The Peacock 56

 "So", Carl says, "Were you forbidden to return to St. Jude's?"

"My father knew better than to forbid me.  I was a really strong-willed kid. and this was frustrating for him, because I was also really gentle and compliant."

"But once you set your mind to something..."

"Then nothing could stop me.  Next morning at breakfast we had a talk, and he simply told me the same thing.  Go there as much as I want, but know my limits.  He also said that he was aware that Father Griffin would remain part of the draw for me, and that I should especially be wary, not of him, but of the fascination I had for him.  He also told me that when he talked with Stephen they both agreed to draw up some plans for getting him out of there, and the sooner the better.  There was one little problem, being Father David, the rector, who was also gay, but very discreet about it.  I think it's absolutely disgusting the way they hid there own gross behaviour behind the skirts of Anglican tolerance and progressive views on gay rights.  But try to persuade them that bedding rent boys in the rectory was not quite the same thing as marriage equality and adoption rights and just listen to their polite Anglican howls of indignation."

"So the rector was in on it too? At least I heard Robert allude to it."

"He used to go on dirty vacations in Hawaii and the Caribbean.  Posh resorts of course.  Typical Anglican hypocritical swine.  They really covered each other's asses.  I returned the following Sunday.  Griffin was the celebrant.  Later, in the coffee room, he tried to engage me in chitchat.  Then, without referring to our previous visit, he invited me out for lunch with him."

"What did you say?"

"I asked him how much he was going to pay me."

Carl burst out laughing, "I didn't know you had it in you!"

"No worries, man.  That's all I had in me."

"So, what did Robert do?"

"He asked how much I wanted."

"What!"

"I demanded from him a hundred bucks, cash, in advance.  He told me to wait a bit, and I said I wasn't going to wait.  So, he reached into his cassock, after retreating to a corner with me where no one would notice.  He counted out five twenties then placed them in my hand.  Then he told me to wait for him to change into his civvies.  I asked him if he was too much of a coward for people to see that he was a priest buying the favours of a teenage boy.  Really, Carl, I don't know what got into me, but I was having lots of fun messing with his head like that."

"I didn't know you were so good.  So, what happened?"

"I started to walk away from him.  He tried to say something, then I showed the money in my hand.  There were still plenty of parishioners in the room.  And I looked at him, smiled , and said, one false move, and everyone gets to know.  He stood there, paralyzed.  I got on a bus, went home.  Dad was back from church.  I gave him the money."

"Then what happened?"

The Peacock 55

 "It was quite a long car ride, since we lived out by UBC.  Father Stephen wanted to know what happened, and I said nothing happened outside of drinking too much scotch with Father Griffin.   I did not mention that he tried to kiss me.  We otherwise said nothing.  I was of course terrified about my dad finding out.  We pulled up in front of the house.  It still wasn't very late, maybe nine or nine thirty.  Instead of just letting me out of the car, Father Stephen insisted on accompanying me to the door, as though he was delivering the spoils of war.  My father received him quite warmly, since they were friends as well as colleagues.  We went into the den, Dad closed the door, and we sat and talked.  Stephen explained how he had caught me in the nick of time and rescued me from Father Griffin's depredations.  I was, to my surprise, feeling suddenly remarkably well, and surprised also at how quickly the effects of the scotch had worn off. I was also strongly reassured that I was not going to be punished for anything.  In fact, all that concerned Dad was that I was okay, and he seemed more relieved than anything that I had been rescued.  and I felt something similar, though lingering in the back of my mind was a faint shadow of disappointment that nothing had happened between us.  Of course I wasn't going to admit this.    My dad then dismissed me so that he could talk more at length with Father Stephen.  As I got up to leave, so did my father get off his chair, approach me.  He enfolded me in a long warm bearhug.  He whispered in my ear, welcome home, son.  I love you.  I went upstairs to my bedroom, and while my dad and Father Stephen were plotting to see how they could get Father Griffin out of the church, I lay down on my bed, and shook and wept, and eventually fell into a deep and dreamless sleep."

The Peacock 54

 "Of course, even as a naïve seventeen year old, I could already guess where everything was headed, and I was frantically trying to draw up an escape plan.  Father Griffin was serving scotch on the rocks, and yes, he was seated right next to me on his plush little sofa, and it was little.  More of a loveseat.  Then he put his hand on my knee.  Then he kissed me on the mouth.  I didn't exactly respond, and I did back away a little.  I wasn't exactly repulsed, just really perplexed about my role in the matter.  Then he started to tell me about his favourite ways of having sex.  Instead of feeling disgusted, or attracted, I simply felt mesmerized.  Like a rat cornered by a viper.  And I had already had enough scotch to drink in order to fog my mind just a little bit too much."

Carl is staring at me intently, in a way that I find so penetrating as to almost want him to please leave me in peace, even if I happen to be sleeping in his room.  I return the look, as though to silently snarl at him the words, Yeah, what?  All he says is, "None of this at all surprises me.  Do go on, please."

"Fortunately, my bladder came to the rescue.  I had remembered not to take off my shoes, and was greatly relieved that that wasn't being expected of me.  I was also still wearing my jacket.  When he asked me to take it off, I honestly felt cold and insisted on keeping it on.  I excused myself, went to the bathroom that he shared with Father Stephen, where I peed, then just as I was opening the bathroom door, there was Father Stephen standing by his open door, jingling his car keys.  Can I give you a ride home, was all he said.  I replied, yes, please, and before Father Griffin could come out of his suite to track me down, we were in the car and on our way back to my father's house where I lived..."

The Peacock 53

  "Anything that could, did go wrong during my dinner date with Father Griffin.  It was a pricey, Nouvelle Cuisine kind of joint and naturally he was picking up the tab.  But he hated everything about the place: our table, the music (too loud and contemporary for his delicate baroque ears).  He dismissed the wine as plonk and seemed to have an immediate hate on for our first server for being a woman (he actually had the colossal gall to demand a male server, instead, and then he hated the male server because he was too old, around thirty, already balding and too skinny.  Yes, he actually said that.)  He thought the pasta was overcooked, the chicken underdone and the salad greens wilted and the dressing insipid.  And don't get me started about his running commentary on the dreadful cheesecake for dessert.  And, I was just seventeen, didn't have a clue about elegant matters, and I really thought the place and food were just fine.

"Then there was the conversation.  Or should I say, monologue.  It was all about him, his horrible childhood and how he was bullied as a sissy, and all his little revenge strategies in theological seminary and all the other students and ordinands, all male, he had successfully bedded.  And all I could do was sit there spellbound and dumbfounded..."

"Rather like watching an elephant giving birth?" Carl asks.

"Rather like watching two elephants having sex.  Two bull elephants.  Then he invited me back to the clergy house for a drink.  And, stupidly, I accepted.  But I was totally under his spell.  That guy was powerful.  He still is powerful, but at least now Father Griffin is powerful for good."

"He tries to be."

"At the clergy house, Father Griffin tried to spirit me upstairs with him before anyone could see that he had a visitor.  But just as we reached his floor and were heading towards his suite, who should emerge from the bathroom but Father Stephen, looking very unclerical in a T shirt and jeans.  He just said to me as I followed Father Griffin to his door, pointing, 'if anything happens, knock on my door.'"

"as I was sitting, at Father Griffin's bidding, on the sofa, he muttered that I shouldn't pay any heed to whatever Father Stephen just told me.  And now, I was really frightened..." 

The Peacock 52

 "So your dad didn't like you snooping around St. Jude's", Carl says.

"He was downright worried.  You see, my dad was an evangelical, and the evangelicals and the high Anglicans have always hated and distrusted each other.  But I wasn't really comfortable with what my dad, or his parish were doing.  I called them Baptists wearing robes.  He was an assistant priest at St. Mark's, low-church, evangelical and smack-dab in the middle of one of Vancouver's wealthiest parishes.  In the nineties it became very popular among the evangelical community for the lively preaching and the great music.  They were all pretty fundamentalist, too.  And it just grated on me, that and my father's shallow and smug certainty about biblical correctness.  I was a brighter than average kid and I really wanted to explore my spirituality but in a way that really harnessed the imagination.  A visitor at St. Mark's, this really eccentric lady who was in a community in Richmond, thought I might be interested in St. Jude's.  She didn't care for the place herself, though her community was connected there, but she thought it might be worth checking out for me.  And she did give me all sorts of caveats.  Oh, by the way, Aaron, our friend here, was part of that community.  He was the de facto leader.  I met him with the lady and two others one evening at St. Mark's.  

"What did you think of Aaron back then?"

"Oh, I liked him right away.  Great sense of humour, super ironical. But he soon quit visiting, and then the two older ladies stopped going.  So, I visited St. Jude's, and I have to admit that I was immediately swept away into something extraordinary."

"It is an interesting church," Carl says.

"Have you been there?"

"We've visited a couple of times."

"During the coffee hour, just following high mass, my first Sunday, there is Father Griffin taking me aside to thoroughly monopolize my attention.  Before I knew it, I had consented to him taking me out for dinner the following Friday evening, and it was only when I went home to report to my father what had happened.  I told him everything except for one little detail."

"Which was?"

"That I was soon to dine with my father's nemesis..."

The Peacock 51

 "Needless to say, Father Griffin and I bonded instantly."

"You became friends," Carl says.

"As much as you can become friends with a priest."

"Your father was a priest, you mentioned.  Anglican?"

"Low church.  He didn't have time for what he often referred to as the popish absurdities of St. Jude's.  He also knew, and thoroughly disapproved of , Father Griffin.  In fact, he warned me to stay away from him."

"Did you know Robert back then?"

"Better than you'd like to know."

"What happened?"

"It would have been my form of teenage rebellion.  Other kids turned to drugs and hard partying,  I turned to Anglo Catholicism.  I would have been seventeen when I started attending.  Dad did not approve."

"It sounds like there is a story there."

"Words spoken by a true journalist", say I.  

"I hope you're not worried that you are going to end up the subject of a future article of mine."

"Would you like to put that in writing?"

"You are witty, you know", Carl says, not exactly smiling.

"I think Carol called it droll."

"Quaint.  But do continue..."

The Peacock 50

 Carl says, "He was bad enough when he was cavorting with his boyfriend and rent boys,  In a way, following his conversion, he became almost unbearable.  Righteous as all get-out.  Only for a couple of days following his big public repentance production number in Switzerland did he really approximate what would appear to be real humility.  He was quite a sad spectacle at first, but also really sweet.  He had become really childlike, and solicitous and open and vulnerable and really quite engaging.  He suddenly seemed to love everybody.   There wasn't anything he wouldn't do for others, and really dedicated himself to almost every level of work and service in our little community in Switzerland."

"Did you ever see the Alastair Sim Christmas Carol?" I ask.

"You mean the British version, black and white, from the fifties"?

"Was he like Ebenezer Scrooge when he woke up on Christmas morning?"

"Even worse," says Carl, "And better.  He was really pretty delightful."

"He just returned to St. Judes, when I started attending again, just one week after Greta and Eric left me.  In fact, he was celebrating mass on my first visit.  It was early on a Tuesday evening, the 6 pm mass that was celebrated in the little chapel in the back.  I grew up in the church.  My father was a priest. He died last year."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"Thanks.  But I was grieving then the death of my marriage and equally the loss of Greta and Eric both.  Following the mass, I returned to kneel at the altar rail, feeling finally that I had returned home and I was crying uncontrollably.  Father Griffin returned,  kneeled down next to me and put his arm around my shoulder, and just stayed there with me while I continued to weep.  When I was done, I turned and saw that he also had tears on his face.  Then he enfolded me in a warm and tender embrace.  We didn't exchange any words, until I got up to leave and we just said goodbye..."  

The Peacock 49

 "So, why did she leave, then?" Carl wants to know.

"All she told me was that now that she had written her thesis, and it was accepted, she had been applying randomly at various universities and institutions all over the world, when a research position in environmental science came open for her in Stockholm.  But our marriage, such as it was, was also finished.  We had only been together eighteen months, lived together one year then made it official in city hall."  

"You weren't really in love with each other, were you."

"No, just sort of habituated to each other.  But I am also sure she felt a real betrayal about me and her brother.  That sort of emotion, it's something primal, inevitable, and Greta was not one to show her true feelings.  About anything."

Carl is looking across, not necessarily at me, but in my direction.  He appears to be weighing my words, weighing me in the scale, only to find me wanting?  I can't understand why he would be smiling, but the smile quickly fades from his face.

"You didn't tell me why you left your wallet with your ID in your car."

"Wasn't that required, for coming here, I mean?"

"Wherever did you get that idea?"

"Father Griffin."

"Let me tell you something about Robert.  First of all, despite everything I have said, I have tremendous respect for him, as a priest and as a man.  And a lot of fondness.  But he really does tend to carry things to an extreme.  It is wonderful how he has devoted his life to all of us in service to Our Lord, but he is one to micromanage."

"Would you say that he plays God?"

"Sometimes he doesn't appear to know the difference..."

  

The Peacock 48

 "Would you call this incest?" Carl asks.  In the half light his face takes on a dramatic emphasis as light and shadow play around his magnificent cheekbones.  His face would be very dramatic as a gigantic lino block or woodcut.  

Too close.  And I have been calling this incest, except for one little detail, and now I think will tell Carl...everything.  "The thing is, we were all set to have sex. We were both lying on the bed, still dressed.  Then, suddenly, it isn't that I couldn't.  More, I just didn't know. I felt completely bewildered about doing this with my young brother-in-law, and strangely, Greta was at the moment very far from my thoughts. I have always been kind of ambivalent when it comes to sex, even with Greta, so, I don't think that her little brother was the only reason she wanted to leave.  In fact, I know it wasn't. 

"So what happened then?"

"Really...nothing. Eric and I just lay there together, cuddling on top of the bed, then we just sort of fell asleep.  I forgot that Greta was returning that very same night.  So when she came into the bedroom and saw us there …"

"She caught you two canoodling"

"But it wasn't even quite canoodling..."

"But on the same bed she shared with you..."

"She never really even mentioned it.  She didn't even seem all that surprised, though with her I always felt like I was waiting for the other shoe to drop...She just said that she was flying back to Sweden in five days, once she had set all her affairs here in order, that she wasn't coming back and that only her brother was going with her. I almost said that nothing happened between us, but she waved me off with her hand, then went to sleep on the  couch.. . 

The Peacock 47

 "And you haven't heard from them.  Anything."

"I could hardly blame them.  She was of course rescuing her little brother from me.  Who could blame her?"

"How old was Eric?" Carl asks.

"He would have been twenty.  He was here on a visit.  You see, their mother died in Sweden.  They had no father.  Her mother was a lesbian who got pregnant from a sperm donor. He was ten years younger than Greta.  She had flown back to Sweden for the funeral, and wanted to stay a bit longer, since there was quite an extended family there she wanted to connect with.  Her brother was going to visit us anyway, so he flew out ahead of her.  I met Eric in the airport, and at first I thought he was Greta, they look so much alike.  By the way, it was the same sperm donor for both of them.  I had a week off from the hospital I was working in--I'm a registered nurse--so it gave me lots of time to spend with Greta's brother before she came back almost a week later.  I found him really hard to reach at first, and knowing that he must be grieving for his mother, I tried to balance giving him space with spending time together.  A very quiet kid, even more introverted and withdrawn than his sister.

I left him in the apartment to do grocery shopping.  We weren't needing a lot, just salad greens for dinner.  I was gone less than an hour.  Eric was on the couch, weeping.  Loudly.  I set the groceries on the floor and instinctively went over and sat next to him. Then, he kind of leaned into me, and was still weeping convulsively.  I put my arms around him and held him for a while, for quite a while.  He eventually began to calm down, but instead of separating from me, he leaned even closer into me, then started to caress my hair, my back, my arms, and my chest.  Then he began to kiss me. lightly and gently all over my face. This was so strange to me.  I had never been with another man, not that way.  It wasn't that I wasn't attracted, and I certainly wasn't repulsed either, but more that it was a barrier I didn't want to cross with anyone.  It was hard enough being a partner for my wife.  

I was bewildered, and confused.  I was of course turned on, but not too drastically.  More than that, I just wanted to comfort and console the poor kid. But he wasn't going to leave me alone.  We ate dinner, then sat and watched a couple of movies.  Then he asked me if he could sleep with me. I wasn't sure how to answer.  We sat together on the couch.  Eric drew me close to him, put his arms around me.  I felt all strength and resolve drain away from me, knowing full well that I had just abdicated my own free will, my personal agency, in order to comfort and gratify the urgent primal needs of my young brother in law..."

The Peacock 46

 "I remembered it for the first time tonight," I say.

"You had forgotten?" asks Carl.

"I never remembered.  I must have blocked it."

"Was there anything else?"

"My ex-wife.  Greta.  I was in a way unfaithful to her.  We still haven't actually divorced, but it's been more than ten years.  She moved back to Sweden.  I haven't heard from her since.  I don't even know if she's still alive, though I don't see why she wouldn't be, she's not older than me."

Carl is looking at me, as though expecting more.  But I'm not telling him.  Not right now, maybe not ever.  It is now almost completely dark outside.

"Was it a girlfriend?" he asks.

Then it blurts out of my mouth, "Her brother became my lover." he seems calm, blank.  Nonplussed. "You don't seem too surprised about this."

"You already know my story.  I was a rent boy, remember?  Nothing surprises me."

"There was something about the pears that reminded me of her face the last time I saw her.  So perfect, white and blank.  And there was something so horribly vulnerable there, though she didn't show any emotion.  Nothing."

"She was in shock."

"She left without saying anything,  No emotion, no scene, no drama, no meltdown.  She simply said she was going back to Sweden, and so she went."

"And her brother?"

"He went with her."

The Peacock 45

 "It all came to a head with the pears."

Carl looks at me, puzzled.

"I'm sorry I didn't get to try them.  They looked delicious, but I have this rare condition."

"You're allergic?"

"Nothing at all like that."

Carl´s mild look of hurt reminds me that I have to watch my tone.  I did almost just yell at him.

"Sorry.  I didn't mean to say it like that."

"I understand  You have not been having a good evening."

"I have a couple of mental health diagnoses, one is schizo-affective disorder.  Which is similar to schizophrenia, with hallucinations, visual and audial.  The other is schizotypal disorder, which is rather a different gig.  But in my case it manifests in very heightened emotional and spiritual experiences. But it also, in my case, seems to be also a form of Stendhal Syndrome?"

"What is that?"

"What? You, an educated European, and you have never heard of Stendhal Syndrome?"

"Educate me, please", says Carl, leaning back in the armchair and crossing his ankle over his knee.

"Stendhal was a French novelist, early nineteenth century, who took a tour of Italy.  The incredible beauty of the many works of art he saw so overwhelmed him that he required several months of bedrest."

"He grew weak in the presence of beauty", Carl says.

"Alison Moyet.  You know her?"

"Great singer."

"That she is", I say.

"For me, it doesn't have to be a great work of art, it can be anything.  In this case, it was the pears."

"Have you read the book, The Highly Sensitive Person?"

"I have it on my bookshelf."

"Melissa, my sister, is highly sensitive.  She might be a helpful person to talk to."

"Sure.  I like her.  I like both of you."

"So, the pears..."

"Yes, the pears.  It's hard to know where to begin.  But when you and Melissa brought them in the darkened room, all on fire, suddenly...It was all that pure naked vulnerability of those beautiful flayed and skinned pale halves of fruit.  On fire.  And then, I was four years old, and being pulled from the wreckage of the car and my mother was stooped over, already dead behind the steering wheel, all covered with flames..."

The Peacock 44

 "So, " Carl says, leaning forward, smiling.  I think that for him this is also an excuse to visit alone with me.  He seems to really like me, for some reason.  I find it hard to trust anyone who appears to like me, and Carl, I really do want to trust.  

"As Carol said today, a needle pulling thread."

"What do you think of her?"

"Did I tell you I saw her in concert, ten years ago?"

"No way!"

"In London, in the Royal Albert Hall."

"Never been there.  To London, yes, but not there.  What was she like?"

"Absolutely amazing. She played Rachmaninov's Third Piano Concerto.  And boy did she play!"

"I'm looking forward to hearing her perform here this week.  Talk about our good fortune, eh?"

"You said that like a real Canadian."

"Well, I've been here for quite a while.  What do you think of her?"

"That bitch is one brick shithouse!"

Laughing, Carl says, "You got that one right." He has a robust and very easy laugh, perhaps a bit forced.  He strikes me as someone who really does overkill.  He is already sincere and open, but works over hard at trying to persuade and assure everyone that he is sincere and open.

"How did she end up here?"

"Same as the rest of you."

?Father Griffin."

"We all seem to have Father Griffin in common."

"Will we see him here?"

"We expect he will appear for a cameo sometime next week."

"That was quite a number you and Aaron did on him today.  You say he actually endorses this character assassination."

"You are going to find that we're all pretty transparent here.  Robert really wanted everyone to have enough background about him in order to quell the illusions, since everyone seems to hold him in a lot of esteem.  It puts him on a pedestal, and makes it impossible for him to be of any real service to us.  And he really wants to be of service.  He feels called to this."

The sky is slowly darkening and the trees have become looming silhouettes towering like guardian spirits over this place.  In the gathering twilight.  Carl stares blankly in my direction.  I know what he's waiting for.  I'm not really sure how to begin.  I feel so embarrassed about what I did, and even more embarrassed by Carl's friendly solicitation, his clear and anxious need to be my friend.

"I will try to explain to you what happened at dinner tonight, but please be patient.  This isn't going to be easy..."

The Peacock 43

 The sun has sunk behind the trees and now begins the twilight.  I haven't the energy to get up from my borrowed bed and turn on the light, then I remember the bedside lamp, just in my reach.  But I couldn't be bothered.  It is nice in the growing dark.  Soothing. I don't want to think of the tragic absurd spectacle I just made of myself, and I hope they will forgive me for ruining what was, till I began bawling and screaming, a beautiful dinner. Two things I just remembered.  My mother's death, and how she nearly took me with her when she drove the car into a transport truck.  She wanted to take me out with her. Have I forgotten it for all these years?  I don't know.  Then remembering Greta's face, so pale and blank, like a mannequin being undressed in a shop window, for all to see its plastic, nonliving nakedness.   She was flying back to Sweden, to Malmo.  I only saw her when she was packing.  She did let me sit with her and her brother in the living room till the cab came.  They left without saying anything, and I could barely croak out a soft, squeaky goodbye.  Eric her brother never answered any of my texts.  I have not seen him or his sister in more than ten years.  

There is a soft knock on the door.  Carl comes in, carrying my laptop.  

"Do you mind if I visit"" he says.

"Well, this is your room." I reflexively switch on the bedside lamp.

He hands me my laptop then positions himself in the armchair.

"How are you liking this room?"

"I really like it.  It feels like a refuge."

"I used to like to just stay up here and read, and look out the window.  I also used to write stories here."

"You said you're a journalist.  Do you still write?"

"I have an online magazine, about spirituality and politics and the environment.  I'll send you the link, if you want."

"I-I just want to apologize for what happened at dinner."

"It's alright."

"Are you sure?"

"Do you want to talk about it while I'm here, or would you rather wait?"  

"I guess now is okay." I have opened my laptop, and it turns on automatically. Fortunately it already remembers my password.  "How do I get online here?"

"Key in southernmagnolia, all one word, small letters.

"Is that from the tree in the back?"

"It is actually.  Do you have a shortcut to your Skype account?"

On my Skype page it says, Welcome Christopher."

"So what is your name, Cosme?"

"It appears to be Christopher."

"Appears to be?"

"I think I'm really Cosme."

"Then you are Cosme.  But tell me something please, Cosme,"

"What?"

"If you wanted to remember your name, why didn't you just look at your ID?"

"There is one very simply reason."

"Which is?"

"I don't have it with me."

"You don't have it with you?"

It's in the glove compartment of my car.  I left my wallet in the car."

The Peacock 42

 Except for the candles, the lights are all out and it is rather dark in here.  Then Carl brings in dessert, a bowl full of flambe pear halves poached in Amaretto. Melissa is following him and as he puts the bowl on the table, Melissa puts a lid on it, dousing the blue and yellow flames from the brandy that had been added as fuel.  

I am feeling rather odd right now.  I have just managed not to tell anyone about two very crucial chapters from my past.  And right now I am feeling rocked like a skiff in a tempest between that vague memory, a child of four, being pulled from the burning wreckage of the car my mother was driving.  She never made it out.  And then my last talk with Greta before she left me.  And even worse, I ended up also losing Eric, my brother-in-law, who couldn't live down the role he had played in what happened to his sister, and to our marriage.

Both images coexist, side by side, the blue and yellow flames almost engulfing me as a man's strong arms are pulling me from the wreckage, and the black pale look, making even whiter the Nordic face of my ex-wife, not even fighting back tears, not even screaming or hitting, but simply retreating back into that damp, cold, dark grey realm of misery, for which Swedes are so famous.  I imagine the burning pears have been my trigger.  While everyone chatters and smiles around me, now even the two community brothers are fully participating, and the Filipino is even cracking a joke right now! I have just retreated into my own dark little misery, like a cell, like the quiet room in the psyche ward, and I can now hear the door closing behind me and the key being turned.

No one is ready for this, and I can't control the tears, the weeping, nor the animal howls that are ripping unbidden out from my chest and in this paroxysm I can only collapse, head down on the table in front of me.  I feel the strong arm of Carl covering my shoulder, and can already feel myself begin to calm a bit, but the tears will not stop, they are not going to stop, they are going to keep flowing on forever and forever, as I try to forget that image of the pure, innocent creamy white pear halves being immolated in those flames or until the dying sun drowns itself for one final and terrifying time in the spewing waves of the boiling sea....

The Peacock 41

 "Who prepared this wonderful stir-fry?" wonders Carol

"I did", says Aaron, "Just following our talk this afternoon."

"It is heavenly!"

"Thank you."

"So, then, Aaron, are you part of the community here?"

It appears that Carol is most happy while she is eating.

"You could call me an honorary associate."

Carl says, "You're family."

"Are you here often?"

"Once a year anyway.  Usually just after my annual trip to Latin America."

Jesús says, "He goes to Colombia."  

"Also Costa Rica.  I have a friend I stay with in Medellín, and other friends, a family, I stay with in Monteverde."

"But Colombia is more beautiful", says Jesús, smiling.

"And more dangerous", quips Carol.

"Yes," says Jesús, chuckling, "In Colombia we are both beautiful and dangerous."

"No te jactes, chamaco", Aaron says with a dry smile.

"What did you just say?" Melissa asks.

Jesús replies, "Stop bragging, kid."

"Muy bien, saltamonte", says Aaron, laughing.

"What did you just say? "asks Carl.

"Very good, grasshopper." says Aaron

The two community brothers still haven't spoken a word, and have hardly even looked up from their plates.  I am beginning to wonder if I'm not the only one here who is sick.  Sometimes the Filipino appears to be trying not to smile or laugh.  The white guy is impossible to read.

"Spanish is such a beautiful language," Carl says.  "I would like to learn it."

"I would call it deceptive.  For example, last year when I was visiting my friend in Colombia we were driving on the highway, and I noticed a sign that said Encienda Luces.  Now, what do the rest of you think that would mean, y Jesús, cállate por favor."

Jesús translates, "He just told me to shut up." he is smiling.  It is nice to see him come out of his shell.  I wish he or someone would help me get out of mine.  

Aaron continues, "Now Encienda Luces could be the name of a famous Colombian torch singer, you know, like Dusty Springfield, only in Spanish with a salsa orchestra.  Or it could be the name of a swanky Gringo all inclusive resort.  Or maybe Encienda Luces is the name of a quaint colonial village with cobblestone streets and bougainvillea everywhere, just across the valley from the mountain where Juan Valdez picks his coffee beans."

Jesús is giggling uncontrollably.

"Okay, Jesús", says Aaron, "Would you be so kind as to tell everyone here the English translation for Encienda Luces?"

Jesús proudly announces, "Turn on your headlights," and suddenly even the two dour Community brothers are joining in the raucous laughter.

As the laughter dies down, Carol asks, "So our dinner tonight is vegetarian?"

Melissa replies, "I think everyone here has been advised that all the food here is vegetarian."

"But not vegan?"

"No, Carol, you needn't worry.  We are not vegans here."

The blonde, white community brother speaks for the first time, "What is the difference between a vegetarian and a vegan, anyway?"

"A vegetarian has a brain", replies Aaron, and again everyone is laughing.

Carl says, "A vegan is a vegetarian who doesn't eat any animal products, like eggs, cheese, milk, yogurt, honey, and so on."

"My younger daughter has turned into a vegan," Carol says.  "It has turned her into one dreadful self-righteous bore.", she says while scraping the last of her food from her plate, "And she hates the Royal Family.  I don't know what I did wrong with her.  Perhaps I wasn't with her enough, did too much touring."

I ask her, "Do you still tour?"

"Oh God, no.  I'm all but retired.  But I will perform for you during our stay here, if you'd like.  There is a lovely baby grand in the other reception room."  She dabs her mouth with a white linen napkin, as though trying to prevent herself from saying anymore, then, like a well behaved schoolgirl sits up erect, facing forward, her hands folded on the table in front of her soiled dinner plate...  

The Peacock 40

 "What is your real name?" Carol wants to know. Melissa has taken away the remains of the salad and is just returning carrying the main course, a huge pyrex serving dish full of a steaming vegetarian dish.

"I can't remember."

"You are being very droll, you know," says Carol with dry irony.  This is the third time I have caught her being British quaint,  using first the word quite, then I dare say, and now, droll.  Perhaps she grew up with older relations, and lived in rather a restrained and sheltered upper middle class bubble.  Or perhaps she is merely pretentious.  Odd woman.  With her share of contradictions, given how she started out today declaring that our sexuality is a gift, whatever the hell that is supposed to mean. But very supportive of the status quo, at least insofar as the Anglican Church is concerned.  

"Not intentionally." This dish seems particularly delicious, I see various vegetables, broccoli, mushrooms, eggplant, peppers and zucchini and what appear to be cubes of tofu and whole cloves of roasted garlic all smothered in a fragrant cheese sauce.

"Not intentionally?" says Aaron with a quizzical smile.

"I mean to say", I can hardly make myself understood while exalting in this half mouthful of savoury deliciousness, "I mean to say that I can't remember my name."  Only after a lapse of a few seconds do I feel all eyes upon me.  All except for the two brothers in the community, who seem silently, prayerfully, focused on their repast.  

"Not intentionally", I repeat, Carefully chewing my food, absorbing the maximum pleasure from this incredibly flavourful food, and knowing that explanations are expected, explanations are being demanded.  "I can't remember my name."

"How did you come up with Cosme?" Carol wants to know.

"I have no idea." And now I really want to change the subject, or for someone to come to my rescue.  Or simply to pick up my plate and finish my dinner alone in the breakfast room...

 

The Peacock 39

 "Where would you like me to begin?" I reply to Jesús.

"I am curious about your name", he says.  "It is a Spanish name. Do you have Spanish or Latin blood?"

"My mother was Mexican."

"Was Mexican."

"She passed away, years ago.  I was just a child."

"I am so sorry to here that, Cosme", says Carol, eavesdropping between mouthfuls of arugula.  

There are not going to be any private conversations at this table.  I see.  Unwritten rule.

"Thanks, Carol.  It was quite a long time ago."

"Yes, love, but she is your mother.  I just recently was nursing my own mother.  She passed away just in November."

"Oh, I am sorry, Carol", I say, wanting to match compassion with sympathy.  

"She was ninety-five.  It was her time."

Jesús is determined to have this chat with me.  Fixing his eyes on me again, he says, "Do you speak Spanish?"

"No, I never learned it, really." 

"She didn't teach you?"

"I´m afraid not.  I was very young when she died.  I hardly remember her."  I know.  Too much information.  Everyone seems a bit uncomfortable now, except the two brothers from the community, who still haven't introduced themselves.  They continue eating in silence, as though they are the only ones in the dining room, as though each one is sitting here all alone in the Wedgewood--coloured elegance.

"She must have given you your name."

"She didn't, actually.  I don't know how to explain this, but...", and now I realize I am addressing everyone seated at the mahogany table, "Cosme... it isn't my real name..."

The Peacock 38

 This dining room is huge.  And beautifully appointed with the indigo blue walls set off by wood trim painted ivory.  Like sitting inside Wedgewood.  I see more paintings, a mountain landscape, an ocean sunset and a still life, huge, of abundant fruit spilling out of the bowl.  We are eight seated at the huge rectangular mahogany table.  I happen to know it's mahogany because Carl, next to whom I am seated, just told me.  Aaron is on my right, and Jesús directly across from me.  On the other side of Aaron and Jesús I see two members of the community, then Carol and Melissa, seated across from each other at the very end, in apparent female solidarity.  

We are just finishing the first course, a butternut squash soup laced with spicy peanut satay.  

Carol says, "This soup is out of this world!"

Melissa replies "It´s an adaptation of an Indonesian dish.  As you may well know," she adds, by way of explanation, "Indonesia was once a Dutch colony, and our cooking has a lot of Indonesian influences." Melissa, who at first I assumed to be autistic, seems to be very eager to explain and educate.  Tending towards the didactic. Neither of the community members have spoken so much as a word since they sat down with us.  They are both young men, both wear glasses, slim, one is more blonde, the other seems perhaps Filipino.  Both are dressed casually, T shirts and jeans. Carol alone has taken the effort to actually dress for dinner.  She is turned out remarkably like she was when I saw her in concert ten years ago.  That could be even the same black cocktail dress.  No one seems to have a lot to say, given how amped out we all are from that long discourse this afternoon.  So much to digest, along with all this delicious food.

Carl leaves briefly then returns bearing a huge glass bowl of salad.  He suddenly suggests for me a kind of handsome earth deity celebrating the early harvest.  With his luminous smile he sets the bowl at the far end of the table, near Carol and Melissa and begins to mete out individual servings.

Again, I notice the soft brown eyes of Jesús strangely focussed on me, as though gently caressing my face.  As I look back, he lowers his gaze, smiles gently, and I think I can see him blushing slightly.  Then, looking up at me as he spears a cherry tomato with his fork, he says to me, "Cosme, tell me about your life please..."

The Peacock 37

 I want to see the peacock again.  I have to see it.  Otherwise it is just a hallucination. Another hallucination.  I was taken off the medication last month.  They wanted to see how I would do.  For the last year they were gradually decreasing the dosage, and I have done well.  But now, I wonder if it is happening again.  Like, forgetting my name.  I was already having memory lapses.  And now, who am I?  I still don't know where the name Cosme comes from.  It's just as well, I suppose.  Father Griffin said that overwork and burnout were affecting me.  I'm sure he's right.  It was on his recommendation that I enrolled in the palliative care training program.  I had already had some contact with death and dying in my work in home care.  I learned a lot on the job.  An awful lot.

It was that palliative care conference in London ten years ago that really framed everything for me.  Father Griffin, evidently a man of means, was not shy about funding me.  And now, to meet Carol again here.  The Great Carol Barlowe-Mead.  To hear her in the fusty Victorian opulence of the Royal Albert Hall, pounding out Rachmaninov's Third Piano Concerto.  With precision, with passion, with energy, with joy, with restraint.  It is hard to square the grumpy, crusty  Englishwoman in the parlour with such virtuosic genius.  The legend is merely human.

I really don't feel like going in for dinner, or not just yet.  I really wish I had my phone with me right now.  Carl mentioned that for an hour after dinner, we can all go on our phones and laptops, but only for an hour, and all in the same room, and we are also expected to share with everyone whatever we happen to be seeing or doing.  I asked why, and he said that it's because social media is really very antisocial, and for each of us, to gain the maximum benefit from being here, then we have to all participate, we all have to enter into a communal rhythm, as he calls it.  

This is also the very spot, Carl tells us, where his father died and his body disappeared.  I would like to know what really happened.  Are we being told the truth?  But there is something about this place, especially this little clearing with the southern magnolia.  I can't put my finger on it, but I feel compelled, that I have to be here, regularly, often. And now the light is melting all the foliage into a molten exaltation of gold, platinum and silver.  A molten exultation.  God, how purple can I get?  I almost can see someone standing in the foliage, wearing something white and shining.  I must be hallucinating.  And I am actually starting to feel hungry right now...

The Peacock 36

 I am so glad to get out of there, to be outside again.  I don't know which I was desiring more, to simply be outside or to get out of that bloody living room.  It is a lovely room, of course, and what an interesting talk we just heard.  But that's enough for now.  That is really quite enough.  The air is so fragrant and cool right now.  That perfect cool of a May afternoon.  The azaleas look more brilliant than ever as the late sun almost ignites them into a huge orange and yellow flame.  This place is truly magical.  Here are the tulip beds.  I wonder how Carl and Melissa find all the time to take care of this place.  But we were just told that there are others living here in community, and we are going to meet some of them at dinner.  Well, after all the beautiful food they have been cramming us with, I can't say that I am going to go hungry here.  I am likely going to get fat, if anything.

I know where I am going.  This is the trail that Carl and I were cutting together today.  It is rather rough and clean looking.  It is a bit of a shortcut, I suppose, to the magnolia. This is where it gets a bit wilder, rather a strange integration of formal garden and West Coast wilderness.  Rhododendrons and azaleas aplenty in their polychromatic riot, flourishing beneath massive trunks of old growth cedar and hemlock. and a plethora of evergreen sword ferns and deer ferns beneath the deciduous pale green canopy of newly unfurled bracken and ostrich ferns.  And foxglove already starting to bloom.  This is an elfin paradise.  How do they manage this place, anyway?

Here is the magnolia tree.  The single flower just beginning to unfurl does seem a bit bigger than this morning.  I am glad they put a couple of benches here. Of course I want to see the peacock again.  If only to know that it is real.  And I did hear him again when I was waking up from my nap this morning,  But that could have been a dream.  I am still really afraid of asking anyone about the peacock while I am here.  It could be just a dream...Or maybe a hallucination....

The Peacock 35

 "You said it was a suicidal depression?" asks Carol. "What exactly happened?"

Aaron says, "I just couldn't go on.  I felt helpless and paralyzed against the monolithic Big Church. If they still had absolute power I would probably have been burned at the stake.  I was going to overdose on painkillers.  Instead, I phoned a friend.  She came over and helped calm me down and on my request she took the pills away.  The next day I wrote Stephen a letter explaining exactly what really did happen, without Gloria or Griffin around to twist and lie.  We soon got together for coffee and he gave me a full and sincere apology.  He was also already taking seriously the importance of getting Griffin out of the church.  Fortunately, after a few months, as the truth about him really began to surface, he was finally kicked out of St. Jude's.  Of course, being Anglicans, they lied about his dismissal, and simply he had taken early retirement.  No accountability."

Looking at Carl, Aaron says, "That would have been just before you met Robert Griffin for the first time."

I ask, "How did he end up in Switzerland?"

"The way Robert described it to us," Carl says, "Following his dismissal from St. Jude's, and it was a dismissal, no matter what other kinds of lies were being told,   Robert was a broken man.  When Melissa and I were staying in his house with the banker dude, Robert had already put the place up for sale."

Melissa interjects, "That was the other thing they were yelling at each other about.  That was why they went outside, since they didn't want us to hear any more."

"And," resumes Carl, "he ended his relationship with the banker dude, and came to visit our community.  He had already been there several times, but always under the guise of the charismatic rebel priest.  And he had a lot of people there awed and wowed.  He did pack quite the personal charisma."

"He still does," Carol said.

Carl says, "It must be getting close to supper, and I am sure some of us must be getting hungry.  Shall we resume tomorrow, everyone?  We have only just begun..."

 

The Peacock 34

"So," continues Aaron

"A needle pulling thread?", says Carol.

"Not bad, "Aaron says.  "But anyway, there was one other misstep I haven't told you about. I also mentioned to Gloria that David, the rector of St. Jude's, might also have had a crush on me.  And even though I still am not absolutely certain, I think I had reason to wonder about this.  But that was just too much information for Her Purity, and of course she blabbed everything to both Father Griffin and to David.  And that is what David wanted to confront me about, but being a coward, he had to have Stephen there for backup, and Stephen of course was determined that the gossip must come to an end.  

"We drove together in Stephen's car to my apartment.  The visit must have lasted maybe a half an hour.  David simply said, deadpan, that no he had never ever had a crush on me.  I of course took his word for it, did not feel at all disappointed, relieved actually.  And humiliated.  And outraged.  Here I had been trying to bring to everyone's attention that one of their clergy had been gravely abusing his position, and this was the thanks I was getting.  There was no effort to reconcile, or find a common understanding.  David wasn't interested in any of that.  Simply to tell me his little lie, get himself off the hook, and also rely on the distraction from having to confront his dear Father Griffin, who was really the one who needed to be confronted.

"It was all really too much.  After they both left, I fell into a profound and suicidal depression.  That was just the final blow for me.  Big Church you know.  They will always have heretics to burn, and if they don't have them, then they will go out looking for them until they find them..."

the Peacock 33

 "Do go on", sighs Carol in near exasperation.

"Well, for one thing, let me explain a thing or two about this woman, Gloria.  She tended, like a lot of people at the church, to take everything literally, all black and white, no sense at all of nuance or irony, no sense of paradox.  In fact, for her and so many in St. James, a paradox is something for docking a pair of ships, and nothing else."

I actually find this quite funny and everyone is looking at me as I burst out laughing.  So I say, "But it's true you know. I have always noticed this about people at St. James, and you know what?  No one there even has a sense of humour.  About anything."

With a very wicked grin on his face, Aaron says. "Just like you Carol." And now he is chuckling.

"I hardly find that funny", she snorts indignantly.

Now we are all laughing.

"Oh will you stop, please!" she sputters. "All of you!"

"Carol", says Melissa, smiling, and she has a beautiful smile, "We're not laughing at you but with you."

"Oh, Aaron please do proceed, will you!"

"As you wish, Madame.  So, as I was saying, it really began to heat up when Stephen, the priest who was actually my friend, who also unlike the others there actually had a really good sense of humour, and nuance, and irony and paradox.  In other words, he had a brain and wasn't afraid to think with it.  Anyway, the rector, being an absolute coward, like most Anglican clergy, enlisted his aid in forming his own little inquisition about me.  I was the one to blame you know.  I was gossiping.  I was simply reporting what I had already seen and heard.  But I was also committing that most cardinal sin.  I was making the church look bad... 

The Peacock 32

"To be fair", Aaron says, "Father Griffin has changed a lot, an awful lot since thirty years ago."

Melissa interjects, "You actually saw a lot more of that side of him, Aaron.  Even I am shocked by some of what you are reporting.  Even after he tried to shut me up and get rid of us with a lovely little bribe."

"I think this is all in the most dreadful, terrible bad taste," says Carol.  "I can hardly believe that Father Griffin would ever consent to this kind of, this kind of character assassination."

The large orange cat, as though to signal his sympathy to the famous concert pianist, gets up, stretches, arching his back, then leaps to the floor and walks out of the room.

"Father Griffin has insisted that we do this", Carl says.  "He says that for him this is an important act of penance, and we fully support him in this."

"Well, then do proceed, I suppose, " Carol assents.

"It was just days after when I was scheduled to have coffee with the journalist who interviewed me for the church magazine. The idea was, since she spoke Spanish as a second language-she had done missionary work in El Salvador for several years, that maybe she could help me get started with the language. So, I was all set to meet up with her, then she gave a phone call to cancel our visit, saying that she no longer wanted to see me, given how I had slandered to her Father Griffin."

"Well, I could hardly blame her, you know," says Carol snarkily.

"Apparently, she had gone straight to Griffin to tell him that she did not want to be part of a church where such dreadful and illicit acts are being done in the clergy house.  Then, Griffin somehow twisted it all around-something he was very good at doing-, persuading her that I had a very fertile imagination, and that no one would even dream of doing anything to disparage the church and bring shame upon the Holy Name of the one she is purported to serve.  He also persuaded her that I was the real problem, given my proclivity for gossip.  But wait, there's more and it gets even more sick and twisted..."

The Peacock 31

"The ill will had of course festered between us over the years. After all the problems with him, I simply didn't want to be around the church if he was officiating or preaching and I also started to refuse the sacraments if he happened to be handing them out at the altar.  And on those Sundays when he was preaching, I would simply go downstairs to the church basement and wait there till he was finished.  His sermons were terrible by the way, they usually revolved around his own exalted self.  A real narcissist, and even though he seems to be finally growing out of this, to this day it is a problem with him.   None of this, of course, did anything to endear me to him, so we basically negotiated like two warring cats around our toxic mutual hate.  

At that time our church had a monthly magazine.  It was really a propaganda rag about how great St. Judes' was as a church and how wonderful and Christlike all their exalted hypocrites.  The lady who edited it wanted to interview me and write up a profile about me for the next issue.  I was flattered, and stupid enough to accept.  I hadn't even thought of the possibility that Griffin himself might have planted the idea in her head.

..

In the morning, she came over to my apartment where we could chat while I was painting.  I believe I was just putting the finishing touches on a giant portrait I was doing of Virginia Woolf.  Yes, THAT Virginia Woolf.  She actually wrote a very kind and interesting piece about me.  Flattering actually.  But then I made my huge misstep.  She was walking back to the church, which was about a forty minute walk and I offered to go with her since I was heading downtown anyway. as we got near the church this lady, who had previously been a missionary in El Salvador, wanted to know what I thought of same sex unions.  I simply expressed my ambivalence because I still hadn't worked out the theological implications, but I also mentioned my concern that gay marriage should never be used as a pretext for gay promiscuity, especially where clergy were concerned.  She wanted me to elucidate, so I told her everything that I knew about our dear Father Griffin.  She thanked me for the information, then left.  And that was but the beginning of all sorrows....

The Peacock 30

 Aaron continues,"I was warned by another friend, also a priest, and also gay, and living with his younger boyfriend, which for me was not at all a big deal, since I really like to meet people where they are at and not put expectations on them, even if they are clergy.  I only draw the line at using the clerical office as a cover for sexually exploiting others, and my friend was not doing this, very unlike Father Griffin. But he warned me about Griffin´s inherent talent at kneecapping his enemies.  My friend even had the nerve to suggest that I seek out Father Griffin as a spiritual director.  If only you could see his face once I stopped laughing!

"Well, I found out soon enough. In February of 1997, we had suffered almost a decade of this nonsense. And I was not having the best of times either.  The little Christian community I had been part of had broken up two years before, and I was feeling quite rudderless.  I was living on my own again, in a small apartment in East Vancouver, and working in health care as a home care worker. But rents were already getting high, and my employers were very parsimonious about hours, so I could barely eat and pay the rent. But I was also going through a creatively fecund period in my life.  I was writing and publicly reading epic poem cycles that were receiving widening acclaim, as well as painting and marketing my art, even if it never was quite enough to make a living.

"A fellow artist invited me to a party in his house that he shared with his wife.  To my shock and horror, I re-encountered more than twenty years worth of my rather twisted and complex personal history as represented in at least a dozen different people I had known, worked with, been friends with and had fought with, and loved at different periods, but it was so surreal that I left the party traumatized. 

"It was during this period of peak vulnerability when Griffin finally struck back at me, and with deadly force..."

The Peacock 29

 Aaron continues: "Father Griffin was pretty nonchalant when I talked to him. He simply said, "oh yes, Donny, a very nice young man."  Then he walked away from me. I decided it wouldn't be worth my time or effort pursuing this further.  However, I could no longer stomach him as a priest.  Not that I ever could.  I mean, it is one thing to accept that no one is perfect and we all make mistakes, but this little reptile was using his clerical robes as a cover for basically doing whatever the hell he wanted.  He just was going to go on hitting on and seducing any handsome young male in his path, relying on his denomination's obsession with appearing socially progressive in matters of homosexuality as a convenient excuse for his self-serving actions.  There was fortunately another priest on staff who shared my concerns about Griffin, and we were also good friends.  We were also quite agreed that turning a blind eye to Griffin's class of excess and welcoming same sex couples into the church were two different and contradictory things.

They were soon at war with each other, even preaching  against each other...in the same pulpit  But Griffin was such a reptile.  He even physically attacked a guy for standing up to his abusive behaviour, and had to be pulled off him since he had knocked him to the floor and was trying to strangle him.  His victim, though male, evidently was neither handsome or young.   He was actually one of the local street people who used to come into the church for the services and then for coffee and buns with marmalade after.  But Griffin seemed to have a chronic hate on for the local poor.

I just simply avoided him, and tried to continue with the ministry.  Though it was rather awkward having to field questions and comments from guys who were getting very annoyed with his attentions. And really, it was very difficult in some ways, because as I mentioned, the Anglican Church has this really lame obsession with appearing socially progressive.  Remember, I said appearing because appearances of virtue have always mattered more to those hypocrites than the real goods themselves."

"Aaron" barks Carol, "I sincerely and most heartily object to the content of your little discourse.  Could you please have done with it! I will not sit here and have the church that I love vilified like this! And what about poor Father Griffin!  Where is he in all of this?  If he could but even guess that you were slandering him this way..."

"Carol", asserts Carl.  "Let him finish.  Robert, or Father Griffin, is fully aware of the content of this talk we are giving about him.  He fully endorses what we are doing.  In fact, it was his idea."

"Well", she says, leaning back with resignation, "I daresay."

The Peacock 28

 "And what kind of answer is that!" scoffs Carol, indignant.  I am afraid that if she gets any angrier she will probably leave the room.  Aaron still has that smug, wily smile on his face.  I don't like it.  

Carl says, "Carol, take it from someone who's worked in the sex trade.  Father Griffin tried to feed me that line, and I will tell you how I answered him.  "If sex is a divine gift, then so is taking a shit.  It is a bodily function, a bodily appetite, primarily for propagating the species, since if it wasn't pleasurable, who would even want to bother with something so gross and messy.  No, think about it."

"You mean to say you are anti-pleasure?" she snorts.

"I mean to say", Aaron continues", that it doesn't matter whether it's enjoyable or not.  But the sex act, unless you happen to be playing with yourself, usually involves another person, and for the act to be appropriate, there needs to be at the very least mutual consent.  It means not treating other people like food.  And because of all the emotions involved, it had better be with someone with whom you are already in some kind of committed relationship.  That kind of vulnerability requires a lot of trust, and a lot of faithful commitment."

"Oh, I suppose", she says with affected indifference.  "But really, must you be vulgar?"

Carl interjects, "But you were talking about Father Griffin, right, Aaron?"

Yes, Father Griffin.  We generally tried to avoid each other.  Then one Saturday morning I noticed one of the rent boys I knew from Boys' Town, just leaving the clergy house.  I had been at the church for early mass.  He smiled, said hi and said, "Hey Greg (that was my name before I changed it legally a few years later)"

"Why did you change your name", Carol asks,

"Later, please", Aaron says chuckling patiently.  "So this rent boy, says he has just been visiting overnight none other than our Father Griffin.  He didn't need to go into any detail, but simply mentioned that the dear father was helping him out financially."  So, the next day, Sunday, I took the good father aside for a little chat after mass..."