Chapter 35 Chapter Thirty-Four

They are planning a funeral.Moira and Ella lay at the head of the bed with blankets over their laps.Moira holds a pen and a notepad on her lap; Ella's thighs are coiled into a bowl with a large bag of marshmallows.They found a cupboard for dry goods, as big as a walk-in wardrobe, and it was full of food that no one had ever seen before, and it must have been food that the employees had left for themselves: cheap colored biscuits, marshmallows, and grown-ups. Box Of Potato Chips. Thomas didn't want to sit on the bed with the two of them, and even though there was room above it, he didn't feel comfortable, so he paced around his parents' bedroom.It was a strange room to him, a place he had glimpsed through the door as a child but never explored in it.No one told him not to come in, but he couldn't explain why he didn't come in, even now he still had a faint sense of fear, as if Lars would come in at any time, widen his eyes, and growl and scold him.

A massive boxwood sleigh bed sits in the center of the room, with huge windows looming behind it like a bed frame. Moira had decided to bury Lars in Sevenoaks, which seemed to Thomas to be a bit malicious.Thomas said that since they were going to sell the place and move away, maybe Lars would rather be buried in the city, he loved the city so much.But Moira insisted on burying him here, saying that since he liked the place so much, it was the best place to be buried here, though she said it with an imperceptible smile in her eyes.She was going to imprison Lars where he had imprisoned her. Ella slowly ate the marshmallows, taking eight bites of each piece, while Thomas wandered slowly around the room, touching objects that had once belonged to Lars, wondering if there was a complete same thing.He looked up at Moira on the bed. She looked happy, taking notes with Ella about the funeral arrangements, planning who should come and what should happen.He felt sorry for his mother because he knew Theresa would be calling soon.Moira probably already knew, but she wasn't willing to face it.She'll probably go back on antidepressants and they'll lose her again.

"Which classmates would you like to invite to Dad's funeral, Tom?" Thomas shook his head. "Not inviting Squeak?" "No need," he touched the comb, "it's too far away." "Yeah." Moira might have sent Piper to pick up Squeak in the old days, just so he could stay with Thomas, but things were different now, and they couldn't afford such a thing anymore. "Is it possible that his father will send him a plane?" "No, forget it." "How's Downey? Did you invite him?" "Donny?" Thomas looked at his mother as if she were mentally ill.

Moira pouted, "Donnie, the one whose stepfather has cancer, you were with him this morning..." Thomas blushed, and he felt terrible and uncomfortable.But Moira thought she had exposed him, and smiled and nodded at him, as if to say she knew. "You can invite her, if you like, your girlfriend." Thomas smacked his lips impatiently and looked into the distance.He was embarrassed because Theresa couldn't be his girlfriend, and the thought of it was horrifying, but he did.On the train back he hardly thought of anything else.He wasn't really thinking about touching her.It was just a warm soup of thoughts, her thick hair, the way her shoulders shook when she walked.He made a trip to the toilet on the train, took a quick jerk off, and thought about something else, a movie he'd seen so he could sit back and safely daydream about fucking her.

"You don't want to invite her?" "yes." Moira looked at him with a serious expression, "You're not going to see Nanny Mary, are you?" "Bullshit!" Thomas spat angrily, angry that Moira knew about their affair and brought it up. "Because that woman sold your father's picture to the newspaper." "I didn't see Nanny Mary, for Christ's sake—" "She's a snake." "Shut up and don't talk about it!" Moira watched his face, knowing he meant it, and returned her gaze to the notepad. At this moment, Ella became impatient and acted coquettishly on the bed, "Okay, now let's talk about what song will be played at the funeral." Her overly coquettish, coquettish, flattering appearance gave Thomas the urge to punch her.Her mood swings all the time—laughing intermittently, asking silly questions: Will it rain tomorrow, what is that color called.

Thomas thought of Phils and Bethany.They will be calm.He imagined himself as the morose Phils, the skateboarding Phils, the Chelsea Phils growing up.Thomas tried to find someone like Phils among his classmates, but there was none, because Phils went to day school, which was always different from their boarding students.If Ella had been Bethany, she would have been calm, she would have been honest with Thomas Fiers, she would have said that she was both sad and happy that Papa had died.Bethany probably trusted Theresa, she didn't have to be sycophants like the characters in the movies, she would know how to do it.

"How about Ocean Star?" Moira asked. "No," Ella said, "that kind of..." She couldn't think of the right word, and just threw her hands up high as if tossing confetti in the air, "upward!" "Exciting," said Moira. "Yes, exciting, exciting, exciting." ""Jerusalem"?" "Is that a hymn?" Moira wasn't sure, "But your father loved it." Ella nodded. "Exciting." "Okay," Moira wrote it down, "and then, should we have a funeral dinner?" "Do people usually do this?"

Unbeknownst to Thomas, he had never been to any funerals, so he just listened. "Well, we could get some caterers, but will anyone come? It's like diplomatic uncertainty. Dad's gone now, no one's afraid of him..." There was a soft phone ringing under the stairs in the distance, and Thomas walked quickly towards the door, "I'll pick it up." "No." Moira turned sideways to the bedside table and held up the cordless phone. "Hello?" As she listened, her expression changed from excitement to confusion.Thomas' heart clenched, and he glanced at the bedside clock. It was only half past six, and it had been five and a half hours since he left Theresa at one o'clock.Little else was on his mind after the breakup, and maybe she was the same, maybe she was thinking about him in the same way.It meant they could overcome the barrier that stood between them, just as Lars had overcome the barrier of having a family.

Moira looked at Thomas with bright and cold eyes, "Wait a minute," she smiled and handed him the phone, "I'm looking for you." Thomas took it, retreating to the other side of the room before raising the receiver to his ear. Heavy breathing came through the receiver, a man's breathing, not Theresa's. "Thomas, is that you?" The voice was slow and tired, the voice of a depressed man, it was Lars, his voice was hoarse because of hanging, he called from the morgue, "Is that you?" Thomas walked to the landing and carefully closed the bedroom door behind him, "Who are you?".

"Thomas, this is Father Sholtham." Thomas held his breath, the name seemed to come from 1 million years ago.Father Sholtham, the school chaplain, was rumored to have been a drunk, a pre-consecrated navy, a boxer, and a murderer.He was a charismatic man who didn't take Doyle or anyone seriously: Thomas had seen him put his hands in his trouser pockets and blatantly scratch his groin at the podium at a parent-teacher conference. "Father?" "Thomas, is that you?" "Well, yes, Father, it's me." Father Sholsam actually called him, and he was a little flattered; the other end of the phone paused for a moment, and Thomas hurriedly asked, "You—how do you have my phone number?" Number, Father?"

"Mr. Doyle..." "Oh, I understand." "Thomas...I don't know how..." The sentence ended in heavy breathing, and the priest sniffed, sounding wet, like he was crying and in big trouble. Thomas didn't want to talk on the stairs in the corridor. He wanted to concentrate on talking to the priest without paying attention to the bedroom door. "Father, can you hang up the phone and wait for me for a while?" "I will wait for you." Thomas picked up the phone and ran downstairs, knowing that voices could travel far in the hallway: he had heard Lars and Moira arguing in the living room.He hurried to the kitchen, down the stairs to the freezer, turned off the light, and sat down on the lowest step in the dark. "Father?" Father Sholtham was actually crying now, like a child, "Tom, Tommy? Can you talk to me?" "Father, why are you crying?" "Oh, God!" Thomas took the phone away from his ear and suddenly realized what was going on: the pastor was drunk.It's sad and disappointing. "Thomas," whispered Father Sholtham, "I know what you do." Thomas was stunned, "I'm sorry, Father, what did you say?" "For her, that woman," he said, sobbing, "God is in heaven." "Father, where are you?" He was annoyed at the question, "Not where! Don't think... I don't want you to think..." He's really drunk and he gets confused easily. "You're a little drunk, Father, aren't you?" "Yes, drunk," a loud sniff, "yes." "Father, you shouldn't talk about that, should you?" "Thomas, there are sins..." "If you heard about it under certain circumstances, you could be excommunicated for talking about it..." "I'm lost, Thomas, and I'd rather be lost than have you—" "Well, look, I think, whether you're drunk or not, you need some help, I think you need to seek spiritual help for this matter, Father, you need God's help immediately." The pastor held his breath, "Yes, you are right." "No harm has been done so far, Father, I'm going to forget this conversation—" "No harm?" he said incoherently. "No harm?" "I mean this thing," Thomas said very firmly, "about this thing, about the fact that you're talking about it, who you need to meet, soon." "I'm going, I'm waiting—" "Until you stop drinking? Well, maybe until you do, you never will." Thomas curled up, hugging his knees tightly in his arms, squeezing his breath, eyes closed. "Thomas?" "Ok." "I'm worried about you." "Ok." "I'm afraid you won't repent." It's ridiculous. "How could I do that now? What do you think?" Father Sholtham had nothing to say about that. "Father?" "what?" "When did you hear about it?" "Why do you ask?" "I need to know." The priest seemed unimpressed, he just snorted, so Thomas added, "I'll repent if you tell me." "Really?" "real." "Because Thomas, it's not enough to repent, you have to actually repent—" "Father, how could I not really repent?" Their voices were low now, almost a whisper. "I can't take a confession over the phone, Thomas." "I know, I'm going to confess here, I'm going to find someone here. When did you hear about it, can you tell me?" "Lunchtime, the day of the choir meeting." "It's Tuesday, isn't it?" "12 o'clock, yes, why?" "Were you drinking?" "God forgive me, yes. Will you repent, Thomas?" "If you go to confession, I will." Hearing this, the priest cried again, for a long time, and from time to time recited some common phrases in the priest's lexicon: Bless you, God forgive you. Thomas promised to confess, and took an oath. After hanging up the phone, he didn't move, but sat in the freezer with his knees folded, dumbstruck.He was so shocked. Squeak had told Father Shortham before they met on that pebbly beach.Finding Sholtham drunk, Squeak confessed to the priest.He said Thomas killed Sarah.Squeak had been planning how to get away with it. Thomas didn't want to be caught, not yet, Theresa would call.What would she think if she knew about it?She would be terrified of him, would think him a monster, and he would never be able to explain what happened in that hall. Even for her. Anyone could do that to you if they took you down, but Squeak was more likely than most.