Tuesday, July 3, 2012

The Confessional

This confessional is the last resort. The guilt is too much to bear, too big to deal with face to face.  Anonymous priest, you will know it all. If I hear you gasp I will understand my fate.

It is so odd that I should end up here. Church has never meant anything to me from a religious standpoint. When I was a kid and went to church on whatever holiday compelled my parents to attend, I was fascinated by the aura of the surroundings. Statues, stained glass, eerie organ echoes. A man on a cross with nails through his feet and hands and thorns on his head.

I was amused by the stiff self-consciousness of ordinary people trying to look pious. Their presence in the church at odds with the thoughts in their minds and the way they conducted their lives.

Being there for me was more entertainment than religion.

I have made so many mistakes in my life that it’s much less time consuming to list the accomplishments.  After a while, consistent failure creates desperation and desperation results in a twisted perspective. A perspective that rationalizes away any discomfort over what others consider immoral.

It starts small, it starts slow. Lying is easy if you are sincere, stealing is an exciting challenge no different than competing in sports. At some point you realize you have an aptitude for deceiving others and what keeps you going is an inability to recognize the way you deceive yourself.

I have sweet talked money from the elderly, people who were imprisoned by a social security existence. It didn’t bother me, even on the rare occasions when I had to use force and walk away from the shock, the disbelief and the tears.

Women find me charming. An attribute I use to get at their money, their credit cards, their valuables.  When I am done I break their spirit with a look as cold as ice and words they never anticipate.

Sometimes even their kids are useful. A woman had a son who was dealing. He thought I was cool, he liked my gun which I let him handle, he told me his secrets. I stole his money and whatever stash he had left and disappeared. He took an awful beating and walks with a limp. He works at a Wal-Mart now.

This last thing, though, I didn’t expect it. Didn’t ever think I was capable of it. Situations can get out of hand quickly in ways that can’t be anticipated, and you are forced to react.

“She saw me coming, I didn’t see a thing.” That’s a line from a song on The Stones last album. Somehow she figured me out, maybe I got too cocky, I don’t know. Turns out she was a better actor than I am, she conned me when I thought I was conning her.

She set me up big time but couldn’t follow through. Maybe a little bit of my charm made it through her defenses, maybe she didn’t want to believe. Who knows.

She ended up confronting me in the kitchen, the word police kept popping up and things got physical. She was a fighter, I’ll give her that, physically and mentally. I was impressed until her broken body landed bleeding on the beautiful, Italian ceramic tile floor.

Shock immobilized me for a while as I sat on a kitchen chair and stared. Eventually I came out of it as my mind convinced me that this had to be dealt with.

Believe it or not my devotion to dark movies and The Sopranos gave me a pretty good idea how to go about it.

Bleach, trash bags, rope and a chain saw that a neighbor had left behind got the job done. I only threw up twice.

And now I am standing in this church and it feels pretty damn religious to me. I don’t really know what I expect to accomplish,  don’t really know why I am here but my confidence is shaken and I don’t believe I can outsmart the cops for long.

I need this. I need to get it off my chest.

Confidentiality is guaranteed in the confessional no matter what. During the confession I casually held my gun at eye level; when I was done and before penance was pronounced, I said some things to Father Gilhooly that could be interpreted as threats.

Just in case.

No comments:

Post a Comment