Page 10 of Holly Jolly Heresy
“Thank you. For telling me. I really am grateful.”
“You seem angry.”
“It’s okay to be angry sometimes, Caleb. Even at God, and maybe especially at the Church.”
He opened his mouth to speak, but no sound came out, her words buzzing beneath his skin like a hornet’s nest burst open in his veins.
She gestured to her pancakes again with her knife. “You sure you don’t want any?”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah?”
“I mean, no. I don’t want any. Thank you.”
He watched with rapt attention as she carved off a triangle of pancake and popped it into her mouth, her eyes fluttering closed as she ate. An answering jolt of electricity raced down his spine immediately followed by a nauseating wave of guilt as those hornets continued to buzz.
Something had shifted between them. Somehow he’d put more distance between them when all he wanted was to bring her closer. His muscles burned with the restraint required to keep from reaching for her hand, to stop himself from bringing them back to the moment when her finger glided against his skin and he thought he might die from the pleasure of it.
Worse still, he knew now, without a shadow of a doubt, he would do whatever it took to get her to look at him again the way she did that night last May.
Chapter four
By the time they left the diner, a few inches of snow had accumulated on the ground, and Molly’s frustration had cooled to a low simmer. The whole time they’d eaten, she’d felt Caleb’s eyes on her, studying her, worry pressing his lips into a flat line. It didn’t matter how she tried to steer the conversation to lighter things, the weight of those few strained exchanges remained between them.
Maybe it wasn’t fair of her, to want him to recognize the failings of his Church, the innumerable ways it passively inflicted harm on the students entrusted to its care, but she couldn’t help it. He was a good man—she knew he was. Was it too much to hope he’d see the morbid irony in his joining the priesthood to help the very kids the Church hurt most?
“Did you know it was going to snow today?” Molly asked, trying once again to get them back to the easy place they’d been in before she went and asked for his origin story.
“No. Did you?”
“I never check the weather forecast. It’s wrong most of the time anyway.”
Caleb chuckled, but it wasn’t as light and free as his laughter had been earlier in the day. Her stomach twisted in knots.
“We’ll get the costumes from Father David and be headed home in less than an hour. I’m sure it’ll be fine,” Caleb said as he steered the car back out onto the main road.
Sure, it would be fine, but wouldtheybe fine?
Blessed Sacrament Catholic School may have been closed for over six months, but that hadn’t stopped the town of Nativity from decorating the lot at the edge of town. A massive nativity scene was spread across the snow-covered lawn, each life-size character depicted on a painted piece of plywood, the faces carefully cut out to allow passersby to take their photos as the Virgin Mary or a wiseman or even as a lamb tucked away in a pile of hay. The only figure with a face was the baby Jesus, whose painted features crossed into uncanny valley territory, especially surrounded by his faceless coterie.
“That’s creepy, right? It’s not just me?” Molly asked.
“Definitely not just you.”
“I never considered myself a grinch, but in the face of allthis,I’m starting to wonder.”
Caleb shook his head. “Hate to break it to you, Mol, but you could never be a grinch. Your heart is too big.”
His words sent confused butterflies fluttering in her stomach, butterflies that had no business occupying any part of her anatomy. She was annoyed with him, dammit, and frustrated by his tacit compliance with a system continuously hurting the very kids he claimed to be trying to help. But she was also captivated by his easy charm, intrigued by the vulnerability in his voice when he’d told her about his path to the priesthood, delighted by his soft words and lingering glances...
Butterflies were out of the question. Her feelings for Caleb were already complicated enough without adding flying insects into the equation.
Caleb parked the car and marched up the walk to greet the priest standing in the open doorway of the decommissioned school. Molly followed after him, half-jogging to keep up with his long strides.
“Father West, it’s so good to see you again,” the priest said, shaking Caleb’s hand. “What has it been? Ten years?”
“At least. Good to see you, too, Father David. Thank you for this.”
