Luchino this week — the last time she had seen him was months ago. She was in Sicily visiting friends and hadn’t planned on leaving — until she received the letter from Jude. Luchino must’ve mentioned she was in Sicily to him, yet she had no memory of him ever mentioning her address.
The blue of the harbour waters contrasted with the buttery stone of the mediaeval fortress on the water’s edge. The ferry pulled up to the jetty. Elio laid his hand on her thigh. The last time Emma saw Luchino he kept saying that she simply must have the green fabric on the mantelpiece in his living room, that it would look nicer at her place because he “always thought bright colours are more your taste.” She knew that was a lie. The fly landed on her faded brown dress. Lemon and butter yellow luzzijiet were moored around the jetty, their Phoenecian eyes watched her disembark. Another, painted black, moored to a buoy, bobbed in the whitewash of the small ferry. They wandered along the foreshore, then up the stone staircase.
Elio’s brown Ford Capri was parked on the main road behind the church, right where he had left it six months earlier. They drove out, through the grand old gate that stood as the only entrance into the city walls. Dry prickly pears grew along the road. Luchino and Emma’s grandmother, would take them to pick these fruits when they were children. She remembered a time they ran off and he tripped over a hidden root, spraining his wrist. Her father had to come looking for them, Emma thought they must’ve been gone for hours. Luchino’s wrist was purple-blue by the time they got home.
Mrs Bonello answered the door without saying a word and brought them into the living room. Father Jude hugged them, kissing both cheeks. “Carmen. Tea.” Jude said. She nodded, leaving the room. “You caught the ferry?” He asked.
“Yes, from Pozzallo.” Emma replied.
“To Valletta? Was it busy?”
“Not at all. Lifeless.”
“Pozzallo?”
“Just the same. Nothing changes.”
“How is your family then? Have you seen them recently? Every Saturday I hear your aunt complain about your uncle. Unfortunately, I have yet to believe any number of Hail Marys can save a failed marriage.”
“My nanna has been put in a mental hospital. She’s convinced my nannu is having an affair. She makes his life hell and yet he seems to have done everything in his power to prevent her from being put in the hospital.”
“A family history of failed marriages, then?” Jude said, bemusedly. “You should have all become nuns. Thank you, Carmen.” The china rattled as the housekeeper handed them each a cup. The sheer amount of crockery she’d broken… yet Luchino had never wanted to find someone new. “Jude, please, how could I? She’s a part of the house now, like the portraits you are obsessed with.”
“Aren’t nuns married to Christ?”
“The Church is the Bride of Christ.”
“Hence why we also make bad Catholics. I suppose my aunty does not understand the point of Confession is not to confess the sins of others.”
“Do you claim to understand the point?” “Not at all. I haven’t been since primary school. And if I had, no doubt I would also start confessing the sins of other people in my life.” Emma replied, leaning back in her chair.
Jude coughed, attempting to hide the smirk growing on his face.
“So it’s done? The plans for the funeral?” Emma asked. “Who is officiating?”
“Yes, all done. I am, and his nephews are serving.”
“Acolytes? How quaint.”
“You know he would have wanted it that way.”
“Is it still just you? Or have you brought in some new deacon or seminarian?”
“No, no, it is still just me.”
“Not enough Jesuits on the island somehow?”
“Somehow.”
“Would you like to have a look around?” he said, putting down his cup.
The ceiling was a flaking white, pressed iron in a gridded floral pattern. On the mantel, wilted sunflowers dropped petals onto the stone floor. Next to it was an overexposed Polaroid of a young woman with long blonde hair and a heavy necklace, wearing nothing but a silk scarf around her breasts.
“Leah Vella.” Emma said.
“Remember she and Luchino hosting here on Fridays? And her always bringing a mountain of food from her farm…” Jude said.
“You two were always late.”
“We always went for a swim first, and a walk along the cliffs. We could lie around on the beach down the road for hours. Only Luchino would be late to his own party. I’m sure I never came so close to death than rushing to get here in that red car. The one that always seemed to be on the verge of breaking down.”
“What did he call it again? His…?”
Jude looked away, shrugging, picking up a card next to the Polaroid. Guido Reni’s Saint Sebastian was printed on the front of the prayer card. Drops of ruby blood dripped from the arrows onto his chest, a cloth falling between his legs.
“His eyes pinned up to the sky, as though his whole body was held up in the act of looking to Heaven,” said Jude.
“Did you know that Reni was scared of women? ‘There will never again, in this world, be another Guido’…”
“Yes I did know. And that is from the little speech Francesco Albani gave when he found out Reni was dead. I did read the book too, you know.”
“Was I suggesting otherwise?” Luchino said, smiling.
“…There will never again, in this world, be another.” Jude muttered, putting the card back down.
“Hmm?” Emma said. “Have you been staying here since?”
“Yes. Very strange to be by myself in this particular house. This is probably the emptiest it's been in years. There is certainly no shortage of paintings to look at, though I’ve looked at all of them a thousand of times before.”
“Have you spoken to Leah?”
“She’s doing all the food for the wake.”
“Is it happening here?”
Jude nodded, putting down his cup of lukewarm tea. He’d hired Carmen after Leah had moved back into her family home to care for her mother since her father had died. It was Luchino’s house, but she’d lived here for years. The house would have fallen into disrepair a long time ago if it wasn’t for Leah.
“The day after tomorrow, correct?”
“Yes, the day after tomorrow.”
The room was cold and dusty.A ray of sun warmed Jude’s arm.
“Are you sure you are ready?” Emma asked.
“There is no one else to do it.”
He pulled out a cigarette, Marlboro Reds.
“I never knew a priest who smokes as much as you do. Luchino never smoked. He cared too much about the smell. He cared too much about the way it made his fingers look.” Emma said.
“I hope you understand how much he talked about you.”
“Me?” She said, starting to laugh, then cry at the same time. “I meant nothing to him compared to you. He adored you. Even after you left… I can’t believe him. You know I thought this is all very unlike him. But that just shows how I barely knew him these last few years. How are you coping?”
Jude put his cigarette out on the metal ashtray.
***
“Requiem aeternam dona eis Domine.” The cantor sung the introit as they entered, passing the statue of Stella Maris that stood at the entrance to the church. “Et lux perpetua luceat eis.” The coffin was carried by somnambulant pallbearers hovering to the altar. Luchino had left no instructions. He, for whom life seemed to be a polished performance of the greatest drama and tragedy, as if each event was composed to occur perfectly on cue, from every slight mishap to the most life changing events, had left no instruction. Jude had assumed he’d be specific down to which incense was to be burnt. He had loved the preciseness of the liturgy, when priest and deacon genuflected to the High Altar in sync, when the voice of the cantor singing the introit drifted down the nave, the great show of the thurifer leading a solemn procession, the bowing of the head every time the name of Christ or the Holy Trinity was mentioned.
“Aesthetic appreciation of the liturgy and faith are two different things.” Luchino said, feeling the warmth of Jude’s chest on the back of his neck as he lay his head down on him.
“I guess but they naturally lead towards each other don’t they?”
“Maybe. Not for everyone. Not for me.”
But no. There was nothing.
Various people lined the pews. A row of old crones wearing lace mantillas and ink black dresses sat on the front pew, kneeling and praying rosaries with bowed heads. Behind them Emma wore a yellow dress. She seemed incapable of dressing for occasion. Though, he supposed this is the way Luchino always told her she should style herself. “Kyrie eleison.” The choir continued. “Kyrie eleison.” Leah sat a few rows back, her hair almost reaching the pew.
The thurifer paused underneath the great crucifix hanging above the sanctuary. The incense rose up in clouds, obscuring the ceiling behind a screen of smoke. The blood dripping down the face of the Christ on the cross was bright against the grey incense smoke and brown crown of thorns peeling the skin off his face. “Christe eleison.” Christ’s eyes stared down at the crowd, resigned to the torpor of death. ‘There will never again, in this world, be another’. “Christe eleison.” Blood flowed from the wound in his side, like water pouring from a jug. Sunlight, coming in from the stained windows, illuminated the plumes of incense. “Libera me, Domine, de morte æterna, in die illa tremenda,” Deliver me, O Lord, from death eternal, on that fearful day. Jude stared at the coffin in front of him, mentally translating the Latin as the choir sang the Libera Me. The Church, in her wisdom, chose to proclaim utter despair and desolation as a comfort to the bereaved. As if complete surrender to God brought the dead back to life. “Preces meæ non sunt dignæ,” worthless are my prayers and sighing. “Ne perenni cremer igne,” rescue me from fires undying. If he slid the wooden panel open ajar, Luchino would be there, lying on his back. His body. It would be right there. The body of Christ hung from the ceiling while the body of Luchino Cardona lay just there, washed clean, pumped with foreign chemicals, drained of his fluids. Under the crucified Christ, with all his mangled bloody wounds, the dead are made to look as if they have simply fallen asleep, as if it mattered what state the body was in when its use had expired. Jude looked up from the altar, out the small wooden doors and could see the ocean in the distance beneath the cliffs.
Luchino’s lips tasted of salt. The sun and sea breeze formed a thin crust across his face. It made his hair coarse and wiry, but still soft and the colour of cocoa. The sound of the waves was just a blur in the background as Jude pulled his cheap sunglasses off. The late March, yolk-coloured sun crept down below the horizon, its reflection floating upon the sea, like whipped egg whites upon a blue sheet. Luchino pushed up against Jude’s thigh, crossing over his sandy legs with his.
“Luchino. I like how your hair feels after you swim in the sea.” “It is cold and wet.”
“It is not so cold to me. Come here. Are you cold?” “Not now, you and the sun are warming me.”
“I love you. Luchino Luchino Luchino.”
Luchino kissed his nose, his mouth, his ears. There was sand in his ears, in his hair, under his nails, but it was Luchino’s sand. He could drown under the palm of his sandy hands.
“I love you too, mouse. I want to stay here forever.”
“Would Leah like that?”
Jude stood and pulled Luchino up by his arm. Lines of shells ran along the beach, pipi, clam and cockle. The moon rose over the eastern cliffs. Jude picked up an oyster shell. The phosphorescence on the silver underside caught the moonlight and kept it in its grasp for a moment, condensing it into a milky white pearl.
They walked up the cliffside pathway passing a chapel. It was small, cut into the limestone, more similar to a cave than a building. The sandstone facade was caked in white salt, carried by the sirocco that battered the southern coast. Set into a niche, facing west, standing precariously on the edge of the cliff, Stella Maris stood upon frothy white waves, floating on the plaster as her feet were washed by the sea. She stamped the moon under her, the stars nestled into her stony hair like jewels. The paint on her feet had long been rubbed away. Her gaze looked out onto the sea, far, far out to the horizon.
“They built it close to the cliff’s edge so the fishermen can still see her out at sea.” Jude said, holding Luchino’s dry palm in his as they walked back up the rough hewn steps to the top of the cliff.
“We're going to be late again,” Luchino replied. They drove off through the evening. It was dark, a southerly breeze blowing, rustling through the date palms that lined the sides of the sand road. They arrived at the house and walked up the gravel pathway flanked by unmown grass. Leah answered the door, flinging it open so violently that it was as if she was seeing them for the first time in a decade.
“Finally! Come in.”
Leah kissed Luchino firmly on both cheeks.
“Luchino, the wine you bought is in the fridge. My uncle dropped off all those olives earlier from the farm.” She said, going around and offering the bowl to everyone, repeating the same cliched anecdotes about growing up on a farm Luchino knew she loved to tell.
“Wine?” Jude asked.
“Yes please.”
Jude’s hand shook slightly as he poured wine into two short tumblers that were stained with coffee. The Leah Vella and Luchino Cardona household hadn’t yet discovered wine glasses, or dish soap. On the verandah, people stood, chatting, smoking and sipping watered down pastis. Leah squeezed between the coffee table and the couch, carrying a bowl of even more olives. A woman in a loose, flax-coloured dress stood by the open window, leaning against a man wearing a navy blue shirt. “Emma.” Luchino said, hugging her.
“This is Elio.” She said. He had blue eyes and caramel-coloured skin.
“This is Jude.” They sat down on the peeling leather couch, a couch that looked older than everyone in the room combined, which Luchino had told Jude he’d seen in the window of a Lampedusa antique store and had made Emma and Leah help him carry it halfway across the island back onto the ferry.
“So how did you two meet?” Emma asked.
“Rita is his cousin. Remember her? We met at her place a few months ago.” Luchino said. Jude chuckled, bemused by Luchino’s ceaselessly complicated social life. There seemed to be only a few degrees of separation between him and everyone in this town. Though that wasn’t saying much.
“Luchino hasn’t been able to shut up about you,” Emma said.
“And he’s only introduced us now…” Jude replied.
“Sorry I thought you might hate each other.” Luchino said, rolling his eyes.
“Leah!” Emma yelled across the room. “Has Luchino introduced you?”
“Weeks ago!” Leah yelled back, deliberately too loud.
“How surprising. How come you two took so long to arrive?”
“We went swimming. And then we went for a walk around the cliff to see the view from the chapel.” Luchino said.
“The one with the statue of Mary on the brink of falling off the cliff?”
“Yes. It’s a very beautiful scene, isn’t it?” Jude said.
“She looks more like a Venus than a Virgin Mary.”
Luchino put on a Django Reinhardt record, even though he knew that no one liked jazz except him. Now Leah was passing around a plate of figs and pomegranate seeds, no doubt from their farm too.
“My nanna used to go there every time my nannu went out fishing. She took me once and crossed herself obsessively until she was on the verge of collapsing. He wouldn’t have died if they had spent their money repairing their fishing boats instead of using it to fix the chapel.”
“You bring that up all the time.” Luchino said.
“Well, it's true.”
“Perhaps. Or the Church itself could have repaired their boats.” Jude said, absentmindedly.
“As if they would ever do that.” Emma replied. “This wine isn't very nice, Luchino.”
“Yes, he has rubbish taste.” Jude laughed, putting Luchino’s hand in his, leaning on his shoulder. He still smelt of the sea.
···
The pallbearers now brought the coffin into the sunlight, placing it by the grave that had been prepared for him. Leah stood by Emma, staring into the ground. “Kyrie eleison, christe eleison” the choir began the Kyrie again, the same four words Jude had heard thousands of times before, but this time he detected every slight tonal impurity, every brief moment a voice faltered.
The acolyte handed him the aspersorium. Jude took it, and, dipping the aspergillum, sprinkled Luchino with the holy water. The salty water splashed and dripped down the sides of the coffin, how appropriate. How appropriate that Luchino be buried with salt water. His hair would go soft again, the colour of cocoa that Jude loved. He’d don his cheap sunglasses again, and Jude would slip them off, one last time. Lying around on the sand, watching the fishermen bring in their traps while their wives bob around in the rocky grottoes. The shells along the beach would now be glistening in the afternoon sun, with the seaweed expelling a rancid smell in the heat.
Was it God who willed one to end their own life? Was it easier to love another person, or to love an idea? Was it better to base your entire existence ardound a person you cannot even see, or to attempt to withstand the sheer tragedy of loving another human being? To be a priest was to fall in love with someone you cannot even see. To love, to love with your whole heart and mind, your whole body, someone you cannot even see.. “Pater noster, qui es in cœlis,” They lowered Luchino into the earth. Jude muttered under his breath as the grave filled with soil, “You were so, so utterly wrong. It was not you who was the selfish one. It was me. Always me.”
···
Clouds closed over the sky as rain pattered against the window. Luchino laid on his bed, and stared at Jude sitting by the window, as if he expected him to say something. Jude avoided returning the stare, examining each bit of his body, but not his eyes. The faded, but still visible, white scar on his upturned palm, the little patch of blonde hair on the left side of his head, the slight redness on either side of his nasal bridge from wearing glasses since he was a child. “What are you looking at?” Jude asked.
“Nothing. At you. Should I not look at you?”
Jude turned to look out the window at the ripples the raindrops made as they dripped onto the green windowsill.
“I wish I could lie here and stare at you forever.” Luchino said.
The noise of the rain on the wooden shutters grew louder as the clouds became darker. It had been days since it had last rained, years of constant sun had cracked away the olive green paint on the sill to the point where there wasn’t really any point in resisting the urge to peel the paint away, it was so old. Luchino had not moved. Luchino, he thought. Luchino and the smell of love. Is that the smell I love? To wake up to the sound of him playing Ravel on the piano? The bitter taste of a crushed pomegranate seed from Leah’s orchard? The fennel, aniseed taste of pastis and water, to be drunk by the cliff as the fishermen below came in? The pain of walking up his gravel path with bare and sandy feet from those rough hewn stairs by the cave chapel? To live in a land of wheat and barley and vines and fig trees and pomegranates; a land of olive trees and honey? Was all that worthy of love? His square-faced watch ticked over to five. “I have to go.” Jude said.
“So I will not be lying here forever.” Luchino replied.
“I am going.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I do have to and so I am leaving.”
“You should think about yourself more. Do you want me to drive you?”
“If it pleases thee.”
“Yes, it pleases me.”
His car was parked by the orange trees that lined the perimeter of his house. Oranges were replaced by dates as they drove by the palms towards the cliff stairs. The summer rain continued to pelt down as Luchino pulled up by the cliff. The drama of a sea storm played out upon the horizon, great dark clouds floating low above the sea, with the sea beating back the sky with angry waves. “I will see you later tonight, Luchino.”
“Shall I also pick you up?”
“That would be lovely. At 7.”
The rain seeped into his scalp. Jude walked down the stairs to the cliffside chapel, dipping his index and ring finger into the holy water font as he entered, passing the statue of Stella Maris. He walked along the left aisle, ducked his head under the stone door frame, and entered the sacristy. Father Dominic walked in and poured the jug of water on the bench into the bowl and washed his hands, muttering prayers under his breath, “Da, Domine, virtutem manibus meis.” Jude opened the wardrobe opposite the bench and put on his cassock and surplice. Father Dominic nodded, bowing his head under the low door, and walked out into the nave. Maybe Luchino had walked down to the beach and swam in the rain, Jude thought. Luchino Luchino Luchino. He smiled under the hanging crucifix, sitting down on the wooden bench by the lectern as Father Dominic censed the altar. Is that the smell I love? Would you rather smell frankincense and hear the banging on the church doors during the Palm Sunday liturgy? To wake to the sound of bells, to feel the relief of sitting up again after kneeling on wood? The stained glass windows were dark, Christ and the Samaritan woman with her water vessel and five husbands just barely visible. ‘Whosoever drinketh of the water that I give him shall never thirst, but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life’ ‘John, chapter four’ was inscribed upon the glass, made to look like a floating, falling paper scroll. Whosoever drinketh of the water that I give him shall never thirst. The raw simplicity of it. Is that what I love? It was so simple, to slake one’s thirst at the well. Is that the taste I love? Yes. Salty holy water landing on your lips as the priest sprinkles the congregation.
Jude’s head started to throb with an out-of-tune organ induced headache. Whosoever drinketh of the water that I give him shall never thirst. It was easy for her, the Samaritan Woman, being told what to do in a few sentences. And that’s it, she was saved. Did she want to return to one of her five husbands? You can assume not, if she went off telling the village of the new water she had found. Such a seismic shift, achieved in just a few sentences told to her. Just reading those same sentences from a book or a stained glass window didn’t have the same effect. Perhaps it was more about the person delivering the lines. Hearing an old parishioner reading the verse and coughing every line a few Sundays ago did not compare. The Samaritan Woman did not know who she was hearing those lines from, but did Jude? It never penetrated deep enough, knowing something, but not registering it in your mind. Whosoever drinketh of the water. It was right there, written down in front of him. Luchino was still sitting in his car.
***
“So, you’ve decided then?”
Jude nodded. Luchino put down his cup of tea.
“I could tell them to get the cliff church fixed.” Jude said. “It is in an absolute state. God knows why the Archbishop hasn’t had it looked at. You know, he really is quite incompetent. I do not know why on earth he was chosen out of everyone. I can still say that, I haven’t taken the vow of obedience yet. Don’t look at me like that.”
Luchino smiled weakly, gazing down at the floor.
“It was always going to be this way. I’ve known for a long time now. At least I was honest. And I’m not being sent away anywhere. I am staying here, so don’t act like I’m moving to the other side of the world and you’ll never see me again.”
“It would be much easier if you were.”
Luchino got up off the peeling leather couch and walked to the front door, past the rows of portraits. Glancing back, he said “For once, I can say that you are the selfish one.”