Saint Training (9 page)

M
atthew’s coming home this weekend,” Mary Clare’s mom announced the next evening.

Mary Clare let the baby bottle slip into the dishwater. It smacked on the bottom of the sink.

“Be careful. If you break one of those you’ll cut your hand on the glass.”

Mary Clare tried to sound casual. “Will the band be practicing here this weekend?” She picked up another bottle.

Her mother let out a sigh. “Where else? They’ve got a ‘gig’ in Watertown Saturday night, so they’ll practice on Friday. I told them it’s the garage or nothing. And they have to quit before ten o’clock. I don’t want the neighbors complaining.”

Mary Clare picked up the bottle brush and was careful not to drop any more bottles. She smiled as she thought of the plan she and Joannie had thought up: the next time Matthew was home from the seminary they would ask him if he and his band, The Seminarians, would play for a party. Her party! No one in her class or her whole school had ever given a party with a live band. It would be so wonderful. And most importantly, it would bring her back into the popular group. Everyone would be dying to get invited to a party with a live band.

Things had gone from bad to worse since she ate cold lunch with the unpopular kids and admitted to Sister Agony that she was trying to save her parents’ money. When she told Jen that she loved her new spring coat and asked where she had gotten it, Jen had turned away at first, then turned back and said, “It doesn’t matter, Mary Clare. I don’t think your family could afford a coat like this.” She’d said it right in front of everybody.

It wasn’t even clear anymore that Kelly was still her best friend. She was still nice enough to Mary Clare, but she seemed more interested in being with Sandra and Jen and the rest of the group.

But meanwhile Mary Clare and Joannie were getting to be better friends, and it was Joannie who had agreed to help Mary Clare plan the party.

They planned how to warm up Matthew to the idea. They’d wait until he was in a good mood—when he was listening to music in his room. They’d tell him how good his band had gotten. Then they’d tell him how much their friends would love to hear them. Mary Clare would even offer to do Matthew’s laundry for a whole month if he said yes. Once Matthew was sold, he’d ask the rest of the band, Butch, Carl, and Dennis, all seniors in high school just like Matthew. And after
they’d
said yes, she would talk Mom into it. Then they’d pray that Mom would get an okay from Dad…which would probably be fine. Even though Dad and Matthew fought constantly, Dad enjoyed the band a lot.

“You’re dreaming again, Mary Clare,” her mother said. She nodded her head toward the stove so Mary Clare would see that the bottle sterilizer was already heating up with three empty slots waiting for the bottles she had yet to wash. It was a job Mary Clare and her mother did every two days. The bottles, nipples, and screw tops had to be boiled for fifteen to twenty minutes, and after they had cooled down they’d fill each with
formula and refrigerate them. Mary Clare liked the feeling of having sixteen full bottles. Then when the babies cried, she’d only have to warm them up under the faucet for a few minutes. Mary Clare dunked the last baby bottle into the warm water and brushed it clean.

“Done!” she proclaimed, handing it to her mother.

“Would you please…” Mom stopped, because Mary Clare had already grabbed the broom and started sweeping.

“Thank you, honey. You’re a saint. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Mary Clare smiled. She imagined the promises she’d make to her mother if she agreed to the party. “I’ll clean the whole house from top to bottom if you say yes,” she’d say, and her mother would say again, “You are a saint.”

Mary Clare plopped down on the couch between Gabby and the little kids and pretended to watch
Gunsmoke.
Instead she prayed.
Please, God, I really want to have this party. You probably don’t think I should care about popularity, but think of how many souls I could save if people really liked me. I still want to be a saint, God. So I need a sign, something that makes it clear that it’s okay to have a party.
She sighed, thinking about how she had just prayed a selfish prayer, and how Saint Monica was selfless as she prayed incessantly for her son to convert. Mary Clare quickly prayed six Hail Mary’s and an Our Father. She made a mental note to pray for the unpopular kids and pagan babies the next day in Mass.
But still,
she continued bargaining with God.
If Matthew says yes to the party, I’ll take that as a yes from You. If he says no, I’ll take that as a no from You.

On Friday, Mary Clare looked forward to seeing Matthew all day. She invited Joannie over for dinner so they could talk to Matthew together. But when the family sat down to goulash, green beans, homemade dinner rolls, and salad, Matthew wasn’t
there yet and Mary Clare was nervous because her father was. Normally she avoided having friends over when her father was home on the weekends. He might be in a great mood one minute, furious the next. And he didn’t really care about who was listening. Things could get especially tense if he and Matthew started fighting again.

Mary Clare looked around. Her father, at the head of the table, was heaping the goulash onto his plate and talking about his work in Chicago over the last week. He seemed to be in a mood. Mom was nodding toward Dad to show she was listening, but Mary Clare could see she had other things on her mind. Four of the younger kids were crowded onto the window seat, which spanned one side of the table. The older boys, Mark and Luke, were sitting on the opposite side of the table at the end near their dad. Then came Joannie, Mary Clare, Johnny in his high chair, and Mom at the opposite end. So far there were no spills or tears, and only two or three conversations at once.

When Dad took a bite of goulash, Mark broke into the conversation.

“Dad, I want to tell you something,” he said. Everyone stopped. His voice sounded urgent.

“Go ahead,” Dad said as soon as he had swallowed.

“Flipper joined the army today.”

“He’s too young!” The response was a chorus from both ends of the table.

Mary Clare heard the front door close and peeked into the living room, where Matthew was dragging his laundry bag across the floor.

“Who’s too young?” Matthew asked. He leaned his laundry bag against the dining room wall and began looking around for a chair to join the family at the table. A chorus of voices tried to answer him at the same time.

“Flipper? You’re kidding. He’s just sixteen!” Matthew said.

“Yup,” Mark said. “His dad signed the papers.”

Martha crawled under the table to get to Matthew. When she hugged his leg she left a tomatoey mess on his pants, but Mary Clare seemed to be the only one who noticed.

“He’s gonna get himself killed,” Dad said.

“And for a war we shouldn’t even be fighting,” Matthew added. His voice trailed as he left the dining room and walked into the kitchen.

Dad dropped his fork and pointed a finger at Matthew. “I won’t have this kind of talk in my house,” he thundered.

“Dad, even nuns and priests are protesting this war,” Matthew said.

“Now wait, I’ve certainly heard of priests fighting for civil rights—Father Groppi in Milwaukee, for instance—but I haven’t heard of any priest protesting the war,” Dad said.

“Well, I’m the one in the seminary and I know priests who do.”

Mary Clare’s body tensed. She looked at Joannie’s frozen face. Her eyes had grown big and she was focused on the salt shaker in the middle of the table. One by one Anne, Gabriella, and Margaret asked to be excused and left the table.

Good thinking. Mary Clare wished she could do the same, but her plate was still loaded with food because she’d been spoon-feeding Johnny.

“Come on, Dad, don’t yell,” Mark said. “I need to talk to you about this.”

Matthew returned to the table, plate and silverware in hand. He scrunched behind the table, where there was now plenty of room at the window seat.

“What was he thinking?” Dad asked. “Why would his parents agree to this?”

Matthew said nothing. But he slammed the serving spoons
against his plate as he was loading it with food and held his silverware in his fist.

“For one thing he’s sick and tired of being suspended for no good reason,” Mark said. “Like this morning, he got suspended for not tucking in his shirt—not tucking in his shirt, for crying out loud! So we decided to go up to Madison and see a recruitment officer.”

“Wait a minute, you ditched school?” Dad said.

Joannie was pushing food around her plate with her fork but nothing made it to her mouth. Mary Clare bit her bottom lip. She knew she should get Joannie out of here, but she was glued to her chair.

“Not exactly,” Mark said, running his finger along the outside of his metal tumbler.

Mom let out a long, exhausted breath. “Mark was also suspended.” She let her fork slip out of her hand as if she were simply too tired to eat. “For not wearing a belt.” You had to listen hard to make out her words.

“You
knew
about this?” Dad hollered.

All eyes were now on Mom. All except for Joannie, who looked like she might start to cry. Mary Clare thought she should excuse herself and get Joannie out of there, but she was too interested in seeing who Dad would be madder at—Mark for getting suspended, Mom for not telling him right away, or Mr. Mooney, the high school principal, for giving him a suspension.

As the children watched silently, Dad’s anger swung between “the asininity of the school for its shirttail and belt policies” and “the sheer audacity of Mark going to Madison in Flipper’s dilapidated VW Beetle without permission.”

“Paul,” Mom said, her voice cajoling. “You just got home from five days on the road. Why don’t you relax? Deal with this tomorrow when you’ve had a little rest.”

“Rest!” Dad said. “The only rest I get is when I’m in a motel at night.”

“That’s fine—that’s so nice for you, Paul.” Mom’s voice was quiet steel. Her eyes were fire, and the flames were directed at Dad. “You get rest in your fancy hotel rooms and peace and quiet when you’re flying or driving. Meanwhile I’m home taking care of nine children and another on the way. I don’t get peace and quiet. I don’t get a break from responsibility. Then you come home and I have to worry about you too.”

Mom stood up and stormed out of the room, leaving Dad silent, still scowling.

Mary Clare watched her mother ascend the stairs, stunned at her anger. She looked at Joannie, who was sitting up so straight and stiff she looked like she had a pole in her back. Johnny whined and held his arms out to Mary Clare. She lifted him out of the high chair. Martha looked like she would start wailing any second but Anne got to her first. She hugged Martha and told her not to worry, everything was fine.

“Wait!” Mark said finally. “I was trying to make a point.” Everyone paused and looked at him. Mark turned to face his father. “I’m sorry I went to Madison without permission. But I wanted to find out about the army as badly as Flipper did. I learned a lot today, and I decided that I want to enlist too.”

Mary Clare had never seen her father’s eyes open as wide as they were at that moment.

“I filled out the paperwork. All I need is your signature.”

“No!” Matthew said, looking at Dad. “You can’t let him!”

Dad didn’t respond to Mark or Matthew. His focus was somewhere far away.

Mary Clare stood up and motioned to Joannie to follow. It was clear that things weren’t going to get better any time soon. The two were almost to the front door when Matthew called her name.

“Yeah?” She hesitated, watching as Joannie bolted out the front door and ran across the street toward her house. Mary Clare didn’t blame her for wanting to get away, but…She returned to the dining room, where Dad and Mark were still yelling at each other.

“What did you want, Matthew?” Mary Clare asked when she could get a word in.

“I just wanted to hear your opinion. Do you think Mark should go to Vietnam? I mean, what do you think about the war?”

“Who cares what she thinks?” Mark said. “I’m trying to get
Dad’s
opinion.”

Mary Clare felt her throat tighten. Matthew was really putting her on the spot. “I think…” she began. She stopped. It occurred to her that whatever she said would offend someone.

“What do you think?” Dad asked, suddenly looking curious.

Three sets of eyes were focused on Mary Clare. She was frozen in place. War and politics were stuff the guys talked about. Matthew had talked to her a few times about marching for civil rights, and she’d loved it because it made her feel like an adult. But she wasn’t even sure she had an opinion on Vietnam. “I, I think…” Mary Clare looked at her father. She didn’t want him to be angry at her too. She looked at Matthew, whose face showed the kind of respect she had always wanted from him. But she didn’t know if the war was right or wrong. She didn’t know if Matthew was right to refuse to fight or if Mark was right to want to go. “I don’t know,” she said. She raced through the living room and out the door, hearing Mark snicker behind her.

“I told you she didn’t know,” he said.

Mary Clare saw Joannie sitting on her front porch, but she just kept running. She ran down the hill past the Henderson house, the Turners’, the Andersons’, past the Stop and Go. She
ran across Madison Avenue and kept running all the way to Mercer Park. There she slowed down to catch her breath. Her lungs felt ready to burst, but they didn’t hurt as much as the humiliation. She was tempted to sit on one of the swings but it was getting dark, so she forced herself to turn around and begin the mile-long hike back.

She tried to picture Mark and Flipper in army uniforms but the image seemed ridiculous. Both sported long haircuts, and when they weren’t dressed nicely for school they wore tie-dyed tee shirts and raggedy jeans. She tried to remember clips she’d seen on the news arguing about the war. She wished she had paid more attention. What she had paid attention to were the terrible images she’d seen on television—whole villages on fire, landmines exploding, people screaming, reports of hundreds of soldiers killed or captured every week. And then there were all the protests right here in the United States. Hundreds—maybe thousands of people in the street holding up signs that said things like “Make Love Not War” and “Question Authority.” Young men burning draft cards.