All Roads

by Peter Murphy

“Oh, can it. I work for a living, you know?”

  “Well maybe you should consider investing in some time with your father. Or are you concerned about your ROI or something?”

  Christ did he want to tell her, but he couldn’t. Behind all that drama, self-serving and manipulative as it was, was his little sister. He often forgot that until later—after he had said something stupid; but she really knew how to piss him off.

  She’d been doing it since they were kids, before running off to tattle to their father. But she was on her own now and he wanted to take her in his arms. He hadn’t felt like that in a few years. They had grown so far apart. It all started when their father moved out. Martin had tried to make her realize that it was for the better but she wouldn’t listen. She probably still believed that someday they would all get back together and be one big happy family.

  “How is he?”

  “No change, but they say that is good.” She looked at him, expecting him to say something derogatory, as he usually did.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Fine. Why?”

  “No reason,” he lied. “I just know that these things are harder for you.”

  “Martin . . .” She hesitated as if she was deciding if she could trust him.

  “What is it now?” He’d meant it to sound funny but it didn’t and she seemed to change her mind.

  “Never mind.”

  “I’m sorry. What were you going to ask?”

  “Nothing, I have to go. I have to pick up the kids. You’ll stay until Mother gets back? She said she would be here after six.”

  At Grainne’s insistence they all had to take turns being there—in case Danny woke up.

  Martin just nodded but he did stand up and take her in his arms. She melted against him for a moment but quickly stiffened and grew cold again, and very brittle.

  After she’d gone, and after he’d checked his phone, he sat by his father and watched him breathe, his chest rising and falling gently. His father was still bluish and was covered in pieces of tape, holding drips and sensors in place. Martin reached forward slowly as if to touch his arm, but he didn’t. He wasn’t ready; but as he sat and watched his father, he felt himself softening.

  Much of it was Rachael’s influence. She’d made him see that none of it had been personal. And the times they got together with his father she made a point of treating him with respect and civility, and chiding Martin for not doing the same. He’d gone along with it for her sake but now, as his father clung onto his miserable life, Martin felt a surge of compassion. He’d never accept the drunken oaf his father had been, but if he ever got his act together . . .

  *

  “Has there been any change?” Deirdre took off her coat and settled in the chair on the other side of her ex-husband, never taking her eyes from her son’s face which, in the low light, looked exactly like his father’s when he was that age.

  “Nothing has changed. We’re still in a holding pattern until his Lordship deigns to leave.”

  “The King is dead, long live the King?’

  “What does that even mean?”

  “I don’t know. It was something your father used to say when he heard that someone died.”

  “Figures.”

  “Martin, do you think we should still go ahead with Christmas?”

  “Well, Rachael is a secular, anti-Zionist Jew and has just spent every waking moment of the last few weeks plotting and organizing. What do you think?”

  “I was thinking more about your father.”

  “He’s in a coma. It’s Rachael I’d be more concerned with.”

  “I hope you weren’t talking to him like that.” She didn’t mean to but she put her hand on her ex-husband’s arm as she spoke. It was like something Grainne would do. Martin seemed to think so, too, and shrugged as he rose and reached for his coat.

  “How late are you staying?”

  “Why?”

  “Because.” He fussed with the buttons on his coat, just like he did as a kid. “I was wondering if you’d like to go for something to eat after.”

  “Are you not going home?”

  “Rachael is going to her mother’s. It’s the first night of Hanukkah.”

  “I didn’t think they . . .”

  “Normally they don’t. And they haven’t told her father yet.”

  “Is that wise?”

  “She’s taking MJ. Joel gets so busy spoiling him that he mightn’t notice.”

  “You’re such a considerate husband.”

  “Mother, don’t be so mocking.”

  “That wasn’t mockery; that was jealousy.”

  “Mother!”

  “Okay, okay. Give me a hug and go back to your office and call me when you’re leaving.”

  She watched him walk to the elevators before she turned back to Danny. “You must be so proud of him, Danny. He turned out to be the you you couldn’t be.

  “I’m sorry. That was a little bitter.”

  Her ex-husband didn’t move but he looked a little less blue. Now he just looked fish belly white—like a normal corpse. She didn’t chide herself for thinking that. Danny liked his humor dark. It was how he’d gotten through all the terrible things in life. That, and getting drunk.

  *

  Being almost dead wasn’t the worst thing that had happened to him.

  In fact, in many ways it was far better than the way Danny had been feeling lately. His body was calm, with no heaving and churning, and his mind was clearer than it had been in years. He couldn’t lift a finger but he didn’t really want to. It was like he was outside of himself, looking in. And from there he could see himself for what he’d really become—his own worst enemy, poking and provoking himself with his own indignation and outrage. Prodding himself until he gave in and picked up the next drink, even though his body and soul were screaming at him.

  He had no other option. It was the only way he knew to drown out all the condemnations and accusations that surged up from deep inside. He’d been a total and utter failure as a human being, and part of him had been hoping that the drink would kill him and be done with it. But it hadn’t. It almost did, but he was still there.

  Another part of him wasn’t surprised and laughed sardonically—he wasn’t going to get off that easily—while another part of him was relieved. He was like someone who’d survived a tornado and, even though everything was smashed to pieces around him, he was still alive. There was still some hope.

  He sensed Deirdre as she leaned over him. She seemed to glow like candle flame and talked in delicate whispers, but he couldn’t make out the words. It sounded like Latin, or Gaelic, or some language he’d forgotten. He tried to remember her eyes when she looked at him like that, deep and dark and peering all the way inside of him, looking for some reason to believe in him again. They hadn’t always been like that. There was a time when she looked to him for hope. But when it was obvious that he could never deliver any, she began to look at him with growing derision.

  It was so Catholic of him, lying on his deathbed recanting. He’d always despised that but now, at the end, he was no different. He was almost resigned to it all. At the very least, when all was said and done, he’d finally be at peace. Poor Daniel Bartholomew Boyle, who’d never known a contented day, and still full of regrets and remorse, was to finally be released from this hell on earth.

  “It doesn’t have to end like this.” His uncle’s voice was clear as a bell and tinged with the same concern Danny remembered from all those years ago—when his uncle Martin used to take him for burgers and chips.

  Look at me, Martin. I’ve become everything they said I’d be.

  “This doesn’t have to be the end.”

  I can’t do it anymore. I just want to lie here and die.

  “But, do you really want to die like this?”

 
I don’t, but what can I do about it now?

  “People haven’t given up on you yet, so you shouldn’t either.”

  What people?

  “Deirdre and the kids have been taking turns sitting over you; and there are others.”

  Tell them to stop wasting their time. I’m not worth it. Even when I promise to get my act together, I can’t.

  “It’s not the end yet, Danny. There is still hope.”

  *

  I hear that young Boyle might finally be ready? Bruno’s statue called out as Patrick tried to cross the Campo De’ Fiori unnoticed. He hadn’t meant to come that way but he had his head down and was deep in thought. But he wasn’t that surprised.

  Miriam had told him that Danny Boyle had been in a coma for more than a week. Jacinta had phoned, too, to ask if Patrick would remember him in his prayers and, if wasn’t too much bother, maybe say a Mass for him. She said she was at her wit’s end with worry and even though she didn’t really believe in all that anymore, it couldn’t do much harm—especially if the holy Jesuit would say a few too.

  “Ah, Uncle. Are you well?”

  Well enough for one of the faithful departed, but enough about me. Boyle’s uncle came to see me and he says it’s time. Don’t you think we should get him over here so we can try to straighten him out once and for all?

  “But he’s in a coma, Uncle.”

  He could hear the reluctance in his own voice. He’d been praying a lot for some guidance, and for some reassurance, because his world had become a very cold and sterile place where old people gathered to linger until their ends. Only he had been hoping for something a bit more theoretical.

  Saving Danny Boyle would be more than a challenge—and one he had handled so poorly before. But if not him then who? John had clearly crossed the line—just like Dan Brennan. And Miriam went along with it all—she probably just didn’t want to upset him. And the bishop was dead and just a voice in his head.

  Patrick. The bishop sounded as he did back in his palace in Dublin—when he used to call Patrick in for a little chat. I’m talking to you from the other side. Do you think a coma is going to stop us? We must strike now, while the iron is hot.

  “But what can I do?” He stopped himself from adding, “Your Grace.” It just didn’t seem relevant anymore. “It seems that poor Danny is bound and determined to drink himself into an early grave.”

  And that’s precisely what we’re not going to let happen. I’d never be able to look Bart and Nora in the face again.

  “But what can I do, Uncle?”

  You can be ready for him when he comes over. He’ll be here by the summer and you’ll get your chance. I know you think Boyle was your own personal failure but he wasn’t—you were just trying to do your part as you had been told how. It’s the likes of me that owe people like Danny Boyle, you know?

  Me and the rest of crozier crowd. We were so busy blocking the devil from getting through the door that we never noticed him climb in the window. He was there among us all the time, Patrick, whispering in our ears about all the good we were doing and stroking our pride until we got so full of ourselves that we became everything we were supposed to be against. And I was as bad as the rest of them.

  “Ah now, Uncle,” Patrick argued reflexively—something he wouldn’t have done back in the palace. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You were only doing what you thought was right.”

  The bishop snorted the way he had done so often before. But that’s the point, Patrick. We weren’t. We were telling the people about the love and forgiveness of the Sacred Heart while threatening them with the eternal fires of hell. It’s no wonder so many ended up like young Boyle.

  You were right back then, you know? It was the young priests like you that should’ve been running the whole thing all along. Young fellows who could still remember what it was all about

  His uncle seemed to smile down on him before raising his eyes and staring at the Vatican—as Bruno had done when they burnt him to death. You know, when all the cardinals and the likes were inside, the good people of Rome should’ve locked the door and not let them out. They should’ve let them sit there and rot and, when their stench was gone, the place could’ve been turned into a museum.

  Patrick couldn’t help but smile, too. It was like something Giovanni might have said. “C’mon now, Uncle. They weren’t all that bad.”

  Patrick, the day Gelasius turned his back on the monastery and took the keys of this city, all that we stood for was lost. And, like most of us, he started out with the best of intentions; but you can’t build a stairway to heaven with the bricks and mortar of this world.

  We soon forgot about all that the good Christ had left us and it was no time at all before we were building the Holy Roman Empire. And we were better at it than all the old pagans. We had half the world bowing and scraping whenever we walked by. They were lined up from Iceland to the tip of South America, on their knees, kissing our rings and giving us anything they had of value. We became the greatest racket this world has ever seen.

  “Is that you talking, Uncle, or have you been spending too much time in Bruno’s head?” Patrick could hear the anguish in his uncle’s voice and wanted to lighten things up a bit. It was the same thing he often tried to do with John—only he wasn’t very receptive anymore.

  You always had a touch of sass about you. I’m glad that wasn’t beaten out of you.

  So was Patrick. He had done what he had never been able to do before. He had moved them on from talking about Danny without having committed, one way or the other. He knew it was the right thing to do, only he wasn’t ready to face that yet and would need a bit of time. Not that he wasn’t up for doing his priestly duties—he just wasn’t very good at them. “I suppose,” he added to distract himself, “that you’ll get to move on after this.”

  I suppose I will, unless, of course, you might need something else from me.

  “Are you not looking forward to it, Uncle? You’re always complaining that you feel like you’re stuck in limbo.”

  You should know by now not to put much stock in anything I say.

  “Go on with yourself. Won’t it be nice to go to whatever is in store for you? Will Benedetta be going with you?”

  Who knows, Patrick? She has about a dozen relatives praying to her every day as if she was a saint. There’s always someone who needs a little miracle every now and then. She’s busier than the pope.

  Patrick smiled at that and thought about it for a while. They’d been selling saints to the people for so long that they were now making their own. Then again, they always had and that was why the Church went along with it.

  “Is any of what we’ve been telling them true, Uncle?”

  He had always wanted to ask but it had never felt right before.

  I can’t be telling you things like that, Patrick. You have to find out for yourself; otherwise there’d be no point in faith. Besides, it’s different for everybody. Some people just get to drift off and become something new. Some of us wait around to attend to anything we left undone and others . . . well, they get what’s coming to them.

  “Like in heaven and hell?”

  I can’t tell you, Patrick, except to say both of them are inside us all the time. We just have to decide which one we want to live in.

  Patrick let it go at that. He could understand his uncle’s reticence. He felt just as guilty about the part he’d played in it all; telling everybody they were supposed to believe that things would be better and that all the trials the world threw at them were part of a plan.

  And even when trials turned to torments, and the love of God had become stern and strict, all they could tell them was to try to emulate the example of Jesus.

  Still, that was what he’d devoted his life to, hoping that the little bit of good would offset the bad. It was clear what he had to do about Danny Boyle.
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br />   “Thank you, Uncle.” He nodded as he turned toward the river. “You always had the knack of bringing me the comfort of a bit of sense when I needed it most.”

  *

  “Will he be all right?” Benedetta asked as she stood with the bishop, casting only the faintest ripple of a shadow on the darkening piazza below.

  “He’ll be fine,” the bishop assured her but she could tell he wasn’t convinced. She knew Patrick and she knew he was far too kind and decent for the world he lived in.

  “Well, you know better than to worry.”

  “I do, but it’s a hard habit to break.”

  She slipped her hand into his, and when he turned to look at her she smiled with all the love in her heart. They didn’t have much time left but she would enjoy it. “Let’s go over to the Pantheon. Giovanni will be there by now.”

  “Has he not moved on yet?”

  “Why would he go anywhere else? This”—she waved her arm across the Roman skyline—“has always been heaven to him.”

  *

  On Christmas Eve Deirdre sipped her wine by the twinkling lights of her little white tree. She wasn’t looking forward to what the next day would bring.

  Rachael and Doug had arranged everything without Grainne knowing. As far as she was concerned Christmas was going to be postponed until there was some development with her father—one way or another. Doug would find some way of coaxing her over to Martin’s, telling her they were just going to have a quick gift exchange for the kids’ sake.

  Deirdre wasn’t against the idea; she just knew how Grainne would react. Lately she had a bee in her bonnet over Rachael—probably over some imaginary slight—and had become very critical, passing comments and knowing glances. Deirdre could see it for what it really was—insecurity; but she knew enough to keep her opinions to herself.

  Martin was on a short fuse too. He’d been going to bat for Doug’s job and it wasn’t going well. Doug wasn’t really cut out for that type of work and Martin’s loyalty was sure to cost him some credibility. Deirdre had seen it so many times before, but he hadn’t yet asked for her advice so she kept it to herself.