by Alena Dillon
Evelyn stepped forward. She felt protective, as if one of her young had caught the eye of a predator. “What scares you?”
Mei-Li glanced around the room, uneasy to be at the center of attention. “The doctors at the practice seem perfectly nice, but what if they aren’t? And what about any male patients? What if someone reminds me of him, my uncle? I’m worried having a job will mean I can support myself and you’ll tell me I should go out on my own, but what if I’m scared after work and I come home to nobody?” Her voice became strained, and she dabbed her eyes with her sweatshirt sleeves. “I don’t want to be scared, but I am. I don’t want to be alone, but I will be. And I don’t want to leave here yet.”
Evelyn knew fear was a weed, a thorny vine that wrapped itself around your limbs. It paralyzed you from the outside and then entrenched itself in your insides, digging through your skin, stretching and coiling in your guts until it strangled your organs. And although it was impossible, she wished more than anything that she could wrestle Mei-Li’s fear on her behalf, prune it back, and untangle it from her heart and lungs so that she could breathe freely once again.
“It’s okay to be afraid,” Esther said, reaching across the table to place her hand on top of Mei-Li’s. Her thumb stroked Mei-Li’s knuckles and her voice was soothing. “I’m afraid too. But do not worry. They won’t kick you out of Mercy House. Isn’t that right, Sisters?”
“My poor dears, Mercy House is closing!” The confession burst from Sister Maria, and then she covered her mournful face with her hands. She turned to Josephine and separated her fingers just enough to see through them. “I’m sorry, I know we agreed to make tonight a celebration, but I just couldn’t keep it in any longer.”
Josephine rolled her eyes. “Yes, who could have expected you to withstand such intense interrogation?”
“We’re closing?” Mei-Li’s small voice shot above the stunned expressions of the residents, surprisingly charged, a small explosion.
“It’s because of that jizz-face bishop,” Desiree said and slapped the table. The corkscrew coils of her hair vibrated and the dishes clattered, causing Katrina to wince and grab both of her earbuds in tight fists.
“Woah, woah,” Evelyn said and pushed her palms out against the swelling strife. “There has been talk of closing Mercy House, yes, but nothing is official yet. And I’m not going to let that happen. I promise you. I have a plan.”
Sister Maria dried her eyes with her sleeves. “You do?”
Lucia folded her arms over her chest and popped a hip. “You might be hot shit with a Lysol can, but when it comes to Bishop Bicho Pequeño, your plans have been pretty lame so far.”
“That may be true. But hear me out.” Evelyn felt the energy of her proposition like an electric current beneath her skin. “A journalist has agreed to run a piece about Mercy House in the New York Times. As far as he knows, the church is closing us down because they can’t afford to run our operation. And that’s all he needs to know. He’s coming in the morning to interview you girls and share your stories—anonymously, of course—in an effort to raise money. Between food, utilities, property taxes, and insurance, that’s what? Two thousand dollars a month? Twenty-four thousand to keep us open for a year? We can raise that. We just need to brainstorm a fundraiser or two the public can get behind and advertise the hell out of it. Even if we don’t raise it, even if we don’t come close, the money isn’t really the point. Once the public is on our side, working to keep this place afloat, rooting for us, the Church can’t get away with being against us.”
“Raise our voices so that, if silenced, the community will hear the difference,” Josephine said, nodding.
“I only know one good way to make money, but I’m happy to teach ya’ll.” Desiree gripped her chin and surveyed the other residents, nodding, assessing. “With this group, we can make twenty-four thousand in a weekend. We got almost every type of fetish.”
Evelyn patted Desiree’s back. “I applaud your enthusiasm, Des,” she said. “But let’s keep brainstorming.”
Chapter 17
February 16, 2010
MERCY HOUSE, A LIFELINE FOR MANY, NOW NEEDS SAVING
It looks like any other brick row house in the neighborhood. If you weren’t searching for the angel doorknocker, its signature piece, you might miss it entirely. In fact, you could live in Bedford-Stuyvesant your entire life, you could walk down Chauncey Street every day on your way to work, and never know it existed. That’s how unassuming Mercy House—a haven for any woman who needs it—is.
Mercy House was founded in 1984 by three nuns of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Mercy. Since then, it has served hundreds of women in search of safety and rehabilitation through its open-door policy.
As Sister Evelyn described it, “We strive to remind these incredible women, though they were victims of violence or emotional abuse, that that is not their identity. They are strong. They’ve been through the worst life can throw at you and survived. They can handle anything now. Their potential is limitless. Though their pasts cannot be changed, their future is up to them.”
Sister Maria added, “And we spoil them when we can—my cookies are a house favorite, if I do say so myself. Our residents have suffered and they are such beautiful souls. They deserve every last chocolate chip.”
But due to a shrinking attendance, and with it, donors, the Catholic Church is struggling to keep facilities like Mercy House afloat. The sisters of Mercy House and its current residents have only one month to raise their operational costs—a whopping $24,000—before the church must repurpose the house into a more affordable, or perhaps even lucrative venture.
“I don’t blame the Church,” said Sister Josephine. “If they don’t have the money, they don’t have the money. It’s just a shame to imagine all of this good work coming to an end, especially if it can be prevented.”
And so, in order to continue its 25-year tradition of silently serving the community, Mercy House is finally speaking up and asking for something in return: the financial and moral support of Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, and beyond.
But as Denise*, a current resident of Mercy House, noted, “Nothing in this world comes free. We know that, so we ain’t about to go around asking for handouts. We aren’t beggars. In fact, I myself am an entrepreneur, so I’m looking at this like a business. What can we provide that is so valuable, people with deep pockets want to throw money at it?”
Melissa*, another resident, continued, “As a group, we strategized a three-pronged approach to our fundraising effort, which we thought was fitting. Like the Trinity, you know? We’ll all play our part, capitalize on our skill sets. The sisters have encouraged us all along to identify our own strengths. That hasn’t come easy to me, and doesn’t come easy to a lot of women who have experienced what we’ve experienced. But I’m getting better. And since I can acknowledge that I’m organized, I’ll manage the project.”
Denise jumped back in to share her part. “I’m director of marketing, of course. Not employing this mouth would be a wasted resource, especially since the sisters refuse to use some of my other talents. But I also thought up one of those prongs my girl Melissa mentioned. See, I’m kind of an expert on local playgrounds; I know they’re hella bootleg, especially in Bed-Stuy. So for every $10 raised, I’ll spend an hour pulling weeds, cleaning litter, sanding splinters from equipment, planting flowers. Beautifying the [expletive] out of it. I don’t get on my knees and sweat for nothing. When I do, I mean business. If people pledge enough, by the time I’m done with Bed-Stuy playgrounds, I promise, you’ll swear you’re in Brooklyn Heights.”
The second fundraising effort is being designed and executed by a teenager by the name of Kelly*. “When my mind is going places I don’t want it going, my hands distract it by knitting. I’m knitting all day long. I know the bamboo, herringbone, and tree of life stitches. I can basketweave and diamond honeycomb. I knit until my fingers ache and my back tightens from so many hours hunched over the work. I knit until I
feel everywhere but my feelings. This hobby might cause early-onset arthritis, but at least my mind will be at ease—and I’ll never be short a scarf! Given all the beanies and mittens piling up in my room, so many I started stuffing them into pillowcases and sleeping on them, it seemed natural to offer them up in order to save Mercy House. So there will be knitwear for every part of your body, in every size and color of the rainbow, in every stitch I’m fluent in, available for purchase—if you’re interested and like what you see, that is.”
The last of their so-called trinity of prongs is the contribution of Elise*, a Mercy House resident and immigrant from the Caribbean. She said, “The sisters administer to us in a variety of ways, but one of Sister Maria’s favorite techniques is through baking. I’ve learned there is something healing about every step in the process: combining dry ingredients and mixing in wet ones; preheating the oven; waiting while everything solidifies inside and the sweet scent spreads throughout the house, calling each of us down to the kitchen; the warmth of the item in your hands; the pleasure of finally indulging with one another. There is comfort in its simplicity and joy. I’d like to apply what I’ve learned from Sister Maria in order to help Mercy House, with a cultural addition. I revisit my home country when I cook the food of its people, and I offer a taste of it to those who have never visited by sharing its flavors. In addition to pledging for an hour of Denise’s playground work or buying a one-of-a-kind Kelly craft, you can also order a box of homemade Haitian treats, including tablet cocoye, a crunchy coconut cookie; konparet, a ginger, coconut, and cinnamon sweet bread; and bonbon sirop, a dark sugarcane and spice cake. The good people at Rite Spice Caribbean Restaurant have agreed to deliver on our behalf.”
And finally, the newest resident of Mercy House, Lydia*, will provide the platform for donating and purchasing. “I took this class once in high school, back when I was still going every day, before I realized it was kind of a waste of my time. I mean, who needs to know what year some old as [expletive] king in some country no one cares about created a tax that pissed off his people? When am I ever going to use that random fact in real life? You think people ask about that kind of thing on the B23? Anyway, the class was called web design or something like that. We had to make fake sites as a final project. The teacher was nice, but she was right out of college and kind of a pushover, so we all built sites to sell drugs or guns or some other illegal [expletive], just to rile her up. It was funny, but I learned something too. So I’m in charge of building the website and running the books. There’s a lot of stuff I don’t know, but you can learn almost anything from YouTube. That’s where I learned how to contour your chest with foundation to make everything look a size bigger. My mom loves that trick. Anyway, visit Save MercyHouse.com. And don’t be cheap.”
“Listen to them. Aren’t they incredible?” Sister Evelyn said.
If you believe in the mission of Mercy House and would like its doors to remain open, you have one month to support its cause. And, in the words of Lydia, don’t be cheap.
Chapter 18
The morning the Times was scheduled to publish the article, Evelyn was at the newsstand first thing, and arrived back at Mercy House to the girls’ chatter in the kitchen. They were awake earlier than usual, pouring orange juice and boiling water for tea while Esther fried eggs and Lucia took orders for the extent of her cooking expertise: wheat bread, toasted or untoasted.
When the front door closed behind Evelyn, Desiree scurried down the hall, her hands reaching for the paper. “Are we famous yet? Are there photographers outside?”
Evelyn surrendered the goods. “Yeah, I just fended off the advances of Russell Crowe.”
Desiree studied Evelyn, her lips pursed. Then she flicked her wrist and snatched the paper. “Now I know you’re lying. No one alive would fend off Mr. Crowe.”
Back in the kitchen, Desiree read the article out loud, and impersonated each of the nuns and residents as she recited their quotations. When she used her airy voice for Katrina’s portion, Katrina whispered to Mei-Li, “Do I really sound like that?” and Mei-Li shook her head, although she did.
Esther reassured her, “Don’t worry. She made me sound Jamaican.”
There wasn’t time to bask in the warmth of their newly acquired stardom. They had work to do, and they knew it.
After breakfast, everyone broke off to tackle her own task. Esther zested a lime for konparet; Katrina set up Maria and Josephine for their first knitting projects; Desiree and Lucia, their faces lit by the glow of a laptop screen, finalized SaveMercyHouse.com; and Mei-Li discussed tasks with each branch, created a calendar of deadlines, and taped it to a kitchen cabinet.
And though she should have been delighted by the camaraderie and dedication, Evelyn sensed him coming like a thunderstorm. It wouldn’t be long now.
The bishop barged in just before ten o’clock that morning. Evelyn had disabled the door alarm so he wouldn’t startle the women, but they were alerted of his presence when he collided with the coatrack she’d shifted into his path. The women and girls stilled and looked at one another.
“It’s all right,” Evelyn said. “The word is out. What can he do now?”
The bishop was breathless when he reached the kitchen. His overcoat was open, revealing a black clergy shirt and white collar, stained by a spot of coffee, perhaps. Evelyn wondered who removed spots from his vestments now. She hoped it was him; she hoped the bleach burned his fingers.
His hands were empty, though she knew he clutched the newspaper in spirit—that’s why he was there.
Father John emerged from behind the bishop and lifted his palm in a sheepish greeting. That, she wasn’t expecting. Although it made perfect sense. With Father John present, there was so much Evelyn couldn’t say.
The bishop’s nostrils flared with every inhale. “It is time for confession.”
Something else she didn’t expect. It seemed the bishop could still surprise her after all. “Now?” St. Joseph of Mercy Church normally didn’t hold confession hours on Tuesdays.
There were eight other people in the room, but he spoke as if only to her. “I told you you’d return to the sacraments. That begins this instant.”
Evelyn gestured to the women, mid-task. “I’m afraid now is not a good time. We are in the middle of important work. Maybe you heard we are raising funds to keep Mercy House open.”
The sleeves of his coat ended just above his knuckles; he gripped his hands into fists. “I insist.”
“Surely you can spare an hour for confession, Sister. It’s a sacred sacrament, after all.” Father John’s features were waxy. He scratched his temple in such a way that she knew he didn’t have a physical itch, just a persisting anxiety. Evelyn wondered what he thought of the newspaper article published that morning, and what the conversation was like that led the bishop to storm their row house, Father John reluctantly in tow.
Evelyn knew what the bishop was after with this strategy; he wasn’t as slick as he thought. Inside a confessional booth, she’d feel the pressure of thousands of years of tradition, the pressure of her faith, the pressure of her life’s vows, to be truthful. It was as close as the bishop could get to interrogation with a lie detector.
Though she didn’t want to be subjected to such scrutiny, and she was disgusted that the Hawk would use a sacrament as a manipulation tactic, more than anything else, she wanted him out of her kitchen, away from the residents it was her duty to protect. She thought of a pet rabbit she had as a girl, an adorable four-pound Holland Lop with floppy brown ears and matching speckles around its nose. Evelyn named her Easter. It was a timid little thing that froze whenever it was held by anybody but Evelyn. One night, her father came home drunk, as he often did. Evelyn was only twelve, but even then she knew she would be a nun and could never have children of her own. She was cradling Easter, singing her an Irish lullaby her dad used to sing. Across the apartment, her father stumbled and knocked into the china cabinet that held their mismatched dishes. It crashed to the f
loor, shattering the glasses and ceramic ware. Easter’s little chest was shaped like the prow of a ship, and beneath the fur and fragile sternum, her tiny heart hammered, as if fighting wildly to escape its anatomical cage. Evie cooed and stroked her ears. She knew Easter was terrified by the clangor, but she didn’t know that, inside the palm of her hand, Easter was having a heart attack. Her rabbit died sometime that night.
In the kitchen, Evelyn was aware of her heart beating, could feel it overworking; she thought she could hear it too, and hoped it wasn’t loud enough for the bishop to realize how much he scared her.
She rolled her shoulders back and stood as tall as her squat form would allow. “I’d be happy to confess my sins. Penance is cleansing. It frees the spirit. We all should admit when we’ve done something wrong, don’t you agree, Bishop?”
Father John’s expression relaxed, but the bishop’s smile was a tight fissure. “Through confession, the prodigal daughter returns to God.”
“I will go with you, Sister.” Esther spoke as solemnly as a loyal soldier, and wiped flour against the legs of her apron.
Maria struggled to untangle her fingers from the cat’s cradle of her yarn. “Me too. I’m not too proud to admit gluttony has gotten the best of me this week. Month, really.”
Desiree clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and leaned into the computer screen. “Shit, I’ve got work to do.”
There was a chill in the sanctuary, a feeling of exposed stone. Although Evelyn had bundled in her Mets sweatshirt, coat, and a bulky scarf and hat set Katrina had knit for her, Evelyn shivered.
She loved the act of confession, or rather, she loved how it felt to have confessed, to kneel before God and admit all the ways in which she’d fallen short. And to be freed of those failings. To be forgiven was to be loved. Although the bishop’s remark had dripped with sarcasm, she did view the act as one of a daughter supplicating before her father. A father who loved her purely and unconditionally.