The reception had been going on for near an hour when a woman came up to Fenn.
“Mrs. Malloy!”
“Fenn,” she said, hugging him, “I haven’t seen you in years.”
“This is Tom,” Fenn said, always quick to show his boyfriend to the world.
“Good to meet you, Tom. He’s very handsome,” she said to Fenn.
“And don’t I know it.”
He didn’t know how much Mrs. Malloy knew about him, or about him and her son, but he had no intentions of hiding anything.
“You haven’t gone up to him,” Mrs. Malloy said.
“Well, he’s been busy,” Fenn said. “Everybody wants a piece of him right now.”
He looked to where some woman was shaking Dan’s hand and the young priest was smiling while saying something polite to her.
“You even missed communion,” she said.
“You noticed that?”
“Yes, I noticed that. He probably did too.”
“He’s very busy,” Fenn said again. “I don’t want to crowd him on his day.”
“You’re his best friend,” Mrs. Malloy said, plainly.
Fenn said nothing.
“I don’t know what men tell each other, but Dan loves you. He always talks about you. You are so important to him. You need to go up and speak to him.”
Tom shrugged and said, “I agree.”
Fenn blinked at Tom, and then he nodded, shrugged and said, “Alright. Let’s go.”
“No,” Tom and Mrs. Malloy said.
“This a solo act, kid,” Tom said, touching Fenn on his shoulder.
Wanting to shoot them both, he went to go stand in the line of well wishers waiting for Dan. An old man kept talking, and Dan kept saying polite things and then came a young woman and then an old woman, and when she was gone, his face changed, and he put his hands on Fenn’s shoulders.
“I’ve been waiting for you!” Dan said. “What happened to you?”
“You know,” Fenn murmured. “Your day. Your space—”
Dan hugged him quickly.
“Why didn’t you take communion?”
“I had to go to the bathroom.”
Dan looked at him suspiciously, and then shrugged.
“Okay, so it’s not your thing. How long are you guys staying?” Dan asked.
“I don’t know.”
Some other people were milling in the background. Dan put an arm around him, jolly and almost inconsistent with his black uniform.
“Look, right now I sort of belong to the public, but could you guys stay a little longer so we can talk? Will Tom be alright with that?”
“Yes,” Fenn said, figuring it served Tom right for sending him up here in the first place. “We’ll just… We can wait.”
“Hey,” Dan said. He reached into his pocket.
“These are my keys. You guys can hang out in the monastery if you want. Crash in one of the guest rooms. I promises I’ll be there as soon as I can. Alright?”
His old friend looked so eager to talk to him, and he had questions for Dan. Fenn nodded.
“Alright.”
“Guys, I’m sorry it took me so long,” Dan came into the common room looking exhausted. “I just basically put my mom to bed and told my sisters where to go for a good time. As good a time as we have in my family.”
“Is everyone in your family really religious?” Tom said.
“We’re a tame bunch,” Dan told him.
Tom stood and said, “I’m going to let you guys catch up.”
“That’s not necessary,” Dan waved it off.
Tom grabbed his jacket.
“Yes it is,” he said. “Besides, I already agreed to discuss music with your organist. Congrats Dan.”
Tom offered his hand, and Dan shook it, saying, “Thanks. That means a lot, Tom.”
Dan watched as Tom left, and Fenn waited, wondering what Dan was about to say, and then he turned to Fenn and said:
“You’re a real son of a bitch.”
“Excuse me,” Fenn said.
Dan grinned and sat down beside his friend.
“Why were you hiding from me all day?”
“It makes me nervous,” Fenn said, frankly. “I don’t know how to handle you, Father Dan.”
“Don’t call me that,” Dan sounded genuinely disturbed.
“I’m sorry.” Then Fenn said, “but that’s what you are.”
“But it sounds like you’re mocking me when you call me that.”
“I’m not.”
Dan said, stubbornly, “I still just wish you wouldn’t do it. It’s enough really old people coming up to me shaking my hand and calling me ‘Father’. They don’t know me. They don’t even see me.”
“They’re not supposed to,” Fenn said.
Dan looked at him.
“Daniel, it’s not about you. Why do you think you’re wearing the same clothes that three hundred other men here are wearing? It stopped being about you the moment you walked into seminary.”
Dan just looked at Fenn.
“You knew that, though,” Fenn said.
“You are the only person who would ever say that to me.”
“I don’t go to church,” Fenn said. “And I don’t really care about priests. To me… you’re just you. That’s probably why you don’t want me to call you Father.”
“I’m enough though, right?”
“Huh?”
“I mean for you,” Dan said. “Me is enough. You don’t need me to be more?”
“That’s a funny question,” Fenn said. “Of course I don’t need you to be more. How could you be more? You and Tara are my dearest friends. I love you, you idiot.”
He looked down and saw that Dan was fiddling with something. He was fiddling with his rosary beads. He looked up at Fenn.
“Of course it’s not about me. Of course it’s about God. It’s about giving up me. It’s about serving. But I need to know that to someone I’m me. Just me. Just Dan.”
Fenn nodded and then stopped nodding. Dan kept looking at his black rosary beads, and Fenn kept looking out of the window.
“You’re thinking something,” Dan said.
“Well… yes.”
“Which is?”
“Daniel,” Fenn said, “as long as I’ve known you, you’ve wanted to be seen as a priest. You’ve wanted to be something more. Today Tom said you didn’t smile at all during your ordination and now that you are, like it or not, Father Daniel Malloy, you don’t want it. You just want to be you.”
Dan shook his head.
“That’s sort of true. I mean it is true.”
“Then what?”
Dan placed a hand on Fenn’s shoulder. He looked, though still very handsome, suddenly a little old.
“Where we are concerned,” Dan said. “no matter what we do, we are always what we are right now. Plain Dan. Plain Fenn. And we love each other.”
“Yes,” Fenn said, nodding as the room darkened and evening began. “Yes, and always.”
He knew who the girls were. They were Dan’s sisters. They waved at Tom, giddy on the day of their brother’s ordination. But they couldn’t have possibly known who he was. He waved back and continued his trot to Overmyer Hall where the organist he had earlier criticized said they would meet.
“So my music could have been improved?” the dark haired young man said, coming down the steps to meet Tom. He was tall and aquiline, dark haired and olive skinned with flashing white teeth. The young musician wore a jaunty fedora and Tom chuckled, reminded of Fenn.
“That’s not what I said.”
“I distinctly heard your friend Fenn say to the newly ordained priest that you said my organ playing could be better.”
Tom blinked.
The dark haired young man chuckled and rubbed his jaw, which was stylishly unshaven.
“He didn’t know I was there.”
“I was feeling rude,” Tom apologized.
“No matter,” the other man shrugged. “You have a little free time?”
“I think,” Tom said, rolling his eyes, “I have all night.”
“Your friend?”
“I might as well put this out there,” Tom said. “Fenn is my partner. We’ve lived together for eight years.”
“Oh,” the organist’s dark eyes rolled. Tom couldn’t tell if he was making fun of him or what.
“Then no need for me to hide, either, but I think we church organists and the like hide in plain sight. Never met a straight one yet. Come on, I’ll treat you to coffee.”
The sun had set. They could hear the distant noise of the town, and overhead the sky was a deep, gold filled blue with stars budding. The other young man’s strides were strong and long, and Tom had to catch up with him. When he turned to his side to look at the trim figure beside him, it hit him like lightning that this was the most gorgeous man he’d ever seen.
“By the way,” the other musician turned around, holding a hand out for Tom, “if I’m going to buy you a coffee, I should probably know you’re name.”
“Oh!” Tom began, and then chuckled, feeling foolish.
“Yes. It’s Tom Mesda.”
“Tom Mesda,” the other man said, cocking his fedora so only one gleaming dark eye showed while he shook Tom’s hand.
“It’s good to meet you, Tom.
“I’m Bryant Babcock.”
END OF PART ONE
