Really, This?

What the fuck does she want with me now? And why here of all places?

This is what Zak repeated to himself as he approached the old stone steps of the church.

Patrick told him two days ago last Wednesday that Callie would be waiting in the last pew, on the right. Zak had been wondering why she’d be sitting on the right and not the left. Women always sat on the left. Thinking it was some kind of puzzle that he had to figure out, Zak briefly considered asking Sister Mary Francis about the tradition. But knowing that would draw the Sister into a long conversation that he’d zone out of anyway, he’s resorted to just thinking about it.

The network of paths and hedges that had led Zak McKinley to be walking up the steps of Saint Michael’s church in the middle of the afternoon was fantastic really, when he considered it. Following in the tradition of his three older brothers, Zak had joined the Air Force right out of high school. Back for his first trip home since Basic, he found that his city had changed and was the same all at once. Moving and traveling behind the past and into the future he was carving for himself was hard enough; learning that Callie wanted to see him just complicated things more.

In their junior year of high school, Zak and Callie hooked up a few times. After one particularly sloppy performance at a house party, Callie became pregnant. She told Zak immediately and together they decided to terminate the pregnancy. Or at least, Callie decided and Zak paid. He’d been an asshole and didn’t go with her to Planned Parenthood. Didn’t even go see her after, preferring instead to pretend like nothing had happened. Callie didn’t return to school after that, and Zak didn’t bother to find out why.

Opening the door to Saint Ambrose’s, the familiarity of the church greeted him like a stern great aunt. Imposing, reproachful and stoic, but maternal in a side-glance sort of way. After dipping his finger in the holy water and genuflecting in front of the cross, more out of habit and obligation than true belief, Zak scanned the old wooden pews for Callie. He found her sitting at the far end of a pew near the front of the nave. Huffing and wishing he was anywhere but in Saint Michaels, Zak walked quickly toward her. Callie turned to watch him, leaning back as she did so. Seated next to her was a small child.

She waited for Zak to reach the pew before speaking.

“Zak, this is your son, Michael.”