Sinner's Stoop

A man locked out of a church and a homeless woman on her way to a closed bakery embody Robert Frost's question, "Before I built a wall I'd ask to know What I was walling in or walling out."

Sinners' Stoop

by  Frances Applequist

The carved door to the dark and silent stone church would not yield. Trevor pushed a wave of blond hair back from his face, inhaled long and slow, and grabbed the handle again.

Still locked.

He sighed and slumped onto a low, two-foot thick stone wall to his left. The coolness of the rock under his thin body contrasted with the moist warmth of the August night. He stared at the purple sky above. Then his eyes followed the stone wall as it descended the steps and wound its way around the church’s property. A mixture of relief and disappointment flowed through him. "Now, Lord,” he murmured, “Didn't Robert Frost ask who was being walled in, and who was being walled out?

“Uh, sorry, Lord.  Maybe I’m still a little drunk." Trevor stopped talking and sunk into the thoughts that brought him to the church that night.

Having lost track of time, he only looked around when he heard a shopping cart rattle over breaks in the pavement below. He exaggerated his normal drawl to cover any remaining slur, and said, "Don't be scared, now. I'm not planning any harm."

Wheels rattled a few feet more and stopped. He caught of whiff of mold and dried perspiration.

"That church is locked," the woman snapped.

Trevor heard a vibration in her gruff voice and wondered if it came from age, nerves, or illness. He sighed, "I could ask if it should be."

"And I’d say, if it wasn’t locked, the silver chalice would be stolen, and the expensive new rugs soiled, and the stained glass shattered.” Her voice dropped a little lower to confess, “Of course, I wouldn’t mind it as a place to sleep." 

Her silhouette wedged the cart into the bushes, and then worked to climb the steps to his level. As she drew nearer, her odors grew stronger. He had smelled worse on himself, so he ignored it. In his soft drawl he asked, "Should there be a silver chalice to steal, expensive new rugs to soil, and stained glass to break? Just wondering."

Her old head swiveled right and left as she mused, “There’s people who wouldn’t come to pray without the glitter.”  A sliver of light outlined her hollow cheek as she tilted her face toward the stars and added, “Of course, all I need is them.”

Above, in the visible crevice of sky, he could see the gray moon. Trevor lowered his view to stare right and left at the abandoned buildings nearby. At the far end in one direction, a pole lamp threw a wash of light onto the street. Somewhere a dog barked once, and another answered. Both animals soon lost interest. After a moment, Trevor’s head grew heavy and he lowered it.

The woman sat on the low wall opposite Trevor. The night air carried her words: "Sometimes mothers get the blame."

Trevor replayed the disconnected statement in his head "twice. He wondered if she was finishing a conversation with an imaginary friend or if he was still addled. Not knowing what else to say, he gave her, "Mine never earned the blame."

She hesitated, "Taking the blame on yourself is good."

Unsure what they were talking about, Trevor looked toward her cart. Life had whittled her down to a basket-full of other people’s junk so, maybe, it had whittled down her mind as well.

She changed her statement into the question, "Are you taking the blame?"

Oh well, he thought, I’ll play. "Over and over again," he answered.

"Nothing’s over if you’re still alive."

He started to laugh, and then he realized that she meant to help him. He turned his laugh into a cough, and sputtered, “Yeah, it’s over.”

The woman just listened.

He surprised himself by admitting, "A loving wife, two kids, a nice suburban house, a job that paid for it. I should not have needed anything else, but I did."

"Booze, horses, women?"

"Yes.”

She waited.

"Elena kept trying. To cover my debts, we sold little things, and then big things. We sold things that didn’t matter, and then we sold things she loved. We kept selling until the only thing left was the four of us. The day came when it was on her face,”

"What?"

"That there was only the three of them."

"How long ago did she leave?"

"Two years." He wished he could afford cigarettes, because it was one of those movie moments where the guy tosses the cigarette aside and walks away. Despite his thinking he had finished talking, he said, "At first, I heard stories that she was having it rough but, with nothing to give her, I stayed away. Now that they're okay, I couldn’t try to move back. I do drive down to North Carolina to see the boys once a year."

The old woman sighed, "Big of you."

Trevor groaned but did not defend himself.

"So, what brings you here at three in the morning?"

Trevor's chest heaved out his words, "My mother died today. I'm supposed to leave in the morning for her house in Poughkeepsie. It’ll be all mixed together: losing my mother, seeing my boys, having Elena right there and out of reach at the same time. Then there’s my father. I hadn't seen my parents in two years, and now I have to face my father.” He hesitated before adding, “And there’s my brothers with their family intact. The older one offered to buy my ticket and pick me up from the train station, but I’ve been pretending I didn’t get the message.”

“Guilt and martyrdom: useless twaddle."

"Hell,” he joked, “guilt’s the only thing holding me upright."

"If guilt kept anyone ‘upright,’ they wouldn't have any."

“That so?”Trevor did not comment on the irony of that statement coming from an old street hag. Somewhere in the distance, they heard a siren. They listened until it faded and then he asked, "What are you doing here at three in the morning?"

In the dark, he could barely see her wave her arm toward the end of the street. Her movement sent more of her aroma his way, but he focused on her proud, "Raspberry Cream Cupcake! The baker on the next block saves the broken ones for me."

Trevor nodded, even though he suspected she could not see it.

"Well" she stood and said, "I have my rounds to finish."

He heard more than saw her make her way down the steps and grab the handle of her wobbly cart. If she said anything else, he could not hear it. Nor could he think of anything to say. The rattling and odor diminished with distance.

Staying where he was, he only knew two things for sure. One, that the locked church no longer bothered him. The other, that he would sober up the rest of the way soon, and his older brother’s cell phone number was in his pocket.

The End