Free Alter Boys by Chuck Stepanek Page A

moved right into damage control. 
     
    This scene was not what he expected, but that’s not to say that he was unprepared.  Many nights he had lain awake pondering how best to respond should he be faced with an accusation.  No, he never expected to get caught in the act, but he still had the same fundamental response in mind. 
     
    He had always imagined it to be pre-planned meeting.  First would come a phone call from an alarmed parent, followed by a face-to-face meeting (at the church of course!) where he could will himself (with the help of every holy emblem at his disposal) upon the accusatory parishioner.  His stock responses to any accusations had always been planned to deflect attention or minimize the impact of his accuser.  “Oh yes, we spent time in my room.  Of course I comforted the boy with fatherly hugs.  But what you’re suggesting, oh my, oh no, I am a priest who is committed to sacred vows.  Besides, you know how boys like to tell stories.  To bear false witness against your neighbor, against your priest, against your church, is to bear false witness against God himself!  I am a loving and forgiving man, but to have such stories repeated would be an act of opposition to the holy institution of the faith.  I pray that you talk to your boy, remand him as you see fit.  Do that, and then you may let him know that I have already absolved him, saving him from any embarrassment of the confessional.”
     
    He had rehearsed the scene countless times but like many an aspiring understudy had never needed to enact the performance.
     
    This was different.
    There could be no deflection, no minimizing, no hiding.  He was busted.  Flat out fucking busted.  Oddly, his now hastily hid erection was still at full throttle.  The shoe string and the cock ring were still doing their job; maintaining the phallus status, despite the fact that at this moment he wanted to be a million miles removed from anything sexually based.  The padre’s pants tented accusingly and made his words unconvincing.
     
    “This.  It’s not what you think.”  It was the best he could do. 
     
     
    13
     
    After daddy had finished the church steps, stamped his feet and headed toward the rectory he did so with trepidation.  He needed words.  Or maybe just one word:  ‘ Done. ’   If the priest felt the need to engage in further conversation then daddy would become absorbed with putting the coat on the boy and leading him out to the car.  Maybe the priest had become tired of watching the boy and would be happy to see them go.  One could only hope. 
     
    Familiar creepers of social anxiety threaded through his chest as he entered the ante chamber of the rectory.  Reflecting on his password, ‘done ,’ made him oblivious to the fact that he was still holding onto the shovel as he headed up the hallway.
     
    The hallway doors were all shut now but daddy possessed perfect recall of doors and the meters that lay behind them.  Besides, he could hear the boy and the priest engaged in some kind of game of celestial tug-of-war.  “See the hea-heavens.  Look for the l-light!”   And the squealing of his son?  Growing up with 10 younger siblings who could ever distinguish between the nonstop squeals of pain and delight.  Besides, nobody ever paid any attention to it, nobody cared.  At least the boy and the priest were talking so that meant he might be excused from participating.  He tried the word one more time on his lips ‘done’ and then had opened the door.     
     
    The scene before him did not unveil.  There was no horizontal image that unrolled from right to left as the door swung inward.  It was more of a mental blackboard with the word ‘done’ that melted into an image of…  The priest was completely bare assed. 
     
    It was obvious what had happened.  The priest had been helping the boy look through the telescope and his pants had fallen off. 
     
    But then the image changed.  The priest