Drowning in the East River by Kimberly Pierce Read Free Book Online Page B

Father, since my wife passed away, I find myself questioning my faith in the Lord." David closed his eyes, tuning his ears to the foreign sounds of the hollow room. His shaky breathing bled into the pulsating silence of the confessional.
     
    "I'm sorry for your loss, my son." The reply was quick, a mere automatic reflex. The priest stammered momentarily as he struggled to think of the next thing to say. “Why do you find yourself questioning God's wisdom?”
     
    "I find myself wondering why… if God is supposed to be this all-knowing, loving God, why would he do this?" David paused to collect himself, swallowing back the frog he could feel building up in his throat. "Why would he do this to my family?”
     
    "You have to believe that God wanted to have your wife with him. She is in a better place, my son.”
     
    "Is she?" David asked, his voice quick and barbed with hostility. The rickety chair creaked underneath him as David leaned forward, bracing his elbows against his knees. He ran his fingers through his hair and sucked in a deep breath. He looked up at the screen, trying to address the man behind it. "I beg your pardon, but I'm having a difficult time believing that, Father.”
     
    "Sometime, all we have is our faith.”
     
    David sighed heavily. It was an answer he had heard before. It was the same one spouted by the stream of priests patting him on the shoulder Sunday, before turning a blind eye towards his troubles during the week. He looked towards the ceiling as he continued, "I understand that, Father. But I can't understand-why would a loving God-“
     
    "Any proof you need is in the Good Book. Lean on that. It will help you through this difficult time." David could hear the rote repetition in the priest's words, making it all the more difficult to take it seriously.
     
    "Thank you Father," David said, not caring enough hide the defeat reflecting in his voice. He sighed heavily, biting back the desire to say all the things flooding his mind. "For these and all the sins of my past life, I ask pardon of God, and penance and absolution from you Father." He ran a hand through his hair, looking around the one more time. He could feel angry heat spreading across his cheeks as he moved to stand up.
     
    "You need to embrace your faith," the priest repeated. He paused for a moment, before continuing. "Say twelve Hail Mary's and ten Our Fathers. Have no fear, my son. You will meet your wife again in the arms of the Holy Father." The pronouncement came quickly, made up from the top of his head.
     
    Hunching as he moved through the tiny confessional, David stepped back out into the nave and maneuvered his way towards a pew near the back. "Ave Maria, gratis plena, Dominus mecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructose ventris tui, Iesus. Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nune, et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.”
     
    David yawned and looked up from his thick Latin textbook. Outside his bedroom window, snow blanketed Greenpoint Brooklyn in a sea of fluffy white flakes. The muffled clap of hooves bled in through the thin glass. A horse and wagon slowly trotted down the otherwise empty street, making the early morning ice run.
     
    Pulling his blanket higher around his shoulders, David glanced up at the grandfather clock against the wall. The little wire hands showed it was a little before three in the morning. The dive bars would be closing and kicking the last few drunks back onto the street.
     
    “David!"
     
    Quietly shutting his textbook, David stood up slowly and blew out his candle. Sliding under the covers of his bed, he pulled the blankets tightly around his chin as he forced himself to fein sleep.
     
    Thomas Freeman always returned from his nightly excursion to the bars at closing time. David knew the smell. His father stank of cheap brandy and cigars mixed with the overpowering odor of cheap perfume from whatever whore his father had spent most of the night