Cornelius

I wrote this as an exercise in a writing class with Lorraine Lordi, my dear friend and mentor. I wrote in the POV of my long deceased Uncle-Uncle Putt. Or Cornelius!

That’s me. The handsome dark haired rogue, sitting there with Father O’Malley at my shoulder. If I look a bit tentative, it was probably for good reason. Father O’Malley was well known for his tendency to tweak and twist the ear of a chap for being the slightest bit unruly. I recall one occasion, I believe I was in fifth or sixth grade, when the good Father caught me carving a swear word on the darkened oak wall of the confessional. My Dad had given me a pearl handled pen knife for my birthday-it was a beauty. The gift seemed to me a clear message from my Dad. I was trusted with a knife-sort of a rite of passage for a boy- signaling my glorious passage into manhood. That thin mirrored steel blade just begged to dig and gouge. And my pals had dared me to do it. That was reason enough for me to proceed.

It was a Saturday, I remember. Every Saturday, Father O’Malley took his walk, along Ocean Drive, after having his breakfast at Hathaway’s Diner. He was partial to their eggs over- easy, always with a large side of homemade red flannel hash. In the spirit of temperance, he only allowed himself to indulge in the greasy feast on Saturdays. During Lent, he gave it up completely. As I recall, his sermons were always more heated and caustic when he was not able to indulge in his favorite repast. I had finished up my paper route early that morning and tried to look casual as I straddled my bike under the awning, out there in front of Nelson’s newsstand. The shade, under that awning, served as a kind of a cloak of cover as I prepared to engage in this, my first manly act of defiance. I was blissfully aware that this caper could earn me some big points. I was sick and tired of being the smart kid. I wanted to be-well-the handsome rogue. I figured that Gwendolyn Harrison might even let me take her to the dance if she knew what a daring fellow I was. I could almost smell her- she smelled like soap and apples. And she had hair the color of corn silk, and just as shiny as that too.

I watched O’Malley leave the diner, that Saturday morning, pumping the hands of his parishioners as they entered the diner, like he was the goddamn welcome wagon or something for Hathaway’s. He turned east and headed toward the bay. I remember wondering if my Grampa Phelps might be down on the docks, with the other Patchogue oyster men, mending a net or readying his old boat for another run out to sea. Grampa would hide if he saw O’Malley coming, go down in the hold and busy himself with greasing a gear or two. Gramps couldn’t stand having to nod and smile apologetically while O’Malley scolded him for his poor attendance to Sunday Mass. If I could have whistled, so Grampa would hear, I’d a warned him that O’Malley was on his way. As he disappeared over the hill, I fired my heel back, tipped up my kickstand and pedaled like crazy toward the church. I felt like a cowboy.

I leaned my bike against the tree in the side yard of the church, and slipped through the heavy oak back door. I figured that this way there was less chance of being discovered by one of O’Malley’s church ladies. They were always scurrying about, polishing the pews with lemon oil or sprucing up the altar with huge vases of flowers from their cutting gardens. But this morning-no one was about. It took a minute for my eyes to adjust to the cool darkness inside. Candle flames danced inside of the ruby red votives where folks could light a flame to honor a departed loved one or petition the Lord for a blessing of some sort. I headed to the front of the church, carefully avoiding the cool marble gazes of the statues. As I crossed before the altar, I bowed my head, genuflected and made the sign of the cross. And then I headed toward the confessional booth.

I pushed the heavy purple velvet curtain aside and sat on the kneeler, collecting my wits about me. I could hear my heart in my ears and I had a weird lightness in my chest. This altar boy was about to cash in his halo. I flicked the pen knife open with a flick of my thumb and pressed the silver tip into the wall, just about at eye level if you were kneeling. I had thought long and hard about what word I would use. It had to be short and not so sweet. Fit for a rogue. SHIT. That would be my legacy. SHIT.

The gouging and the digging commenced in earnest, and with each slip of the knife, I could smell the crisp curls of golden pulp as they landed on my lap in the cool darkness. I was just about to cross the T when I heard the back door open and then close with a deadly thud. I lifted my feet up and hugged my knees, trying to avoid being discovered behind that musty old curtain. Footsteps echoed on the cold marble floor. A cold sweat dripped from my eyebrows.

And then- there they were-Father O’Malley’s unmistakable size twelve black oxfords- standing there at the entrance to the confessional- blocking my exit.

“Cornelius?” I heard him whisper. “Cornelius O’Leary? Is that you?”

I wet my pants.

The curtain parted and I stood up quickly, the golden shavings falling from my lap like snow. The pool of piss blackening my trousers. He looked at me confused.

“Whatever are you doing here, Corneil? Confessions are not due to begin until…” O’Malley blinked and arched his eyebrows in disbelief. He pushed me aside and looked in horror at the expletive that I had so deftly carved in my neatest script.

In a snap, he had my ear tweaked and twisted between his thumb and index finger, pinching so hard that I was sure that my ear might rip off. I sort of wished that it would because maybe then I could run away, bloodied but free. I could run away and never go home again. Maybe join the circus as the one- eared boy. Father O’Malley pulled me clean out of the confessional and dragged me down the aisle and out the back door. I thought sure that O’Malley was taking me to the rectory where he would call my Dad-or worse yet-my Mom. But he yanked and pulled me by the ear like a recalcitrant donkey right past the rectory entrance and into the back yard. An old garden shed stood at the edge of the lawn. O’Malley flung the door open with his free hand and pushed me into the shed. I imagined a whooping was about to occur.

“Get the sandpaper from that drawer there!” He motioned to the bottom drawer of an ancient chest. “And some wood stain. There . Over your fool head. There on the shelf.”

I complied with all due speed.

That afternoon, I sanded and stained and oiled the oak walls of that confessional, all the while reciting Hail Marys. I must have said a hundred.

Father O’Malley never told my Father. Or my Mother. But every Sunday, Father O’Malley came to dinner. Every Sunday as Mother laid out her best china and silver and lighted the candles and basted the ham and mashed the potatoes, my right ear would hurt. And O’Malley would smile.

When I Was A Kid...

When I was a just a kid in Macon, Georgia, I ate peaches so big that you had to spread all your fingers wide, just to hold them. And they were so full of juice that my sisters and I would take big bites, the fuzzy flesh against our pinked cheeks, and then laugh, leaning forward, as the sweet nectar drained down our faces.

When I was a just a kid in Macon, Georgia, we would pick fallen pecans off the huge tree. The nuts were mahogany brown with fine little black stripes running the length of the shells. When held in a sweaty hand, the shells would take on the deep hue of the stair rail, that ran from the floor to the sky, in our big house with its wraparound porch and its wide yard. That same pecan tree held our tire swings, her limbs so high, that we could throw our heads back and ride a thousand long slow arcs.

When I was a just a kid in Macon, Georgia, there was a family who lived in a ply board shack in the woods, way out behind our house. They were black as coal with pink nail beds and palms, white teeth-and the whites of their eyes- so much like moons in their dark faces. The mom washed clothes in a big pot over a wood fire. My sisters and I  thought she was a witch and we would crouch behind a rampant row of honeysuckle bushes and watch her stir and lift the steaming wads of clothes with a stick. She would hum as she worked. There was something oddly consoling in her rhythms.

When I was a just a kid in Macon, Georgia, we would while away the long summer days having tea parties. I remember putting sweet green grass in hot water and sipping it delicately, pinkies lifted. We would pick honeysuckle blossoms and suck the nectar. One afternoon, I plucked a blossom, grasped the delicate stamen and pulled it away from the petals. A tiny drop of clear nectar balanced on the stamen’s end, like the star on a magic wand. I pushed it through the steel diamond of the chain link fence where a black face waited. His tongue was impossibly pink as he licked the drop, smiled…and ran away.