The administrivia and the feeling that he was never quite a part of real life were a complete drag, though. And somehow, the administrivia made his ever-present loneliness worse.
As Sister Cortona started to speak, he forced himself outside his head and back into the gloomy office. “The budget shortfall will force us to shut down the pre-K program—”
If anything could yank his brain back from his maudlin thoughts about how he should be content but wasn’t, it was hearing that they would have to shut down the pre-K program.
He’d taken ownership—even the Catholic Church employed consultants who said things like “taking ownership”—of creating the program for low-income children when he’d started at St. Bartholomew’s. It was open to all the neighborhood kids, regardless of whether they were members of the parish, with tuition on a sliding scale. And it had been a resounding success. Kids who had spent two years with them were reading earlier and seeing higher math test scores in the first and second grades. The program had done more to burnish the Church’s reputation locally and bring parishioners back to services than anything the diocese had done over the past few years.
Decades of scandalous, harmful, traumatizing behavior by priests had thinned out the ranks of the faithful and those who answered the call to minister. Patrick believed that initiatives like the pre-K program, things that actually helped people in the community, could turn the ship around. The fact that people in the neighborhood surrounding St. Bart’s now knew a priest who wasn’t a total creep was actually getting butts in pews. The pre-K program was a more important part of his ministry than saying Mass.
Losing it would be devastating, and he couldn’t let it stand. “How much do we need?”
“We’re twenty-five thousand dollars short when it comes to paying for the teacher’s salary and the necessary supplies.”
“Shit,” he said quietly.
“Language, Father.” Sister Cortona gave him the same look that Sister Antoninus used to give him and his best friend, Jack, when they threw spitballs during class. It was withering.
“We can’t lose this program.” He was adamant about that. He would do whatever it took to keep the pre-K kids learning. He was so agitated that he stood up and started pacing. “There has to be something that we can do.”
“We could start charging a larger fee.” When Patrick threw her a look that he hoped was just a little bit as withering as hers about his language, she added, “Just a small amount of a larger fee.”
“None of the kids could afford it.” Well, virtually none. All the public schools in the neighborhood were Title I schools—low income. The families that sent their kids to the pre-K program needed to save their money for food. If St. Bart’s started charging higher tuition, their enrollment would drop almost immediately. “Could we hit up the Dioceses for more money?”
That elicited a snort from the good sister. “You could try, but the archbishop isn’t as susceptible to those pretty fuckin’ green eyes as the silver hair brigade at daily Mass is.”
Patrick ran his hand through his hair, which also elicited a snort from Sister Cortona. He didn’t think she actually thought that he was a useless pretty boy, but she liked to deploy any weapons at her disposal to keep him in line. Making derisive noises about his good looks helped her do that. In her mind, she probably thought that grooming his thick black hair at all was unbecoming to a man of the cloth. She took her vow of obedience rather loosely, but she was good with the numbers and could pinch a penny until it bled. Which made her indispensable.
He suddenly had a searing headache and just barely suppressed the urge to bang his head on his desk. The last thing he needed was Sister Cortona telling him that he would ruin his pretty face that way in her perfectly annihilating deadpan voice.
“Could we do a fundraiser?” he asked. That, at least, gave him a concrete, external goal that would keep him from spending too much time in contemplation or trying to have a conversation with God, who never seemed to answer.
“It would have to be a mighty big fundraiser.” She did not sound hopeful, but that only motivated Father Patrick. There was something about her faint praise and dry insults that he found very inspirational. If he were in therapy, that would be something that he would look at.
“I’ll look into it.” He’d save the pre-K program, and he would feel good again. Probably. Definitely.
CHAPTER TWO
PATRICK HELPED HIS FATHER behind the bar at Dooley’s three nights a week. It was time that Patrick could ill afford away from his duties, but even Sister Cortona looked the other way because he did it in the name of being a dutiful son.
His father didn’t thank him, just looked him up and down and said, “I suppose you’ll do,” every time he walked in the door.
Danny Dooley was a hard, stubborn man from a long line of hard, stubborn men. Patrick’s father, grandfather, and great-grandfather had all run Dooley’s their entire lives. Patrick’s great-grandfather had practically shit every brick of the exterior, the way that Danny told it.
Now that Danny wasn’t as hale and energetic as he had been, he couldn’t run the place all on his own. And, someday, he wouldn’t be able to work behind the bar at all. Patrick tended bar that night while his father went over the books at the end of the bar, near the doors that led to the office.
Even as an adult, Danny liked to keep an eye on his sons when they were in his domain. Didn’t matter that they were both adults and Patrick was a functioning adult. It still made him feel deeply cared for that his father wanted to be around him. Even if his father wasn’t much of a talker, he never worried about where his paperwork was. He’d never done his own taxes. His father might not have been free with pats on the back or words of affirmation, but he was steady.
Chris had started making noises about them selling and had gone as far as to field a few offers. He didn’t want anything to do with running the business now that he was an attorney on the way to making partner at his firm. Uncharitably, Patrick thought that his meteoric rise had a whole lot more to do with his brother’s gift for bullshit than it did with his smarts.
Patrick would never be able to take the place over, and Danny had never quite accepted it. His father would have liked to put any connection with the Catholic Church in the ground along with his wife, but Patrick had prevented that by entering the seminary.
All three of the Dooley men were at a permanent impasse when it came to what to do with the family legacy. The prospect for any legacy at all was in severe doubt at the moment. Unless Chris got his head out of his ass—which would take major surgery or a true miracle in Patrick’s view—his brother wasn’t going to find anyone willing to put up with him beyond a few weeks. And Patrick was obviously not going to be carrying on the family name.