Gossip being free, the news spread like wildfire around the Kitchen: Jack Murdock's boy had pushed a man out of the way of a truck, and had ended up in the hospital.
He'll never walk again, they said; no, he'll need a kidney transplant; no, he's only broken his leg.
"No," Bridget Malloy said outside the half-open door to the vestry, not knowing that Maggie was on its other side. (But why should knowing Maggie was there change how anyone spoke of Matthew Murdock? Of course it wouldn't.) "No, that wasn't it. I was there myself. I saw."
The women who must have been clustered around her cooed and fussed, and Maggie was reminded of nothing so much as a flock of hens.
Shut up, she wanted to tell them, but she knew nothing would deter Bridget Malloy when she had news to share, so she waited.
"He was blinded," Bridget said when the noise had died down, pleased to have news to share, and Maggie imagined smacking that smug, pious look off her face until the woman's words registered.
Blinded.
Her son, blinded.
Bridget kept chattering about how she'd heard the boy screaming, "Cut through me like a knife, it did. Poor motherless child."
Quietly, so quietly, Maggie closed the door.
"Maggie."
Of course Paul Lantom was there. He was always there, and usually Maggie thought it was a good thing.
This was not one of those times.
Mindful of the hens on the other side of the door, Maggie spoke quietly. "Did you know?" She gave him the same look she'd used when she'd found a cluster of boys smoking behind the church the previous week.
"I was coming to find you."
From that defensive tone in Paul's voice, her stern look had worked.
Good.
"I have to go to him," Maggie said, hating the tremor in her voice. She couldn't cry - she could not.
"Maggie, you know you stayed away for a reason." Paul's voice was gentle and kind, and she hated him for it. She saw him reach for her and stepped away, knowing that if he touched her she would scream, or hit him, or really start crying and not be able to stop, and she didn't have time to pull herself out of that pit.
Paul put down his hand.
"There was a reason," she said, her voice tight with the effort of not crying.
Just then, she didn't really remember what that reason had been. Not with her son, her boy in the hospital.
"God -" Paul began.
"Don't," Maggie interrupted him, her voice fierce. "Don't you dare say that He has a plan for Matthew that includes blindness."
So Paul folded his lips and didn't say anything, and Maggie was glad. She turned and walked through the vestry and out to the church.
Sister Constance waited by the exit, her expression concerned. Connie had been Maggie's rock in those first horrible days after she'd returned to the Church, and then in the only slightly less awful days that followed, and now Maggie didn't know what she would do without her.
"Maggie," Connie began, her expression full of compassion.
"Don't try and stop me," Maggie replied, but Connie offered the fold of cloth that had been hanging over her arm.
Connie smiled. "I thought you might want a jacket."
Maggie bit the inside of her cheek, a distraction from the tears that still threatened. "Thank you," she whispered.
Connie helped her into the jacket and squeezed her shoulder. "I'll go pray for Matthew," she called as Maggie set off. Maggie, glancing over her shoulder before she turned the corner, still saw Connie watching from the doorway.
Maggie hesitated at the turn for the subway. It would be quicker than walking, but she continued on. Even in the armor of her habit, she couldn't take the press of people just then. At least outside she could breathe.
And this way, she thought as she picked up her pace, feeling the pavement pounding through her calves, she could walk past Matthew's school. Nobody had commented that her regular afternoon constitutionals had taken her past the school at recess time, though Connie had given her a fond, knowing look and Paul had occasionally shaken his head at her when she'd returned.
She didn't care. She'd left her son - for good reasons, yes, at least at the time - but that didn't mean she wasn't going to watch over him. She'd even been there for his first Communion, throat so tight with pride and pain that she hadn't been able to say the responses.
Jack had seen her, that time. He'd looked over Matthew's head and smiled to her, gestured for her to come over, but no. How could she give Matthew empty congratulations when she couldn't say what was in her heart?
Maggie's breath caught as she passed the school, and she reached to brush one hand along the playground's chain-link fence, grounding herself to the present. Would it still be his school, when he had recovered? Would even that glimpse of him be taken from her?
She should pray, she knew, but she couldn't find the ritual around her questions, foremost why? Why had a so-called benevolent God allowed this to happen to her boy? So she walked, her pace increasing with her effort to keep her composure, until she was nearly running by the time she reached the hospital.
Maggie asked at the desk for Matthew's room number, and her habit spared her the song and dance about whether she was a family member. She pushed away the thought of how she would have answered that, if they had asked.
Her steps, so sure, faltered as she approached the door. She could see them through the glass: Matthew asleep in the bed, Jack seated at his side, head bowed. Was it prayer that put him in that posture, or despair?
Jack's mother had been the staunch Catholic; surely she, not Jack, had been the one to ground Matthew in the Church. Maggie couldn't help but be glad of it, however it had happened, as it had brought Matthew closer to her.
No, she doubted that Jack prayed. Not just then.
"Does he ask about me?" she'd once asked him on the phone, about the time that Matthew had started school.
Jack had hesitated, and Maggie had imagined his self-conscious smile, the way he'd always looked when their conversations had gotten too real. "Mags, he doesn't know to," he began, and Maggie spoke quickly, cutting off his words before they could wound her further.
"Of course not."
She'd always sworn that she would tell him one day. When he's an adult, she'd always thought, for what good Catholic child wanted to learn that his mother was a nun, of all things? Nuns were creatures of mystery, or of fear, or of learning, but they certainly weren't mothers.
Maggie had imagined that conversation countless times. Would he reject her? Hug her? But in all her imaginings, her boy looked her in the eyes and knew that she was his, that he was hers.
She swallowed hard, knowing that was no longer possible, and in that moment Jack looked up and met her gaze. Was it relief that crossed his face, or fear? He straightened Matthew's blanket and then came out to join her in the hallway.
"Mags," Jack began, and then his face twisted, and it was all Maggie could do not to take him in her arms. She gripped her jacket cuffs, willing herself to maintain her composure.
"How is he? I came as soon as I heard." She knew she sounded distant, and hated the necessity, but letting herself warm to Jack wouldn't help any of them.
Jack drew in a breath, a tremor going through his body. "He's blind," he said, flinching at the words. "Mags, I didn't mean… you know Matty. He's outside all the time, in the neighborhood. I never thought…" His voice broke, and he turned away from her, one battered hand lifting to shield his face.
Maggie's heart clenched, and she reached to take that hand, tugging gently against Jack's resistance. She allowed herself to smooth a thumb across his bruised knuckles, knowing as she did so that it wasn't the best idea but unable to help herself. "This is not your fault," she said, though she knew she sounded more fierce than comforting.
His expression bleak, Jack asked, "Whose fault is it, then?"
Not hers. Of course he wouldn't say that. Not her fault, because she had left Matthew to him, and if she had just been there, then maybe -
No. No, Jack didn't blame her. He'd made that clear years ago. She'd done what she'd had to do.
He didn't blame her, but that didn't mean she didn't blame herself. Every time Matthew had struggled, she'd wondered if it would have been better if she'd been there.
But she hadn't been, and she wouldn't be. She'd made her choices, so she just shrugged helplessly at Jack. "He'll get through this," she said, her voice low. "Children are resilient. He's tough."
"You didn't hear him earlier," Jack replied tonelessly, and Maggie remembered Bridget Malloy's description of Matthew's screams.
How could she be both upset and grateful not to have heard? She nodded, not meeting Jack's gaze.
Jack scrubbed at his face with his free hand, and Maggie, realizing she was still holding the other, let it go. "Yeah," he said, his voice rough. "He'll get through it, but it'll be tough." Jack bit back a yawn, adding, "I really need to go get some coffee. Can you sit with him?" Perhaps sensing Maggie's hesitancy, he added, "Five minutes, tops, and he'll probably stay asleep. It's okay, Mags."
Maggie nodded. He'd asked so little of her over the years. Surely she could manage to sit with a sleeping child for five minutes.
"Thanks, Mags." Jack moved forward as if to hug her, then visibly checked himself. "Five minutes," he repeated, managing a smile despite his obvious fatigue and distress, and Maggie couldn't help but smile in return.
Jack stumbled and then righted himself before making his way down the hallway. Maggie hesitated in the doorway, and then moved in a rush to sit at Matthew's side. She should pray.
She did not pray. Connie was doing enough praying for the both of them, and likely at least half the parish as well.
Maggie reached for her son, her hands halting just above his head.
No. She had no right.
She folded her hands in her lap, gripping so tightly that her knuckles whitened.
She didn't want to wake him. That was it. He needed his rest.
Maggie cleared her throat. "Well, I'm sure your father taught you to look both ways," she began.
No. That wasn't what she wanted to say to her son. She straightened his blanket, the closest she would let herself get to touching him. "They're saying at the church that you saved a man, Matthew. You pushed him out of the way."
She took a deep breath, feeling it catch at the back of her throat. No tears, she told herself sternly, devoutly wishing that Matthew had been walking down some other street, or that he hadn't reached the accident in time, or that he just hadn't intervened. But he had sacrificed himself, and would have to live with the consequences.
Matthew stirred in his sleep, and Maggie held her breath, fighting against her rising panic. "Shh," she murmured. "It's all right, Matthew." He subsided, and she felt an odd triumph. At least she was able to help him in that one small way. But Matthew would not remain asleep much longer, and so she knew that she had to leave. She darted a glance toward the nurses' station; surely they would see if he moved.
And it isn't like this is the first time I've left him, she thought, bitterness tightening her throat. But she didn't know what she would do if he woke and found her there, so she got to her feet. Before she left, she allowed herself the lightest touch of her fingertips on his hair.
"I'm so proud of you, Matthew," she whispered, and then slipped out of the room.
As she reached the exit, she heard Jack calling for her, but she kept walking.
It's for the best, she told herself, not bothering to wipe away her tears.