"Detective Vecchio," the voice continued. "Did you hear what I said?

Floaty. For a disjointed moment he enjoyed the feeling, then reality started to bleed back in.

Reality? No. Not reality, because this wasn't true. Couldn't be. He stared at the FBI agent as the world came back into focus, and felt his face flinch in a reflexive smile. The joke was on him. From what part of his subconscious had he dredged up this particular nightmare? Pa had been a deadbeat, a down and out, a thorough waste of space. And yeah, he drank, and he gambled, and he knocked them around as kids, and he'd raised his fist to Ma... but there was no way he'd have done... that. Not what this suited voice had declared, so mercilessly. As though it was nothing, as though...

"Detective Vecchio."

"Don't."

"Excuse me?"

"No, I won't..." Shit. Who was he kidding? This wasn't a dream. This was just the FBI messing with him. He scraped back his chair, and rose abruptly. "We're done here. I'm not playing these games, and you're not playing me. So just..." He wished Benny was here, and not on leave. He wished he'd told Benny about this whole damned mess when he still had time, that he'd put his foot down weeks ago when they first started bothering him with this shit. He wished he had a clue what to do here, what to say.

"Detective Vecchio," the agent said, his broad, pleasant face seeming gentle. "My colleagues and I are certainly not playing you." He looked around the board table for confirmation, and the other agents nodded, synchronised. What, did they learn that trick at Fed school? How to be a robot. How to deliver vicious lies without blinking. "We simply thought you should be aware of everything before you made your mind up."

"Yeah? Well, my mind's made up." He shook his head, to clear it. He tried to think of something to say, something to express just how furious he was that they'd pull this shit on him. Nothing. He had nothing. He turned, and stalked out of the conference room. Slammed the door.

He was shaking. Shaking as he left the glass chrome building, shaking as he made his way to the car park, to his riv. Shaking as he sat behind the wheel.

He knew the FBI were manipulative bastards, would do pretty much anything if they thought the ends justified the means, but even for them, this was... vicious. This was...

Oh God. What if it was true?

No.

He sucked in a deep breath, sat back, and started the car. Home. He was going home. He was going to sit next to Ma on a big plush couch, and listen to her talking about the kids, and how big the McAllister baby was getting, and fund-raising for the children's hospice. And he didn't care what those bastards said. He wasn't going to do it. He wasn't going to leave his family. Not Ma, not Frannie, not Maria and her kids, not Benny. Not even Big Tony. He was staying put, right here in Chicago. And when Benny came back from Canada they'd get back to their normal work routine, and he'd... yeah. He'd start to calm down.

He'd be fine.

Fine.

"They're rebuilding St Luke's," Ma said, comfortably, finally sitting down and relaxing. Her left foot was sore enough with the arthritis that she had it up on the couch tonight. He'd told her to see the doctor, but she insisted it wasn't that bad. For once all the kids were in bed on time, the other adults were all out, and she was taking some time for herself. He'd even got her to accept a mug of hot milk sprinkled with cinnamon.

"Yeah, I saw they were doing that." Ray had noticed the scaffolding, out of the corner of his eye, as he was driving back from the interview with the Feds. It barely flickered on his consciousness at the time, but it had been hovering in the background ever since, a dull ache in his temples. Damn. He was still feeling fuzzy round the edges. It was the interview. Or maybe it was just that things were too sharp. It was hard to tell. St Luke's. Yeah.

"It's about time they fixed the place up. I hate to see an old building standing empty, let alone a church."

Ray closed his eyes, remembering the ugly red brick building.

"Are you alright son?"

"Yeah. Yeah, Ma." He rolled his head back on the back of the armchair, trying to let the tension bleed out. "Don't worry. Just... tired. Tough day."

"I'm sorry, Raimondo," she said, like it was her fault. Then, straight to the point, as always. "If you want to talk about it..."

As always he shrugged her off. "Nah, it's okay. Nothing a little sleep won't cure."

Ma shifted on the couch, huffed her disapproval at his reticence, and he heard the television start up. She was watching a nature programme. Something Benny would like, no doubt. For a moment he opened his eyes to watch the screen, and let out a faint laugh. Meerkats. Even weirded out and hyped up as he was, meerkats were funny. Ma glanced a smile at him, reassured by his laughter that he really was okay, and he let his eyes fall shut.

Agent Cash started talking in his head again, repeating the same ugly lie. Ray twisted in his armchair, trying to crush out the voice. Jesus Christ, he thought, am I so transparent? That the FBI could figure out the most monstrous trigger he had and abuse it like that... well, it made him sick. Sick of the Feds. Sick of himself. He'd been letting them call the shots for weeks now… what the hell was wrong with him? He should have just told them to piss off. Damn. They could play him like a child. He was a grown man, for God's sake. He should have put childish things behind him. For a moment he almost laughed again. The nuns would have been proud of him. Here he was, after all these years, with Sunday school lessons still resonating through his head. 'When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But when I became a man I put away the things of a child.'

Only, he hadn't. He still carried the child around inside him, and the fucking FBI had seen it. Seen him.

Dirty, dirty bastards.

He itched beneath his skin, trying not to think. Not to move. Not to tip Ma off to the fact that he was so wired he felt like screaming. It wasn't so bad, he told himself, like a mantra. Not so bad... It wasn't the FBI who were making him feel like this. He didn't believe their lies after all. No, it was just… he had too much work, and Benny was in Canada, and he hadn't been sleeping, and then Ma had to bring up St Luke's. It wasn't what Agent Cash had said about his father. Not at all. It was just the big red church in his memory, like a dirty old tombstone, or a broken tooth.

Damn. He clutched his pleated trousers, then smoothed them. Calm down, Raimondo, he told himself. Don't give Ma anything to worry about. It's okay. You're okay. Just breathe. Breathe.

There'd been no Father Behan back then. He would have made all the difference.

"You're supposed to honour your father." Father Curry's voice, cold in his memory. "If he disciplines you children, well, that's his job."

"But..." Ray had shifted on his knees, glad that the priest couldn't see his tear smudged face through the grid. "He hits Ma too."

"She's his wife. She should submit to him. You all should."

"Yes, Father," Ray whispered. The backs of his thighs still burned from the belt. (Yes, Pop, I'm sorry Pop. Don't...) "I'm sorry Father."

"'Disobedience is as the sin of witchcraft,'" Father Curry declaimed, sternly. Ray covered his face, braced for his punishment. "The rosarium." The priest's voice sounded more tolerant, now that penance had been decided. "All fifteen mysteries."

"Yes, Father."

He had gone straight to the pew from the confessional, and started his rosary immediately. The beads slid between his fingers as he muttered his prayers, knowing not to rush them, because then they wouldn't count. Even so, he said the whole rosary on his knees, so that his father wouldn't beat him for pretending to be holy when he got home. When he finished he didn't immediately leave. He bent forward, his eyes still shut, and rested his head on the wooden back of the pew in front of him. He was stiff, he was tired, his knees hurt, and he had to go home in the dark.

"You said your prayers well, Raymond," came Father Curry's voice behind him. Ray flinched, sitting back on his haunches, then got to his feet. He hadn't realised the priest had been watching him. "A lot of children would have gabbled through them quickly. You obviously took your penance seriously."

"Thank you, Father." He didn't want to tell the priest that he had been putting off going home.

"Let me see where he hit you."

"Father?"

"You said he took his belt to you. I really should look, just to make sure that he was disciplining you appropriately."

"Erm, you said... it's okay. It's not that bad."

The priest sighed. "Still, I should look."

Ray lifted one leg, tried to pull up the trouser.

"Not like that. Come through, I'll have a proper look."

Ray bobbed into an obedient genuflection, and followed Father Curry through to the little room on the side. It was stuffed with cardboard boxes, and heaps of books, and dilapidated pictures of the saints.

"Trousers down," said the priest.

Ray froze. He'd heard stories. Not about Father Curry, that was one of the reasons he'd come to him, that and he wasn't Italian, might be more likely to believe him. But there were always stories.

"Oh, not like that," the man snapped. "I'm not going to do anything, I just need to look."

Flushing with shame Ray dropped his pants, and turned. Behind him Father Curry knelt, and touched his right thigh. Ray hissed against the cold fingers on the raised welt. He was frightened. The man's fingers trailed up and down his leg, touching the hot marks left by the lash. Then the left hand joined in, touching his other thigh, and Ray flinched, blinked back tears.

"Is it the same on your buttocks, Raymond?"

Ray didn't want to say anything, but it would be rude not to answer an adult, even ruder not to reply to a priest. "Yes, Father," he whispered. In his head a little voice was repeating, 'please don't, please don't, please don't look.'

Behind him, the man laughed, and stood. Ray realised to his shame that he had spoken aloud, "don't."

"Pull up your trousers lad."

Hurriedly, gratefully, Ray pulled up his pants, and turned round, facing the priest, but looking at the man's shiny black shoes, so as not to make eye contact.

"Your father hasn't done anything untoward," Father Curry said. "He's harsh with his discipline, but within his rights. You'll just have to try harder not to offend him."

"Yes, Father."

"You made a good confession today, and a good penance. If you do anything to offend your father again, I want you to tell me."

Why? "Yes, Father."

"Good boy. Perhaps I can help you learn how to be more obedient."

"Thank you, Father."

Father Curry looked at him benevolently. "Call me John," he said. Ray swallowed. That would be like calling his Ma 'Sophia', or Pa 'Joey.'

"Yes Fath... J... John."

"Not in public, you understand. But when we're together like this."

"Yes... John."

The man smiled, then formed the sign of the cross over Ray's head. "God bless you, Raymond. I'll see you at school, no doubt, and next Saturday for confession."

Ray nodded, walking out backward, then sketched the flimsiest genuflection of his life before running out of the church, and all the way home.

"Raimondo, are you asleep?"

Ray blinked, and he was back in his living room.

"Sorry, Ma, I musta dozed off."

"I'm glad you're not at work tomorrow," she said. "You look tired. You should lie in. Unless... do you want me to wake you up for mass? Not the early one, we could go to the eleven o'clock."

"No, Ma. I mean, I'll probably get up, but I think I'll sit this one out."

She nodded, used enough to it now that she wasn't offended. She wasn't that worried about his eternal soul anymore. She'd mellowed in the years since Pa died. She was as devout as ever, but her faith, although stronger, seemed less… terrified.

Thank God. He never wanted to give her something to pray about. Not the way she had prayed in his childhood, when she thought all the children were asleep, and couldn't see her crying. He remembered waking sometimes, aching from a beating, and hearing her by his bed, whispering prayers. He had long ago decided that if he ever had a daughter, he would never call her Maria, no matter how much he loved his sister. Santa Maria had never done anything for him, despite his mother's whispered pleas. Looking at Ma now, comfortable in her own home, he found it hard to imagine that such a strong woman could ever have been so utterly ground down.

He shut his eyes again. He'd been so glad when they shut St Luke's. The church, the school, the whole rotten heap. Now they were rebuilding the damned thing.

Well, Father Curry was long gone, and Ray was a grown man now, so there was nothing really for him to fear or resent in that old building. And he didn't blame the Church, not really. He blamed Father Curry, and he blamed Pa, and he blamed his nine year old self. Which, he knew, was unfair... he'd never blame another kid in that kind of situation. But he still, after all these years, felt like he should have known better. He did know better, that was the worst thing. But after asking for help, and having it used against him like that... he couldn't ask anyone else. And besides, all the man had ever done was look. He didn't even touch him, other than that first time, when he touched the abrasions on his legs.

Shit. His eyes flew open. Did the FBI know about it? Shit. His heart hammered in his chest like he'd been running. The damned bastards knew how much he hated his father, that's why they'd come out with that bullshit story. Maybe they knew everything.

"Fuck," he muttered.

"Raimondo?"

"Sorry, sorry Ma. I just... bad dream." He got to his feet, stretched like everything was normal, then bent down and kissed her on the top of her head. "I'd better go to bed while I can still climb the stairs."

"Buona notte, mio bambino."

"Buona notte, Ma."

It wasn't a good night though. The story that the FBI had told him kept twisting around in his head and his heart, clenching in his stomach, making him nauseous and sad. He knew it couldn't be true, but something kept whispering to him… what if it was? Surely somebody would have said something to him by now though. After all, it was nearly forty years. You couldn't keep a secret for decades, could you?

Yeah, yeah you could. He'd never told anyone about Father Curry after all.

"Oh Jesus Christ," he groaned, part of him conscious, as always, of the blasphemy. He looked up at the ceiling, ironically. "If You're listening," he said, "I could do with some help down here."

No answer. Wasn't that always the way?

When he was a child, he'd been sure that the reason God, or the Virgin, or her Son, had never answered was because he was such a loser. After all, Pa said he was a loser often enough, and what kind of kid was so rotten his own father hated him? He'd pray for Pa to stop drinking his wages, he'd pray for him to stop beating them, but things would stay the same. Ray's fault… If he wasn't such a whiny little brat his father wouldn't keep leaving the house to get drunk. If he didn't get on his nerves, Pa wouldn't have to hit him. His own father couldn't stand him, so it was no wonder God didn't listen.

And then, the biggest irony of all. Years, and years, and years after it was all over, just at the point when he'd convinced himself the whole thing was a lie… no heaven, no hell, no afterlife… Pa decided to start haunting him. Ray laughed. Maybe he'd just been having a breakdown, but…

It was such a damned vivid ghost. Like Pa it had smelled of booze, and cigarettes. It had talked like the old man, walked like him, said things that Ray had long forgotten he remembered. Other people shivered when the thing walked past. Yeah, Ray might have wished it wasn't real, but he knew in his bones that it was. And if a ghost could walk the earth, then maybe the rest of it was true as well. Not necessarily the way the Church said, but at least some of it. Which should have been comforting, but… If God was a father, then Ray wasn't sure he wanted to know Him. He'd never had much luck with fathers.

At least the old man was gone now. Ray hadn't seen him since that final confrontation in the Canadian woods, when Pa tried to bully him into leaving Benny to die. What a prince the old bastard was. At that moment, Ray had realised that he'd spent his whole life feeling inadequate, trying to live up to a man who really, he owed nothing to. A man with no loyalty, no love…

No loyalty. If what the FBI said was true, the man had never had a shred of loyalty, or decency at all. Ray flung an arm over his eyes, still trying desperately to sleep. It was clawing away in his heart now, an increasing dread that maybe it was true after all.

"Jesus," he whispered. "Jesus Christ." He didn't know if it was blasphemy or prayer, but he couldn't think of a single other thing to say.

"Raymond," Father Curry said. "Like that. Stand still. Keep your eyes closed."

Ray stood still, in the posture that Father Curry had chosen for him, with his eyes squeezed so tightly shut they hurt. He could hear the priest breathing, but the man didn't touch him. Didn't ever touch him. Ray lived in fear of the day he did.

"Good boy," the man said, his breathing getting ragged. "Stay there, just like that. Hold it so I can see it." His voice was going gaspy and rough. "Good, good, good boy." Then he made that strange noise of his, and Ray wrinkled his nose at the sudden sharp smell which always followed it. He didn't open his eyes. In the dark he could hear the man moving, getting to his feet. 'Cleaning up,' Ray thought, miserably. He'd never seen what happened, but he could guess. He might be only a kid, but he wasn't stupid. Kids talked to each other about things. Ray had been told about it. He knew what men did.

"You can open your eyes now," Father Curry said. "And put your clothes on."

Ray opened his eyes, to look for his clothes and…

He was in the Lieutenant's office. Welsh was dressed in clerical robes, and everyone he worked with was staring in the window. Benny opened the door, and looked at his nakedness with such… disappointment.

"Ray," he said. "I expected better of you."

Ray woke the whole house up with his screaming.

"That was some nightmare," Frannie said, at breakfast. Maria glared at her, Ma looked away. The rest of the family had decided to pretend last night hadn't happened, but Frannie, as usual, was having none of it. Because Frannie never knew when to stop, and she always thought you could talk everything better.

"What," she said, gesturing with her cutlery. "It's true, it was a hell of a nightmare. It's bad to bottle things up." She shoved her fork into the bacon, and smiled at her brother encouragingly. "You'd feel better if you got it off your chest."

Ray glowered at his plate. Frannie carried on, obliviously. "I've been reading about repression, or regression, or aggression… some shunny thing anyway. Apparently, if you bottle things up, it can cause all kindsa problems." She looked at Ray meaningfully. "Like bad dreams."

"Leave it, Frannie," Maria warned, under her breath.

"So, Ray," Frannie asked, talking between mouthfuls. "What was it about?"

"He doesn't want to talk about it," Maria said, pointedly.

"Sure he does."

"I don't remember," Ray said, pushing his breakfast round the plate.

"Don't try and pull that one on me," Frannie said cheerfully. "You're a terrible liar."

"Yeah? How would you know?"

"I can see it written all over your face," she said. "You never could keep a secret."

And Ray felt himself go white, and cold.

Secrets…

His breakfast plate shattered with a crash against the wall, food scattering to the floor. For an instant he was outside of everything, could see himself, the image of Pa, looming over the kitchen table, while his women folk cowered away. At a far distance he heard Vito, Maria's youngest, starting to wail.

He blinked, and everything crowded back in. The look of fear on his sisters' faces. The children rigid with shock. Ma with her hands to her mouth.

He opened his mouth to say 'sorry,' but the word died on his tongue. He hated that word. He couldn't say it, because then… then he really would be Pa. He'd be the man who smashed the place up, then said sorry, like an apology would ever make a difference.

It struck him that he was looking at his family through a veil of water, and then he blinked, felt it on his face. A slow slither, warm, like blood from a blow, or…

Tears. He was crying.

'Big baby,' his father said, in his memory. 'Learn to take it, be a man.'

He shook his head helplessly, stepped back, banging into his chair.

"Raimondo," his mother said, in a small voice, the voice with which she had pleaded with her husband. "Raimondo…" ('Giuseppe.')

He turned, and ran.

Maria found him, sitting on the step outside St Luke's. He squinted up at her, shielding his eyes with one hand.

"How'd you find me?"

"Must be psychic," she said, and sat next to him. "Nah, I just knew you wouldn't go far on foot. Frannie went North. I called Tony and he went…"

"Oh, shit." He scrubbed his hands over his scalp. "Now I got the whole family out on a manhunt. I'm sorry." His voice-box tensed shut. He'd said the hated word. 'Sorry.' "I mean," he stuttered. "I don't know why I did that."

"Frannie shouldn't have egged you on."

"Oh yeah, right." He snorted. "Obviously, it's Frannie's fault. It's okay to smash things up if you can say a woman made you do it."

Maria nudged him with her elbow. "You know I didn't mean it like that."

"I know." Christ, if anyone knew that, it was Maria. How many times had she been the one Pa blamed for his outbursts? "I know. I just…" He shook his head. "I can't believe I did that. It was like…" He looked at her, seeing her tight-faced concern. "It's like I turned into Pa."

She put a hand on his shoulder. "No," she said. "No, it's not. You didn't hit anyone. You didn't blame anyone. And you stopped."

Ray leant forward, elbows on his knees, and covered his face with his palms. "How's Ma," he managed.

"Worried."

"How's Vito?"

"Playing with Angelica on the swings. He'll be fine."

"He shouldn't have had to see that."

"I know. None of them should."

Ray glanced at his sister, and, strangely, found himself smiling. She wasn't offering easy sympathy, she wasn't saying what he'd done had been okay. He'd just burst out in anger in front of her three kids, but she was sitting here with him, all the same. That was something.

"Not that I want to set you off again," she said, "but… do you want to talk about it?"

Ray swallowed.

"You don't have to."

"I know."

They sat in silence, watching the pigeons flutter through the struts of the scaffolding. Sunday morning, thought Ray, and I finally made it to church. Okay, a dead church, not open yet. But still…

He sighed. Scrubbed his face again, like he could clean it, and sat upright.

"You remember Father Curry?"

Maria nodded, watching him carefully. "Yeah, I remember him. Started teaching Latin the year before I went to High School. He taught you too, didn't he?"

"What did you think of him?"

"Don't tell Ma, but I thought he was a bit of a shit, really."

Ray laughed out loud at her frank assessment. "Any particular reason?"

"Well, he loved the sound of his own voice. Remember his sermons? All hellfire and brimstone… and boy, if you got him in confession." She rolled her eyes. "Phooey, that man gave out tough penances."

"Yeah," Ray nodded, bitterly. Penance. "Yeah. I remember that."

Maria sat silently for a little longer. Her hand had drifted down from his shoulder, and was resting on his arm. He turned his palm up, and closed his hand around her slender fingers.

"Thanks, Maria," he said.

She nodded, like she knew what he was thanking her for. After another moment of silence she said, "why did you ask about Father Curry?"

He shuddered, and realised too late that she must have felt it, running from his fingers through her own body, like an electric current. She stiffened next to him, and her hand tightened around his.

"Jesus, Ray," she whispered. "Did he…"

He shook his head, convulsively. "He didn't touch me."

"What did he do?"

"He…"

"What?"

Ray closed his eyes. Maybe Frannie was right. Maybe he should tell someone. Maybe he shouldn't have buried it all these years…

"Ray," Maria's voice was very quiet. "Ray, you can tell me anything."

"He…"

Maria's other arm came around him in a hug, and he rested his head on her shoulder.

"He never touched me," he said. "He never… never touched me." He wanted to tell her the truth of it, that the man had watched him. Made him stand there blind, and naked, and touch himself. But…

You couldn't say that to your sister. You couldn't say that to anyone.

She was rocking him against her, like he was one of her little ones, and he should have been ashamed of himself, a grown man, sitting in the street, crying into his sister's hair, but…

"He didn't touch me," he told her. "I swear to God, Maria, he didn't touch me."

"It's alright," she soothed him, like Ma. "It's alright Raimondo, it's not your fault."

But it was, he thought, helplessly. He had known better.

"I should have told someone," he whispered. "Why didn't I tell anyone?"

"It's okay," she said. "You've told me."

He shook his head, and shook his head.

"Why didn't I ask for help?"