He sat back, wishing he could understand, as Father rang the prayer to a close. Upon the final lines the choir stood together, relieved and moved, bored and distracted, to sing the answering Amen.
The Our Father followed. They gave each other the Sign of Peace. Down the bench Teddy farted, trying to muffle it. Father said, “This is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world,” and Biddy, hoping somehow that it would help and knowing that he was wholeheartedly sincere in at least this prayer, said, “Lord, I am not worthy to receive you, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.”
They sang “Silent Night” while the congregation received Communion. When the song was finished and the choir filed out of the pews to receive as well, the congregation, unsure of its new singing responsibilities with the addition of a choir, began haltingly to start a new verse before petering out and leaving only the shifting sounds in the pews to accompany the quiet dialogue between celebrant and communicant, not quite lost in the hush: “ … The Body of Christ. … Amen.” His mouth full of the dry tasteless wafer, he sat down, his eyes closed until the saliva could break it down.
There were more prayers, and suddenly they were all standing for the concluding blessing. Father said, “The Lord be with you,” and the response was the most wholehearted, the most enthusiastic of the Mass, as it always was: “And also with you.” “The Mass is ended. Go in Peace.” “Thanks be to God.” And Sister looked at them over her shoulder from the organ and nodded as her hands began “Hark! the Herald Angels Sing.”
Biddy sang. He sang as he never had before and perhaps never would again, realizing the song had always been his favorite, realizing it to be the perfect song with its power and joy to appear here to end the ceremony, to send them out into the snow and Christmas: “Joyful, all ye nations rise, join the triumph of the skies, with the angelic host proclaim, ‘Christ is born in Bethlehem!’ Hark! the herald angels sing, ‘Glory to the newborn King!’”
There was another chorus but the congregation thundered into the aisles, leaving only the choir and Sister to appreciate it. And with small knots of parents remaining, clustered at the main doors, they sang the final notes and turned to one another in exhilaration, grinning and clapping congratulatory hands on shoulders.
Sister stood away from the organ and said, “You were just wonderful. Merry Christmas to you all. I’m proud of you.”
Their ranks broke with a whoop, and he wished them all Merry Christmas — Sarah Alice, Teddy, Janet — trying to catch them before they disappeared into the chaos. Laura hugged him. She wished him a Merry Christmas and swept down the central aisle to her parents, leaning forward with their arms out at the main doors.
They found him still at his seat: his mother, Rose, Sandy, and Michael. The altar boys were moving swiftly back and forth extinguishing candles, anxious to get home. “You were wonderful,” his mother said. “Did you see us over on the left?” He hadn’t. Everyone agreed the choir had been marvelous. Rose kissed his cheek, a glancing blow, and it occurred to him she was happy her talk had turned him around. His mother asked what they were waiting for.
“I’ll be right there,” he said. “I just want to do something.”
She offered to wait but he said he wanted to talk to Father. They said they’d go on ahead in that case, and left, wrapping coats and mufflers around themselves and hunching forward as they passed through the main doors. Michael brought the car around for Rose. Biddy could see the snow coming down beyond. A noise from the sacristy intruded, and he turned and slipped into the second choir pew. He lay back along the bench seat gazing up at the ceiling beams brightly lit from below. He could hear odd metallic and wooden noises, as well as the rustle of Father’s chasuble as he bustled around the church preparing to leave. When the noise grew very close, he knew Father was taking a last look in the chapel, and suddenly the lights went out, leaving only the glow from the sacristy coming over the horizon of pews like a yellow sunset. When the door shut, the light disappeared, leaving him in darkness. He imagined he could hear the snow piling up outside. An outer door swung shut with a much heavier sound, and he sat up.
It was already Christmas. Probably near one-thirty. He couldn’t see his watch. There was a faint light coming in the rose window at the end of the nave. He could smell the smoke of the candles. As his eyes adjusted, he could make out the lines of pews, silent in the dark. He started to sing.
It was very quiet at first: “Hark! the herald angels sing,” and then his voice grew louder and he sang it all the way through, once, and fell silent, listening to the church.
“Merry Christmas,” he said finally, his voice almost a whisper, the sound taking flight in the darkness.
He woke with Stupid on the bed and Kristi pulling at his mouth. “Come on,” she said unnecessarily. “It’s Christmas.”
He got a tent. An EMS Explorer, extremely light and compact, rolling up to the size of a football. A mess kit. A big flashlight. A ground cloth. A compass. He had to be reminded he had other presents to unwrap.
When they were finished, his father returned to the kitchen and started cracking eggs into a big bowl. He stacked the shells inside each other and they looked like a fat necklace or smooth caterpillar.
“Thanks for the hot-lather machine,” he said when Biddy came up to the counter next to him. “Did you expect so much camping stuff?”
Biddy lifted the line of shells delicately, from both ends. “No.”
“Well, in the summer you can take advantage of them. Get some use out of them.”
The phone rang. Teddy said, “What’d you get?” when he picked it up. They each listed the highlights.
“Teddy got Atari,” he said when he hung up. His father was swirling eggs around the pan with a plastic spatula.
“Good for Teddy. Just what a kid needs — something to keep him in front of a television,” he said. “Come and eat something. Then you can play for a while, but we’re going over the Lirianos’ at noon.”
What was there to do? He didn’t want to see Cindy again. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t realized this would pop up in the middle of his Christmas, like a horrible bug found under his pillow. He sat in a living-room chair gazing past the tree to the snow outside, and his father appeared before him, half his face covered with lather.
“You stare out more windows than I don’t know who,” he said. “Are you going to get dressed?”
Upstairs he chose the same clothes he’d worn the night before. He couldn’t refuse to visit the Lirianos. And he realized as he pulled his pants on that he didn’t want to, for the same reason he’d found himself listening with special care to his parents’ conversations around the house the last few days: he still hadn’t completely deciphered what had happened, and he wanted to know.
He hesitated before entering their living room, causing Dom to inquire whether he had passed away in the hall. He came in and found sanctuary on the sofa, concentrating on their tree. It was smaller, decorated more carelessly. Presents were jumbled around it, Mickey’s strewn in an arc across the room.