Part IV: Spin (Chapter 73)

“We haven’t had much of a chance to talk.” Dan says, taking my hand.

I pull away. “Probably not a good time. You seen Ruby?”

I have barely spoken with my sister today, and we have so much to talk about before she goes back to Arkansas tomorrow.

“She’s outside with the kids.”

“Well, I’m going to find her....”

“I just want to talk to you about something.”

The “oh, oh” goes off in my head; I have nothing that I would want to discuss with Dan O’Flaherty, now or ever.

“Maybe some other time...”

“Look, I just want to thank you. If it hadn’t been for you, I would’ve never become a priest.”

“Right.”

“It’s true. I found my vocation the summer we did Mass in the backyard, and it’s kinda difficult to say Mass without a server. Thanks for being my altar boy.”

“You’re welcome ‒ I guess. I didn’t have anything else to do.” Tess, Ruby’s girl, runs by the pavilion; I figure that Ruby can’t be far behind. “Look. I want to catch Ruby.”

Dan pulls me back. “We sure did have fun in those days, didn’t we?”

“You had fun, maybe. Can’t say that ‘fun’ was in my vocabulary.”

“My brothers and I tortured you pretty bad. Sorry about that.”

“It’s all in the past where it belongs.”

“Remember the time old Mr. MacIntyre caught us swearing in Nana’s garden?”

Yeah, I remember, all right. I remember what happened afterwards, I remember Danny going home, and I taking the flak for everything that happened.

That awful day when Nana left us alone ‒

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Sorry ‒”

“No apologies, please.”

I just want you, Father Dan O’Flaherty, to disappear from my life forever.

Sheldon is across the room with Sal and Nana, who’s napping again.

Sal is talking to ‒ mostly at ‒ Shel, but he doesn’t appear to be listening. Instead, he keeps glancing over at us, a worried look.

He excuses himself from Sal.

The moment I have been dreading, ever since the invitation arrived in the mail, this crossroads where flawed, complicated knight without armor must face armed nemesis.

“Samantha,” Shel says as he slides his arm around my waist.

He nods toward Father Dan.

Thick silence, mealy and sour.

I don’t want to introduce these two men – counterpoints of my life – but basic etiquette demands it. “This is Dan O’Flaherty.” I nod toward my cousin. To Dan: “My husband Sheldon Weiss.”

Dan offers his right hand to Shel. “My pleasure.”

Sheldon mumbles something, avoiding Dan’s hand – a pale spotted bird suspended in air just as the bullet enters its heart.

Dan slowly lowers his hand, squeezes it into a fist. “Well, then.”

“Yeah,” Shel says, pulling me even closer to him.

The three of us paralyzed in this tableau, unable to break its hold.

“Samantha!” Nana yells from across the room.

Our rescuer.

“We better check on her,” I say to Shel.

We pull away from the magnetic field of Father Dan...Danny?

But Nana’s rescue comes too late....

Pictures of that weekend 30-plus years ago scroll by, clear and forceful and ‒

Undeniable.