Saturday, October 12

     Just before the doors closed again, Rev. Rom Soriano sprang from the PATH train onto the platform of the Christopher Street station.  As the train continued to Herald Square without him, Rom climbed the stairway into a warm, brilliant Greenwich Village day.
     He looked at his watch: nearly noon.  He stood a moment, squinting, on the busy sidewalk, feeling guilty about his decision to forego the meeting at the archdiocese.  But if he showed up there, he had decided, he had two options — go through with the trip or explain why not — and he wasn't ready to do either.
     He took a deep breath; already he felt better.  But he would need sunglasses, and it was getting warm.  He wished he could change out of his black suit again.  In New York, he'd found, his priestly attire seemed as much a liability as an asset. Many people smiled and greeted him on the street with a nod or a "Hi, Father," but just as many seemed to sneer as he passed.  Then there were the frankly sexual stares of the men who cruised Christopher Street.
     From a sidewalk vendor he purchased a pair of knockoff Ray-Ban sunglasses, then stopped into the "That's-A-Nice" pizzeria near Seventh Avenue and ordered a slice.  As he waited with his Coke he again relived the escapade of the previous night.  He remembered the climb up the clothesline pole, the clumsy swing down, the lucky discovery of the hubcap. The frantic dash through the training center lot and up and over the garage roof. The labored climb up the fire escape and the breathless tension as his pursuers noisily passed under his window and — thank the saints! — kept going.
     He'd soaked his sore knee, then gone to sleep around two and slept until ten.  He'd taken his dirty suit to the cleaners on Park Avenue, bought some coffee and scanned his Star-Ledger until he found the account of Thursday night's escapade, but there'd been no mention yet of the previous night's adventure.  He'd hopped a City Subway car — No. 13 — and at Penn Station he'd boarded a PATH train to Manhattan, the weekend schedule dictating a leisurely route through Jersey City and Hoboken.
     His pizza arrived and Rom dug right in, not having eaten since the Short-Stop the previous night.  The pie was greasy and the crust underdone, but the sauce wasn't bad, although nowhere near as good as the sauce he remembered from Vulcania's in the old neighborhood.  Rom paused and visualized what was on the corner of N. Fourth Street now.  Oh yes, nothing.
     He finished up and headed toward Bank Street, feeling satisfied and now, in the midst of multitudes, somehow important.  He checked his back pocket.  Yes, the scarf was there.  In his jacket pocket was the mask.  Was it really for "good luck" that he'd grabbed them as he'd left the apartment?  Would he be carrying them all the time now?   As he strolled down Hudson Street looking for a place to buy a six-pack, Rom pondered the possibility that he was going crazy.

     He ran into Lopez on the corner of Greenwich and Bank streets, where Lopez was coming out of a restaurant called Nadine's with a large pastry box.  They went back to 121 Bank, where Lopez' battered yellow Checker — bought 10 years earlier from a taxi company — sat parked.  Rom took the tour of the minuscule flat his friend was so proud of.  The kitchen seemed doll-sized, yet Lopez had organized it so that one could cook and wash dishes without moving two steps.  The bedroom was only slightly larger and featured a wooden loft over storage drawers, and the bathroom was smaller than many closets Rom had seen.  The living room held little more than a couch and chair, a large TV and a good-sized fish tank, sparsely populated.  The fourth room, a pint-sized library/guest room, featured an assortment of hanging plants in varying states of health and a tall window open to the red brick air shaft, through which Rom could clearly hear — and smell — everything that was going on in the apartment building.
     The two old friends drank St. Pauli Girls, and Lopez recapped the years since he'd last seen his friend.  After abandoning Rutgers University in his sophomore year, having run out of the money Rom had left him — and for which he now thanked him — Lopez had sold swimming pools, worked construction and driven a parcel delivery route before moving to Manhattan and finding a job with WBLT, first as a film courier, then running the sound equipment, finally moving to camera work; now he was working to qualify as a satellite monitor technician, a position that would get him off the street and into the studio.  To supplement his income — and stay high — he sold marijuana to a small circle of friends.  He'd dated women through his twenties but had been "out of the closet" for about 10 years.  He had occasional "flings," he said, but liked the simplicity of his lifestyle.  He had put on weight, lost some hair and become an animal in the Manhattan jungle.
     Rom filled his friend in on the details of his adventures since leaving Casa Lopez, omitting the escapades of the Son of Zorro, and after a couple hours the two found themselves on the sidewalk outside saying goodbye.
     "Where are you heading again?" asked Rom.
     "Columbus Circle.  Melody says it'll be some kinda protest against Columbus, so go figure.  They'll carry signs and make noise for an hour, or until the cameras leave, whichever comes first.  Drop by if you don't find anything better to do."
     "Hmmm. Maybe I will."
     "I'm sure Melody would like seeing you again. You made an impression on her yesterday."  Lopez chuckled.  "She asked me what kind of priest you were."
     "What kind?"
     "Yeah, whether you were the old-fashioned celibate kind or one of the, uh, how did she put it?  One of the ‘new breed of intellectual, passionate clerics.' Ha! I coulda died!"
     Rom smiled.  "So what did you tell her?"
     Lopez was getting into the Checker.  "I told her to keep her mitts off ya."
     "Thanks, I guess."
     Lopez got into his car and rolled down the window.  "Listen," he said, "You don't need that kind of trouble.  Get a hooker.  This is New York; there's one on every corner."
     "A what?"
     "I won't tell the pope, I promise."
     Rom watched Lopez drive off and just stood a moment, hands in his pockets, thinking. Then he began walking purposefully toward Seventh Avenue and didn't slow down until he reached a drug store.  He went inside and looked around.
     "Can I help you?"  It was a slight Asian man, about 20, with acne, a spiky haircut and several gold chains around his neck.  Rom took a deep breath.
     "Uh yes, I'd like some condoms."
     The young man just stared stupidly a moment, then grinned broadly.  "Hey, gonna get some tail tonight, eh?"
     Rom looked left and right, then leaned over the counter and smiled.  "Listen," he said quietly.  "Just shut up and give me the condoms, OK?"
     "Hey, no big deal!  You want lubricated or non-lubricated?"
     "I don't care.  Which kind do you use?"
     "Oh, I don't use these things," he said, producing two boxes.  "I hate ‘em."
     "You don't say?"
     "Yeah.  They keep comin' off in my ass!"  The clerk doubled over in a fit of laughter that attracted the attention of everybody in the store.
     "Everybody's a wise guy," muttered Rom, plucking a three-pack from the nearer box.
     "Hey, you're the one dressed up like a priest!  Two seventy-five plus tax."