XX
It took a little time to get back to normal. At least as normal as things could be considered. Jean knew what had nearly happened after catechism that day. She knew that he had called her by her first name in that tone of voice with his breath on her cheek. She knew that he had been about to kiss her and she had wanted him to and she had very nearly let him.
The next day, she'd come back to the rectory and made his breakfast and he had been hungover and sullen. They had not talked about it. If they had, it might have spelled disaster for them both. Jean had been a bit too insistent, perhaps, on things being as normal as possible. And he had followed her lead, which she appreciated.
In time, about a week or so, that normalcy did not need to be forced anymore. They were friendly and efficient and everything was they way it was supposed to be. Jean knew her place and Father Blake knew his.
But oh she could not get it out of her mind, the way it had felt, in that moment, to be so close to him. There was danger and trouble surrounding it all. She couldn't ever let that happen again, for both their sakes. She just wished beyond all reason that she could stop thinking about him that way. For Father Blake was a good man and a good priest but Lucien…that was a different story altogether. It was still difficult, at times, for Jean to remember that he was a priest. He did not act like a priest so often, particularly when they were alone. They were alone quite often. And in those time, he was just a troubled but brilliant, beautiful man. A man who needed her help to do his job. But that job, as she forced herself to recall, was for him to deny his very humanity. He was very much not a man and could not be. He was a priest.
On that particular day, just shy of two weeks from when he had nearly kissed her and she had nearly let him, Jean and the priest were working in the church. It was their last set of tasks for the day before they would go their separate ways for supper. She was working on flower arrangements while he was doing inventory of eucharist materials. Christmas was coming relatively soon, and he would need to be sure St. Catherine's was properly stocked with what they'd need.
Jean was looking forward to her first Christmas in her new home. She recalled with fondness the pageants and nativity plays that were put on at Sacred Heart. She had always been in the Christmas shows as a child and loved being on the stage. Young Christopher had been an altar boy and Jack wanted to play a part as well, so Jean always volunteered with her boys. For two years, her Christopher had been in the audience to cheer on his wife and sons. And then after that, there had been no one to cheer for them. But she and her children carried on joyfully just the same. After the boys had left, she did not participate any longer. She helped make costumes but never again bothered to go onstage. It was just too full of memories that could never be anymore. When she'd lived with Doctor Blake, she'd not even bothered to see the nativity plays.
Now, though, she was in a new place with new people and she was eager to take part in new traditions here. "When do you start planning for the Christmas show?" she asked the priest as she trimmed the stems of flowers for the altar.
"Hmm?"
His confusion made her look up to him. And she saw the flask in his hand. That was unlike him. Nowadays, anyway. "What have you got there?" she asked sharply, forgetting all about her thoughts of Christmas.
He raised his flask to her in some kind of ill-advised toast. "Just getting through the day, Mrs. Beazley." He took a long swig from it and smiled.
It did not escape her that his eyes were not entirely focused and his cheeks were a little flushed. She knew what that meant. And she also knew that anyone in the world might walk into the church and see their priest drunk before the sun had even fully set in the sky. "Have you finished the inventory?" she asked him.
"Yes, I've got it all right here," he said, proudly slurring and waving the sheet of paper toward her.
"Good." Jean shoved her flowers into the vase, making them a minimal level of presentable, and marched up the altar to him. "You are going right to the rectory and having a cup of tea while I make you dinner."
"Oh you don't have to do that," he teased, laughing a bit too loudly.
"Oh yes I do," she snapped. "You are far too drunk this early in the evening."
He made no protest as she led him to the rectory. She was so angry at him, she could hardly see straight. How could he do this?! What was he doing!? Did he even know anymore?
"Sit down and don't you dare touch that flask again while I'm here," she barked. Jean practically shoved him down into his armchair and snatched the flask out of his hand, putting it over on the shelf with the rest of his whiskey.
She could feel his eyes on her as she bustled around the room. He did not speak, which was for the best. She desperately tried to keep moving so she could keep from screaming at him.
"Honestly, Lucien, why on earth do you do this to yourself?" she muttered angrily. It wasn't until after the words left her lips that she realized what she'd actually said.
"Do you really want to know?" he asked softly.
The gentleness of his tone made her pause. She turned and looked at him. His eyes were suddenly clear again. "Yes, I do," she replied.
He nodded slowly. "Then I think it's time I tell you."
"I need to make some tea," she said.
"No, that can wait," Lucien insisted. "Please sit."
Mrs. Beazley sat down on the sofa across from him with a furrowed brow. She looked confused and interested in equal measure. Perhaps it wasn't a very nice trick of him to feign drunkenness like that. But he'd wanted to see what she would do, how far she would go. And when she asked the question he'd hoped she would ask—using his proper name, even—Lucien knew it was time. It was time to tell the rest of the story of his life, the story that explained all the wretched things about his sorry state, the story that would send any good, reasonable person sprinting away from him. This was the story that Lucien had never, ever told anyone. But it was a story he knew he had to tell her. For if she turned from him now, it was all he deserved. And he could not accept her kindness any longer when it was presented under false pretenses. She deserved to know that he did not deserve all that she gave him.
"The very simple answer is that I drink myself to oblivion because it quiets my mind. I suffer from severe nightmares that cause me so much distress, I cannot usually sleep unless the alcohol numbs me to unconsciousness," he explained.
"Nightmares about the war?" she asked.
He nodded. Presumably she'd heard of other soldiers with similar problems. "Unlike most soldiers with my problems," he told her, "I do not have flashbacks to combat. I never saw direct combat, actually. After my medical training and I joined the army, I rose quickly through the ranks to become a Major. I was stationed in Singapore and met a woman there. Her father was a diplomat from China. She was beautiful and intelligent and proud and strong. And we fell in love. Her name was Mei Lin. I believe you saw her picture in my trunk."
Mrs. Beazley nodded very slowly, entranced by the unexpectedness of his story.
Lucien wished he had his whiskey in his hand to give him strength as he confessed these deepest of his secrets. Not even his own father knew of Mei Lin. Nor would he have ever told the old man. "We were married. It was less unusual in Singapore, given her station and mine, than it might have been if I had been in Australia and married a Chinese woman. And for a time, we were happy. We had a daughter, Li. A beautiful little girl who looked just like her mother. She was a happy child, always laughing and smiling. Being her father was the best thing in my life that I had ever gotten to do."
He lost himself for a moment, thinking about his little girl. Thinking about the pure joy of holding her in his arms, of seeing her spinning around in the garden and laughing. Nothing in all his years ever compared to those precious moments. Nothing ever would. Because all joy and goodness had been ripped away from him.
Mrs. Beazley sat on the sofa across from him looking mildly shocked. Perhaps she had guessed that he had once had a family of his own. But she said nothing, kindly and patiently waiting for him to continue. He went on, "When the war began, people were sending their families as far away as possible. Other officers I knew were sending their wives and children to Australia. I did not imagine my father would have taken kindly to my Chinese wife and mixed-race daughter that I'd never told him about. And this country would not have been kind to them, I don't think. Mei Lin's father wrote to us, asking me to send them to Hong Kong where he could protect them. I should have sent them then."
"But you didn't?" she asked.
Lucien felt the familiar churning nausea of his guilt. "No. I wanted them with me. I didn't want to be without them until there was no choice. I was too afraid to say goodbye. And I…I never got to."
She looked like she wanted to ask what he meant, but he did not want to make her.
"The bombs were falling and it was too late to send them away. One of the bombs exploded in our garden, trapping us under rubble. Mei Lin had Li in her arms, covered in dust and debris. And then the Japanese came to take prisoners." Lucien clenched his hands on the arms of his chair, feeling the terror fill him as he forced himself to describe that terrible day. "I was captured. And my wife and child were slaughtered in front of me."
Mrs. Beazley gasped in shock. Lucien dared to look at her and saw tears fall down her cheeks and a shaky hand cover her mouth.
He barreled onward, not wanting to stop on any of that. "Three years I spent in the camp. We were beaten and barely kept alive. I used my medical training to help as many of my fellow prisoners as I could. But the tide started to turn in the war and fewer and fewer supplies were sent to the camps. The Japanese fed and clothed themselves and mostly ignored the rest of us. One lad, he'd been small when he was captured, he was dying of starvation. We all were. I was doing slightly better than the rest, however, and I knew I had to help. I was able to sneak into the officer's mess. I found a can of pineapple. I was going to steal it to feed the others. But I was caught. I was caught and…"
For some reason, the words would not come. He'd gotten this far but could go no further. There were no words for what had happened, what had been done to him. He wished every single day that he had died when that bomb had gone off, that he had been killed instead of captured, that he did not have to suffer the loss of his family, that he did not have to endure what became of him after.
Knowing that there was no better way to explain, Lucien stood up. He pulled off his cassock and unbuttoned his shirt as Mrs. Beazley watched him in horror. He shrugged the shirt off his shoulders and turned around so his back was to her. And he stripped off his vest to reveal the truth to her.
