Unholy Shepherd by Robert Christian (rooftoppers txt) 📕

fraternity at a high-end university. There was little about the old priest that said soldier to her eyes. Father Patrick took a sip of his drink, shook off whatever malaise had come over him, and smiled.

“I think I’ll grab the main course,” he said. “Please excuse me for a moment.”

He left the room and returned shortly with another tray with two steaming bowls filled with a fragrant broth, noodles, an assortment of vegetables, and what looked to Maureen like beef. Father Patrick set one bowl in front of her, along with a large ceramic spoon and a pair of chopsticks. He sat back down in his own place and gestured to her.

“Please eat,” he said.

“What is it?” Maureen eyed the dish.

“Ah, one of my favorite dishes. It’s called pho. A Vietnamese noodle soup. Very good, very comforting.”

Father Patrick picked up his chopsticks and deftly scooped some of the noodles into his mouth, slurping them down. Then he picked up the ceramic spoon, filled it with the broth, and sipped it, smiling with contentment as he swallowed. Maureen tried to copy him, but she had never been good with chopsticks, and so she abandoned them for her fork. The dish was tasty, just as the priest had promised, with hints of ginger and garlic. They sat in relative silence as they finished the meal.

As Father Patrick cleared away the dishes, Maureen sat at the table, staring into her glass. She wasn’t keeping count of her drinks, but she was feeling warm in the face. She promised herself that she would keep on her guard, though, being determined that no amount of drink would allow her to reveal anything to the priest that she didn’t want to.

“Can I pour you another scotch?” Father Patrick’s voice startled her. He was standing at her elbow, holding the half empty decanter and a glass of scotch and ice of his own.

“I don’t want you to think I’m a drunk,” she said, though she knew she could go on drinking all night. Manny wouldn’t come get her until she called, though, knowing him, he was probably sitting in a parking lot around the corner.

“I don’t begrudge anyone their vices,” he said, settling down opposite her. “I believe that we manifest our broken nature into certain behaviors. It’s only natural. Facing the truth about oneself is exceedingly difficult without a crutch. No matter who you are.”

At this, he raised his glass to her and took a sip. Maureen thought for a moment he looked as broken as she felt all the time. She shrugged her shoulders and decided that if the remainder of the night was going to be spent wallowing in a bottle, she wasn’t going to let him outdo her.

“Well then, fill me up,” she said, sliding her glass to the middle of the table.

He did, and they sat in uncomfortable silence for another few moments. Finally, Father Patrick leaned back in his chair and looked intently at her. “Maureen, I’m aware that you know that my reason for asking you to have dinner with me is to learn more of your story. I want you to know that it’s okay if you don’t want to speak to me about these things, but I believe it will help you. And that’s all I want to do, I promise you.”

“I believe you. I just don’t know if I agree that it will help me. What more do you want to know? You already know me better than anyone else. Except for—”

“Detective Benitez,” he finished for her. “Yes, he seems like a good man. Maybe too good?”

“I can’t give him what he really needs,” she said, echoing the thought that she had repeated to herself for days. She pushed the thought away and took an aggressive sip of scotch. “Can we just talk about something else?”

“As you wish,” Father Patrick said. “Tell me something. You seem to have a certain discomfort with religion and God in general. Your abilities to see, at least to me, seem to suggest something that should be embraced as a gift from the Lord. Why don’t you?”

“Are you sure you want to know?”

“I really do,” he said.

Maureen pressed her lips together hard and debated about how much to tell him.

“You can trust me,” he prodded.

“Fine,” she sighed and took a long sip of her drink. “It started when my brother died. I was eight, he was five. He disappeared from our house one afternoon. My mother went insane, looked everywhere for him. The cops were in and out of the house for days. No one was coming up with anything.

“A few nights later, I had the first dream that I can remember. I was driving along the road, and I stopped at a mile marker. I can still see it as clearly today as I did then. Highway 3, mile marker twenty-five. Facing north. I went to the back of the car, opened the trunk, and pulled Braden out. His body was limp and cold, and I was carrying him from the side of the road into the woods. The whole time, even though I was young, I could tell it wasn’t really me. The hands were covered with gloves, but I could tell they were too big to be mine. And Braden felt light in my arms. I knew I could never carry him like that. The arms dug out a little grave off a pine-needle-covered path, put Braden in, and covered him with leaves. It was fall so there were plenty of leaves to hide the body.

“I’m told that I sleepwalked downstairs that night. I remember waking up standing next to my mother in the living room and trying to tell her where Braden was. She told me that I just had a nightmare, that it meant nothing, and that I should go back to bed. I knew from school that to talk to the police you needed to dial 9-1-1. So I snuck into my mother’s room to use