by Jane Lebak
Bulletproof Vestments: A Father Jay Story
Jane Lebak
A former gang member has tracked down the man who ratted out his brother ten years ago. It's time for some good old-fashioned revenge, except the man in question is crippled. And he's a priest. And no one's going to let him go down without a fight.
Bulletproof Vestments: A Father Jay StoryCopyright
Jane Lebak
Published by MuseItUp Publishing at Smashwords
ISBN: 978-1-77127-659-7
Copyright 2014 Jane Lebak
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Bulletproof Vestments
Eric eased the church door shut, leaving him in darkness until his eyes adjusted. The long aisle guided his eyes to the altar and the crucifix hanging on the wall behind it even as the bright light of noon diffused through the stained glass. The white walls and light wood of the pews proved his expectations wrong: he'd figured on dark, ornate quarters that would leave him nondescript in his jeans, t shirt and jacket. Not to mention his gun.
In the third pew on the left, where light streamed in a side windowbefore the tabernacle,a priest knelt in prayer. Eric walked with measured pace. His heart fluttered, and he set his jaw.At the edge of the pew, he drew his gun and aimed at the priest's head.
The priest pivoted, the motion tapping his dangling rosary against the back of the next pew. “Nobody interrupts a conversation with the Blessed Mother.”
Eric cocked an eyebrow. He could just shoot now. Instead, in the face of that curious calm, he said, “Fine. I can wait.”
He took a seat across the aisle and watched the priest's fingers passing over the black beads. Both hands stayed visible; the guy wasn't trying to call for help. If he had, Eric would have shot before he got the phone out of his pocket.
After five minutes, the priest made the sign of the cross, set the rosary on the wooden bench, and edged himself back onto the seat. He squinted directly at Eric through his thick glasses. “I know you, don't I?”
Eric snorted. “You've forgotten me?”
The priest hauled himself to a stand, rail-thin and unsteady on his feet. Eric caught his breath because what if he had the wrong guy? It had to be a sin to kill a priest, after all, but God knows Jay Farrell wouldn't have become a priest, not a real priest. The last time he'd been with Jay, they'd just keyed the hell out of a guy's car for cutting them off in traffic. The Jay Farrell he remembered had been muscular, able to scale the outside of a building to break into an unlocked third-story window—or to break out when his dad half-heartedly grounded him.
This guy was crippled. He wore coke-bottle glasses and despite that seemed like he couldn't see a damn thing.
Jay, if it really was Jay, said, “Eric Murphy?”
Oh, so it was him. Bastard. Eric raised the gun. Jay said, “We're in a church. If you're going to shoot me, would you at least do it in the parking lot?”
Eric didn't lower the weapon. “I'll shoot you wherever I damn well please. You have any idea what you did?”
Jay said, “I joined the army, drove over a land mine, and realized I had one last chance not to screw up my entire life.”
Eric's hand tightened. “You sent my brother to prison.”
Jay's gaze dropped.
“And you don't even care.”
“I do care. I think all the time about what happened back then.” Jay gestured to the door. “Look, let's go outside. I love my parishioners too much to ask them to clean blood out of a carpet.”
Love. Like Jay Farrell loved anything except himself.
Eric let him limp toward the door, leaning on the pew edges as he passed. What was Jay doing, acting? Still, Eric shoved the gun back in its holster. “I want to know why you did it.”
“Because I was a self-centered prick.” At least Jay was honest about that. “I'm not sure what else you want to hear. The cops were asking me all these questions, and I didn't want to go to jail, and I'd already spent one night hiding on a roof over Thirty-Fifth Street. I was cold and hungry. I ratted him out. I told them where to find the evidence they needed, and they let me go.”
Eric shoved his hands into his pockets. “We should have killed you then.”
Jay pushed open the door, emitting a flood of sunlight. “No question you would have killed me. That's why I enlisted. Someone was going to do it, but my odds were better in Iraq.”
It took him ages to work his way down the three steps at the front of the church, one painful stair at a time. Eric squinted in the sunlight, and he touched the holster. They were outside. He could do it now. “Is Toby doing okay?” Jay said. “I looked him up online, and I found where he'd been sent.”
“It's a prison. How do you think he's doing?” Eric stalked past Jay to the sidewalk. “Are you trying to die of old age?”
“I'm not actually looking forward to being shot, you know.” Jay flashed him a smile, and Eric had to resist smiling back because that was the same smile, the same mischief in Jay's eyes. “You do realize I didn't lie to the cops. I sold him out to save myself, but I didn't frame him. It was self-centered and dishonorable, and at the time, that's exactly who I was. I'd rather not pay now for who I was back then, but I'm also not going to run again.”
Eric huffed. “For one thing, you can't.”
Jay reached the sidewalk, then waited.
Eric glared at him. Jay didn't move.
He really should shoot him without any more talking, but Jay said, “It's been ten years. Why come after me now?”
“I didn't know where you were before. Then someone was laughing about a crippled priest with your name, and I figured I'd check you out.” Eric folded his arms. “Where's your shadow? Did he also find religion?”
“Kevin?” For the first time, Jay looked shaken. “I don't see him anymore.”
Eric snorted. “Really? He was always running after you.Did you sell out your own kid brother? “
Jay shook his head. But nothing more came, and Eric was too aware of the cars on the little side street where the church and its parking lot nestled between row houses. “The other guys wanted to take you down themselves, but I said no.Toby's my brother. It's my job.”
Jay murmured,”Kevin would have done the same.”
“Is that a threat?”
Jay sounded wry. “Kevin's different now. He won't gun you down in a dark alley, especially not for me.” He gestured toward Eric's waist, at the holster hidden beneath his jacket. “And you? Still the same?”
Eric didn't answer.
Jay said, “There's more, you know. You can leave it behind.”
Eric's mouth grew hot. “Don't try to fast-talk me.”
“It's the only fast thing I can do nowadays.” Again that glimpse of the long-ago mischief-maker, and Eric steeled himself against it.
Jay turned his head, and Eric caught motion at the edge of the property. Three boys came running, each wearing a red armband.
“Your new gang?” Eric said. The boys were in their early teens, maybe younger.
The shortest of the boys, with a shock of blond hair obscuring his face, pushed right up in front of Eric. “Farrell, is this guy hassling you?”
“It's fine, Masa.” Jay said to Eric, “These are some of the Archangels, a grass-roots public service organization of young men who have taken it upon
themselves to patrol my parish.”
Masa lifted his chin. “The cops never come here. Someone's got to do it.”
Eric said, “So yeah, a gang.”
Jay sighed.
Masa laughed. “Yeah, but he won't let us have any weapons. What kind of a gang is that?”
“One where you won't die.” Jay pointed to them. “Masa, Jonas, and Spider.” He pointed to Eric. “And Eric, a member of my own former grass-roots service organization.”
Masa looked puzzled, then brightened. “Oh! You were in his gang! You got to tell us about that! He never tells us nothing, but I know there's got to be some good stories.”
Eric looked at Jay, who it suddenly occurred to him didn't look like a man in fear of his life, and he wondered whether Jay wasn't afraid to die, or whether Jay felt confident it wasn't going to happen now. And even worse, it probably wasn't.
Eric murmured, “Did you know they were out here?”
Jay said, “No, because at least one of them should be in history class right about now.”
Masa rolled his eyes. “Math, and who cares?”
Jay said, “Should I compile a list of people who care? It would start with your mother.”
Masa chuckled. “Whatever, man. I'll go back in a couple hours. Computer class is kind of cool.”
The kids genuinely seemed to like Jay. It was so odd. At that age, Eric's dad had left and Jay's mom was dead. Who had Eric looked up to like that? Well, Toby, and maybe some of the older guys, the ones who'd graduated to dealing and auto theft when he was still nicking wallets. Not his dad, and certainly not a priest. Why would a priest have taken any interest in them back then?
Jay pointed up the block. “Well, since you're here, go take a look around the parking lot. Someone was hanging out up there earlier, and I want to make sure Mrs. D's car is safe.”
The Archangel boys took off to the other side of the church, shouting and laughing. Anyone trying to break into a car would hear them and already have doubled the speed limit, but hey, it got the kids out of here. Which meant that yeah, Jay really didn't think he was about to die.
Eric said, “Aren't you a total hypocrite to stand here telling people how they're sinning?”
Jay opened his hands. “Given my past, who better?”
“Is that why they stuck you in this neighborhood?” Eric clenched his fists. “I've hated you for the past ten years. Every day, every day, I hoped you'd get shot like the dog you are.”
Jay gestured to himself. “God gave you exactly what you wanted. I drove over a land mine, and this is what's left of me. Shot like a dog, left with shrapnel in my body, legs that don't really work, eyes that work even less, and a conscience that woke up and tortured me with exactly what a monster I'd been back at home. So if your prayers did this, then thank you. It's better than what I deserved, and I thank God for it every day. But I can't accept that kind of gift from you and then leave you stuck in the gutter, so I'm asking you again, please, leave this life behind too. There's another way.”
Eric drew the gun from the holster.
Jay went pale. “I forgive you. Someday, eventually, please forgive me.”
Eric slipped his finger into the trigger. Years ago, a guy had held a gun to Jay's head and Jay had snarled, “If you pull that trigger, make sure you kill me, because if you don't kill me, I'll spend every day of the rest of my life making you regret it.”
No threats came from Jay now, only silence and a very stark fear. Pigeons were clustering on the sidewalk, and Eric could hear the boys on the other side of the church. Archangels. A gang defending a priest they admired. Defending an old lady's car.
Eric put back the gun. “They all know where you are. I'm only the first one. You're a walking dead man.”
“I've been a walking dead man for five years.” Jay sounded shaken.
Eric turned his back and walked to the street.
Jay said, “There's another way.”
“Not for me,” Eric called back without turning his head, the unfired gun heavy on his hip. “And not for Toby.”
* * * *
Toby.
“The thing is,” Jay told Father Ron as they drove, “Toby really did do the things I turned him in for.”
Father Ron, who had probably tired of hearing this after the sixth time, only nodded. They'd just pulled off the highway and were following the signs to the state prison. Jay shook his head. “It's not as if I lied in order to get myself off the hook. The cops wanted to know who'd done the carjacking. They said they could prove it was me. I didn't know what to do, but I knew I didn't want to go to prison.”
Father Ron sighed. “Police are good at that sort of thing. There's a tremendous amount of psychology that goes into getting a confession out of someone.”
Jay looked down. The world outside the car windows was only a blur, so he might as well stare at the carpet. “You mean they wouldn't have charged me anyhow.”
Ron said, “You could ask your brother.”
“I can't ask my brother.” Jay huffed. “I haven't spoken to him in about a year now, and when I do call, the first thing he's going to do is ask if I've come to my senses. I doubt we'd ever get to the question of police procedures.”
Ron slowed as they turned onto a smaller street. “But you never spoke to him about any of this?”
Jay shook his head.
Father Ron said, “I think you should call the police about Eric rather than trying to handle this on your own.”
“I don't want violence in my church, and I don't want the police hanging around. Ask for a police presence in this neighborhood and the cops will just look for something to do. Masa and the other Archangels kids already don't trust the cops.” Jay traced a crease on his pant leg. “Plus, the police can't stay here all the time. Eric's waited ten years. He'll just wait a little longer.”
Father Ron said, “You might get lucky.”
“I'm already far luckier than I deserve.” Jay closed his eyes. “I'd hazard a guess I'm more prepared to die than my theoretical killer. From an eternal perspective, better me than them.”
Thanks to being legally blind, Jay couldn't see the prison very well. Lots of grey and black, lots of echoes, a nice foyer with carpet that made scratchy sounds under his feet, a flat smell as if even the odors got screened before they could enter. He passed through a metal detector and the guards didn't consider his rosary a weapon of cosmic proportions.
The priests waited in an alcove while a prison guard fetched Toby. Father Ron said, “Kevin would want to know there's a threat against your life, even if he also wants to know if you've come to your senses.”
Jay folded his arms. “It takes a special kind of fanatic to gun down a priest. That gang—we had some priorities back then. It was ten years ago, but half of them had really Catholic mothers who would have hit them over the head with a five-day votive candle before letting them badmouth a priest. Shooting one of us—it's not really going to be on their radar.”
Father Ron tapped him on the shoulder “Did you forget? Eric came to do just that.”
Jay said, “In the end, he didn't.”
As the guard returned, Father Ron said, “They're vestments, not bulletproof vests.”
Jay found himself at a desk behind shot-resistant glass (which direction did they think the shots would come from?) with a microphone and a small groove in the table surface where they could pass things through. Shortly, Toby took a seat on the other side. Jay focused hard on his face, trying to make his pinpoint vision recognize the familiar features with ten extra years of damage permeating the surface.
Toby said, “You staring at me?”
“No, I just can't see very well. Eric came and talked to me, and I knew I needed to talk to you.”
Toby said, “Pleading for your life?”
Jay opened his hands. “I came to apologize for whatever wrong I've done to you.”
Toby snorted, and it came like a burst of static through the speaker. He probably rolled hi
s eyes too, but that Jay couldn't see. “Eric told me you'd gotten religion and were hiding behind a dog collar, and it's not going to save you. You can hold up your Bible and tell everyone how holy you are, but we know the truth.”
Jay said, “I'm sorry. I'm sorry I did this to you. I'm sorry this was the outcome.”
Toby said, “I get out in a year. But you don't have to wait that long. Eric already scoped you out. We know where you are. If you really believe in God, you'd better make nice with Him soon.”
* * * *
“It didn't go all that well,” was all Jay said to Father Ron as they left the prison in time for him to hear Confessions and say the Saturday 5pm Mass. His normal life nowadays.
The car hummed, and Jay let his thoughts swirl into the noise of the road. Toby's friends and family would be practical. When death came, it would come after he closed up the church one night and walked back to the rectory. Jay would have done it the same way, although even back then he never considered murdering anyone. Follow the person to his house and get him when he stopped to unlock the door. Take his wallet or take his life—the tactic would work either way. Quick and anonymous, and if the killer was smart enough to leave Jay's wallet, it would look like a rubout and the police wouldn't investigate too much.
Well, they might. Kevin wouldn't let them close the books too quickly. But dear God, please, keep the Archangels kids out of it. Don't let them interfere and get hurt. Don't let them try for revenge. Just…don't. It would be so awful for this bunch of fatherless kids to try avenging him as if he really were their father.
Jay tried to quiet his mind, but he kept thinking of Eric, of Toby. Toby deserved that prison sentence. Maybe he hadn't deserved it at Jay's hands, was all.
At Saint Gus, Jay unlocked the church, and Father Ron followed him in. “You're staying?” he said, and Father Ron said he would for a little while. Jay opened some of the windows, flipped on the light in the confessional and then turned to find Father Ron at his back. “Come on,” Father Ron said. “You've clearly got a lot on your mind.”