The Prodigal: A Ragamuffin Story

  “I read your books,” Father Frank was saying as Jack poured this last beer. From down the bar, Shayla chimed in, “I started the first one, Jack, but I couldn’t get all the way through it.” She made an I’m sorry face. “It made me feel bad about myself.”

  “That was sort of the point,” Jack muttered. “We don’t feel bad enough about ourselves.”

  “Oh, I think you feel bad enough. More than bad enough,” Frank said. “And you taught everyone else to feel the same.” He patted the top of the bar. “When you were inviting people to open their Bibles, did you ever invite them to turn to that lovely spot in Romans? ‘For I am certain of this: neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nothing already in existence and nothing still to come, nor any power, nor the heights nor the depths, nor any created thing whatever, will be able to come between us and the love of God, known to us in Christ Jesus our Lord.’”

  That last glass of beer had worked wonders; he could say what he was actually thinking. Jack turned to Father Frank and smiled for several seconds. “I was the people’s pastor. You’re a broken-down, alcoholic priest in a broken-down town. And you think you’re going to teach me something about God?”

  Frank inclined his head, and Jack thought maybe he’d gone too far.

  He’d never been punched by a priest before.

  Then Frank raised his head and looked Jack square in the eyes. He saw pain, but there was something else. “You’ve spoken God’s truth there, lad. But perhaps you might try and answer the question that yours begs: How is it that, late one night on the first day of Christmas, the people’s pastor finds himself in a bar in this nothing town, talking about God with this broken-down alcoholic who calls himself a priest?”

  “I’m sorry,” Jack said, raising a hand. He sighed. “That was cruel.”

  Frank shrugged. “You asked me a real question,” he said. “I’m asking you one in return.”

  Jack raised his pitcher. Nothing but the dregs was left.

  “Can I get you anything else, Jack?” Shayla asked.

  “No,” Jack said. “Thanks, Shayla.” He laid his last two dollars on the bar as a tip and took a deep breath.

  Back out in the cold? Back to a house full of memories?

  He wondered where Tracy was tonight, if Alison was asleep or lying awake. He imagined her sleeping, probably at her grandparents’ in California. Maybe they were nervously listening for the door, wondering if he was going to track them down. Why hadn’t he even considered it?

  More likely the church had helped them start a new life somewhere far away from TV cameras. And tonight, the grandparents were visiting, helping Tracy and Alison ease into their first Christmas without him.

  Not even that fourth glass of beer could soften the blow. He would never find them, never get his church back, never be anything but a punch line for the rest of his life.

  “I’m finished,” he said. He sat back in his chair, feeling it in his bones. Everyone had abandoned him. God had abandoned him. He was done for.

  “What’s that?” Frank asked.

  “Nothing,” he said. He laughed, a sardonic “huh,” and slid unsteadily to his feet. “Thanks for the company. I guess I’ll go”—he exhaled slowly—“home.”

  “Let me drive you,” Frank said, stretching out a hand to steady him. “You’ve had a lot to drink in a little time, and Shayla has had enough of my company for this one night.”

  “Go on,” she said, looking up from polishing a glass. “Who needs you?” But she smiled at Frank, and despite his own extremity, Jack could see love in her eyes.

  “Okay, then,” Jack said. “I’d be grateful.”

  They walked out to the sidewalk. The wind was whipping down the street, and Jack hugged himself for warmth.

  Father Frank still drove that ancient Chrysler LeBaron, maroon, with a white vinyl top.

  “I know,” Frank said, opening Jack’s door. “1986. Beat up as its driver.”

  “You’ve had this car as long as I’ve known you. Known about you,” he corrected himself as they got inside. Frank turned the heat on high as soon as the engine warmed up.

  “It still gets me where I’m going. That’s enough. And I don’t think I could ever replace all my cassette tapes. Not on a priest’s salary.”

  “Well, there you go,” Jack said. He was beginning to warm up, and he felt pleasantly buzzed. Father Frank pulled something from the backseat—a cassette. He pushed it in and an Irish reel filled the car.

  “Really?” Jack asked. “You are a walking stereotype, Father Frank.”

  “What can I say?” Frank shrugged. “We love what we love.”

  “I expected Van Morrison,” Jack said.

  “Ouch,” Frank said, backing into the empty street and pulling forward onto the snow-blown main street. “And here I was just listening to ‘Moondance.’”

  It was a short drive, and they let the silence sit. It was not uncomfortable.

  “It’s the corner up ahead,” Jack blurted out, perhaps unnecessarily, because Frank pulled easily into the drive behind his father’s car. Dennis and Mary had left.

  “Your father and I have had the odd conversation of late,” Frank said, after he shifted into park. He looked meaningfully across at Jack. “You’ve come home at a good time.”

  Again, Jack could not help but laugh, a bark of amusement totally out of proportion to the mirth he felt. “Is that how it seems to you?”

  “Yes,” Frank said. “Indeed it does.”

  Jack reached for the door handle, but Father Frank reached his hand out. “This broken-down old priest would enjoy a word or two with you again sometime.”

  Jack turned to go. Then he nodded. “It’s a small town,” Jack said.

  “That it is. Give my best to your father. Good night, Jack.”

  He waved as he backed onto the street, then drove off into the night. Jack stood watching him go, shivering, wondering if he would wake up his father. Wondering if he really wanted to go inside at all.

  He walked up to the lighted porch, raised his fist to knock, but hesitated.

  It opened then, of its own accord. Or so it seemed.

  His father stood in his plaid flannel robe, thin white legs exposed beneath it.

  “Come inside,” he said. “I made coffee.”

  “Hey,” Jack said, closing the door behind him. “I—”

  “I made coffee,” Tom repeated. He led Jack by the arm to the table. They sat and sipped and thought about what they might say to each other.

  “I’m sorry about your sister,” Tom said at last. “She shouldn’t have said those things.”

  Jack shrugged. “She’s got a right. She’s been here. I wasn’t. I’m–I’m sorry I ruined the evening.”

  His father waved it away. “You can’t ruin ham casserole. I left you some if you want to warm it up.”

  “I think I do,” Jack said, making his way to the fridge. He hadn’t eaten since breakfast, and not much then. “Father Frank said I should tell you hello.”

  “Did he?” Tom asked. “Father Frank?”

  Jack was spooning some casserole onto a plate and paused. “I guess because he’s been keeping an eye out for you.” Jack looked back at his father. “Since you’ve been sick and all.”

  Tom nodded, his head down. “He has.”

  “I’m sorry,” Jack said, returning to the table. “I’m sorry you couldn’t tell me. It’s no wonder Mary’s mad at me. I’d be furious.”

  “Well,” Tom said. He shrugged. “You’re here now.”

  “It doesn’t make up for—” Jack stopped himself; it sounded horribly familiar.

  They listened to the microwave hum, the fan breathe out the scents of melted cheese and diced ham.

  “Why don’t you come to work with me tomorrow?” his father asked after neither had said anything for a minute or two. “I could use your help with year-end inventory. Back room mostly. You wouldn’t have to talk to customers. And you could do with something to occupy y
our mind.”

  The microwave dinged, and Jack pulled out his steaming food. “I’m not saying no,” he said. “But how is counting hammers going to get back what I’ve lost?”

  “I don’t know,” his father said. “But it seems to me that we do what we can with what we have where we are.” He spread his hands, indicated the table, the town, the planet. “And this is where we are.”

  “Sounds like something Father Frank would say,” Jack said, seating himself.

  “It probably is,” Tom said. He inclined his head. “Don’t forget to say grace.”

  Jack looked at his father, waiting.

  He looked at his sister’s ham casserole, steaming on the plate.

  He looked around the table, empty of so much for so long.

  He looked at himself, a dark shadow in his grandfather’s dining room table.

  He looked back at his father, head bowed.

  And then he, too, inclined his head.

  “Grace,” he said.

  Then Jack picked up his fork, and slowly and with gathering strength, he began to eat.

  5.

  Some things never change. In Jack’s lifetime alone, the world had moved from rotary dial to cell phones, from three networks to YouTube and Netflix, but in Chisholm’s Hardware, Eisenhower was still president—or maybe Roosevelt.

  Teddy Roosevelt.

  Jack walked in and turned in a circle, taking in its rough-plank floors and tall shelves filled with hacksaw blades, plumbing supplies, and four-penny nails.

  He was amazed that customers could slide a credit card at the cash register now. Otherwise, it didn’t seem that anything had changed since his childhood, including the dirty tile at the front desk.

  “You know, they’ve developed a wonderful new flooring,” Jack said. “I think it’s called linoleum.” He shook his head. “And that stool. You should use it for kindling.”

  “Your mother used to sit on this stool,” Tom said after they had unlocked the door, hung up their coats, and stepped behind the front counter.

  “I remember,” Jack said. “You used to work the back room, and she’d sit out here and make people laugh. That was before—” Jack stopped.

  “Yes,” his father said, sighing as he eased himself slowly up onto the stool. “That was before.”

  “So, what can I do?” Jack said, looking around. He had worked at the store through high school, and in the summers when he was home from college. He had worked the register, loaded lumber, signed in shipments, made deliveries, counted loose nails. He’d done every task in the store except bookkeeping, which was Mary’s province. Running this store was second nature to him.

  Like preaching a sermon, he thought, shaking his head.

  Like shaking hands after the service. Like smiling until your face hurts.

  “I tried to let things sell down here at the end of the year so there’d be less to count.”

  “Like always.” Jack nodded.

  Tom pulled a black binder from next to the cash register. “I was hoping maybe you could do a rough count of the lumber. Manny and I can’t shift the piles the way we used to.”

  Manny was older than Tom—had worked for Tom’s father, in fact. No one, maybe not even Manny himself, knew how old he truly was. Jack guessed that about all he was good for anymore was sweeping the floor and companionship. Not that those were unimportant.

  “Loose and bundled lumber both, okay?”

  “Of course.” Jack felt a tiny smile flicker at the corners of his mouth. He’d be outside where he didn’t have to talk to anybody, and two days after Christmas, surely nobody would be in the lumberyard. It was as close to hiding out as he could get in plain sight.

  As if on cue, the bell at the front door jingled, and an elderly woman in a red-and-green Christmas-themed pantsuit and tennis shoes stepped inside. Her agility belied her age. Nora Calhoun was in her eighties, but she was apparently still able to take her morning walk.

  “Jack Chisholm,” she was saying now. He looked left and right, as though perhaps she was speaking to someone else. But her eyes—and her grin—were directed straight as an arrow. “That’s right, son. I am talking to you.”

  Against his better judgment, he returned her smile. “Mrs. Calhoun,” he said. “Can I show you some hammers on this lovely morning?”

  “Don’t give me any of your lip,” she said, but she had a twinkle in her eye. Nora Calhoun had been his Sunday School teacher when he was in fifth grade, the first grown-up outside his family to tell him how sorry she was about Martha’s death. She was also the custodian of a secret recipe for fried-chicken seasoning that was the pride and envy of a town full of women who still cut up fryers and put them in a pan of hot oil. “I came as soon as I heard you were back. I hope you’ll stay a good long time.”

  “Good Lord, no,” Jack blurted, his eyes going wide. “I mean, I’m just here for a while. Just helping out.”

  Nora Calhoun shook her head. “It’s good timing,” she said. “Your father needing the extra help. And your recent troubles.”

  It’s a sad thing when your private shame becomes public knowledge, he remembered. He had better grow a tougher skin—or regrow the one small-town living had once taught him.

  “What can I do for you, Mrs. Calhoun?” he said. “Exactly?”

  “Oh, you’re not getting off that easy, Jack,” she said. “I don’t need anything this store can offer.”

  “You need a new roof,” Tom said, and Jack turned to him, grateful for the opportunity to edge away.

  “As though I could afford a new roof, Tom,” she said. “The materials alone would set me back a pretty penny.”

  “We could sell it to you in installments,” Jack said, heading toward the coatrack. “A nail at a time.”

  “Oh,” she said in mock indignation. “I don’t suppose I’m quite that hard up.”

  “We’ll work with you,” Tom said. “Nora, you do need a new roof.”

  “I do,” she admitted. “Lyndi climbed up and put that tarp over the leaky spot. And it still leaks.” She turned to Jack. “Lyndi is my great-granddaughter. She comes to see me every week or so from Austin.” She smiled wryly. “I believe her mother makes her.”

  “I’ve got to go out to the yard,” Jack told her, pulling on his coat. “It’s good to see you, Mrs. Calhoun.”

  “Oh, I’ll see you again,” she said. “That’s a promise. Now, I’m off to practice for Sunday.” Nora Calhoun had been the organist at Saint Paul’s since before Jack was born. She smiled and turned to go, and he stepped out the back door and into the lumberyard, clipboard in hand.

  It was chilly. He pulled on his gloves, tugged on the wool cap he’d found in the top of his closet, knitted by his mom years ago in the maroon and white of the Mayfield Wildcats. As he slipped it over his head, it felt a little like a hug across the great divide. Thanks, Mom.

  The lumberyard was a small space—unlike in the big box stores where the lumber stretched into the distance like a studio back lot. The racks and shelving were built into the walls of the building behind them, which Grampa Joe had bought, gutted, and opened to the sky back in his day.

  Jack wondered, illogically, if maybe it had been the haberdashery.

  Not much wood was out here. When contractors bid a big project, they usually went into Kerrville to Home Depot, or all the way into San Antonio or Austin. Jack wondered what his dad thought was going to keep him occupied for long in this store, in this town.

  In this life.

  He pulled out his phone, checked again: no messages. That morning, as every morning, he had already called Tracy, called her parents, called Sally. No answer, no reply, nothing from any of them.

  Would he ever hear from them again?

  He didn’t have many personal contacts in his phone book. Not for somebody who had been CEO of a multimillion-dollar nonprofit, pastor of a megachurch, best-selling author, and media figure.

  He didn’t have that many people he wanted to talk to, or who wanted
to talk to him.

  Maybe he never had.

  On an impulse, he called Danny Pierce’s number. It was a Thursday, two days after Christmas. He didn’t figure Danny would be at work, but who knew? Maybe he’d pick up.

  He didn’t. Jack took the phone down from his ear, looked at it, frowned.

  Then he shook his head and left a message. “Danny. Jack. Wanted to see how things went on Christmas Day. I hope it was okay. Better than okay.” He paused, bit his lip. “And to tell you my dad found me. Thank you, I guess. I was in a pretty bad place. Still am. But at least—”

  That was all he had. He didn’t know what the silver lining was.

  He couldn’t finish that sentence. Not yet. Maybe not ever.

  “I’ve got to count some lumber,” he said instead. “I hope you’re okay, Danny. I know I left you in a terrible spot.” He stopped, shook his head, sighed. “Listen. Take care of yourself, man. That place will eat you alive.”

  He hung up. It wasn’t an apology. He knew that. He had witnessed enough non-apologies in his years of ministry. But the sentiment was true. All of it was true.

  He did hope Danny was okay.

  He did realize he had left him in a horrible spot.

  And that place—like any church—would eat him alive if he wasn’t careful.

  He looked down at the pile of lumber in front of him, raised his pencil and clipboard, and amused himself by estimating the total board feet. After Mary taught him how, he used to waste time out here in the summers of his high-school and college years doing calculations, something alien to his English-major mind. That thought brought a smile to his lips. He remembered sweltering summers with Darla, before she left him. And with Bill, down at the creek at day’s end with a cold beer and the radio turned up loud in his Chevy truck.

  It was the first time he had remembered being happy in Mayfield. Maybe that’s why he didn’t hear the footsteps behind him before he heard the voice—blustery, gruff, and not particularly friendly, “Well, looky looky. I heard you were back. I just couldn’t hope to believe it.”

  Jack felt his stomach do a slow roll as he was yanked from the creek and his college years to the dusty playground behind the middle school. He knew that voice immediately, and it was connected to a long, looping left hook caroming off the side of his head. To a ring of boys in a schoolyard shouting encouragements to one or both of them. To the thud of blows landing on each side.