Father Thomas woke to find himself tangled in a damp sheet. It was twisted tightly between his bare legs. In the darkness of the master bedroom, his abundant white flesh was pickled red with the beginnings of a heat rash. Had there been daylight pouring through his bedroom window, he might have looked like a monstrous floating angel uncomfortably positioned on a misshapen cloud in the background of a cathedral fresco.
A foreign arm lay draped across the priest’s chest. It was too heavy and hairy to be the arm of Mary Tobbit, the big-breasted choir director, who had been in the process of rubbing coconut oil over his back somewhere on a beach in Mexico when he awoke. Distracted by the sinful details of the dream, it took Father Thomas’s brain a moment to communicate to his right arm to trace the unknown limb’s origins from the cool wrist, to the fleshy elbow, until it located the arm’s origins, at his own left shoulder, which was clamped tightly against the bedroom wall. Father Thomas grabbed the dead arm with his right hand and shook it several times until he could feel a tingling sensation in the limb.
He elevated himself against the wall and blinked at the unfocused numbers of his digital alarm clock. His comforter and pillow were nowhere to be found on his bed. His right hand grasped through the warm darkness until he found the thick, black-rimmed glasses that lay on his nightstand. It was 2:30am.
Father Thomas crossed himself and murmured a faint “Hail Mary!” Under his breath, he asked forgiveness for his impure dreams. He worked his bare body out of the musty sheet and swung his feet onto the wood floor. The floor lay untouched by the spirit of the heat wave. The pries let out a loud fart as he reached down to pick up his nearby comforter and pillow. He scratched his bare bottom and readjusted himself before making his way to the tiny kitchen.
The antique thermostat yielded to a lovely 92 degrees. Father Thomas swatted it with his large paw but the tiny red needle showed no mercy. He had been warned about the air conditioning units in the older houses before his own stubborn purchase of this one. But he loved the comfortable front porch swing and the privacy of the established oak trees.
Father Thomas’s revived left hand found its way to his freezer door and emerged holding an optimistic carton of Chocolate Brownie ice cream. Spoon in mouth, the priest trudged to open the front door. A dense breeze ascended up the front porch and into the tiny hallway of the house. Father Thomas propped open the front door, set his ice cream on his porch swing and padded down the hallway to retrieve his swing towel. He had not yet finished sanding and sealing the splintery boards that harnessed together the shape of the swing.
Before returning to the swing, Father Thomas detoured back to the kitchen. Inside of his refrigerator was a sparsely-dressed top shelf, containing only his weekly bottle of wine and a new carton of orange juice. Father Thomas downed half of the contents of the orange juice and wiped his face in his arm hair.
He spread the large beach towel across the swing. He often ventured out to his porch in order to rebirth his fatigue. The lolling rhythm of the swing put the priest’s thoughts and prayers at ease. Tonight would be no exception.
Father Thomas closed his eyes and let the swing sway him side to side. He wondered how he had slept through the twenty degree ascent into hell. The swing chains creaked and somewhere in the distance, a dog barked. The priest’s mind began to mull through the habitual: how it might work this experience into an upcoming sermon. Father Thomas was committed to several guest sermons at a nearby parish lacking in a regular priest. For weeks he had suffered from what he called sermon block. Of course, there were the pre-formulated sermons he could go with, but Father Thomas didn’t like to preach without his own personal anecdotes. He wanted to gain the parish’s attention and trust. He wanted to make them laugh.
After a few minutes of rocking, Father Thomas was beginning to feel impatient. He could not call his favorite air conditioning repairing parishioner, Bill Dunham, at this time of morning, and the last thing he wanted to do was return to his damp bed.
When sleep did not greet him, Father Thomas decided that if he would go for a walk. He pulled himself off the swing and briefly returned to his boiling room, where he tied his shoes in a hurry. He stood up and grabbed his keys and when he motioned to place them in his pocket, he touched only the soft, loose skin on his hips. He started toward his closet door for a pair of shorts, but the overwhelming cool of the outdoors beckoned to him, and he tossed his keys back on his dresser. He resolved to keep an eye out for dawn and to bring his towel.
As he stepped off his front porch, Father Thomas shivered. For years he had been vacationing at nude beaches. Each Sunday was a countdown of communions until the moment he could swing off his heavy priest robes and drive home. Often he couldn’t even walk ten steps into his house without tossing aside all of his articles of clothing. Of course, when he had guests, he was careful to go against habit and remain clothed, but lately it took all his restraint to keep his clothes on as he listened to his parishioners bare their souls to him in the confessional booth. One day, a woman talked to him for two hours about her how she had killed her cat after it shredded the leg of her favorite chair; by the end of that confession, he had desperately fumbled with the neckline of his robes to the point that he felt like he was choking. He had issued the woman five Hail Marys, two Our Fathers and called it a day.
Thomas made his way down the street and inhaled the emptiness of life at this hour. The silence wasn’t exactly the pure silence he craved; there was the inescapable white noise of the suburbs: the whipping wind of the nearby highway, a steady hum of functioning air condition units, and the occasional dog bark—but it would do.
He draped the towel over his shoulder and whistled a little bit. His tuneless whistling soon caught on to the refrain of an old spiritual, This Little Light of Mine. Thomas wasn’t sure why he fell into this song. It had been years since he heard it performed in a church. He had gone to an old college friend’s Southern Baptist church and was amazed by how lively their masses were. Sometimes he wished that the Catholic church would embrace a more lively choir and mass format. Maybe he could talk to Mary Tobbit about that.
At the end of the block Father Thomas reached the high school. For a long time Father Thomas had wanted to climb the track bleachers and say a little prayer at sunrise. Being naked outdoors gave Father Thomas a greater spiritual connection than any part of his professional life. Without the safety of his porch, being naked in a public place was something new and terrifying and Father Thomas loved every moment of it.
It was more exciting than administering any of the sacraments: confession, communion, and confirmation. The revelation this new level of nudity triggered contained a combination of the feelings of early adolescence, when around every corner was a new experience. He hadn’t felt this way in years and for a long time life had been too predictable and routine. Tonight he was like Eve: if somebody caught him parading around his forbidden fruits, he would be run out of the town.
As he climbed the metallic steps of the bleachers, Father Thomas paused to take in the surrounding view. He wished that people would stop being ashamed of their bodies. From the top row of the bleachers, he could make out the round dome of town hall and the steeple of his church. His heart leapt in his chest with pride.
Father Thomas knelt and crossed himself. He bowed his head and prayed for a few of his parishioners. He asked God to help George Tobbit remain faithful to his wife and for Mary Tobbit to orchestrate a wonderful collection of music this week. He prayed that his sermon at the neighboring parish would go off without a hitch. He crossed himself and sat on the metal bench. It was cool against his bare bottom. But he was quickly growing tired and he had left his towel at the bottom of the bleachers. Father Thomas decided that he would take a break a quick break and examine the stars. He laid across the bench, stared at the heavens, and basked in the enjoyment of his nakedness.
Father Thomas woke with a start as he rolled off the narrow bleacher bench. His glasses cracked in one lens as he fumbled to pull himself back on the bench. He frantically looked at the edges of the sky for first light. He sighed with relief when he saw that he was still shrouded in darkness.
Father Thomas was suddenly frightened at his foolishness for venturing so far from home without clothes. He pulled himself to his feet; his legs and back were red and imprinted with the metal lines of the steps. Each panicked step down the bleachers woke the stiffness that had set in his joints during his short outdoor voyage. He didn’t think twice as he passed by his towel toward home.
He passed the sprinklers on the north side of the field. Father Thomas’ stroll was almost a job, but as he passed the cool streaming water, he could not abstain from running through. The water created goosebumps as it streamed down his back, and his face broke into a huge grin. For a moment he skipped. He made a mental note to include in his sermon the unrestrained joys of childhood.
As he reached the end of his block he was once again feeling inspired. The movement of his shoes on pavement helped him formulate what he would say in his sermon. He began to wonder if God had broken his air conditioning for a reason. Without this experience he would’ve just gone with last year’s sermon for mass.
Father Thomas was two houses away when he heard the mechanical crank of an opening garage door. Instinctively, he began to run. His skin and other body parts flopped as he passed the next house and made contact with his own lawn. He kept running until he was safely on his porch. Panting, he learned forward to catch his breath by bracing his hands on his knees. It was going to be a good day.
Written by Leanne Cardwell
