by Pearl Solas
“The truck finally got warm and we started driving. When we got to Bishop Santana Park, he pulled over and parked in a dark spot under a tree. I asked why we were stopping, but he didn’t answer. He just kind of jumped at me and tried to kiss me. I pushed at him, and he stopped trying to kiss me, but he put his hand on my crotch and then opened his pants and rubbed one out. Afterward, when he was zipping up, I got out of the truck and ran across the park to get home. I heard him calling after me, but I didn’t stop. I was so freaked out. When my mom got home, she said she was sorry she’d been stranded. I couldn’t stop crying, and finally she made me tell her what had happened.”
As Jeremy spoke, Tavis followed along in his notes from his earlier interview and underlined several phrases that were identical to what Jeremy had told him before, and to what Dolores had said during her first call.
“Thank you, Jeremy, for going through that with me again. I know it’s hard. I just have a few other questions. Do you know whether Father Frank’s pickup was a standard or an automatic?”
Jeremy’s eyes flew to his mother. She said, to Tavis, “Jeremy’s only fourteen, Mr. Pereira, and we haven’t started working on driving. Jeremy, while he was driving, did Father Frank have to keep moving a stick between the two of you, or did he just move a lever one time before he started driving?”
Jeremy gave it some thought, and then he answered, “He moved a stick the whole time he was driving.”
Tavis smiled to encourage him.
“When the police start investigating, one of the things they’ll want to do is to look at video footage. They’ll probably ask people in the neighborhood if they have security cameras that would have recorded that night. They’ll definitely look at the footage of the video cameras the City installed a few years ago in public places, like Bishop Santana Park. Do you think you can help me narrow which footage they’ll need to look at by showing me the tree where Father Frank parked that night?”
Jeremy examined his hands. A deep red color creeped upward under his skin beginning where the collar of his shirt met his throat.
“He was crying and in a panic that night!” interjected Dolores indignantly. “I don’t think we can expect him to point out a particular tree in a street full of trees.”
“It doesn’t need to be exact—the general area should be enough.” Tavis turned his attention back to Jeremy.
“Did you notice, Jeremy, or do you remember, whether Father Frank is right- or left-handed?”
Jeremy studiously avoided looking at his mother, and began a halting response, “I-I think . . . I don’t really remember, but . . .”
Dolores’s voice broke in with authority, “I remember what you told me, sweetheart, you said that—”
“Ms. Ray, thanks for your help, but I really need Jeremy to answer these questions.”
Dolores turned her head, but not before Tavis caught the venom in her eyes.
“Go ahead, Jeremy,” Tavis encouraged gently.
Jeremy craned his head back and contemplated the ceiling, as if it held the answer.
Finally, with a slight shrug, he looked directly at Tavis. “He’s left-handed,” answered Jeremy certainly and correctly.
“But the reason I know that isn’t because it would make more sense for him to have been left-handed to touch himself while he grabbed me across the truck with his right hand. I remember it from earlier that day, at the food pantry, when Father Frank was talking with an old woman who had teased him about being ‘sinister.’ Father Frank laughed, but I didn’t understand the joke, so Father Frank told me that the word ‘sinister’ comes from the Latin for ‘left,’ and that there used to be a lot of superstitions about left-handed people. It was interesting.” Jeremy turned his body to face his mother. With the steady exhale of a sniper, Jeremy released a stream of words. “He was actually really, really nice. I’d never met a priest, and he wasn’t what I expected. He wore normal clothes, he let me pick the music for the drive home, and he didn’t try to talk to me about church, or God, or anything like that. He was just a regular guy. A nice, regular guy. He told me I should take home a bunch of good food that they were going to have to throw away because nobody took it that day.” With the shape-shifting mystery of early adolescence, Jeremy’s face at once lost the extruding angularity of his burgeoning maturity, and a fat tear streaked down the soft cheek that suddenly seemed to belong to a much younger child.
Dolores scoffed prettily. “We didn’t need food from a food pant—”
“Just stop, Mom.”
The authority in her son’s voice silenced Dolores.
“If the police find videos, they’re going to see that I didn’t run home across the park. He dropped me off in the driveway. He didn’t touch me.” Jeremy wiped the corners of his mouth with the pads of his thumb and ring finger. “I just said that because . . . because . . . we, I-I thought that all we hear in the news is that so many priests are lechy creeps, and maybe the Church would give us some money if a priest had done to me what they’ve done to all those other kids.”
“Well, Jeremy! You told me . . .” Dolores’s hand shot to her throat in search of absent pearls, a flawless southern belle as performed by a gifted actor. Jeremy silenced her with a look. The hardest part behind him, Jeremy now stared in a daze at the ground. “I’m really sorry,” he mumbled miserably. “Please tell Father Frank I’m sorry.”
Chapter Fourteen
When Father Frank opened the door to his office, his eyes were red-rimmed and bleary, but when he saw Tavis, he gave a warm smile and opened the door wider.
“Come in, come in, Tavis,” he said, as he removed books from the chair nearest the door and gestured that Tavis should take a seat. “It’s so nice to see you.”
“I gotta say, Father, I don’t usually hear that from someone in your position.”
“Of course, but I know how important your work is and I admire your professionalism. How can I help you? I’m sorry I don’t have anything to offer you to drink, but I had a long, rough night and I’m running behind today.” Father Frank leaned forward in his chair, placing his elbows on his desk and resting his chin on his steepled hands in a posture of intent listening.
“Good news, Father. After a thorough investigation, there’s no evidence to substantiate Jeremy’s claims. Actually, the evidence shows the opposite. It appears that his mother had researched the Church’s settlements with victims of abuse, and then she coached Jeremy to make allegations.” Tavis briefly filled in Father Frank on the investigation.
“So what happens now?” asked Father Frank.
“Bishop Cólima has reviewed the notes from my interviews with Dolores and Jeremy, and you should expect there will be no further action against you after our presentation of evidence to law enforcement.”
“And Jeremy and Dolores?”
“Well, that depends. The police can probably make a case for extortion. Bishop Cólima is willing to pursue this on behalf of the Church if you feel strongly about it. Another route he mentioned is for the Church to offer them pastoral care and counseling . . . from someone other than you, of course . . . although they’re not Catholic so it’s not clear they’d be willing.”
“I’m not interested in being punitive,” Father Frank said, “and I won’t be responsible for seeking their prosecution. It’s funny . . . I had the impression that young man was interested in the Church, and he should have the opportunity to see how it shows God’s love and forgiveness.”
Father Frank removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes. When he returned his arms to the desk, he exuded defeat.
“I don’t get to deliver this type of good news very often, Father, but when I have it’s usually been met with a little more enthusiasm,” Tavis chided with a smile.
Father Frank raised his eyebrows and returned the smile half-heartedly. “I’m sure it is, Tavis. Thank you for your good work, and of course I’m pleased. Forgive my subdued response. As I mentioned, I had a tough night. I found out last night that a
young woman with whom I’ve been working took her own life, and I’m finding it difficult to be enthusiastic today . . . even with your excellent news.”
“Of course, Father,” Tavis said, shaking his head. At a loss for words that might comfort him, Tavis shared Father Frank’s suffering by sitting with him in silence.
After a moment, Tavis made his excuses and prepared to leave. As he rose from his chair, Father Frank, with his head bowed and his forehead resting on his steepled hands, spoke so quietly that Tavis almost did not hear him. “They’re not wrong, you know.”
“Excuse me, Father?”
“Jeremy and his mother. They must have somehow recognized what I am.”
“I don’t understand what you’re saying,” Tavis said, quickly resuming his seat with his heart pounding. “Are you saying that there’s some truth to Jeremy’s claims after all?”
“No . . . No. I never touched that boy. It wouldn’t even have occurred to me.”
As Father Frank slightly raised his bowed head, his bloodshot, anguished eyes peered up from under his brow and directly into Tavis’s eyes, saying, “He’s too old.”
Chapter Fifteen
Tavis remained glued to his chair as Father Frank began to unburden himself.
“What I am can’t be explained by a bad childhood. My parents kept me safe and happy. Nothing bad happened to me, and I never even broke any bones. Sure, I had the usual cuts, scrapes, and splinters—all the result of playing in a protected neighborhood full of children roughly my age. I remember very clearly the only event that gave anyone even a moment of genuine panic about my safety.
“When I was seven, and playing near the bleachers at my older sister’s softball game, a high foul ball hit me right in the head. I remember seeing my mother spring up from her seat in the bleachers in an attempt to reach me in the milliseconds before the ball struck. Because I had no idea the ball was coming toward me, I just thought her exaggerated expression was pretty funny. And then I was unconscious. A visit to the emergency room revealed a minor concussion, and my life soon returned to normal.”
As if Tavis were his confessor, Father Frank continued to describe his childhood. Although he couldn’t have put his finger on it at the time, Father Frank later realized that his deep sense of security in childhood resulted from the careful structure his parents cultivated. It would have been easy enough to be carried along by the tide of seasons, holidays, school schedules, and activities. But Frankie’s parents delighted in the flow of the seasons, in the art of balancing their busy professional lives with meaningful participation in the lives of their children and their community, and in observing traditions and milestones with creativity and enthusiasm.
From Frankie’s perspective, this was simply how to live life. He began to realize it might not be as effortless as his parents made it appear when he overheard a conversation between his mother, Scarlett, and her friend one summer evening. “Seriously, Scar, how do you do it? I don’t have a career, I can barely cook a grilled cheese, and it’s all I can do to make sure my kids and their clothes aren’t obviously dirty when they leave the house. How do you work full-time, raise kind, smart children, host most of our neighborhood functions, run the PTA, and still have energy to make every holiday an event? I feel like I barely have time to finish preparing for one holiday, which usually just involves making a dish to bring to your house, and the next thing that requires something of me is already upon me—and it all just comes faster every year.”
Scarlett just waved her hand, deflecting the praise, as she leaned in to soothe her friend. “Oh, stop it, Kay. It’s just a matter of how we’re built to recharge. You need time alone with your thoughts to feel like yourself, so doing these kinds of activities and being ‘on’ around other people is stretching for you. But rather than using up my energy, planning and hosting events is how I recharge.”
Frankie’s well-educated parents were never wealthy, but they used their limited resources creatively to meet their family’s needs and to project a carefree and unique style. As a small child, Frankie recalled observing his mother, looking particularly lovely before Sunday Mass, coloring a bleached spot on her black blouse with a permanent marker. When they were small, Frankie and his two elder sisters dreaded his family’s regular visits to Goodwill. While their parents patiently sifted through an overwhelming amount of clothing and household goods to find hidden treasures, Frankie and his sisters played in the racks of musty-smelling clothing and whined in an attempt to hurry their parents along. As they grew older, Frankie, Amelia, and Emmy adopted their parents’ enthusiasm for treasure hunting and for finding unique, quality items that cost virtually nothing. They listened to their parents’ advice about seeking well-made materials and easily mended flaws. They delighted in answering compliments about particular pieces with, “Can you believe it? Three dollars!”
The fruits of the Muncy frugality were consumed almost entirely by the costs of educating three children at Saint Peter’s Academy, which was both academically prestigious and a source of religious comfort for Scarlett Muncy, who prioritized steeping her children in the Catholic faith that meant everything to her. The Jesuit faculty at Saint Peter’s had high expectations of its students, and required both critical thinking and concrete actions toward social justice. Scarlett feared her children would have missed these character-shaping values if they had attended the perfectly adequate public schools in their suburban community.
By adolescence Frankie had become a devout, compassionate boy with precocious insight into the motivations of others. His ability to apply information gained in one context to other, seemingly dissimilar situations earned him the admiration of his teachers, and his humility and humor gained him the good opinion of his classmates. Although almost all of his schoolmates considered Frankie to be a friend, the circle of children Frankie himself considered to be friends was intimate. He bonded with his closest friend, Jackson, over their favorite subject—technology—with both boys scrimping and saving to buy the most advanced computers they could afford. Their limited resources also went to paying off the telephone bills they ran up by dialing in to the electronic bulletin board systems that were popular at the time with tech-heads. Frankie and Jackson spent nearly every cent they earned from their part-time jobs at an ice cream shop to pay for time on the networking precursor to the internet. The computerized bulletin boards were incredible new tools that enabled them to connect with many others who shared their interests, and to trade information about topics that fascinated them.
Frankie’s future seemed to be a cloudless forecast of familial, professional, and financial success. The outside world couldn’t see, though, the dark and deeply troubling storm cloud looming over Frankie. He never felt more uncomfortable than when his friends or family teased him about girls and dating. They assumed every boy his age would be eager to date one of the many pretty girls in his life. And Frankie’s good looks and quiet confidence did provide him with opportunities to date, which eventually he grasped in an attempt to distract himself from a budding awareness of the true objects of his attraction.
* * *
“The fact that I was a sick freak didn’t just dawn on me one day out of the blue. I came to understand it slowly, over a series of years,” Father Frank continued in a rush—a speeding freight train that could not be stopped.
In elementary school, Frankie had enjoyed the commonplace succession of short-lived “girlfriends” among his contemporaries. In kindergarten, Frankie formed a close friendship with Suzanne. The two referred to each other as boyfriend and girlfriend, and they were inseparable during meals and at naptime. While eating lunch, they modeled behaviors they had observed in their parents: they served food to each other, made sure the other had everything they needed for their meal, and they cleaned up together. While driving to Suzanne’s sixth birthday party, Scarlett asked Frankie how he knew he wanted Suzanne to be his girlfriend. Frankie shrugged and responded, “We were on our cots for nap one day and I looked
over at her. I just knew she is my favorite friend.”
As childhood progressed, Frankie participated in the ritual of sending and receiving “Do you like me? Check yes or no” notes. Like most elementary-school romances, these declarations didn’t have much practical effect. There were a few awkward attempts at swinging together at recess. There were occasional aggressive hand-holding sessions that served more as a means of cementing the intention to be “boyfriend and girlfriend” than as expressions of affection. The children were usually too embarrassed by the implications of their relationships to speak to each other, so eventually one would send a break-up note to the other, there would be no further discussion, and a few days or weeks later, the cycle would begin with someone else.
Frankie and his classmates continued this sequence well into sixth grade. Near the end of that year, it began to shift. Boys and girls began to hone flirtation skills, and those who advanced more quickly were able to maintain actual conversations with members of the opposite sex. “Relationships” that previously lasted, at most, a few uncommunicative weeks began to extend to months of backchannel expressions of interest, telephone calls, shared lunches, jealousies, and emotional, attention-seeking break-ups.
Along with these psychological evolutions, their physical development also began to accelerate. Frankie soon found himself surpassed in height by all but the smallest girls. The pubescent girls first thickened and then stretched until, near the end of seventh grade, most of Frankie’s female schoolmates seemed to be made entirely of long legs and budding breasts. Toward the end of middle school, the boys had begun their own sprints toward physical maturity. They grew several inches, sprouted acne and hair in awkward places, and teased each other about the wildly fluctuating pitch and timbre of their voices.