The musty parish rectory creaks in the rain and I remember Kathleen. I am grateful for the sound of rain on the slate roof, I am thankful for the creaking sound of ancient floor boards beneath my unsteady feet, I am blessed by the pitter-pat of rodents coming from the attic. The noises soothe me, they comfort me.
When mass is over and the people go home, I walk up the narrow, groaning staircase to this apartment. When the workday is over and my secretaries go home and the nuns go back to St. Monica’s, I retreat to the rooms I’ve called mine for nearly forty years. By myself, it is just I, Father Collin, monsignor of St. Patrick’s.
Alone upstairs I remember Kathleen Gallagher with her dark brown hair, her saucer brown eyes. I remember when she came to me first and I remember when she left me last. We would sit, side by side – an old, white-haired man with black glasses and the young girl, not yet eighteen, the world hers for the asking – and I advise her on the lessons of life.
She’d take my advice, she’d ignore my advice, but she’d always smile those saucer brown eyes at me. When she visited me, her company would ease the silence of the unending hours at the upstairs rectory. I would remember her silky soprano, the vibrato of her gentle laugh, her long brown hair that would bounce when she turned her head. And then she’d shake my hand and be gone.
Now Kathleen has married and moved to Lancaster, I am back to my routine. Mass, then upstairs. Work in the office, then upstairs. Walk the hallways of the school, then upstairs. Thankful for the creaking noises of the rectory, the rain on the roof, the rodents in the attic.
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