The Paper Shepherd Read online

  “Wow, okay,” Tony said. “You took the guitar from me and started singing and the women just started flocking in. I mean, they were all over you, Max.” Max stuck his hand in the pocket of his denim jacket. It smelled strongly of smoke from the night before. He opened his hand and dropped a pile of slips of paper onto the table.

  “Well that would explain these,” he said, staring at Tony. Tony picked up one of the slips of paper off the top of the pile. They were all phone numbers, written in slightly different versions of curly, neat, ornamented, indisputably female handwriting.

  “Tina. Yeah, she was the brunette who sent you a beer. Rebecca, she sent you a mixed drink. I think it was a ‘sex on the beach.’” He dug further through the pile. “And I have no idea who gave you these,” he said, holding up a red satin thong gingerly between two fingers.

  “Tony, I didn’t....” Max was obviously mortified. “You know. I didn’t.... go home with any of these girls, did I?”

  “Hey, Max, You’re an adult. I didn’t wait up for you, man.” Tony looked at Max who looked tormented on the other side of the table. He couldn’t lead his poor friend on anymore.

  “Max, I’m kidding. You were with me the whole time. You were a perfect gentleman. Not that half those girls would have minded if you hadn’t been.” Max sighed, greatly relieved. He closed his eyes and let his head drop with a loud thud against the high wooden back of the booth.

  “You’re sure I was with you the whole time?” he asked, desperately in need of reassurance. I’ll never drink like that again, he thought.

  “I left you for like two minutes to go pee. When I came back, there was this cheerleader who was trying to get her tongue down your throat, but she was a little put off when you started blathering hopelessly about......” Tony stopped himself short.

  “What?”

  “The bible.”

  “I talk about the bible when I’m drunk?”

  “Yeah, first letter of John, I think.” Tony lied. Max had in fact been sorrowfully reminiscing about his ex-girlfriend. He seemed convinced she was in danger and that he urgently needed to speak to her about some decision she was making. But, if he didn’t remember that, Tony was not going to be the one to remind him. It had been just under a year since Max had broken up with her and decided to pursue the priesthood. The first three months had been very rough. Max had spent at least part of every day beating himself up about their lost friendship. Tony had done everything he could to keep him too busy to remember. He insisted Max practice guitar ten hours a week. Max often exceeded this, quickly excelling at it. By now, Max barely ever mentioned her. She had become for him merely a historical detail like the Watergate break in or the beheading of Ann Bolin.

  “Well, thank goodness,” Max said, his shame obvious in his eyes.

  “On the upside, Jake said anytime you want to sing there, beer is on the house.”

  “I don’t want to drink again,” Max pronounced.

  “Fine, but you have to keep singing there. He said if you do, my drinks are free too.” Max chuckled.

  “I don’t get it. I thought that grunge stuff was in now. Why in the heck does he want me to sing my pathetic first year student acoustic guitar ballads?”

  “Because Jake knows that women like all that really sad stuff you sing. It makes them think you’re sensitive.”

  “But women don’t drink very much.”

  “Ah, but men follow women. It’s a law of nature, like osmosis. And men drink a lot. And men buy women expensive drinks, thinking it will get them laid.”

  “And how do you know so much about women?” Max asked, suspicious.

  “Unlike you Max,” Tony said sarcastically. “I wasn’t born a priest.”

  37

  Two weeks had passed since Max’s twenty-first birthday. Jake’s invitation for free beer not withstanding, life had returned nearly to normal in Ohio. As mid-February snow collected on the already knee-high piles around campus at St. Andrew’s, paper hearts and card board cupids accumulated on every vertical surface of the cafeteria and the student union and spun on thin strings from the ceilings as if they were a unique form of February precipitation. Max, who had always seen such things as the over commercialization if yet another Christian holiday, sat at his favorite desk in the library. It was on the top floor of the building where the ceilings were low and slanted. Water pipes, steam pipes, and electrical conduit crisscrossed along the walls. The furthest desk from the elevator, no one just passed by. Adding to it being completely neglected, it was the one desk that was not in sight of one of the massive picture windows the college added when the 100-year-old building was renovated ten years earlier. In fact, the one window was a small octagon that made Max feel like he was a stowaway on a late nineteenth century steamship on his way to Egypt for a dangerous adventure to unearth something of biblical origin.

  Now that he was in the seminary, Max was not supposed to be anywhere on campus without Tony. But, Tony needed some after dinner coffee and insisted his Italian American heritage cried out for something smoky and black with steamed foam on top. Max stared absently out the window when he recognized the slow stiletto footsteps he had not heard in over a year.

  “Hey, Dee,” he said, reflexively getting up from the desk to greet her. Tiny crystalline snowflakes still stuck to Brandy’s brown wool coat making her look like a beautiful chocolate fairy covered in powdered sugar. She unbuttoned it to reveal a short wool skirt and a tight, gray cashmere sweater.

  “I’m glad I found you,” she said. “I need help on a paper I’m writing about the Shroud of Turin.” Max held out his hand, inviting Brandy to sit in the chair across from his. She instead walked around and dropped a tome at the seat next to his. She sat down unceremoniously. Max retook his seat and watched as she flipped rapidly through the pages of Melson’s Inventory of artifacts of the Holy Land. Once she got to the marked page, she sat up a little straighter and leaned over the book. It seemed as though she had inadvertently rested her cleavage on top of the book, pushing the top of her breasts out of her V-neck. Max diverted his eyes. Why did she have to sit next to me? These tables are tiny.

  “What was your question?” he asked, trying to end this exchange as efficiently as he could.

  “Here’s the thing I don’t get,” she said. When she realized he was not looking in her direction, Brandy paused. Max finally looked back at her, willing his eyes to stay at eye level or higher.

  “What is it, Dee?” Max encouraged. Ask the question already.

  “It seems like Melson’s is saying that the shroud of Turin is in fact really the cloth Jesus was buried in,” she said. “I thought it was all a hoax, that some artist painted the patterns on it.” Max felt uncomfortably warm. He then realized this was because Brandy was pressing one of her thin, white legs against his. An accident, surely, Max tried to assure himself. These tables are too small. Max stood up and took the chair he had earlier offered to Brandy so they were now facing one another. As he formulated his answer, he continued to focus his attention as hard as he could on her forehead.

  “The book isn’t saying it’s definitely the cloth that Jesus was buried in, only that it could be,” Max explained. “It is pretty certain that somebody was buried in it, likely someone who had been beaten up and crucified.” Max felt something bump his knee. She must have accidentally bumped me when she was crossing her legs, he reasoned. Max felt as though he were starting to sweat. Brandy’s foot did not move away. In fact, she began rubbing the inside of his leg. Please be an accident! “There was speculation in the thirteen hundreds that artists were making fake shrouds, and that this one was one of those fake ones.” This is not an accident, Max finally concluded. Brandy’s foot was now rubbing his crotch. Max wanted to run out of the library. Yet, he felt oddly compelled to finish his lesson, as though ignorance scared him more than anything a mere mortal could physically do to hurt him. Equally odd, Brandy’s face did not betray any knowledge of what her lower body was doing. Max scooted his c
hair back so that her foot could only reach as far as his mid-thigh. “But, the shroud of Turin doesn’t look quite like any of those. It is hard to paint on a flat surface what cloth would look like wrapped around a three-dimensional object. When scientists reproduced the actual burial conditions that it dictates in the bible, the impression left was much more like the shroud of Turin than to any of the other painted cloths that have been produced.” Max stared at the books across from him on the book shelf which walled him away from any prying eyes. On this day, they left him without any witness to a slowly unfolding drama he was helpless to stop. Useless moldy paper! None of you can tell me how to get out of this! This suddenly gave him an idea. Max quickly hopped up and walked over to the shelf, staring at the books.

  “It may be clearer if you read this chapter in….” he looked around the shelf in desperation. Damn it! He cursed himself. Industrial Revolution? How am I going to make that seem relevant? Max pulled a book off the shelf and pretended to be flipping through it meaningfully. His mind raced to make up some connection between this book and the Shroud. As he turned around, he realized he would not need it. Brandy had her arms on either side of him, her hands planted on the book shelf. She was just inches away, eye to eye, mouth to mouth. Max dropped the volume in surprise. She lunged at him and kissed him. No, Max tried to say in protest. No, no! he said, a little louder. However, with his mouth covered with hers, his exclamations sounded like moans of pleasure and seemed to encourage her. He soon realized that opening his mouth at all, even in a demure, only gave her space to sneak her tongue in. Think! What would Jack tell you to do? Max ran through the many bullying scenarios his father had forced him to practice as a child. Both hands up. Swift, short push on the chest. Max immediately realized the problem with applying this technique to an attacker who was not a boy. Damn! Breasts! Max felt sweat beading on his forehead. Mammary glands. Nothing to be afraid of. His father’s voice broke in to chastise him. Afraid of? Size C grade A hooters! Enjoy them, you freaking pussy! Max quickly tried to retract his hands back to his sides, but Brandy had already covered one of his hands in hers, keeping it in place over her breast. With her other hand, she began rubbing his crotch again. No! he thought. Stop! What are you doing?

  It felt to Max as though he had been in this horrible involuntary love scene for a few hours, although only a few seconds had passed since Brandy stood up and ambushed him. Calm down and think, he told himself. With his free hand, Max now tried to get leverage on Brandy’s hip. One, two… in a short, forceful push, he propelled his attacker away. Brandy, thrown off guard, turned and folded, thrown off balance by the asymmetrical position of the pushes. The combination of that, having her hand temporarily caught on Max’s as she fell away, and the ridiculous height of her heels, caused her to stumble in slow motion and land on the un-renovated linoleum.

  A confusing flood of emotions rushed at Max. Fear. But, I have nothing to be afraid of, he fought back. I didn’t do anything. Shame. This wasn’t my fault. Embarrassment. I stood my ground okay. Anger. Why? Why? Why? Why? He suddenly realized Brandy was still sitting on the floor, bewildered. He instinctively held out his hand to help her up. However, seeing it there, hanging in space in front of her, he didn’t want her to touch it. He pulled his hand away and rubbed it habitually on the leg of his pants, as though it were already soiled by proximity to her.

  “Why would you do this?” he finally asked. Brandy’s face changed from stunned to sultry confidence.

  “You know you’ve always wanted me,” she accused him.

  “No, I haven’t,” he quietly parried. “And, you know I haven’t either, or you wouldn’t have trapped me against a bookcase.”

  “Then why were you always inviting me out for tutoring?” she said pointedly.

  “Because you really needed it,” Max continued calmly. “And I thought as a friend I should help you.”

  “Some friend you are,” Brandy deflected. “You haven’t even called since I left that message.” Max stopped, puzzled.

  “What message?” he asked innocently.

  “At Jakes. The night you were singing.” Oh! He thought back at the thong that had been left in his pocket. A picture began to form in his mind.

  “You’ve been stalking me this whole time,” he stated simply, his voice devoid of emotion. Brandy huffed an unabashed admission. “But, why?”

  “My fiancée cheated on me,” she said, finally showing an emotion other than seductive pride.

  “And, was I supposed to help you carry out some sort of revenge?” Max inquired with unnatural aplomb. Brandy began to look around the library, as though looking for better answers than the ones she had.

  “And help me feel better about myself,” she said. “I felt so ugly and unwanted.” Max shook his head.

  “Sex is not supposed to be for revenge or an ego boost,” he said logically. “It’s a sign of love between two people who love one another.” Brandy sat on the floor, unmoving, while Max walked past her and began packing up his books. She tried a different tac.

  “You keep saying you’re my friend,” she said “My fiancée cheated on me with another woman. How are you going to make me feel better?” Max buckled his bag closed.

  “If you had called me as a friend, I would have listened attentively and patted you on the shoulder and assured you one day you would find a man who could truly appreciate you,” he said, draping his coat and scarf over his arm. “But, it’s a little late for that now. Plus, it sounds like you found the man you deserve.” After he finished his icy statement, Max began walking toward the stairs.

  “Aren’t you going to at least help me up?” Brandy called after him. Max stopped and turned around.

  “I could call campus security. I am sure they would be happy to help you up.” He let this last statement sink in. When he saw Brandy had no comeback, he walked away in search of Tony.

  38

  “Cut it all off,” Sal told the stylist at Tye’s Salon and Day Spa.

  “All?”

  “All.” Renee sat motionless in the barber chair, staring blankly into the mirror as the conversation unfolded around her. It was July and the spring semester had long ago drawn to a close. Here, in the one high-end hair salon in the area, nestled deep within the sleek, newly renovated mall, neither the cleansing summer rains nor the illuminating sunshine could penetrate. The spring semester had gone more smoothly for Renee then had the fall. She had found the time to exercise regularly again and had even joined the official study groups for two of her classes. This was all thanks to the additional time she had now that she worked ten hours a week instead of twenty. Renee had taken Sal up on her offer to introduce Renee to her boss, the owner of the notorious Fox Tail Gentleman’s Lounge. Chuck, the owner, was equally pleased with the arrangement as this new creature they called Renee was not only more attractive, but far more skilled on the run way then the girl she had just replaced. Chuck let her start dancing two days later. That’s right, Renee said, suddenly attending to the instructions her friend was giving the stylist. What will Chuck think?

  “You’re sure Chuck won’t mind?” Renee objected as the hair dresser held out the first lock of hair and poised his scissors over them. He stood motionless waiting for the conversation to reach a resolution.

  “Honey, you wear a wig to work,” Sal pointed out. “How could he possibly care?”

  “I know, but...” Renee whined. The brown curly wig she wore to work covered her whole back. Chuck explained how knowing her back was naked but not being able to see it made it seem more attractive to his customers. In addition, the long flowing locks flipped around dramatically with every tiny movement of her head making the whole experience more “serpentine”, Chuck liked to say. Renee, whose own hair was only half way down her back and straight, felt like it being the same color as the wig made the wig less of a lie.

  “Renee, come on honey, you said you’d let me do this for you to cheer you up.” Renee rolled her eyes. “Anyway,” Sal added. “The l
ess hair you have, the easier it is to get a wig on. Trust me.”

  “Fine,” Renee relented. The stylist turned Renee away from the mirror and readjusted his scissors. Snip, snip, snip. Renee sat motionless as foot long locks of velvety brown hair fell lifelessly to the floor. Sal took a seat in a nearby barber chair and watched. In the year she had known Renee, she just couldn’t figure her out. For most of the first two semesters they were in school together, Renee wore almost exclusively skirts. When Sal asked her about it one day, Renee explained that her mother had always worn suits when she was working at home to promote proper mental discipline and as a sign of respect for herself. Snip, snip.

  It was confusing to Sal later when she found out Renee’s mother was a school teacher who hadn’t worked since their family left the country when Renee was five. The insistence on dress clothes was even more confusing to Sal when she learned of Renee’s tight financial situation. That is when she realized that her initial joking description of Renee’s style—that she wore the kinds of clothes people wear when they are visiting their grandmother for Easter, was in fact exactly true. Renee had, since her uncle kicked her out more than a year ago, bought all of her clothes at a second hand store, buying clothes that were in impeccable shape because other kids out grew them before they could wear them out. Snip, snip. Buzzzzzzzz... In a way, it was charming.

  But, the past few months had seen a drastic change in Renee’s appearance. Her better fortune monetarily had a paradoxical effect on her manor of dress. She started wearing one of two pairs of baggy jeans to class every day. Her tops were always loose and shabby. She hid her hair under a baseball cap and, when she wasn’t going to work, didn’t wash it. Grunge music had long since swept through college campuses, making flannel shirts and worn out jeans more popular. Sal knew musical and clothing fads had nothing to do with Renee’s transformation. Renee explained once that she no longer felt like giving away for free what some men paid good money for. Sal was convinced she had just given up on life all together. Losing interest in her outward appearance was just one symptom. Buzzzzzzz....