Jim Wood: What I learned about writing

We sat in the room on little white chairs around the circle. I spoke first.

“All right, fictional characters from my novel. Agnes, stop playing the piano on your legs. Pay attention. Most of you are wondering why I’ve brought you here. Norman, Siobhan, you didn’t like it very much when I teleported you from 1930s Philadelphia to 2011 San Francisco to ask you about ‘the best feeling in the world.’ But I had a purpose.”

The whole group looked out the window at motley Victorian houses, fog rolling down the hill, and blue-gray Toyota Priuses driving by. They gasped, realizing they’d been transported eighty years into the future and three thousand miles across the continent.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve invited you here today to thank you for teaching me how to write. You’ve also taught me how to think clearly, but most of all, you’ve taught me how to do what I love best.”

I looked at my heroine, so pretty with her red hair, freckles, and green eyes. “Agnes Limerick, you’ve taught me to be bold and daring and to take risks. If you didn’t know it already, you’re my alter ego and you’re the main character of my novel.”

“I don’t believe it,” blurted out Norman, “I thought I was the main character.”

“You know, Norman,” I said, exasperated with him, and not for the first time. “I was tempted to make you little more than Agnes’s sex toy. But after doing this round robin session, I learned you’re the insecure overachiever who has to be the center of attention. There are lots of those in the world, you know. And you’re not half bad.”

“Watch it, mister, I work hard to be the best I can.”

“That might be, but as your punishment, go down 18th Street to that place called ‘Badlands’ and dance in your underwear. They’re gonna like you there. Mind you, don’t go hooking up with anyone. I’m saving you for myself tonight, you hunk-a-hunk-a-burnin’-love.”

Cristina whooped up a little noise from her throat. “Cristina, everyone needs someone like you to point out that enjoying life is the highest achievement. Just be a little more careful about having sex with other women's husbands."

Agnes cocked her head to her best friend. “Cristina, what does he mean by that?”

Brian Larney giggled but I continued. “And Brian, you’re the counterpoint for Norman, the marvelous piano teacher who gets to live with Agnes after I make her a World War II widow.”
“What?” asked Norman, “You’re killing me off?”

Collin Doherty interrupted. “Why does Brian get Agnes in the end?”

“Monsignor Doherty, Brian doesn’t ‘get’ Agnes. Love isn’t a possession, it’s a quality of thought. Don’t forget, Father Collin, Brian is a gay man – just like you are, except you never acted on it –“

“I am not a homosexual,” harrumphed Collin. “How dare you make such a claim.”

“Well, I’m the author, so yes you are. I’ve tried to respect your religious choices, Father Collin, but try to remember you’re dealing with a power higher than God. After all, he didn’t transport you eighty years into the future. I did.”

This was a mistake, bringing the men together. They (and their egos) have given me nothing but headaches. Having finished with them, I wanted to address my matriarchs, all four of them.

"Siobhan Limerick and Georgianna Balmoral, you taught me there are so many ways to look at faith and family. I modeled you on two of my great-grandmothers – or, at least, what I thought they were like – and I discovered that Irish Catholic fanatics and Victorian grande dames have a lot in common. They just want their children to be safe.”

I looked at my only African-American character and felt an immediate sense of peace. "Gracie Honeywalker, you’ve weathered the years beautifully. You taught me to persevere in the most difficult of situations. You escaped from slavery in 1850s Kentucky and led a fulfilled life in upstate New York. Even if you were poor, you depended on no one but yourself. You taught me that grace comes from within, not from without.”

“Thanks, Mr. God. You hear what he says, Miz Agnes? Grace comes from inside here.” Gracie patted her heart.

“Oh, poo,” trumpeted Annie Kate Limerick. “All this emotional talk is giving me gas. You learn by doing, not by talking. Let’s have something to eat. I’m starving.”

“Thanks, Granny. How could I ever live without you?”

“Ah, Agnes,” I said, a sob catching my throat. “That’s just what I learned from you and Granny the most. You’ll do just fine without her. And I’ll do just fine without my mother, whenever God takes her back – the real God, not me the writer.”

Agnes Limerick: Good advice

Granny asked Agnes the question she’d been avoiding thinking about for two weeks now.

“Does Norman Balmoral love you?”

Granny would ask her that question. Everything that’d happened in the last two weeks had cemented that nagging feeling in her heart, Norman really didn’t love her and he was simply doing his obligation to the baby, offering to marry her. She couldn’t get his wide-jawed, pointy-chinned, fair-skinned, dark-haired muscular handsomeness out of her mind. It’s what had pushed her over the edge, that Saturday afternoon in the back office of Balmoral’s General Store – and what had led to their present predicament.

When she thought of Norman’s feelings, she sometimes drew a blank. She knew so little of him – why, even Cristina seemed to know more about him than she, truly a bad sign, since Cristina couldn’t stand Norman and had been urging her to consider her options outside of marrying him. But she and Norman had spent so much time together in the last six months, all those lovely walks in Rittenhouse Square, those secretive dinners in West Philadelphia, feeling the brisk fall air lead them into winter. Surely he wouldn’t have spent that amount of time with her, surely he wouldn’t have made love to her in that office, if he didn’t feel love.

Why, he had said it to her that day – but he’d resisted her advances until, finally, his thrusting, erect midsection had taken over. And since she’d told him about the baby these past two weeks, he’d insisted they marry. But that didn’t tell her he loved her. She thought about his eyes, their magic and sparkle. Somehow, they stood out from anyone else’s. That must be it, she thought – that’s the evidence she needed. The sparkle in his eyes. No one but she could see it.

“Yes, Granny, I believe he does. I hope he does.”

Norman Balmoral: Whispering

Norman sat in the small chair and jumped when Mr. Smith banged the office door shut and came back to his desk.

“Young man, if I see you with Ms. Cassata one more time, you’re fired. Now get back to your desk and work.”

That had certainly been succinct, Norman thought. Here he was, in the middle of designing the Pennsylvania Hospital wing, spending time his luscious girlfriend on weekends away from work. How could he give up Cristina? She fascinated him with her sarcastic remarks, her knowledge of literature, her love of all things Philadelphia.

But Norman couldn’t get around Smith’s iron-clad rule – no socializing between the architects and the secretaries. If it weren’t for the meddling eyes of Mrs. Weisskopf, the itinerant matchmaker, Norman could get away with it. But she’d find them out, even if they snuck off to Pottstown, Doylestown, or somewhere no Philadelphian could be seen. But how would they afford the train tickets? He had no money ... now that he’d spent all his savngs on a sapphire fleur de lys for Cristina’s birthday last month.

Norman walked back to his desk – but couldn’t avoid Cristina’s desk. It stood right outside Mr. Smith’s office. So he looked the other way. He knew she was staring at him, wondering what was the matter. But he couldn’t bring himself to look back at her. It hurt too greatly.

Siobhan Limerick: The best feeling in the world

“All right, class,” the teacher said as Siobhan took her seat, “we’ve gotten rid of the bad driftwood and that nasty man who kept repeating he wanted to be inside … well, I can’t say it. And we’ve called up this lovely woman, here, and asked her to take his place.”

Siobhan had just joined the circle of people sitting on little wooden chairs – and looked around her. They looked very odd, indeed. One woman had a silver ring in her nose, another man had fluorescent yellow hair, and a third person (Siobhan couldn’t tell, male or female, but it had to be one of them) wore a t-shirt with a pattern that could only be described as the sun exploding all over the place.

She looked out the window – goodness, she’d never seen any place like this, these steep hills, but at least the houses looked right to her. Then an automobile drove by. She assumed it was an automobile, but she’d never seen such a low, sleek vehicle with rounded lines, dark windows, and lines of silver chrome. Another one, and then a third drove by. Insaniity, she thought. Had she been transported to the future from 1933?

“Madame, you look confused,” the teacher said, “so I’ll bring you up to speed. You’ve been chosen for our survey and transported here from the past. Today is June 16, 2011 and you’re sitting in a salon in Noe Valley, which is San Francisco, California. My name is Dr. Susan Helfgott.”

She clutched her pearls. “Good Lord! I want to go back home to Philadelphia!”

“Please indulge me, ma’am. You’re here to answer just one question. Please list me the top ten best feelings in the world for you. We’ll discuss the answers and then send you all back home.”

Siobhan thought real hard. Se pursed his lips and put his pen to paper. Lovely pen, but she wanted to make out her list and be gone back to Philadelphia 1933. Patrick and Collin needed her.

1. Giving birth to Patrick and, yes, Agnes.
2. Attending mass.
3. Taking in Collin’s homilies.
4. Listening to Agnes play the piano in the parlor.

“I can’t continue,” she blurted out. “This is too painful. Please send me back to Philadelphia and my son.”

Collin Doherty: Promises

Siobhan didn’t see him in the corner of the sacristy. She kneeled in a rear pew, folded her hands, and dropped her head to pray. For the longest time she remain fixed in that position, what ever conversation she was having with God clearly a long one. Collin could only imagine the grief his sister had to endure.

He’d grieved over each calamity that had befallen her, his favorite sister. Everyone always thought Julia had been the favorite sister, but he’d always loved Siobhan the best. And what she’d had to endure! Losing four babies, Martin dead just after she’d turned forty, nearly losing the house in the Depression, now forced to move to a strange city where all those Roosevelt socialists were destroying their country, Patrick unmarried with no prospects – and Agnes. Oh, Agnes pained Collin more than anything.

His own niece had betrayed their entire way of living – by marrying that man, that heathen who’d laughed at them just after Annie Kate’s funeral. He’d taken their beautiful red-headed princess and turned her into … well, he couldn’t say it … an Episcopalian. Damned for all eternity, and their bastard daughter, too – just born a short six months after the wedding. And his sister, kneeling there at St. Patrick’s Church, at his parish, unable to change the events that had nearly destroyed her life.

God will protect you, dear sister – always keep your faith. I know you have the faith, dear Siobhan. Even if your only daughter betrayed you, keep your faith. Because the kingdom of salvation awaits you.

Agnes Limerick: Warning signs

Another contraction seized Agnes as she heard the rear wheels spin behind them. She looked at the old, white house – shingles falling apart, the sunken front porch, steps torn apart, the rickety fence broken down in a waving pattern from left to right – and groaned. The best midwife in fifty miles lived in this house?

“Norman, faster, let’s get out of here. This house gives me the creeps.”

A black woman holding a broom peered out of the red barn on the side of the house. She couldn’t be more than five feet tall, and old as the hills – must weigh less than ninety pounds, Agnes guessed. Actually eighty-seven. Agnes liked to play a game and guess people’s weight, though most people didn’t like it very much. She was always far too accurate.

Chickens flocked behind the woman and she dropped the broom on the dirt floor. Dust flew up in her face but the woman ignored it. She stomped out toward them, waving her elbows up and down.

“Don’t you be kicking up mud in my driveway, young man. You be getting that car off my property!”

Norman stopped at once and got out, walking right toward her. “I’m Balmoral, woman, and my wife’s in labor.”

A black woman, a midwife. Agnes didn’t care what color she was – she just wanted someone to help her. Someone who’d make this pain go away – Norman, who’d done nothing but irritate her these last three hours, ever since their game had gone astray and he’d killed that cat with the car. And the baby! She wanted her baby out.

Brian Larney: Boxes

Brian packed the last of the boxes – twenty-seven boxes of piano music. He had no idea where he’d put all his music at Agnes’s house, but she told him not to worry, they’d find space. She said something scatter-brained about putting a new bookcase in the music room, but said don’t worry, Brian, we’ll make room for you. You’ll be one of the family.

He had a hard time with this job. When had he last moved? He didn’t exactly remember, but it was after he and Arthur had parted company – that was 1909 or 1910, he believed. More than thirty years ago. Yes, he’d been living in Mrs. O’Toole’s house since then. He remembered reading about the Titanic’s sinking. He remembered the Great War – now people were calling in World War I – and he remembered Woodrow Wilson’s arsenal of democracy. He remembered the 1920s when Prohibition made it a lot of fun to drink. Just like having sex with men: in the closet, risqué, something forbidden. Something daring and exciting.

Brian groaned. Suddenly he realized he wouldn’t have his freedom any longer. He’d be living with Agnes, her mother-in-law, and her two children. Little Grace, not yet twelve, and little Harold, not yet eight. Norman hadn’t even been dead for a month, so he was moving into a house of mourning. No freedom to go out late at night, no freedom to bring a gentleman caller up to his bedroom? What would Agnes say, having her children exposed to that? Mrs. O’Toole had always gone to bed early and slept too soundly to know when a “friend” was coming over. But Agnes … she was a night owl, he knew from what she’d said. And then there was the grand matriarch, Old Mrs. Balmoral. He had no idea what to expect of her.

Brian had made his decision, however. Moving in with Agnes he would do. And he’d turn sixty in less than a month. How much longer could he seduce gentlemen callers and bring them to his bedroom?

Annie Kate Limerick: Good advice

Granny paused before asking Agnes the only question that really interested her.

“Does Norman Balmoral love you?”

“Yes, Granny, I believe he does. I hope he does.”

“I’ve met him and he’s not the kind of man who’d be kind to a wife he does not love. Some advice, my dear. Make your decision now and stick with it. You’ve been very hard on yourself these past two weeks. It’s been painful, waiting for you to come to me, knowing how you were suffering. Now’s the time to trust yourself and follow your instincts, sweetheart. You’re going to make the right choice, I’m certain of that.”

“What if I don’t marry Norman? What if Uncle Collin makes me give up my baby? And what about the Church?”

“I’ll fight anyone, Collin Doherty included, who tries to take your child away from you. You’ve got to decide which is more important, your baby’s father or the Church. I know you well enough to know the answer to that. Same answer for me. Your grandfather’s been dead more than twenty years, your father’s been gone more than ten, and Uncle George now two. I’d give up all the Catholic Churches in the world if I could have just one more day with my husband and my sons.”

Agnes gave Granny a big squeeze of a hug and left the room.

Cristina Rosamilia: Whispering

Cristina Cassata could just hear the whispering at the firm. Mrs. Findlay had seen her with Norman on Arch Street, walking hand in hand. She’d given her a reproving look at the time, but hadn’t said anything at the office, despite Mr. Smith’s iron-clad rule, no socializing with the architects.

Well, what of it? She’d done nothing wrong. What she and Norman did on their own time was their own business. They were long past the Victorian age, now more than ten years past the Edwardian age. The times were changing and young people like her had to make their own choices. She knew very well she had a big choice to make, as she sat in the office’s small kitchen, reading “The Great Gatsby” – would she marry Angelo Rosamilia and make my family happy, or do I continue my affair with Norman? Maybe one day Norman would propose to her and she’d be able to get out of South Philadelphia. Angelo meant she’d spend her whole life on those same four square blocks.

Mrs. Findlay stopped by the kitchen door. “Miss Cassata, it’s time to return to our desks. Mr. Smith will want to have a word with you this afternoon, by the way.”

“Yes, Mrs. Findlay.”

She went back to her book, intending to finish the chapter before going back to her desk. And then Norman walked by, stopped, looked at her, looked away, then walked away. How odd, she thought – he’d done just that yesterday. Funny thing, he’d been avoiding her since their Saturday walk on Arch Street. That got Cristina to thinking. Angelo Rosamilia did have a teddy bearish way about him, all those muscles and all that furry hair …

Norman Balmoral: The best feeling in the world

Norman felt woozy from the time warp that landed him in a 2011 feel-good self-introspection psycho-therapeutic workshop for Depression-era O.C.D. architectologistics. He tried to understand where he’d landed but something about the street's steep angles outside told him it was San Franweirdocisco.

Mind you, Norman told himself, he suffered no fools gladly and this city as he always knew from the ‘30s had its fair share. A lot less than pretty much everywhere else, he had to admit – only smart people lived on the penile peninsula, he knew. After all, weren’t they the gadflys who’d built that fabulous orange-red bridge over the water between the rocky brown mountains? Even if most of them got all wet over their own gender, they were smart, smart, smart. But they were still fools, Norman Balmoral swallowed.

“All right, class,” the teacher at the 6:30 p.m. Tuesday evening therapy group session on 18th Street just west of Collingwood Street (didn’t he and Agnes have a neighbor on Spruce Street by that name? Some insufferable woman?). “Today’s assignment is to list me the top ten best feelings in the world. For you and for no one else! Then we’ll discuss and debate.”

Norman thought real hard. He pursed his lips and put his pen to paper. Lovely pen, they’d given him. They’d never had such good ones in the ‘30s. Even his architect’s pens were nothing compared to these new-fangled contraptions. Off to his list, then.

1. Being inside Agnes.
2. Running from the Art Museum to Penn’s Landing on a cool June morning.
3. Smelling his own body odor after a hardy day's work outside.
4. Eating Mother’s dinner.
5. Going to a 76ers game with his own little Harold.
6. Peace and quiet in his architect’s studio.
7. Playing draedels with his own little Grace.
8. Pissing off Agnes’s uncle, a.k.a. Father Doherty (what a fanatic).
9. Pissing off Mother Limerick (Siobhan, that is).
10. Being inside Agnes (that one bears repeating).

The therapist took a look at all their lists. Her glasses fell down her nose and she looked at Norman. “Back to the 30s you go, Mr. Mister.” Norman felt the swoosh, swoosh, swoosh and found himself back at Balmoral’s pharmacy in the accounting office. Agnes knocked on the door and entered. At least, he’d experience #1 and #10 right now.

Collin Doherty: Three chairs and a double yellow line

Horsefeathers, Collin said aloud from the bench in front of St. Patrick's. Fall's golden leaves fell onto his head and lay crumpled at his feet. The snap, crackle, pop of the leaves under passersby's feet was just about the only thing that day that didn't raise his blood pressure.

All the trouble began when Agnes married that Balmoral man. No, it began before then -- it really began when Annie Kate Limerick moved into the house with Siobhan. He loved his sister, but she had no idea how to handle her mother-in-law. Annie Kate had dictated when Agnes would take her piano lessons, which books she'd read, what picture shows she'd see. She'd advised Patrick on science lessons (of all things for an Irish immigrant to talk about), told him that obeying Prohibition was for ninnies, and said, don't rush into marrying that Conaghy girl, there'll be plenty of girls when you're in your twenties. And now it looked like Patrick wouldn't ever get married. How could he? He'd probably never rub two dimes together.

He looked at the newly paved street. Those Roosevelt people, they were always doing things to his Philadelphia. Why'd they have to paint the roads? Why couldn't they just leave things be? But no, everything had to change. Hadn't Collin endured enough change? He had to sit here and look at these stupid double yellow lines. Why'd they have to paint the roads? They never needed lines back in the horse and carriage days -- back before he'd gone into the priesthood and he had a narrow waist, broad shoulders, and hard muscles.

Why do Siobhan and Patrick have to move to Washington? Ever since Agnes had left and Annie Kate had died, his sister had worn a blank expression. She looked like she'd had a stroke that killed the emotional side of her brain. She never smiled, she never laughed, she never complained, she never got angry. And his nephew never did anything except look at his mama and do whatever she asked. Why couldn't Patrick stiffen his spine a little bit?

Times, they'd been changing too much lately. He rose from his bench and went back into the church. He'd been reading mass for almost thirty years and had another one to do.

Siobhan Limerick: Promises

She kneeled to pray. No words came to Siobhan in the walnut-bedecked church she’d known since Collin first started serving at St. Patrick’s in 1906. In almost thirty years, she’d not once come to the church with a grievance against God. But today she had a long list to present to him – and why was God always a man? Perhaps that’s why he made so many mistakes.

Number one, God. You took four babies from me. I had six children and you only let me keep two of them.

Number two, God. You took my husband when I was barely forty years old. You made me a widow with two young children, living in a big Philadelphia house.

Number three, God. You presented a heathen to my dear sweet Agnes and allowed her to fall in love with him. She committed carnal sin and gave birth to my only grandchild four months after her wedding. And you allowed her to leave the Church to marry that man.

Number four, God. You took our fortune away from us, our security, and you almost took away our home. We had to sell it and now we’re moving to a small three-room apartment in Washington because that’s the only place where my son can find work.

Number five, God. You made my only son different and because of this, he will never marry. He’ll probably have an unhappy life because his nature goes against what you taught. And yet I know in my heart he feels this way only because that’s how you made him to be.

I still believe in you, God, and I know you never made me any promises. I just want you to know that, even if I still believe in you, I’m keeping a close eye on you.

Gracie Honeywalker: Warning signs

Gracie swept the barn floor and heard a tremendous noise outside, like one of her cows moaning in death’s final grip accompanied by a cacophony of hens awaiting the slaughter. She looked at the door and a bunch of chickens pecked their way outside.

An old Model A lay prostrate in the road, the front wheels stuck in the mud. A white man sat at the steering wheel, gunning the motor. Looked to Gracie like he was trying to get his car out of the mud. A woman sat in the car with him – looked like red hair to her.

They got out and started walking toward her. White people on her place. Couldn’t be good, that’s all she could think. Fifty years on this farm, Gracie had never had anything good come of white people on the place.

“Don’t you be kicking up mud in my driveway, young man. You be getting that car off my property. What in tarnation you doing here anyway? White people never come out this far.”

“I’m Balmoral, woman, and my wife’s in labor. Old Many Lacey sent us here. He said you’re a midwife. Are you Mrs. Honeywalker?”

Gracie looked at the pair – the man so tightly wound, every muscle in his neck strained, the woman with the long red hair, pregnant and waddling as she walked toward Gracie. Bad news, Gracie thought, always bad news in the ‘20s and ‘30s trying to deliver a white woman’s baby, especially one as white as this freckled girl. But something in the young woman’s eyes …

Siobhan Limerick: It closed

She smashed her Waterford goblet on the wood floor and ripped her brooch of Agnes and Patrick off her dress. She looked at the pictures -- Agnes on the left, Patrick on the right. She lobbed the picture of Agnes out and tore it to shreds. The dining room walls closed in on her. The floor rose up and the ceiling crept down. Her mouth went dry, she felt the sewer-like vacuum of acid gurgle in her stomach, and her hands shook. Mother Limerick stood in the foyer, saying something in her Irish brogue, Siobhan had no idea what. She had to get out of this room.

Agnes gone, Agnes gone, my daughter is gone to me, all I've got left is Patrick, where is he, I never see him around the house anymore, either, I have no one, my husband is dead, my four babies gone twenty-five years, my only daughter gone, my son God knows where, I have no one. Despite her Oxfords and heavy stockings she galloped up the steps two at a time, vomited into the toilet across the hallway, then ripped into her bedroom, the choke of vomit particles still in her nose.

She threw herself at the window. Please, God, please say this isn't so. My Agnes married that Protestant heathen. And she's going to have his baby, a little bastard damned from conception on. She's damned herself for all eternity. Don't let it be so, she was always such a smart girl, such a good little girl even if she was left-handed, please, God, please say this isn't so. Let me wake up from this nightmare and see her pretty red hair and green eyes in front of me. Let me hear her play Beethoven on Mother Limerick's piano, let me hear Collin scold her for doing her math equations. Please, God, please say this isn't so.

Norman Balmoral: We finally did it

The wind and the maelstrom outside shook the house and it reverberated with each thunderclap. Lightning bathed the dank bedroom with white light that pitched the room back into blackness as soon as it dissipated. The crucifix of Jesus hanging on the wall opposite the bed hung off-kilter, blown off course by the elm crashing against the side of the house. Agnes emitted a deep moan that seemed to regurgitate from the depths of her bowels.

Norman could do nothing but watch and hold Agnes’s hand. She squeezed so hard with each contraction, he felt certain the bones would break with the next contraction. Perspiration soaked his white shirt through and he’d long ago shorn himself of his tie. Where it was, he had no idea. Agnes called out to him – sometimes his name, sometimes Martin. Her father, dead so long, she confused him with her father.

Finally the storm came to an end and light peeked through the windows. Prodded by Gracie Honeywalker, “Push, Miz Agnes, you got to push!” Agnes took what seemed her final breath – all the air in the room, Norman thought – and squeezed until the head came out. One more squeeze and the shoulders emerged. Gracie’s tender black hands prodded the arms, abdomen, and legs out – a baby girl who cried her first when Gracie picked her up, washed her off, and gave her to Agnes and Norman. They'd finally done it.

Collin Doherty: Oprah

O.P.R.A.H. Old priest rims a homo. Collin shook his head, disgusted at kids these days. What was the world coming to. They’d achieved nirvana with Kennedy’s election in ’60, but it’d all come crashing down in Dallas ’63. Then they’d had to deal with that hick Texan and his wife with her “shrubes” and bushes. Vietnam came and started taking the lives of parishioners he’d baptized in the ‘40s and (worse) early ‘50s – the children, no – the grandchildren of people he’d counseled nearly 60 years earlier. Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy got shot and killed just 62 days apart. But the worst of it, the worst of it, was the betrayal of the young generation – where Collin had always placed his hopes. They felt betrayed by Johnson and the warmongers, but Collin felt betrayed by them.

Old priest rims a homo. Did they really think that of him? Did they really think an 87-year old Catholic priest would have ever partaken? To be sure, Collin had appreciated the muscles and forms of young man – had all his life. But to break his vows, no, he’d never have done that. And, thank the Lord, he never had. But a day had never passed that he didn’t want a man. He still wanted a man – just not in a physical way, any longer.

Betrayal. These young people, they didn’t understand what that meant. His Agnes – his favorite niece. He’d thought she’d betrayed him, but in the long run, she hadn’t. She’d simply stayed true to her soul and her love for Mr. Balmoral. But these kids and their profanities, they didn’t understand the consequences of betrayal. Old priest rims a homo, indeed.

Gracie Honeywalker: Tenth Street Cafe and the white picket fence

M’Lord, you sure ain’t to know what it’s like, walking by that picket fence yonder. Y’all love it, the story I’m gone to tell you. Back in ’60, you know I was 8 year old living on that Kentucky mansion, working for Old Manny, he done told me right, there’s a store, they done sold bad chickens, done get everyone sick as dogs, they did. All the white folks, they stayed in bed three, five days depending on how strong they were. Made life easier for us colored folk, we didn’t have to work none so hard or hear to so much tinny racketing. Get me this, get me that, you lazy maid, you never done listen to me. All such nonsense. We listen, we hear, but they talk like they gone to chicken brains.

I suppose, it serves them right. They never done known, tell a good chicken from a bad. Nine years old, I know when to eat it, when to turn my nose right up and say, this stinks like my daddy’s underarms after a day in the fields. But ain’t any reason to talk to white folks these days. They’re scared as turkeys in November, haven’t got any reason to hope. They see what’s coming, sure as we do. And we’re getting ready to run. Good riddance, cause I done be gone to the north soon as I can. I want to learn, I want to read, I want to write.

Agnes Limerick: The key

“Oh, Cristina, you forgot your wallet!”

She got no response when she leaned out the front door. She looked down to 19th Street, but Cristina must’ve picked up a brisk pace to get home. She looked up to 20th Street just to cover all the bases, but Cristina wouldn’t have walked in that direction. She and Angelo lived on Christian just east of 5th Street.

Agnes walked back in the house. She’d just have to call up Cristina and remind her that she’d forgotten her wallet. Even if she weren’t there yet, Angelo would be at home and he could tell Cristina she had to come back for her wallet. She went right to the kitchen and plopped the wallet down on the table. When she turned and reached for the phone, she heard the sound of metal clanking on the floor.

She reached down to the floor to pick up – a dime, a quarter, and a key. Odd, she found it, that Cristina would keep a loose key in her wallet. It had a familiar look to it, so she put the change down on the table and investigated. It looked very familiar and, turning it over, she recognized the initials in his own handwriting: N.B.

Why did Cristina have a key with Norman’s initials on it? Norman. He’d been dead eleven months now and hadn’t been in Philadelphia since the Navy shipped him off to England. But now Agnes recognized the key to Norman’s private architectural studio. Why did Cristina have a key to Norman’s private studio?

Agnes rifled through the wallet. One dollar bill, sixty cents in change, and a small stack of photos. Her parents on their wedding day in 1902. Her sons’ first communions. And Norman in Florence – with Cristina. She sank to the floor and a catatonic freeze seized her.