They let the boys wear dresses for a day because Jesus said so. The girls were wearing dresses too which I guess was also dictated by Jesus but this was a pretty normal and unexciting thing for them. It seemed like Jesus’ dictations were often aligning with what girls were supposed to do RE: be giving, courteous, kind, caring, compassionate, etc. but for boys it was like a short vacation from quiet cruelty to be a disciple for the day. Disciple to what? I don’t really know. They kept telling me all the stuff about God who was either scary or or gracious, though it wasn’t clear if I was supposed to choose which one I believed or if I’d have some vision which would reveal to me His true nature, but either way I didn’t really ‘get’ what I was supposed to be taking from the whole Catholicism thing. I couldn’t even really say the word yet with all its pointy syllables. The closest I’d gotten thus far sounded something like Cataclysm.
But I was wearing a dress in public which felt sort of naughty like my punishment was imminent, yet all my aunts were taking pictures, ruffling my hair, calling me adorable etc, so I guessed this one time was okay and rumor had it we’d all get to try the bread for the first time today. Allegedly, it was what the whole day was about but you wouldn’t be able to tell through all the fanfare bookending and smothering the central thing. The older kids all claimed the bread tasted like cardboard and wasn’t really worth all the ruckus but I’d wager they were just mad because their one day to wear a dress had come and gone and now they were stuck in pants again like everyone else. Schmucks.
The dress itself was no frills, sleek and white but wide so I was swimming in it and kept wiggling my hips in circles to reach its outer limits. The girls’ dresses were better with the desired frills and extravagant lace and they even got little headpieces adorned with white flowers which was pretty cool.
There were some boys too whose parents clearly didn’t buy into the whole ‘dress as holy religious ceremony’ thing and had unceremoniously dunked their precious angels into pants they would grow out of in a month. This was sort of how I knew that it was probably not okay for me to be in a dress but you couldn’t really tell me shit. I was happy as a clam. I felt pretty.
It’s not that my mother was making any sort of statement, it’s just that it didn’t even really occur to her as a thing to worry about. But that’s how all things start, you don’t worry about it until someone who worries about everything explains to you why some benign idea is worth worrying about forever. She’d probably be biting her cuticles off by the end of the day wondering if she’d set me down a path there was no turning back from. Like all fifteen of us boys in shapeless dresses would be handing over our Christmas lists later this year with a jump scare itinerary of heels, tights, plum red lipstick, cutesy skirt, Bratz Doll, etc. Anything was possible, everything probable in God’s glorious domain.
Bobby was one of the few boys in pants and a tuxedo jacket and it was clearly going to his head a bit. Despite being no taller than the rest of us, he was making a big show of tilting his chin up toward God to look down on each of us in turn. My mom and aunts were all drinking and laughing against each other’s shoulders so they didn’t notice when he walked by in his stupid loafers and bonked the back of my head with a closed fist. He moved on before I could really defend myself but made sure to smirk over his shoulder just in case I’d started crying which I was trying really hard not to do. It helped to push my bottom lip into a pout like if I had to hold the tears in I needed to get something out.
It was pretty obvious he was only carrying out these covert attacks on the dress-wearing boys which only reaffirmed that I was doing something not only wrong but downright unacceptable. I pulled at the confines of my dress and watched it warble across my body.
Father Marion was ducking in and out of the room which was a sort of lobby with scattered tables and lots of murky light filtering through the frosted windows. He seemed agitated without direction. My dad got like that sometimes, a rising fit in which he’d stew quietly in his brain without explanation, ultimately building up to some sort of exclamation like Will anything ever go my way! Or Can I get one break? Just one break? Father Marion was leaping between the lobby and the nave like that, steaming beneath his big white dress which made him look neither masculine nor feminine though there was something concretely manly about the hard crease in his brow, the stern and uniform cut of his graying hair and the length of his stride as he paced. Set against the growing laughter and merriment of my aunts, the loose movement of their wrists swirling long stemmed glasses of Jesus’ blood, I got the impression that men and women were like opposing storm fronts, big in their different ways and maybe dangerous if they collided.
There were lots of big families and most were Irish, little sprawling nations taking up residence in the various corners with their cameras, the mothers fixing stray hairs and tilting flower headbands before snapping quick pictures. The dads and uncles huddled conspiratorially against the pale walls muttering through mustaches and keeping their eyes on the flat red carpet. My family in particular refused to relegate itself to any one spot and was continuously spilling across the room, taking up more space than seemed possible. My aunts were many and I struggled to keep track of them all sometimes. I slipped between my mom’s legs and wound my way through the maze of aunts looking for someone to provide comfort to my bonked head but they were pretty distracted with their laughing and sipping.
Aunt Carrie leaned toward my mother and said something tight-lipped against her ear. The both of them had to clutch at their mouths to keep from erupting with laughter. Their sweatered stomachs shook above me like the scolding hand of God. Wine spittled over the rims of their glasses and I dodged the red rain with a child’s quickness, scurrying through the forest of legs, feeling my dress ripple around me. I found Tim casually rubbing the back of his head like he just wanted to raise the stubble against his palm but the tough set of his jaw told me he’d just got a good Bobby thwacking. I bumped my shoulder against his and we shared a look of quiet solidarity. Shy, missing-tooth-grins. We spun around in circles until we grew dizzy then complained about being bored.
My dad was with Bobby’s dad up against the wall looking stoic with a beer warming in his hand. They nodded rhythmically at one another’s tiny musings. Bobby ran up, grappled his father’s leg and was unceremoniously shook off like a rodent and shooed away. Unperturbed, he hurried over and seemed to pause before Tim and I as if trying to figure out had he already tortured us and then, realizing he didn’t care, delivered a swift kick to Tim’s shin where it was covered by his dress, pinched my upper arm through my silky sleeve. He ran off, arms outstretched like a plane’s wings teetering into violence. Aunt Debbie squeezed my mom’s shoulder and laughed loud like the great organ warming up in the other room. Tim and I rubbed at our wounds but didn’t talk about them.
Father Marion called out from the doorway, whatever he said being drowned out by the clamor. I waggled my tongue against a loose tooth, wondered if chewing on the body of Jesus would finally extract it. Bobby pinwheeled through the crowd catching stray calves with his grimy fingers. Tim drummed against the wall.
Father Marion called for order once more right as Aunt Sally hit the punchline of a potentially raunchy joke that I didn’t get and a chorus of women’s laughter rose like feathers. My mom was shaking her head in disbelief. What a tasteless joke! Why can’t I stop laughing!
Dads receded further into the wall like a pale mosaic.
Tim and I were spinning again.
Bobby tumbled past Father Marion and received a wry grin, a tousling of his hair and then he was past, clearing a wide path of destruction.
“Please—can I have your attention, please!” Father Marion shouted, his face contorting with a loudness that rivaled his low voice.
The women clinked their glasses one after the other, laughing with big rosy-cheeked grins. Cheers to something!
One of the other boys yelped at the sudden arm lodging in his gut. Bobby sputtered on.
Laughter like a physical presence, joy rising, all things rising.
I twirled and Tim twirled and we twirled and and twirled and
“BE QUIET!” came Father Marion’s sudden roar, a shout that rose up into the rafters and descended from the heavens like growling thunder, a biblical admonishment.
The room’s joy withered on the vine. I could hear the blood of the Lord curdling inside my mother’s stomach. Father Marion’s face was red with someone else’s blood, it could not be that of Jesus which painted him furious. Even Bobby had stuttered to a halt, his weapons of destruction fallen flat at his sides.
Father Marion took several deep breaths that seemed not to calm him at all, then said, “We will be starting now.” He turned in place toward the door and then back around to pointedly face my family and added, “The level of volume is highly inappropriate. This is a church of the Lord.”
He marched back through the door and let it swing shut behind him. My aunts laughed but with a dark edge. My mom rolled her eyes. Tim and I shared a look and went back to twirling like if we went fast enough we might launch up through the rafters and all the way home.
My mother fixed my hair for the hundredth time, took a picture of Tim and I with our arms at our sides, then ushered us into the nave with a tight, forced grin teasing the corners of her mouth.
We did the whole thing, walking down the aisle in lines with the roof soaring above us, windows of jagged color kicking light around the room, small small small inside my dress. Holding thin white candles with timid flames sputtering weakly like my heart when Bobby hurt me. When Father Marion offered the flat morsel of the Eucharist pinched sternly between two fingers I found I could not lift my eyes to meet his gaze. He placed the flat wafer on my tongue, and with his thick fingers and hairy knuckles so close to my teeth and lips, the sheer breadth of him towering over me, I thought I maybe felt God for a moment and understood His nature.
The stale-tasting body of Jesus melted unexcitingly into the spit lining my mouth. I swallowed.
At home, while they set out a pristine white cake and poured more wine, I took my dress off, folded the white fabric into a careful square on my dresser and changed back into loose pants. I joined my father and uncles against the kitchen wall and watched all my aunts laugh with my hands deep in my pockets. God watched it all and said nothing.
Further Fiction For Ur Nerve
Divine Vignettes
Scraggly black cliff faces stretching upupup toward miasmic clouds, roiling pearls predicting a dark ink spill on downy white, a reverse incantation, a dissolution of magic from divine to devoured.
THE ENDING!!! you have outdone yourself. at my first communion I was brought near to tears because everyone wanted a million pictures and my cheeks hurt from the posed smiles. But generally i think it should be a happy event for girls and also boys too
That last line. ✨