Fruit (14 page)

That morning, Mr. Mitchell started off the day by reading us a story from his
Christian Tales for Modern Youth
book. I listened very carefully to a story about a teenage girl who stays at a sock hop past her curfew and makes her mother cry. When he finished, Mr. Mitchell asked what the moral of the story was. My hand shot up like a bullet.

“Yes, Peter?” Mr. Mitchell looked pretty shocked. I don’t put my hand up very often.

“Blind are the eyes of the unfaithful, Mr. Mitchell.”

Someone behind me snickered. It was probably Brian Cinder, but I didn’t care. I had the Virgin on my side now. “Devil worshipper,” I said to him through a mental telepathy message.

“That’s a very valid point,” Mr. Mitchell said. “I’m not sure if it’s exactly the moral of
this
particular story, but in general, yes, that’s very true. Um, anyone else?”

I worried all day about what Daniela had said; that I had to build a shrine to the Virgin to make her happy. Then she’d cure my nipples. Maybe she’d even help me lose weight and get a boy friend! But what kind of shrine should I make? Like Daniela said, the Virgin was pretty tricky and something told me she had very high expectations.

Later that night, the answer hit me over the head like a hammer. I was looking through the
Observer
and saw an ad for a do-it-yourself nativity scene. The kit included life-size illustrations of Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus. All you had to do was glue the figures onto a sheet of plywood and cut them out along the dotted line.

“So simple to do,” the ad said. “Makes a lovely addition to any yard. And just in time for the Holiday Season! What a perfect way to remind your neighbours that Jesus is the Reason for the Season!”

I told my parents about the ad and asked if we could order it.

“I think it’s a perfect way to remind our neighbours that Jesus is the Reason for the Season,” I said.

“You’re being a little strange about this,” my mom said. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t see why not,” my dad said. “How much is it?”

Every night before I went to bed, I crossed myself in front of the Virgin and told her to be patient.

“Have faith in me, Mary,” I whispered to her. “Your
shrine should be arriving in the mail any day now.”

A week later, a big cardboard tube showed up at our door and my dad and I went downstairs to get started. I could tell he was excited because we had to use his power tools. He was probably happy that we were finally doing something that fathers and sons are supposed to do. I was happy, too.

“This is like our very own shop class,” I thought to myself.

My dad even went upstairs to make himself a coffee, which he doesn’t usually drink, and came back down with a plate of Cinnamon Swirl cookies and a hot chocolate for me. It was good to be around him and actually have something to talk about.

“Now take a damp cloth, Peter,” he said. “And wipe down where you’ve glued so you don’t get bubbles. That’s it. Gently ease into the wood with the saw. Peter, pay attention. Peter, look at what you’re doing. For god’s sake, Peter! Follow the dotted line! You’re as blind as your mother!”

We finished everything that afternoon. I think I did a very good job, because even though some of the lines around the manger were a little jagged (I was trying to make the straw look more realistic) everything else looked very professional. Joseph was wearing a brown robe with a yellow rope tied around his waist. Jesus had a face that seemed a bit too old for someone just born, but he always looks that way in Christmas paintings. Mary was the best, though. She was wearing a white dress with a blue veil that covered her brown hair. She was looking up at the sky and her hands were pressed together in prayer. She
didn’t really look like the Virgin in my closet, but I knew which one was the real deal.

My dad attached poles to the backs of the figures and we took them outside. We arranged them beneath the living room window and then hammered the poles into the ground. Then my dad said we should put a spotlight on the nativity scene so that people could see it at night. So we went to Canadian Tire. While we were there, I saw Craig Brown with his dad. They were looking at hockey sticks. Craig’s dad was old, even older than my dad, and he was wearing a baseball hat and a big ugly parka with fur trim around the hood.

“You and your dad go buy your stupid hockey stuff, Craig,” I said through a mental telepathy message. “My dad and I are doing something much more important. Something religious. You wait until my picture is on the front page of the
Observer
. Then you’ll really regret not talking to me anymore.” I hurried off before he spotted me. My dad paid for the spotlight with a wad of Canadian Tire money.

“The Virgin will be pleased,” I thought when my dad plugged the spotlight in.

“Oh my,” my mom said when she came out to look at it. “I can’t wait for the Catholics to see
this
.”

Once my shrine was set up, it was time to take care of the other stuff. I signed out a book on the Catholic religion from the school library and made a list of all the tools I would need to make the Virgin happy.

I cornered Daniela the next day. She was out shovelling her driveway.

“I don’t know if I’d be bothering to do that if I were you,” I said. “It’s supposed to snow again tonight. You’ll just have to do it all over again.”

“Yeah, well. What else is fuckin’ new?” Daniela said. She was huffing pretty hard and there were clumps of snow in her black hair, reminding me of her Miss Basilico baby’s breath.

“You’re doing a great job,” I said. I knew I had to be extra nice to her.

Daniela looked at me like I was retarded. “You think so, do you?”

“Yes,” I said. “But then again, you always do a great job. You’re a pro, Daniela. A world-class pro.”

“What the fuck are you talking about? And what the fuck is that in your front yard?” She pointed to my Virgin shrine.

“None of your business,” I said, crossing my arms.

“What do you mean, ‘none of my business?’ It’s in your fuckin’ front yard!”

“So?”

“You put a fuckin’ spotlight on it!”

“Deaf are the ears of the ignorant,” I whispered. Another message from the Virgin! I’d have to remember to write that one down in my notebook.

“What did you say?”

“Exactly,” I said. “Look, I need you to help me out on something. Remember when we went to St. Michael’s to light the candle for your cousin?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, remember those necklaces that the old ladies were holding in their hands while they were praying?”

“The rosaries?”

“Yeah. Listen, where do I get one? A rosary. Is there like a Catholic store in Sarnia?”

Daniela threw her shovel down into a snowbank. “Why the fuck do you want a rosary?”

I wondered if I should tell Daniela about my religious experience, because when I stopped to think about it, she was the one who introduced me to the Virgin in the first place. If she hadn’t taken me to St. Michael’s that day, or told me about her mom going to Peterborough, I might never have noticed the Virgin in my closet. But I knew I couldn’t say anything until my plan was complete. I didn’t want to take the chance of betraying the Virgin. Then she might never heal me. Besides, Daniela would probably tell her mom and I’d have every Italian woman in Sarnia knocking at my door.

“Well,” I said, slowly. “I’m thinking about becoming Catholic and like any good Catholic, I need to get some supplies before I devote myself to God.”

That was partly true. If the Virgin
did
heal my nipples, the least I could do was turn Catholic. I knew my mom would have a fit, but she’d understand once I showed her my closet.

“Ah, jeez,” Daniela said. “You just can’t go into Woolco and buy a fuckin’ rosary, y’know. And you can’t wake up one day and decide to be a Catholic, either. You have to be born into it. It’s part of your heritage.”

I promised Daniela I was being serious.

“Look, I can’t talk about this, but let’s just say that I’m on to something very, very big. Something that would make your mom want to be my best friend and then I could tell her not to make you shovel the driveway or clean the garage because she’d do anything I said.”

“What are you talking about?” Daniela narrowed her eyes and rubbed her coat sleeve under her nose.

“I told you,” I said, “I’m forbidden to speak. You can try all you want, but I won’t say anything. But believe me — I’m talking about major stuff, Daniela. I’m talking about the fate of the world and saving starving babies and front page headlines.”

“God, you’re bugging me,” Daniela said. “I’ll see what I can do. But this will cost you some large cash. Rosaries don’t come cheap, y’know. Ten bucks. Take it or leave it.”

“Eight.”

“Ten.”

“Nine.”

“Ten.”

“Nine-fifty.”

“Ten.”

“Nine-seventy-five?” I asked. But the look on Daniela’s face gave me the answer.

“Ten,” I said. “But I need the rosary by tomorrow. There’s no time to lose.”

After school the next day, I went to St. Michael’s instead of going home. The place was empty, so I was in luck. The first thing I did was go over to the Virgin Mary statue and make the sign of the cross.

“I now know what it was you were trying to tell me,” I whispered to her.

Then I deposited fifty cents in the tin box and lit a candle for the world. On my way out, I took the turkey baster that my mom keeps in her dresser drawer and squeezed up some of the holy water from the dish by the entrance.

I hurried home. I had to be very careful and hold the turkey baster like a candle, so none of the holy water would leak out. When I got home, I tiptoed to my room and squeezed the water into an empty Imperial margarine container. Then I hid it on the top shelf of my closet.

“It will only be a matter of time now,” I said to my nipples as I slowly peeled off the masking tape. “Only a matter of time.”

The next day, while I was carrying my bundle of papers home, a firm hand grabbed me from behind.

“Don’t turn around,” a husky voice whispered. “I got something for you. Meet me in my garage tonight at seven. Tell anyone and you’re fuckin’ dead.”

When I opened the Bertoli’s garage door that night, Daniela was pacing back and forth. She was wearing a black beret and a pair of sunglasses.

“You got something for me?” she said, walking over to close the garage door.

“Yeah,” I said. I turned up the collar of my jacket and sat down on the bumper of the Bertoli’s car. “You got something for me?”

“First the money,” she said.

“One five now,” I said. “The other five when you hand it over.”

Daniela sighed and put out her hand and I gave her the money. Then she pulled a Ziploc bag out of her coat pocket.

“I went through a lot of trouble to get you this,” she said. “I hope you fuckin’ know that.”

I grabbed the bag and handed her the other five dollars.

“You do good work,” I said. “I might hire your services again. Do you shovel driveways?”

“Get out of here before I bash your fuckin’ head in.”

That night, I had to lie awake until everyone else had gone to bed. It wasn’t hard, though. I was too excited. I waited until I could hear my mom snoring and I crept out of my bed and tiptoed over to my closet to get the Imperial margarine container. I took the rosary out from my sock drawer and grabbed my Mirror Game candle.

I lit the candle and put it on the floor on top of my math book. Then I got on my knees in front of the closet door and took my shirt and tape off.

I dipped my fingers into the holy water and sprinkled a bit on each breast. My nipples crinkled up as soon as the water touched them. I gasped. Had the Virgin healed me that quickly? But then I remembered that whenever my nipples get cold or wet, they always shrivel up. So I wasn’t sure.

Then I recited the prayer that I’d written and memorized.

Oh Virgin, the mother of Jesus,

Thou are good and very giving.

At this moment, I pray to you,

To shrink my nipples back to normality,

So that I may stop having to put masking tape on them.

And while I pray to you at this moment, Mary,

I also ask you to make me thin by September,

and that you command Andrew Sinclair to call me.

In exchange for thine kindness, I promise

That I shall say twenty Hail Marys every night,

And turn into a Catholic.

Bless you, Virgin Mary. Bless you for all eternity.

I made the sign of the cross, making sure I did the right order. Then I squeezed my eyes shut and waited for the Virgin to perform her miracle. I must’ve stayed there on my knees for about five minutes or so. It felt like forever. But nothing was happening. I snuck a peek down at my nipples to see if anything had changed, but they were still there, big and puffy as dumplings.

My parents’ bedroom door opened. It was my mom, getting up for her nightly pee. I was afraid that she would see the candlelight coming from under my door and start screaming “Fire!” so I blew the candle out and waited until the toilet flushed and I heard her go back to bed. Then I put the Imperial margarine container back in the closet and the rosary beads back in the Ziploc bag.

I put my T-shirt back on and lay there in bed, staring at my closet door. I was pretty disappointed, but I also knew that the Virgin works in mysterious ways. She’s one
tricky lady, just like Daniela said. She was testing me to see if I really deserved to be cured or not.