‘I feel mad close to ya right now, Matthew,’ he whispered and sighed softly. ‘Wish I could sleep here with ya. All night, like.’
Matthew couldn’t help a sigh too. It was a sweet thought, to be sure. ‘At least the rain’s stopped now. And your uniform should be dry.’ He smiled. ‘Er,’ he corrected himself. ‘Should be drier.’
‘Yeah.’ Jonah sat back and drained his glass. He stood up from the bed and set the empty down on the bedside. ‘Best be getting home. Big weekend to look forward to, at least.’
‘Palm Sunday,’ Matthew agreed. ‘A lot to do.’
Jonah’s expression turned slightly sheepish. ‘I meant the other religion actually. The footy starts back this weekend.’
***
They had no trysts during Holy Week. Not for any reasons especially pious, but more due to how their respective social obligations fell in the lead up to Easter. Their paths crossed at the footy ground and in the street, and Jonah even put in an appearance at the tea service held on Good Friday. They shared a drink together at the Easter Sunday party, the public face of their friendship back to the level it had been during Matthew’s first months in Dinbratten. Despite having soundly failed to uphold his sobriety and observance during Lent, Matthew nonetheless felt the full force of that Easter Sunday’s celebration. He was filled up with the blessedness and joy of love and resurrection. He felt renewed.
When he and Jonah fell together once more into his bed come Monday night, Matthew was bolder than ever before. He met Jonah’s strength with his own, wrestled and manhandled and took charge, drawing forth moans and sighs and a grunting that spurred him on. He put teeth marks upon his shoulder and scratches upon his thigh. And Jonah gave back in kind. A week between kisses had maddened them both.
Eventually, in pursuit of intimacy beyond any they had previously shared, Matthew spread his friend wide and kissed and mouthed and licked into the very core of him. Jonah pushed his face into the bedding and swore, his pelvis canted, knees pressing deep into the mattress, every muscle tense as he clutched the pillows to him. There was no sight more beautiful than that.
It was that beauty, perhaps, that broke Matthew apart so cruelly.
‘Could you leave?’ Matthew heard his own voice coming out tiny and stretched, sounding more like a man at the end of his tether than one who had just climbed the heights of ecstasy with a trusted friend.
‘Jonah? I need you to leave.’ He felt panic welling inside him, crawling his gullet, kicking at his ribcage and throat with hobnailed boots as it travelled. ‘Please leave,’ he all but sobbed out.
He was unable to look Jonah in the face, knowing the expression of concern and care he was certain to find there. He could already hear it in the tenor of Jonah’s voice, though Matthew’s brain refused to register what the actual words or phrases being spoken to him were.
‘I can’t,’ he began saying, realising suddenly he’d been saying it for some time already. He felt so ill all of a sudden that he feared his stomach was preparing to empty all over his bed and his companion. All he knew was he had to make Jonah leave before such a thing might happen. The embarrassment and mortification of even that, though, would not be as bad as this unearthly panic that was visiting itself upon him with such violence.
He was aware of Jonah moving, his weight and his warmth stealing away, making the mattress bounce and Matthew’s skin goosebump with the sudden chill. Matthew pitched onto his side, facing away from where Jonah now stood and felt tears pricking at the backs of his hot eyes. He tried to take a deep breath and only half succeeded. He tried another and at least managed a modicum intake of air.
Outside the bed, there were sounds of Jonah gathering his clothes and pushing his various beautiful body parts into them, all the while making sounds that Matthew knew were words of assurance and comfort. Still, though, Matthew couldn’t let himself decipher actual phrases. Somehow, he knew he daren’t, that if he were to allow Jonah’s care to penetrate his bubble of panic right that moment, it would only undo him further. He’d witnessed a similar phenomenon with young children when they were so beyond upset over one thing or another that they worked themselves up into being absolutely overwrought. Any attempt to soothe or console would only cause their sobs to be wrenched out of them all the harder, their attempts to swallow them down all the more pathetic and ineffective.
A hand landed on the shoulder Matthew wasn’t lying on, concerned words spilling out over him. All Matthew could do in response was push his heated face into the pillows and beg his friend again to leave him. The hand on his shoulder squeezed once, twice, then pulled away. Relieved, Matthew listened to the heavy footfalls of Jonah crossing to the door. It seemed he paused there a moment, and Matthew imagined Jonah looking at him sadly, wondering what he’d done to deserve such treatment. Then footsteps again, and Matthew held his breath in the back of his throat until he heard the back door open and close once more.
Jonah had obeyed his request. And Matthew felt wretched for it. No sooner was he alone than a flood of shameful weeping punched up out of him, as though solitude was all it had been waiting for.
What was happening to him? Had something broken? It felt like he’d broken something. Something deep and fundamental and unnameable. Something that he couldn’t pinpoint or articulate, but which terrified him profoundly. It was a darkness inside him, maybe. Or perhaps, instead of a something, it was an absence of something? A gaping hole right through the heart of him. A hole so big, he’d had to push Jonah away rather than risk his friend might pass right through it. Through him.
An absence that big, a piece of him that large going missing … why, there was only one thing that could be, surely?
Matthew gulped around sobs and curled his naked, shivering body into a tighter and tighter knot. Curled in his bed that smelled of Jonah, drenching his pillow with snot and salt, he realised that maybe this was mourning. Mourning for what used to fill that gaping hole within him.
Mourning the place where God should be and always had been.
Chapter 5
The room was set in the expectant gloom of nearing dawn when Matthew awoke. He didn’t recall falling asleep and couldn’t tell how long he’d slept for. His only clues being that the bedside candle had burnt itself out, and the curtain across the window was faintly outlined by approaching sunrise, bird calls singing from beyond. He remembered the wretchedness that had visited, of course. With a gut-twist of shame, he remembered the tears and the unnameable sadness, the sense of mourning. He remembered begging Jonah to leave, recalled a hand on his shoulder and heavy boot sounds crossing his floor.
What new misery was this?
Matthew sat and rubbed his sore eyes carefully. They were gritty, no doubt from long-dried salt, and the tiny grains pricked at the delicate skin as he rubbed.
He pushed back the covers and swung his legs over the side of the bed. Feeling like his whole body ached, he dragged himself over to the washstand. With perfunctory motions, he soaked a wash cloth and cleaned his front from his belly to his thighs, then splashed some water on his face. Drying off, he crossed to the dresser to fetch a clean nightshirt. Since the first night Jonah had visited him, Matthew had taken to sleeping naked, luxuriating in the feel of the bed linens against bare flesh. He desired to be covered now though, and pulled the garment onto his body gladly. Feeling more respectable, he retreated back to his bed.
He’d begun mentally reciting a morning prayer whilst washing, the words tumbling through his semi-consciousness almost without volition. He took a more concerted approach now, dropping to his knees at the side of the bed, clasping his hands together on the rumpled bedclothes, and launching into prayers of confession and contrition, then prayers for guidance and entreaties to forgiveness. He prayed until the sun was fully up, until his knees protested, and then some, only letting up when a cramp in his left calf forced him to stand and stretch it out.
He heard the distant rumble of a cart on the road. The town was waking and setting abo
ut its day. The thought of putting on his professional face and taking on his duties of meetings and home visits made him feel vaguely nauseous, and he had to swallow away another rise of panic. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t let the world see him in this state, couldn’t let the good people of the town witness his fall. He couldn’t even bear the thought of the less-than-good people of the town seeing him.
Calling himself a coward, Matthew crawled back into the cocoon of his bed covers, pulling the blankets high around his face. He could hide away at least for a little while. At least until he could stomach the fear of seeing anyone again.
He began another prayer, twisting his hands into the blankets about his chin, and soon tumbled into another weary slumber.
An insistent knocking on the front door roused him sometime later. His bedside clock, through bleary eyes, showed it was just after nine am.
‘Father?’ a woman’s voice called out from the front of the cottage.
Mrs Sutherland. Of course she would stop by. Matthew pushed the now-stifling covers aside and clambered out of bed, unhooking his robe from the back of the bedroom door as he shuffled towards the resumed sound of knocking.
His housekeeper looked understandably worried when Matthew opened the door. One hand still raised in mid-knock, she swept her grey eyes over him once and made a clucking sound with her tongue. ‘Are you not well, Vicar? Aye, I can see you’re not.’ Not waiting for an invitation, she barrelled into the house, shooing Matthew away from the door and closing it behind them.
‘Get yourself back to bed,’ she ordered. ‘Is your fire stoked? I’ll see to it and make you a cup of tea.’
Matthew didn’t have the opportunity to answer her about the fire, being bustled towards his bedroom. Clearly, Mrs Sutherland had flown into complete mother hen upon seeing him. He glanced at himself in the mirror above the washstand as he passed it. Yes, he could see why his appearance would concern her.
Matthew made his way back to the wreck of his bed. He ditched his dressing robe, then pulled the covers up and crawled back in. In the main room, Mrs Sutherland could be heard banging about at the range, obviously opening the grate and stoking the embers. Matthew heard her grumbling to herself about how much fire there remained—and her with a kettle to boil! He burrowed deeper into his pillow and his covers and allowed the comforting sounds of someone taking care of him (no matter how violently) to lull him into another light slumber of untellable length.
‘Nice hot cuppa, Father.’
Matthew was roused from his doze by Mrs Sutherland standing over the bed, offering him tea. It came back to him immediately why he was in such a situation, why Mrs Sutherland was nursemaiding him, and it shamed him to think of the kindly woman’s morning being so disturbed.
‘I’m quite sure this is beyond the call of duty, Missus Sutherland,’ he told her drowsily, pulling himself up into a sitting position.
‘Tosh,’ came her no-nonsense reply. ‘Here. Take this. I’m opening that window. Get you some fresh air in this room.’
Fumbling to take the teacup, Matthew suddenly panicked to think what this room must smell like, after the activities of the night before. If Mrs Sutherland had noticed the telltale aromas of sweat and sex and men, she was nice enough—or at least discreet enough—to not make mention of it. Maybe she would simply think him a committed onanist. She’d brought up some unspecified number of sons, after all, she was no doubt accustomed to the particular sensory delights of men’s bedclothes. Matthew blushed into his tea.
Having flung the room’s one window open as far as it would go—though leaving the curtains firmly in place, to indicate the poorliness of the home’s occupant—Mrs Sutherland bustled back to the bed and slapped one rough and surprisingly cool hand onto Matthew’s forehead.
‘You don’t feel feverish,’ she pronounced. ‘Are your feet cold?’
Matthew instinctively rubbed his feet together beneath the covers. ‘No, they’re fine.’
Mrs Sutherland nodded and took her hand from his head. ‘How are your bowels, Father? Are you keeping regular?’
Matthew managed a chuckle around a sip of tea. ‘They’re quite fine, too, Missus Sutherland. But thank you so much for asking.’
Turning her attention to the pillows, Mrs Sutherland plumped and batted at them as if they were in dire need of punishment. ‘Feel like chucking?’ she asked next.
Matthew cupped both hands more firmly around his teacup and nodded his head. ‘Earlier,’ he confirmed. ‘I didn’t though. Just felt like I would.’
‘Shit, this isn’t a hangover, is it, Father?’
‘Oh no,’ Matthew rushed to assure her. ‘I haven’t had a drink since the party on Sunday night. I swear.’
Pale eyes regarded him sternly for a moment before softening and showing their usual fondness. ‘Sorry,’ she muttered. ‘It’s just the sergeant’s been leading you astray, hasn’t he?’
Matthew commanded himself to not outwardly react to her words. ‘However do you mean, Missus Sutherland?’
‘Well. He’s made damn sure you’re well acquainted with the pubs in this town, hasn’t he?’ She straightened her posture and crossed her arms. ‘I mean, it’s good that you’ve made such a firm friend so soon in a new place, Father. Don’t get me wrong. And the sergeant’s a good man. Best man you could knock about with in this town if you ask me. But he’s not exactly pious, you know.’
Oh, Matthew knew. Knew better than any other person in the district, he suspected. He lowered his gaze to stare intently into what remained of his tea.
‘And now I’ve gone and offended you by speaking a home truth about your new mate.’
Matthew glanced up and saw that Mrs Sutherland was wearing a soft smile. He tried his best to return it. ‘I’m well aware that my friendship with Sergeant Parks may not seem entirely appropriate, Missus Sutherland.’
‘I don’t mean—’
‘But I’m not hungover,’ he interrupted. ‘I assure you.’ He placed his cup on the bedside table. ‘I’ll endeavour to cut back on some of the more public drinking expeditions if it would make you feel better.’
‘Oh, Father, you don’t need to be changing yeself. I’m sorry to even bring it up now.’
‘Not at all, Missus Sutherland. I’m grateful for your concern.’
Uncrossing her arms and smoothing down her patterned apron, Mrs Sutherland looked at him directly. ‘I’ll pop back around half-one with some soup and bread.’ She held up a hand for silence when Matthew opened his mouth to tell her he didn’t require such nursing. He snapped his mouth shut again and let her continue. ‘I don’t want you to get out of this bed unless it’s to visit the dunny. You hear me? I don’t care if you actually sleep or not, but at least get some bloody rest. You’ve obviously been burning too much of the midnight oil. You need a full day of feet-up. Stay in bed.’
Her last words were delivered with all the finality of a proclamation. No dissent would be tolerated.
‘I will,’ Matthew replied, feeling a little smaller in the face of the woman’s considerable forbearance.
‘Good. See to it.’ Mrs Sutherland walked towards the door before favouring him with a little wave. ‘I’ll let myself in at dinnertime, then. Seeing as I’ll be carting soup ‘n’ all. Be sure you’re decent.’
Matthew managed a tiny laugh. Maybe she did have him pegged as a committed onanist. ‘I’ll be nothing but, Missus Sutherland. You have my word.’
She chuckled with him and then left him alone.
As soon as she was gone though, any amusement Matthew had found in her presence evaporated, and the preceding crushing sadness returned to him with a vengeance. It crawled its way across his prone form and settled hard over his ribcage, over his heart. Matthew turned onto his stomach and buried his face into the freshly plumped and punished pillows.
Oh dear God. His bed positively reeked of Jonah. Sleep, you pathetic so-and-so, he told himself coldly. Just let this day pass.
He pressed his face harder into the
pillow, harder into Jonah’s delicious scent, and lulled himself to a fitful sleep by reciting the Lord’s Prayer on repeat like so many counted sheep.
***
Lord, why have You sent me Jonah Parks? Why make our paths cross? There must be some reason, some lesson for me to learn here, to learn from this … association.
I chose abstinence, Lord, because I thought it best. And it hasn’t been a hardship. Not overly. I could always bend my head to my work and my duty, to my calling, and doing so wasn’t a chore. I like serving You, Father, and serving the communities to which You send me.
But then You sent me here.
If I did have to cross paths with Jonah Parks, couldn’t You at least have made him … well, not look the way he does? I’m not blaming Your creation, of course. Heaven knows You did a sublime job when making him. It’s just … I might still have been able to bend my head to my work and my duty, if only he wasn’t quite so … how he is.
That makes me weak, doesn’t it, Lord? Weak to my temptations. Weak to a man like Jonah. Perhaps that’s even why You did this—to test me. Brought me to this place and put a man like Jonah in front of me, a man who is … amenable to me … just to see what I’d do, how well I might resist such temptation.
Well. You and I both know the answer to that now, don’t we? I failed, Father. If this was indeed a test, not only have I failed it, but I failed it spectacularly.
You must have seen us last night. Saw the things I did. And I feel no guilt for the act.
I feel … physical, fundamental. Yet I’d expected to feel somehow soiled. Heaven help me, but I do not. I don’t feel dirtied, nor used, nor debauched. On the contrary, I feel somehow lifted up, some elation or ecstasy, a sense of rightness or power. Am I to trust these feelings? Should I embrace them? Surely it would be churlish to throw such feeling back?
I smile when I think of him, Lord. My blood thrums when I remember the things we’ve done. But I don’t know how to proceed, Father.
By the Currawong's Call Page 12