the american spirit, i don't wanna go near it
darlin:attachment: rural boys watch the apocalypse by keaton saint james
Peter has gotten into the habit of sending Harley poetry. Often. One of Peter’s school friends, MJ, was hardcore into poetry, and evidently, it rubbed off on him.
Harley’s hopeless.
This poem, as the title would suggest, reminds Harley of the boys he grew up around. The accents. The biblical beliefs. The end of times. And it’s absolutely beautiful, even if Harley doesn’t know what to make of Peter sending him this specific poem.
Just as he starts falling into daydreams, his phone lights up with a call from Rosie. Her contact photo, one of her stuck in a tree, swallows up the whole screen, taking over the poem.
“Hey, Harley.” His sister sounds - tired. More tired than the average 12 year old child of a terminally ill single mother, abandoned by the only other person who understood that.
“Hey, Rosie. Everything okay back home?”
“Yeah, uhm,” her voice cracks, worn thin and weak. Harley’s heart feels like it’s stretching in his stretch. “Mom’s not doing so well. Treatment wise. The ones on her lungs got bigger. And the doctor said,” she starts talking faster, “that if they did surgery to remove them, she’d have pretty much no lungs left and - and -”
“Rosie, Rosie. Breathe, alright?” Harley coaches over the poor reception. He has one option here. “Alright. I’ll fly down as soon as I can, okay?”
Rosie sniffles. “No, no, please don’t. I can do this. You wanted updates, right? And it’s only been a week and a half. And it’s not like she’s never gotten worse before.”
She’s begrudgingly right. “Yeah, but you’ve never been alone with it before.”
She scoff-laughs. The connection makes it sound like two dissonant notes. “Harley, I have. When you’re out in your lab at all hours of the night, I’m dealing with it alone. You ever noticed how we don’t talk about it much, that Mom’s dying?”
“Not after the initial diagnosis. It’s hard.”
“It’s hard as all get out. But you’ve had your time with her. This is mine. Did you know her favorite flower used to be petunias, and that she has a petunia tattoo on her ankle?” Rosie asks incredulously. Harley finds a grin somewhere in all the rubble.
“Did she tell you about the tattoos on her shoulder?” Rosie audibly shakes her head, hair jostling around, mouth making the little mhm sound of uncertainty. “You should ask her about them. That’s a dramatic topic.”
A moment goes by where neither of them talk. Harley looks out the window in the kitchen at the lively city, juxtaposed with the silent interior of the tower. He wonders briefly about a life here. A real life here, after college maybe, with Rosie and him in a little apartment.
“I miss you,” she sighs. “And so does Mom. But I get why you need a break. And you better stay up there.” She chuckles, more genuine than before, at her own joke.
“As you command, Miss Dictator.” Harley grins. She really needs to meet Morgan, maybe at the expense of the rest of the world.
“Are you making plans for after?” She asks quietly. “Up in New York with the Starks?”
Harley exhales. “Yeah. Don’t worry about all that, Rosie. I got that covered. I’m your big brother, after all. Just - keep things together back home, alright? And call me if you need it. Or want to.”
“Okay. I can do that.” She swallows thickly. “Love you, Harley. Call me anytime, too. You haven’t done that yet.”
“Love you too, Rosie-Posie.” She hangs up first.
Harley sets his phone down on the counter. Unconsciously, he rests his head in his hands, fingers wrought into his hair. Lord. He pulls up again. He needs to be somewhere other than here. He needs something familiar. What’s one place that never really changes?
He steps into the church. It’s almost daunting. The roof, a million miles above him, angled like an arrow to the sky. A depiction of a gaunt Jesus on the cross sits at the front of the room, ribs sticking out, hair spinning down from his hollow face like tendrils. In the pews, near the front, a pastor is sitting with a nondescript man. The pastor looks up briefly at him. They make eye contact. But, unlike back home, Harley doesn’t feel haunted by his look. Harley finds a seat in the back row. As he walks, his footsteps echo through the room, worn rubber on old wood.
He doesn’t know how to think about being in a church. He doesn’t feel at home here. Does he feel at home anywhere, though? He hunches over, elbows on his knees, hands clasped together and thumbs almost at his forehead. This is how he was taught to pray. It doesn’t make much sense to him. He feels like he’s hunched away from whatever entity he’s looking for.
“Hello, son. Is there anything you’d like to talk about?” The pastor looks kindly at Harley.
How does he say he wants to talk about everything? There’s so much happening in his life that he doesn’t have the answers to. So much pain that has been bottled up for so many years that he feels like he’s going to explode under the pressure.
“I don’t really talk about my - feelings - much.” Harley struggles for the word feelings. It’s weird to talk about. He’s not supposed to be emotional, apparently, but how can he not?
“Well,” the pastor sits down next to Harley, “that’s what I’m here for. I’m Father Lantom.”
“I’m Harley,” he sighs, noticing how he’s shaking his leg before forcing himself to stop, “sorry. I’m not really used to all this. I haven’t really been to church in a while.”
“That’s perfectly fine, Harley.” Father Lantom says his name very softly, very personally, like he actually cares about this random kid in his church. Is this what church is like in New York? “I’m here to listen, never to judge.”
“My mom has terminal cancer.” Harley still has his elbows on his knees. He’s still hunched. It feels like a kind of repenting, like when he used to kneel by his bed and shout at G/d to listen to him, to be there. To not leave.
“I’m sorry to hear that. If you want to hear it, the Lord will speak to you.”
Harley shrugs. “I don’t know if I’m Christian. I grew up down south, in a small town, where everyone was Christian. I was a good Christian kid. Read the Bible. Said I’d never do drugs. Went to church on Sundays with my mom and sister. But - when I pray, it feels like I’m pleading guilty to something I didn’t do. A guilty plea that keeps me from getting the death sentence - or something.” Harley finds himself blurting all of this out. Quietly, of course.
“You don’t have to be Catholic, or even religious, to find sanctuary here. If I can ask, though, Harley, why would you come to a church?” Father Lantom asks.
“My little sister just called me. I’m up here visiting a family friend for a month, trying to make plans for after our mom dies. She’s stressed as all get out. And I keep thinking that it’s my fault, because it is. I’ve always been the one who handles all the hard stuff. Medical bills. Making appointments. Figuring out taxes. Talking to doctors. But now she’s the one who has to deal with that face first. She’s still just a kid. I’ve been trying to preserve that for her, because she deserves a childhood, but I can’t. And I don’t think it was working much, anyways. I feel awful for leaving her back in Tennessee, but I had to leave. I feel like there’s nothing I can do to help her, no matter how hard I try.”
“How old are you?”
“16. 17 soon.” Harley runs a long hand through his hair. Father Lantom looks at him sadly.
“Son, you’re still a child. You do not have to repent for that. Years ago, I met another young boy carrying the world on his shoulders. He had been blinded, you see, and orphaned. He grew up with that weight. But he grew up. This pain is not permanent. Grief, I’ve found over my years hearing from people here to find peace with it, doesn’t completely go away. But it does shrink. You learn to live with it. Though, I fear you already have, and at such a young age.”
It’s nothing Harley hasn’t heard before. But, hearing it from a priest, hearing anything but hellfire from his mouth, is enough. Harley doesn’t feel like a Christian. How could he? He’s never felt that draw, that pull to religion at his heart, but he believes in divinity in people. That’s what invention is; a product of some divine trait that everyone has some variant of. It’s a scientific path of finding G/d. It’s the only path Harley can understand.
“Thank you, Father Lantom.” Harley nods, pursed lips in a meager smile. Father Lantom claps his shoulder and gets up, groaning as he does. He walks back to the front of the pews and past the other man. Harley could, in actuality, leave right now. He’s gotten his mini-sermon from Father Lantom. But he wants to stay a while, maybe. He feels something he can’t quite put a name to, sitting here. Safe, maybe, but that doesn’t fully cover it. Reassured? Relieved? Less of an awful person? More deserving of joy?
He sits in that pew, not ready to move up closer to the holy figure. That’s too much. That reminds him of the church down the street from his house. Even though there aren’t any libraries in Rose Hill, there are four churches. He doesn’t go anymore. That church is a monolith to all that Rose Hill is, all that he will be there. Disliked. Filthy. The designated ‘other’. It’s different here. It’s better here. The weight on his shoulder is lessened now. It’s like it’s being shared. Maybe Father Lantom took some to carry on his own. Harley looks down at the worn paneled floor. This is where he needed to be. This place is a kind of sanctuary, a sanctuary from all the overwhelming world outside. In here, it’s quiet. It’s always the same. It’s steady. It feels almost like home.
He gets up after fifteen minutes of sitting in silence, real silence. It’s rare that he gets that feeling. The moment he crosses the doorway, he’s thrust back into the world. It’s loud. A biker swerves past him. Cars honk from the crowded street. People with their own lives and destinations rush past him, a school of fish, swarming in all directions. Someone is yelling into their phone, something about the electric bill. As calm as the church was, this is the other part of the world. This is part that he can’t leave, either.