Ultimate Supernatural Horror Box Set (25 page)

She slipped the hair trimmings into the plastic bag.  These cuttings could not be tossed into a dumpster or even flushed away.  They were sacred.  They had to remain here with the Virgin.

“I hope you can understand the way I felt, Mother, because I can’t imagine you ever feeling dirty or unworthy.  But the dirtiness was not the real problem.  It was the hopelessness that came with it—the inescapable certainty that I could never be clean again.  That’s what did me in, Mother.  I knew what your Son promised, that we have but to believe and ask forgiveness and we shall be cleansed.  I knew the words, I understood them in my brain, but in my heart was the conviction that His forgiveness was meant for everyone but Carolyn Ferris.  Because Carolyn Ferris had be involved in the unspeakable, the unthinkable, the unpardonable.”

She kept cutting, tucking the loose trimmed ends back under the Virgin’s wimple.

“I’ve been to enough seminars and read enough self-help books to know that I was sabotaging myself—I didn’t feel worthy of being a good nun, so I made damn sure I never could be one.  I regret that.  Terribly.  And even more, I regret dragging Dan down with me.  He’s a good man and a good priest, but because of me he broke his own vow, and now he’s a sinning priest.”

Carrie felt tears welling in her eyes.  Damn, I’ve got a lot to answer for.

“But all that’s changed now,” she said, blinking and sniffing.  “Finding you is a sign, isn’t it?  It means I’m not a hopeless case.  It means He thinks I can hold to my vows and make myself worthy to guard you and care for you.  And if He thinks it, then it must be so.”

She trimmed away the last vagrant strands of hair, then sealed them in the zip-lock bag.

“There.”  She stepped back and smiled.  “You look better already.”

She glanced down at the Virgin’s long, curved fingernails.  They were going to need a lot of work, more work than she had time for now.

“I’ve got to go now.  Got to do my part for the least of His children, but I’ll be back.  I’ll be back every day.  And every day you’ll see a new and better me.  I’m going to be worthy of you, Mother.  That is a promise—one I’ll keep.”

She just had to find the right way to tell Dan that the old Carrie was gone and he couldn’t have the new one.  He was a good man.  The best.  She knew he’d understand and accept the new her...eventually.  But she had to find a way to tell him without hurting him.

She placed the bag of clippings under the table that constituted the Virgin’s bier, then kissed her wimple and blew out the candles.  She snapped the combination lock closed and hurried upstairs to help with lunch.

‡

Carrie was adding a double handful of sliced carrots to the last pot of soup when she heard someone calling her name from the Big Room.  She walked to the front to see what it was.

Augusta, a stooped, reed-thin, wrinkled volunteer who worked the serving line three days a week, stood at the near end of the counter with Pilgrim.

“He says he’s got a complaint,” Augusta said, looking annoyed and defensive.

The guests often complained about Augusta, saying she was stingy with the portions she doled out.  Which was true.  She treated the soup and bread as if it were her own.  Carrie and Dan had been over this with her again and again: The idea here was to serve everything they made, then make more for the next meal.  But they couldn’t very well tell her she wasn’t welcome behind the counter anymore—they needed every helping hand they could find.

Carrie glanced around for Dan, hoping he could field this, but he was standing by the front door, deep in conversation with Dr. Joe.

“Preacher don’t want me to say nothin’, Sister,” Pilgrim said, “but he found this in his mouth while he was eating his soup and I think you should know about it.”

He held out his hand and in the center of his dirty palm lay a three-inch hair. 

“I’m Preacher’s eyes, you know.”

“I know that,” Carrie said. 

Everybody knew that.  Mainly because Pilgrim told anyone who would listen whenever he had a chance.  Preacher was blind and Pilgrim was his devoted disciple, leading him from park to stoop to street corner, wherever he could find a small gathering that might listen to his message of imminent Armageddon.

“I’m usually pretty good but this one slipped by me.  I kinda feel like I let him down.”

“Oh, I’m sure Preach doesn’t feel that way,” Carrie said, plucking the hair from his palm.  “But I do apologize for this, and tell him I’ll do my best to see that it doesn’t happen again.”

“Oh, no!” Pilgrim said, agitatedly waving his hands in front of her.  “You got me wrong.  It ain’t your fault.”  He pointed a finger at Augusta.  “It’s hers.  Look at that gray hair straggling all over the place, and that’s a gray hair Preacher found.  She’s supposed to be wearing a net.  I know ‘cause I useta work in a diner and we all hadda wear hair nets.”

“He has no right to say that, Sister,” Augusta snapped.

Just then the basement phone began ringing in the far corner of the kitchen.  Hilda Larsen went to get it.

“It’s for you, Sister,” Hilda called from inside.  “Your brother.”

Uh-oh, Carrie thought as she hurried back into the kitchen and took the receiver.  Brad never called her at Loaves and Fishes.  This could only mean that his American Express bill had arrived. 

“Hi, Brad.  I can explain all those charges.”  Well, most of them, anyway.

“What charges?”

“On the card.  You see—”

“I didn’t get the bill yet, Car.  And whatever it is, don’t give it a second thought.”

“I went a bit overboard, Brad.”

“Carrie, I’ve got more money than I know what to do with and no one to spend it on.  So let’s not mention AmEx charges again.  That’s not why I called.  It’s about Dad.”

Carrie felt all the residual warmth from her hours with the Virgin this morning empty out of her like water down a drain.

“What about him?”

She asked only because it was expected of her.  She didn’t care a thing about that man.  Couldn’t.  The mere mention of him froze all her emotions into suspended animation. 

“He passed out.  They had to move him to the hospital.  They say it’s his heart acting up again.”

Carrie said nothing as Brad paused, waiting for her reaction.  When the wait stretched to an uncomfortable length, he cleared his throat.

“He’s asking for you.”

“He’s always asking for me.”

“Yeah, but this time—”

“This time will be just like the last time.  He’ll get you all worked up thinking he’s going to die, get you and me going at each other, then he’ll come out of it and go back to the nursing home.”

“He’s changed, Carrie.”

“He’ll always be Walter Ferris.  He can’t change that.”

Brad sighed.  “You know, I wish you’d take one tiny bit of the care and compassion you heap upon those nobodies down there and transfer it to your own father.  Just once.”

“These nobodies never did to me what that man did.  It’s because of him that I’m down here with these nobodies.  We can both thank him for where we are.”

“I’ve managed to do okay.”

“Have you?”

Now it was Brad’s turn for silence.

Carrie wanted to ask him why he hadn’t been able to sustain a relationship.  It seemed every time he got close to a woman he backed off.  Why?  What was he afraid of?  That he was like his father?  That a little bit of that man hid within him?  And that if he had children of his own he might do what his father did?

But she couldn’t say that to Brad.  All she could say was, “I love you, brother.”

And she meant it.

“I love you too, Carrie.”

Suddenly she heard voices rising in the Big Room.

“I’ve got to go.  Call me soon.”

“Will do.”

As Carrie turned away from the phone, she saw Augusta coming toward her.

“Honestly, Sister.  That wasn’t my hair.  Mine’s long and thick.  That one Pilgrim gave you is short and fine.”

“It’s okay, Augusta.”  She brushed past the old woman.  “What’s going on in the Big Room?”

“Probably another fight.  You know how they are.”

But it wasn’t a fight.  The regulars—Rider, Dandy, Lefty, Dirty Harry, Poppy, Bigfoot, Indian, Stony, One-Thumb George—and a few of the newer ones were clustered around one of the long tables.  She saw Dan standing on the far side of the circle as Dr. Joe bent over Preacher who sat ramrod straight, holding his hands before his face.

“A miracle!” Pilgrim was screeching, dancing and gyrating among the tables of the Big Room.  “I always knew Preacher had the power, and now it’s come!  It’s a miracle!  A fucking miracle!”

Carrie pushed closer. 

Preacher was staring at his hands, muttering.  “I can see!  Praise God, I can see!”

She stepped back and stared at the short strand of gray hair in her hand.  It hadn’t come from Augusta.  She recognized it now.  It was the same length and color as the stray strands Carrie had been trimming from the Virgin a short while ago.  It must have stuck to her sleeve downstairs and fallen into the soup as she was adding the ingredients.

A miracle...

She wanted to laugh, she wanted to cry, she wanted to grab Pilgrim’s hands and join him in a whirling dervish.

Oh, Pilgrim, she thought as she hurried back through the kitchen and down to the subcellar.  If only you knew how right you are!

Yes, it was a miracle.  And Carrie had a feeling it would not be the last.

‡

“Preacher can really see again,” Dan said for the third or fourth time.  Evening had come and they were cleaning up the Big Room after dinner.  “Not well, mind you.  He can recognize his hand in front of his face and not much more, but at least that’s something.  He’s been totally blind for forty years.”

Carrie had decided to hold off telling Dan about the piece of the Virgin’s hair in the soup.  He’d only go into his Doubting Thomas routine.  She’d wait till she had more proof.  But she couldn’t resist priming him for the final revelation. 

She glanced around to make sure they were out of earshot of the volunteers in the kitchen.

“Do you think it’s a miracle?” she said softly. 

Dan didn’t look up as he wiped one of the long tables.  “You know what I think about miracles.”

“How do you explain it then?”

“José says it might have been hysterical blindness all along, and now he’s coming out of it.  He’s scheduled him for a full eye exam tomorrow.”

“Well, far be it from me to disagree with Doctor Joe.”

Dan stopped in mid wipe and stared at her.  “Aw, Carrie.  Don’t tell me you think—”

“Yes!” she said in a fierce whisper.  “I think a certain someone has announced her presence.”

“Come on, Carrie—”

“You and José believe in your hysterical blindness, if you wish.  All I know is that Preacher began to see again within hours of a certain someone’s arrival.”

Dan opened his mouth, then closed it, paused, then shook his head.  “Coincidence, Carrie.” 

But he didn’t sound terribly convinced.

Carrie couldn’t repress a smile.  “We’ll see.”

“We’ll see what?”

“How many ‘coincidences’ it takes to convince you.”

Fruitless Vigil in Tompkins  Square

Approximately 1,000 people gathered last night for a candlelight prayer vigil in Tompkins Square Park.  Surrounded by knots of curious homeless, many of whom call the park home, the predominantly female crowd prayed to the Virgin Mary in the hope that she would manifest herself in the park.

Sightings of a lone woman, described as “glowing faintly”, and identified as the Blessed Virgin, have been reported with steadily increasing frequency all over the Lower East Side during the past few weeks.

Despite many recitations of the Rosary, no manifestation occurred.  Many members of the crowd remained undaunted, however, vowing to return next Sunday evening.

(The New York Post)

SIXTEEN

Manhattan

“Something bothering you, José?”

Dan and Dr. Joe ambled crosstown after splitting a sausage-and-pepper pizza and a pitcher of beer at Nino’s on St. Mark’s and Avenue A.  José had been unusually quiet tonight.

“Bothering me?  I don’t know.  Nothing bad or anything like that, just...I don’t know.”

“That’s the first time you’ve put that many words together in a row all night, and six of them were ‘I don’t know.’  What gives?”

José said, “I don’t know,” then laughed.  “I...aw hell, I guess I can tell you: I think two of my AIDS patients have been cured.”

Dan felt an anticipatory tightening in his chest and he wasn’t sure why. 

“You’re sure?”

“It’s not just my diagnosis.  They were both anemic, both had Kaposi’s when I’d seen them in July.  They came in last week and their skin had cleared and their hematocrits were normal.  I sent them to Beekman for a full work up.  The results came back today.”

“And?”

“They’re clear.”

“Cured?”

Dan saw José’s head nod in the dark.  “Yep.  They’re now HIV neg.  Their peripheral smears are normal, their CD4 cell counts are normal, their skin lesions are gone.  Not a single goddamn trace that they were ever exposed to HIV.  Hell, they both used to be positive for hepatitis B surface antigen and now even
that’s
gone.”

José sounded as if he was going to cry.

“But how—?”

“Nothing I did.  Just gave them the usual cocktail, and let me tell you, man, they weren’t all that reliable about taking their meds.  Fucking miracle, that’s what it is.  Medical fucking miracle.”

Dan’s mouth went dry.  Talk of miracles did that to him lately.  So did talk of people seeing the Virgin Mary in his neighborhood.

“Miracle.  You mean like...Preacher?”

“I can’t say much about Preacher.  I’ve got no medical records on him from when he was blind, so I can’t say anything about the condition of his retinas when he couldn’t see.  All I can say is that his vision has improved steadily until it’s almost twenty-twenty now.  But...these two AIDS patients, they were documented cases.”