I Have Sinned Page 5

  “You two are making even less sense than usual,” said Jackie, “and that’s really saying something.”

  “Furries,” said Paidi. “Weirdos who dress up as animals and then have sex with each other.”

  “That’s not a thing,” said Jackie.

  “Oh no,” said Donal. “It is alright. They’d a big write-up on it in the paper. They call having sex ‘yiffing’ – after the sound that foxes make when they’re on the job.”

  Jackie considered himself on the more liberal end of the scale, but this horrified him – his grandkids watched that show. As if on cue, Diller stuck his head out the door. “I’m not one of them. I’m working as a mascot up in Times Square.”

  Jackie nodded, relieved. “Yeah, that makes sense.” It was a New York institution – out-of-work actors in costumes charging tourists five bucks to get their picture taken with Darth Vader or Elmo or Pocahontas. “By the way, Dill, you never said, who is—?”

  In answer to the question Jackie hadn’t finished asking, the bar’s double doors flew open again and two more foxes stumbled in.

  “Told ye,” said Donal.

  “Gallagher’s all over again,” agreed Paidi.

  “Both of you shut up.”

  The two foxes pulled the heads off their costumes to reveal two sweaty men. One of them had shaggy blond hair, the other was a couple of eyebrows away from being an egg. The bald one looked around. “You seen a fox come in here?”

  Jackie stopped to think. “Could you be more specific?”

  The blond pulled a face. “Very funny. A guy in a costume like ours?”

  Jackie shook his head. “Doesn’t ring any bells.”

  “We saw him come in here from down the block,” said Baldy.

  “Is that right?” said Jackie. “Well, I ain’t seen him. What about you, fellas?”

  Both of the sentinels shook their heads before Paidi added, “How come you’re wearing the heads?”

  “What?”

  “You ran in here and then you took the heads off. Would it not have been easier running about with the heads off?”

  The blond guy looked genuinely appalled. “We can’t take the heads off outside. It’d ruin the magic for the kids.”

  Donal nodded. “Method acting. Fair play.”

  “We’re gonna take a look around,” said the bald guy.

  Jackie shook his head. “I’m sorry, gentlemen, but this here establishment exists for the purchase and consumption of alcoholic beverages in a convivial atmosphere. I’m afraid you turning it into the Animal Farm remake of the Diary of Anne Frank is not going to be conducive to the aforementioned objective.”

  “What?” asked Baldy.

  “He says feck off,” said Paidi.

  The blond guy took a step forward. “Shut up, old man.”

  “Ohhh now,” said Jackie, taking a baseball bat from underneath the bar in as casual a manner as it was possible to do so. “Paidi is a loyal patron of this here watering hole. Nobody tells him to shut up.”

  The bald guy tried to stare Jackie down.

  “Is there a problem here, Jackie?”

  Jackie turned to see Bunny standing in the archway that led to the back room, two empty glasses in his hands.

  “Nah, Bunny, everything’s fine. Our furry friends were just leaving.”

  The blond guy pushed the other towards the door. “C’mon, Stevie.”

  Stevie seemed to have as little sense as he did hair. “You tell your friend – we own Times Square.”

  “Is that right?” said Jackie. “Congratulations. That’s a prime bit of real estate. You should spend some of that money on getting your suits dry-cleaned.”

  The two foxes departed.

  “What in the feck is going on here?” asked Bunny, placing the glasses down on the bar.

  “Place is becoming a furries bar,” said Paidi.

  “Shut up, Paidi,” said Jackie. “You can come out, Dill.”

  Diller emerged from the hallway looking sheepish. “Thanks, Jackie.”

  Bunny stared at Diller, confusion writ large on his face. “What have you come as?” Then his body language changed. “Wait – were them lads looking for you?”

  “It’s alright,” said Diller. “Don’t go getting involved.”

  Bunny looked towards the door. He wasn’t used to not getting involved.

  “Usual?” asked Jackie.

  Bunny nodded.

  “One lemonade, one whiskey and one Guinness coming up.”

  Diller, Smithy and Bunny sat around their usual table, although Diller wasn’t dressed as he usually was.

  “I don’t get it,” said Bunny.

  “What do you mean?” asked Diller.

  “You dress up as, like, a fox?”

  “Not just any fox. Funtime Freddie.”

  “Right, yeah. And then you just hang about in Times Square looking for business?”

  “You’re making it sound a lot more hooker-like than it is,” said Smithy. “Tourists love it. They get a picture with their favourite character from whatever.”

  Diller nodded. “You could make a fortune being the dude from Game of Thrones, Smithy.”

  Smithy shook his head. “No, thank you. I’ve had enough looky-loos to last me a lifetime.”

  Bunny slapped the table. “You could use your thing! Ye know – your thing.” He pointed at his head. What he was referring to was the fact that Smithy, as an after-effect of getting run over in a convenience store parking lot, occasionally heard in his head what could be considered “the voice of God”. At least, Diller believed it to be that, Bunny seemed undecided and, most importantly, the voice itself seemed utterly convinced of it. Smithy tried to rationalise it away as some form of post-traumatic stress, but that argument had so far failed to work on the voice.

  “How could I use ‘my thing’?” asked Smithy, in a tone of voice that made it clear he didn’t think there existed a sensible answer.

  “Easy,” said Bunny. “You get yourself a little booth and a sign that says, ‘I hear the voice of God in my head. Five bucks – you can ask him anything.’”

  “It doesn’t work like that,” said Smithy. “And even if it did, I think I’ll stick to driving a cab rather than being a freak show for tourists, thanks all the same.”

  “Fair enough,” said Bunny. “How’s that going by the way?”

  “The cab? Fine,” said Smithy, with a nod. “Great. No problems. Can we get back to Diller? These guys are after you because…?”

  “Because, one of ’em works one side of the street and the other does the other. They are trying to suppress my right to engage in free competition. I mean – there’s four Darth Vaders.”

  “Hey, wait a second,” said Smithy. “You told me you were going to be the dude from Star Wars.”

  “Lando Calrissian,” said Diller with a nod. “Yeah, I tried that. Not enough people knew who I was. A few Korean tourists asked to get their picture taken with me and I’m pretty sure they just wanted a picture with a black guy. That was weird.”

  “Hang on, hang on,” said Bunny, knocking the bottom of his pint glass on the table for attention. “Them two pricks chased you all the way here?”

  Diller nodded.

  “What were you doing hiding behind the bar? Me and Smithy would’ve taken care of it for you.”

  Smithy nodded.

  Diller looked embarrassed. “Well…”

  “What?”

  “I mean, no offence, guys, but I’d rather handle it my way.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Smithy.

  “It’s just that – y’know I love you both – but when you get involved in stuff, it has a tendency to get a bit… violent.”

  “Ah, here now!” said Bunny, who’d been in a violent clash with two drug dealers just that afternoon.

  “That’s not… that’s…” said Smithy, who’d come there directly from nearly hitting a fare dodger with his cab before landing an elbow drop and a cock punch on the dude
.

  The table descended into a rather frosty silence as everyone took a drink.

  Diller pulled the collar of his suit out again, trying to circulate some air.

  “Have you not got a change of clothes?” asked Smithy.

  “Nah. My stuff is in a locker at the bus station. I need to go back later and get it.”

  Smithy nodded. “Right.”

  “So,” said Diller, turning to Bunny, “what is this about?”

  “Well, as it happens, I’d like to engage your services. I need your help following a priest.”

  “Cool,” said Diller, looking at Smithy excitedly. He’d been trying to convince him that they should start their own private investigation business for quite a while now.

  Smithy grimaced. This was why Bunny had insisted on waiting for Diller to get there before explaining the nature of his latest emergency. He thought Smithy would have tried to talk him out of it and he was right. Smithy loved working with Diller, but he wanted the kid to go and be the actor he was destined to be. He didn’t want to look back on it twenty years from now and regret that he’d turned a really good actor into a gumshoe.

  “By any chance,” said Smithy, “would this be the priest you were going to see about finding the sisters?”

  “That’s right. He says he’s never heard of them.”

  “So why are we…?”

  “’Twas the way he said it,” said Bunny. “He knows them, I’m sure of it. Ideally, we should’ve started the surveillance before I asked him, but que sera. If he’s not contacted the sisters already, I bet he will. He knows what I look like, so…”

  “I’m in,” said Diller.

  “Hold up,” said Smithy. “I’d like to help, but this sounds like it could take quite some time. I’ve got the cab and Diller’s got his job.”

  “I’d rather do this,” said Diller excitedly.

  “Yeah, but we gotta pay the bills.”

  “Oh, sorry,” said Bunny, “did I not make it clear? I’m hiring you – on a proper rate, too.”

  Smithy furrowed his brow. “You had to get a loan of fifty bucks off me last week. Has your magic bank card been turned back on?”

  Bunny shook his head. “No, I ehm… I came into some money.” He pulled a wad of notes out of his pocket to emphasise his point. Then he peeled off a fifty and pushed it across the table to Smithy.

  “Thanks.”

  “This is great,” said Diller. “I’m gonna get one of those fancy lemonades to celebrate.”

  “Hold up, hold up, hold up,” said Smithy. “Where did all this money come from?”

  “’Tis not important,” said Bunny. “So, are you in?”

  “Yes,” said Diller, unnecessarily.

  They both looked at Smithy expectantly.

  He sighed. “Alright, fine.”

  All three men suddenly looked towards the front of the bar, where a great deal of shouting had broken out.

  “Stay here,” said Smithy to Diller, before getting up and moving across to where he could see around the corner.

  “What is it?” asked Bunny.

  Smithy stood there watching.

  “Smithy?”

  Smithy turned back. “I have no idea. A guy in a suit and a dude in a hoodie walked in and now Paidi and Donal are losing their collective shit.”

  Chapter Six

  “OK,” said Father Gabriel, “first things first: show me your hands.”

  Bianca obediently held her hands out in front of her, and the priest examined them carefully, turning them over and back. He looked at them like he was expecting to see the face of God. The man was pretty intense about everything he ever did.

  “And you iced them when you got home, like I told you?”

  “Yes, Father G.”

  “And you’ve not had any aches or pains in them?”

  “No, Father G.”

  “And you got a good night’s sleep?”

  “Three bags full, Father G.”

  He looked at her, his round frameless glasses making his eyes look somehow bigger. Trey had once described him as a Latino John Lennon. Bianca hadn’t understood the reference, but then he’d shown her the picture and she’d got it.

  “Oh, I see,” he said. “That’s how it is now. You win yourself a title and suddenly you’re giving me attitude?”

  She smiled back at him. “Can I see my trophy again?”

  He gave her a stern look, mostly to keep from giving her the smile she wanted. “No, you can’t. You said you wanted to train, so we train.” He’d taken the trophy back to the church last night, as per her wishes. She hadn’t had to say why. Something nice like that – if she took it home, it might disappear.

  “Maybe I could practise holding my trophy up? I’m worried my swagger game is off.”

  Father Gabriel let go of her hands and gave her a playful tap on the cheek. “I think your swagger game is just fine, Señorita. What we have to work on is your humility.”

  “Ohhh.” She grinned. “He talking smack now. You gonna get in the ring with me, Padre? Teach me a lesson?”

  This was a recurring riff in their conversation, the joke being that Gabriel was so small and slight of build, he wasn’t that far out of her weight division. In reality, despite being a sprightly thirty-four years old, he never boxed in the gym he had built. That a Franciscan priest was training fighters had been met with a lot of disapproval in some quarters as it was. The gym was not about him. It wasn’t much of a gym, truth be told, but he was proud of it.

  The idea had come to him one morning as he sat eating his breakfast after another long night administering last rites and offering ineffective comfort to relatives in the ER. He had been working in the parish for nearly four years, and in that time, he had mostly met his congregation at funerals. He would inexpertly deliver impassioned sermons he had spent all week crafting, only to see blank faces interspersed with occasional snoring. It had felt like there was an impenetrable force field between him and his congregation and try as he might, he couldn’t find a way through. Night after night he had prayed for inspiration, for the Lord to show him a way to make a connection. He’d been tired – tired of simply praying for the dead and offering cold comfort to the living. He’d wanted to find a way to fight back. To stop children becoming soldiers in the war that the gangs perpetually fought, with Coopersville as their battleground. So, without asking – for fear someone would say no – he’d taken the modest bungalow next to the church, where he was supposed to live, and knocked down the internal walls. He’d done the first one there and then in a fit of zeal and then he’d had to pay one of the local men to come in and fix it, as he knew nothing about working construction. He had moved his bed into the church’s basement; it would be fine for his needs.

  After a few false starts, St Theresa’s boxing gym had been born. To begin with, the ring was a square marked out in chalk and there were some basic weights and a heavy bag. He’d scrounged some gloves and put up a notice on the door: “All welcome. No weapons. No gang colours. All disputes left outside or settled in the ring.”

  A couple of young kids got sent there by desperate mothers looking for anything to keep them off the streets. Father Gabriel had got himself a book from the library. His one advantage, at the beginning, was that the kids didn’t know enough to realise he was making it up as he went along. It had happened gradually – kids drifting through the doors in ones and twos. From little acorns… It turned out, he had found a way in.

  Now, the gym’s biggest problem was space. They had to work out schedules so that everyone could get in and still there was not enough room. They’d rigged up a second shower, but they needed more. Around him right now, a dozen kids trained, the older ones helping the younger. In an hour, another dozen would replace them. Later that night, the women’s self-defence class would be filled to capacity – taught by Gina Marks, a nurse originally from the Philpott housing project. She’d got out and now lived in Brooklyn with her husband and three kids, but wanted to g
ive back. They also had a couple of hours of women-only training on the schedule. Bianca wasn’t bothered by the boys so she trained whenever she could. In this gym, she got respect. Only a fool could see her work and not realise that she was something special.

  “I’m not getting in the ring with you, Bianca, but don’t go thinking a trophy made you a champion. It’s training. Discipline—”

  “And determination,” continued Bianca, who knew this speech well. “That’s what makes a champion.”

  “Just because I’ve said it before, it doesn’t make it wrong.”

  Bianca raised her hand into the air theatrically. “Preach, Padre, preach.”

  He cracked and gave her the smile she was going for. Gabriel tried not to play favourites, but given Bianca’s journey from a lost and angry little girl to the powerful and confident woman she was growing into before his eyes, it was hard not to. He had also found that, put in the context of the gym and training, communicating with the kids had become so much easier. Everyone was there for a purpose and talking was secondary. Somehow the pressure was not as great. He simply spoke better from behind a heavy bag than a pulpit.

  Bianca turned and pointed at the far corner, near where Darrell Wilkes was ineptly but enthusiastically losing a fight with the speed bag. “I was thinking we could put my trophy over there.”

  Gabriel shook his head. “This is a gym, not a trophy room.”

  Bianca gave a mocking pout. “But we got yours up?”

  Gabriel turned his head to follow her point and his heart sank. The framed article from the newspaper was back up on the wall.

  Rosaria Annabella Montoya, the parish secretary, was part force of nature and part gift from God, but she was also the bane of Gabriel’s existence. He’d taken it down twice now, and argued his case for why it shouldn’t be up there, but Rosaria was immovable on this point. It had been she who had contacted the paper. They’d all known that they needed money from somewhere if they were going to expand, and they definitely needed to expand. That kind of donation wasn’t going to come from Coopersville – Gabriel had been very insistent on not taking money from the gangs. Still, the gym couldn’t fulfil their needs – and that was just in the training area. The club had expanded beyond its initial remit, becoming more of a community hub than a boxing club. Kids had needed somewhere to do their homework and so they’d curtained off an area at the back of the church and put tables in. Mrs Welpes from down the block was keen to create an amateur dramatics club, but they had nowhere to rehearse or perform. And then there was the works programme for the older kids. It had started with Father Gabriel needing jobs done about the place last summer and it had just grown and grown. He’d gotten Fred Daniels to give a carpentry class and that had gone well too. Every success led to another problem, though. Soon, Gabriel had found himself with more eager hands than he’d known what to do with, the church only needing so many odd jobs done, even in its dilapidated state. They had gone around to anyone they could think of, trying to find work for the young men. Gabriel’s logic had been simple: put ’em in a job, keep ’em out of the gangs. Society told these kids they were worthless, and the gangs fed off that, offering a sense of belonging that was otherwise missing from their lives. If you wanted to break the cycle, you needed to find opportunity and pray to God they took it. Gabriel was a realist – he’d lost an awful lot more fights than he’d won, but he still had to fight every one. So, yes, he had agreed to the article, but only on the condition it was about the kids. That was not how it had turned out. “THE PUGILIST PRIEST” was the headline. It made him out to be a combination of Mother Teresa and George Foreman and he couldn’t look at it without cringing. He’d been so careful with the photographer, or at least he thought he had, always making sure there were boxers between them. He’d told them he didn’t like having his picture taken. The photo showed two kids sparring, their bodies a blur of motion in the foreground, while it picked him out in the background, standing perfectly still, looking on intently.