“You read the readings beautifully,” he said, blushing, and I said, “Your homily was great as usual.” Then he asked me about my job and family and, except for clearing his throat several times, he let me talk, which I loved. When we finally said goodbye, we hugged each other from the waist up as he nervously patted my back.
For the next three months, I walked out the side door. There was always such a long line of parishioners out the front waiting to shake his hand. I was afraid of what I’d started. I also knew Father would be disappointed when he got through the line, and there was no me. The fact that I could have this kind of effect on a man, on him, assuaged my unhappiness, made me feel in control at least for a little while. There were times when therapy made me feel more broken, like the day I remembered when my father had taken Nellie and me to Beefsteak Charlie’s and afterwards to the hotel he was staying in on Shore Parkway until he found an apartment. The waitress told him how gorgeous Nellie was, as I cut her meat and went up to the buffet three times. Then when we walked into his room, the haze of stale cigarette smoke made us cough as Papa put on the Mets game, closed the thick, dark drapes, and snored in the chair. I thought, How sad. I sat Nellie on the bedspread dotted with burn holes and tried teaching her Miss Mary Mack, pretending I didn’t feel lonely as the sun choked its way from beneath the hems. After a few minutes, her eyes got so heavy, I laid her golden head on the pillow. Alone in the dark with the glare of the TV and Papa’s snores mixing with Ralph Kiner’s voice, I started to cry softly. After a half hour I couldn’t take it any longer. I wiped my face and nudged Nellie awake so her crying would wake my father. When I got home, I pretended I was fine. I didn’t want to bother my mother. She always had so much to do. I was afraid she wouldn’t understand. Once I told RF, I cried for hours.
A few days before Palm Sunday, Father called me to ask if I’d fill in for a lector who had cancelled. He’d gotten my number from the parish files. Standing in my blue and white kitchen, I vaguely felt he’d crossed a line, but I was too excited to complain. When we spoke again after Mass, I looked in his hazel eyes and gushed, “Father, you listen. So many people don’t; they’re just thinking about what they’re going to say next. It’s nice.”
Then Good Friday happened.
I was with Janine at the three o’clock service, the hour that Jesus died. The church was cloaked in purple and swelling with people but quiet except for a sporadic cough. I was saving a seat for my friend Silvia who had something to tell me but didn’t want to wait until I got home from church. I tucked my hair behind my ear just in case Father Infanzi was one of the celebrants. Then he and two other priests including Monsignor Brennan were processing down the center aisle. Instead of heading for the presiders’ chairs as they would during Mass, they prostrated themselves on the altar. Silvia slipped into the seat next to mine, we kissed hello, and she waved at Janine.
I looked at the altar and felt an odd sense of satisfaction—Silvia and Father Infanzi in the same place. She and I’d been friends since third grade except for the first semester of high school. Since I was going to a different school than she was, I was hoping I’d make a new best friend. She was always so perfect and pulled together: her straight dirty-blonde hair never out of place, her science scores always higher than mine, her sins hardly worthy of confession. The night of our eighth grade awards ceremony, I’d had enough, but not because she was valedictorian. I had won the English award. It was all I’d wanted, but back at her house after the ceremony, she asked me to take a picture of her and her father. My father had not been there. I’m not sure if my mother or I even bothered to ask him. When I looked through the lens, Silvia and Mr. Pelusi both 5’7” and holding her certificate in front of them, looked like a couple—heads cocked, Neapolitan pride flooding their faces, especially his. I felt invisible, but I wasn’t sure why, which only made it worse. A few months later when we went off to high school, I tried to break it off with her. But when I transferred to Catholic school half way through the year, she stopped me in the hall one day and asked, “Ri, can we be friends again?”
I bowed my head thanking God for Father, when out of the corner of my eye I saw the emerald cut engagement ring on Silvia’s hand that she’d splayed on the pew in front of us. I’d known this day was coming—she’d been going out with Greg for a year—but I’d pretended it wasn’t. She was my only single friend left. Stung, I looked at the altar trying not to see the ring, but it pressed on me, springing up from the pew like a big, perfect bow, growing to the size of my envy. I wanted to drop my head on my sister’s shoulder, but she wouldn’t have understood. Even if she and the rest of my family knew that the only reason I was dating Rick—a friend of a friend who had called on Valentine’s Day—was so I’d have something to do on Saturday nights, they’d never suspect I felt a calling. They’d tell me I was only twenty-seven, I’d meet the right one, there was plenty of time.
I steadied myself as I looked at Father Infanzi on the floor. There was no way he was celibate because he couldn’t get a wife. He had a choice, which made his priesthood a beautiful sacrifice. It didn’t matter that he had lifted my phone number or that whenever we spoke he looked like he was struggling not to say something. All I saw now was a perfectly sweet, good looking man who would’ve made a wonderful husband giving his life to Christ. How did he do it? When the men rose from the floor and continued the liturgy, I was certain Father helped me overcome my jealousy. I lifted Silvia’s hand, looked directly at the gem, and mouthed as genuinely as I could, C…o…n…g…r…a…t…u…l…a…t…i…o…n…s and W…o…w. She smiled and mouthed in return, I k…n…o…w. After church, when Silvia showed off her ring to me, I proudly introduced Father Infanzi to her.
The next night at the Easter Vigil after Father had sung the Exsultet, and I approached the lectern to read, I looked in his eyes. It was a split second, but I could see how excited he got. After Mass I told him, “I didn’t know you could sing too,” and he laughed and said, “You look nice.” I walked away feeling lit up but unsettled, the same way I felt four days later when he called again. It was one thing for us to talk after Mass, another for him to call a second time for no reason. It felt wrong. I wanted his attention but on my terms. I’d told myself that this was just a budding friendship. His phone call had threatened that. For the next several weeks I walked out the side door again, but I was soon in line at the front door once more. His relief when he saw me was intoxicating. We started talking after Mass nearly every week. In June, when he was leaving to go on a cruise, I sent him a bon voyage card: I wish you some lucky strolls in the casino. I thought celibacy such an enormous sacrifice that he deserved a little fun. When he called to thank me, I felt the knot in my stomach again, but I said, “You’ll be missed.” Two weeks later, I asked him out to lunch.
I was standing near my car after Mass stalling, hoping that if I gave Father enough time to finish locking up the gates he’d come over before I drove away. I’d spent the previous weekend with Rick at our friends’ pre-wedding festivities in upstate New York, but I thought about Father Infanzi. I’d sent him another postcard: After driving beside Seneca Lake for a half hour, there’s still more lake. As beautiful as it is, I’m truly a city girl. Hope you’re doing well. I got in my car, put the key in the ignition, and pretended to search for something in my pocketbook. A minute later, Father was a few inches from my window telling me how special the postcards were. Then he told me that he was going on a second vacation, this time to the Midwest to visit his family and to go to Vegas. “Wow,” I said, feeling a little jealous, though I wasn’t sure why. Priests go to Vegas? When he added that he’d be gone for a month, I looked away and back at him. Then, before I lost my nerve, “Maybe when you return, I could show you around the college, and we could go to lunch?” He blushed and laughed nervously. Putting his hand in his pocket to calm himself, he said, “That would be very nice.”
Five weeks later on my 28th birthday, we were sitting in a quaint Italian restaurant, the salt tang of New York Harbor sweeping through the French doors. I was wearing a long flower-printed dress with short sleeves and had my hair pulled up softly on the sides. He was wearing khakis and a light pink button-down shirt with a beeper clipped to his belt in case the rectory needed him. Ordinarily
