The Catholic
“It’s just over,” he said. Or I said. Doesn’t really matter anymore. The anti-climax of eight months of horror, now brought to a rolling boil and reduced cleanly to thirty minutes of numb spectatorship, casual indifference, newly-empty underwear drawers.
Good, I thought. Good, good, good.
But no, no, no. Eighteen months ago we spoke of better and worse. This is worse, isn’t it? Be a good girl. Eighteen months ago, ruby red tulips and perfectly pressed table linens and cathedral ceilings and Frank Sinatra promised a life that wouldn’t turn out like this one. Eighteen months ago we spoke of good times and bad.
But this isn’t bad, God—it’s terrible. I never said anything about terrible.
You learn things you never imagined. Lesson One: Death By Drowning Can Take Months. You hold your breath at first; you panic and struggle. When that doesn’t work, you try to swallow it, choke it down. Eventually you become too exhausted to continue. You stop the fight and lose consciousness.
Don’t drown, Rachel. Save some energy for the real struggle.
What about Mom? She’ll be so disappointed. And me? Those most unmistakable shades of shame and humiliation will forever reside on my cheeks. From this day forward, my lips will be incapable of making proud promises and proclamations; my brain will forever mock the honesty, integrity, and commitment of my words. My eyes will ache to remember the peace and freedom that once came with meeting people’s glances on a level plane.
Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.
Amen.
“You can’t just work it out, huh?” they said.
“It’s good that you didn’t have children,” they said.
“You’re lucky that you’re so young,” they said.
“This will be a really simple one,” they said.
Clearly, they were right. I must’ve been too young, too naïve, too immature to process this “really simple” thing everyone spoke of. Save for a handful of embarrassed and critical relatives, a handful of friends who weren’t really friends anyway, no one seemed to judge. Dust yourself off, pick yourself up, everyone makes mistakes, they said. There was no scarlet “A” waiting to be fastened, no public stoning. Maybe that would have made it easier.
So that was it? Fifteen pages of double-spaced, 12-point, serif typeface to undo a covenant before God and man? Fifteen pages of cruelly neutral nouns and verbs, traded even-up for eternal damnation? A swift, clean, easy “undo.” Just like that.
And just like that, it was over.
“You’ll need an annulment,” they said. “From the church.”
But no, no, no. This was supposed to be over. The papers were signed in triplicate. Everything had been notarized, embossed, stapled, filed. It was over. Please: no more wounds to tend. Please: no more alternately pitying and condescending smiles from notaries, no more squeals of congratulations from uninformed coworkers and pharmacists and mailmen who don’t understand that my newly changed name isn’t what they think—and doesn’t warrant their forced attempts at polite glee. Please: no more daily reminders.
Please: No More.
“If you don’t get an annulment,” they said, “you cannot marry in the Catholic church again.”
Good, I thought. Good, good, good.
