Read Online The Jew's Wife & Other Stories by Thomas J. Hubschman - Free Book Online Page A

pink on his
forearms and the tops of his thighs, but otherwise he was
cadaverously white. He rarely looked at his body. He was vain
enough to worry about his weight (his housekeeper would turn him
into a blimp, given half a chance). But his concern was limited to
how he looked in clothes—in a roman collar and suit or in a cassock
or chasuable. What the nude body beneath those garments looked like
did not ordinarily enter his mind. He was surprised now to see how
pale his skin was and how far along he was toward having a spare
tire. You didn’t notice such things when you were shepherding a
bunch of rambunctious altar boys around a crowded beach.
       “ It’s
not bad once you’re in,” Charlie said, emerging from the surf
dripping like a fish. His body was a healthy brown, and despite a
tendency to carry excess weight in the same area where Father
Walther’s own flesh was expanding, his muscles showed plainly, no
doubt from regular use.
       “ I’ll
take your word for it,” Father Walther replied, taking a half step
back from the water. The backstep was a conditioned reflex: one of
the more popular activities on class outings was to throw
non-athletic types like himself into the water. Charlie laughed,
perhaps recalling those same dunkings, and proposed they take a
walk.
        Until
now, he hadn’t given much thought to why Charlie had chosen to
invite him to his summer home. Charlie must have known well in
advance when his own vacation would fall due, and it was only by
pure chance that their times off happened to coincide. But Charlie
had always been impetuous. His two unannounced visits of the last
decade proved that, but even in high school he was given to sudden
urges for a breath of mountain air or a midnight cruise through an
old girlfriend’s neighborhood. If his friend Richard happened to be
with him when those inspirations struck, he was enlisted to go
along for the ride. The nature of their friendship was such that
Charlie played the role of doer—the volatile, impetuous
fool-rushing-in—while Richard Walther even then played the role of
passive adviser.
        Thinking
back now on that relationship, he felt a sense of embarrassment.
What business did he have acting as father confessor to a young man
whose experience of the world even then exceeded his own? And yet,
Charlie had been his closest friend. For all the years Frank
Willett and he spent in the same schools, they never confided in
one another. Nor did he make close friendships in the seminary. His
vocation seemed to preclude sharing his real self with anyone but
God. But now, he thought, he would welcome the friendship of
someone who would treat him as an equal. And who better to look to
for such a friendship than Charlie Weeks?
       “Well, what do you think of
her?”
       Charlie couldn’t be referring to
anyone but Sylvia, but the question—rather, the eagerness he put
into it—seemed odd.
       “ You’re a lucky
man.”
       “ Do you really
think so?”
        Charlie’s
pleasure was obvious and, considering the longevity of his union,
touching. He began taking little half-steps, skips actually. Except
for his slight paunch and bit of gray hair, he might have been the
same sixteen-year-old who exulted at the first buds of spring or,
alternatively, flew into a rage when Richard Walther questioned one
of his scientific canons.
       “ The
trouble with me and Sharon,” he went on, “we were too much alike.
I’m the moody type, and so was she.”
        He took
a few more steps before realizing his friend had come to a
halt.
       “ This isn’t the
same woman you married seven years ago?”
        Charlie regarded
him with amazement.
       “I thought I told you, Sharon and
I broke up.”
       “You never said a word,” the
priest replied, trying not to show his irritation. “You and Sylvia,
then, are...?”
       “ Married? Sure.” Charlie suddenly regarded him with shock.
“You don’t