Whatever led Brian Kinney, self-proclaimed heretic, to the confines of a Catholic Church one April afternoon had to be greater than Fate. He sat three rows from the front, on the right-hand side, staring at the altar with anything but piety. Wasn't he supposed to be moved by the Virgin Mary cradling Jesus to her chest? Instead, he shivered in his Armani jacket. Clearly the collection basket was more concerned with candles and gold-framed icons rather than common conveniences like heating. And yet rather than return to April's warm embrace, he only huddled further into his jacket. 

If Deb knew he was here, she'd throw back her head, cackling like a witch before silently joining him, because beneath her contempt she was a good Catholic girl at heart. A moment with the Great Unseen soothed her nerves during the most challenging of times.  Otherwise, no one else would have understood. So when Michael texted to ask after his whereabouts, he hadn't answered. Peace and solitude were luxuries soon to become extinct in his world. His Loft provided no solace, neither would any of his usual haunts. Only the Church seemed appropriate, with its open doors and promises-- exaggerated promises-- of rewards in the afterlife. 

So there he sat, three rows from the front, right-hand side. A comfortable place to be. Too close to the front and he felt exposed to Divine disapproval; too close to the back and he would yearn for the open doors that beckoned him to sanity. But here he could maintain his scepticism whilst submitting to a strange sense of peacefulness. Silence could be a friend: it could be an enemy. Here, it was neither. This nuance, this indecision failed to either disturb or please him, no matter how deeply he considered the subject. 

Leaning back against his seat, he gazed up at the engraved ceiling. Whatever glorious incantations had once been etched there, all was lost under a thick mass of cobwebs. He turned his attention back to the altar, bedecked in gold, silver and fine wood. Truly a house fit for a King-- a God, in fact. The decorations were a labour of love to the Unseen who had created, protected and guided humanity since time immemorial. Well right now, still shivering and now sniffing, Brian felt the opposite of being protected and guided. As for the question of his creation, that didn't bear consideration.  

Candles burned low in their holders around the icon of the Mother and Child. Someone would come and replace them later, but their feeble light still managed to draw his eyes towards the icon instead of clashing with the sunlight. One day, back in the years of his youth and innocence, he had wondered what Catholics saw in Mary-- a woman only famous for a conception that flew past the level of sheer absurdity. Always veiled and demure, subtly directing his attention to the Son of God resting in her arms. And yet even now, he could not take his eyes away from her. Was it the intimacy of the icon, or his own yearning to have a childhood question answered once and for all? Leaning forward so that his arms rested against the next pew, he studied the icon further. Gold leaf decoration lined Mary's head and for the first time he noticed the Child gazing up at his mother with love. A protective love.

Something twisted painfully inside his stomach. Memories drifted in and out of his mind like the disjointed pieces of a puzzle daring him to make them whole; memories of him holding an unknown child. Last year's events had become like blinding flashes of clarity that a recovering amnesiac receives after months of drawing total blanks. Yes, he had a child-- yet he felt like a childless bachelor. Everything about that child seemed distant, foreign, wholly unworthy of comparison to a Mother and Child. In his experience, the only icon he could create in a similar fashion would be titled Stranger and Child. 

And what would it look like? Brian zipped up his jacket and stuffed his hands into his pockets, thinking. Perhaps there would be a window with a picture of himself peering through as Melanie and Lindsay gazed down on their son a million miles away. Perhaps there would be two frames; one with him and one with his child. Or perhaps he was holding his child, but the child was a ghost. 

Indeed, a ghost, because rare moments with his child felt cold to the touch. He heard no sound in them, remembered precious little of the experience. Yet surely there had been an experience of some sort? Seeing the child for the first time flooded him with awe, elevating him from his own ordinary, insignificant existence. Hadn't he gazed at the child and known the meaning of unconditional love, understood the beauty of parenthood? Only a mystery could have produced someone so precious, so perfect that he had been willing to sacrifice everything to protect this helpless human being.  

Oh yes-- he had known, even if he wanted to pretend otherwise. But still, the Mother and Child could not revive those memories, or at least bring a smile to his face. Those memories did not belong to him any more. He had signed them away upon a legal document and thrown them at the feet of Melanie and Lindsay whilst he ached and mourned inside, because their happiness came before his own. Worst of all, he dared not regret.  

Of course, drink, drugs and self-imposed loneliness had helped to mask the gaping hole in his chest for many evenings afterwards. He had long been addicted to the sweetness of a detached reality where his identity, his cares, worries and fears melted away into the darkness, leaving him gloriously liberated. Pain became a laughable concept, rather than a daily reminder of his own failures. Mindless deception and laughter were the order of the day. Like a prisoner feeling the first kiss of freedom, his mind, soul and body rejoiced in the world of make-believe, blanking out any lingering hint of reality.  

But each time he had lost himself in drink and drugs after signing away his rights, real life would break the seal and intrude. Then he would be thrust into the unimaginable torture of returning from his delusions. Every last vestige of alcohol and weed left his body, clawing their wretched way down his body before vanishing into thin air. Then the memories of him and the child returned in glee to torment him: afternoons where he made the child laugh with funny faces, or kissed his forehead when he learnt something new, or bought him new toys and clothes just to watch his innocent eyes light up in joy. Simple pleasures snatched away from him by a legal document. Now his arms felt cold, lifeless, and not just because of the Church-- these arms had once cradled a child to his chest. It had been an unspoken promise of protection, now brushed aside as history. 

And where was the Divine throughout this, the force allegedly responsible for rewarding faithfulness and punishing evil? The force that believed in atonement through suffering and sacrifice-- criteria that he, Brian Kinney, the self-proclaimed heretic, had not only met, but exceeded. Where was his reward? Sitting alone in a Church, three pews from the front, on the riht-hand side brought no comfort, particularly not when staring at the perfect representation of selfless love and devotion from this damned Mother and Child. Suddenly, he longed to lunge at the altar, grab the icon and smash it on the floor. It was a misleading, exaggerated relic, silently taunting him. And afterwards, he would knock all the candles off their holders and watch a river of flames singe cloth, wood, gold, silver, before springing into the air and devouring this whole building.

Even that destruction would never suffice. The mark of stranger had been branded onto his soul perhaps even before he signed away his rights. At the hospital, when he'd lifted the child out of Lindsay's arms and stood stunned, completely lost to the world, he'd been plagued with doubt. It wasn't just a case of his irresponsibility, his experience or his fear; he had questioned his right to even be a father. This child had been too perfect, and he too sinful. For the first time in years, he had felt a burning sense of shame at his own inadequacies, and for the day when this child would discover them in all their ugly detail. And what of his overwhelming dream of New York, where he would conquer the advertising world by storm? He'd never factored a baby into the equation. 

His dream was gone. The child, however, remained. 

Then again, perhaps the branding of a stranger occurred daily. Every time he had come to visit the child and been surprised to find him either able to gurgle, or signal for things he wanted, or able to smile only served to remind him how little he knew. Turn his back and the child would be learning to walk soon, and then talk, and then... 

He was brought out of his musings when he heard a sniff. But upon glancing around and seeing no one there, he realized he had heard himself. He wiped his eyes in an attempt to discourage any more sniffing. It didn't work. A while passed before he regained enough control of himself to glare at the Mother and Child, as though they were responsible for showing him someone he should have been. He had failed, of course, all thanks to a certain Jack Kinney who still plagued him with miserable shadows from beyond the grave. With cruel irony, he remembered only too clearly memories of his own childhood, memories that burned him every day. And to think of his mother, Joan Kinney, with her distant selfishness and high-handed piety caused even deeper wounds to re-open and fester. Their example had prompted him to believe in better, to aspire higher when it came to his child. 

Clearly, he too had failed.  

Or had he? He might be many things: arrogant, selfish, over-ambitious... No doubt his friends could fill in even more faults at their leisure. But he would rather die than picture himself yelling at the child, throwing broken beer bottles, making threats and sending the child to bed in barely-concealed tears. That torment belonged to the hand of Jack Kinney, not him. Never him. Had the child still belonged to him-- no, when the child had still belonged to him-- he had endeavoured with heart, body and soul to show him better. Whilst he might not be able to voice the emotions, he more than made up for this inadequacy in his actions. There had been warm hugs, and pet names, and falling asleep on Lindsay's sofa with a tiny bundle on his chest, still trying to protect the miracle he'd created. 

But what of that photo Jack had shown him, back from a day when his father seemed capable of smiling and affection? What had happened? The ravaging effects of unemployment, illness, frustrations, poverty, a frigid and proselytizing wife had taken their toll. Would he, Brian, someday degenerate into a similar bitter wreck, preferring the company of drink and friends who despised children? 

No.

No he repeated to himself again, as his eyes grew wet once more. But promises were for those with time to fulfil them, and he had none. 

He lifted his gaze to the Mother and Child, pleading for an intercession. Call it madness or desperation; indeed, desperation often contained a good deal of the former. What could he learn from this ornate relic that would stave away the pain? It took a great deal of self-control to stymy any lingering scepticism he felt in favour of a passive silence. He didn't expect a blinding flash of light in his head, or wind, or a powerful voice commanding him to perform some exalted task. Neither did he expect an overwhelming sense of calm, or some miraculous elevation from his current pain. Just a thought, a path towards an answer, a new perspective-- not from mysterious sources, but from the recesses of his own mind.

And suddenly, the answer lay in front of him, an answer so simple he wondered why he hadn't seen it earlier. Persistence. Nothing more, and nothing less. The law could make or break, imprison or release, cheat, steal, rule for or rule against... but it could never break the bonds between a father and his son. Or, indeed, a Mother and Son. For the first time since entering the Church, he smiled a little. All he needed to do was persist. Dare he say it, or dare he not, but the child was his, even if the law no longer recognized this. Closer to him than anyone else, the child was his. Persist and all those memories lying shattered would become whole once more, bringing light and life to his darkness. No more huddling into his jacket, or silent weeping where none could see him. And instead of the child, he would remember the name: Gus, or Sonny Boy. His Sonny Boy. The one who had effortlessly reached into his heart by simply existing. 

Persist. 

Standing up, he took one last, long glance at the Mother and Child. The candles were almost burnt to a stump, melted wax dripping off the holders every now and then. All was silent as the grave. And then Brian Kinney, self-proclaimed heretic, did something that surprised him, something he might never do again.

"Thank you," he whispered.  

Then he turned and wandered out of the Church, back to the warm embrace of an April afternoon.