An Afternoon with Nick

 

I know—it’s been many days since I last wrote about my evenings with Nick. But there are good reasons for that, as you’ll soon see.

As I mentioned in the previous post, Nick spent a few weeks in America. There, after a chance encounter with someone from his old days living on the streets, he found himself facing what seemed like a fierce temptation to return to addiction.

Determined to remain sober and committed to the promise he had made me, he left California and headed for the East Coast. Afterward, he returned to visit his family and finally came back last Wednesday.

In the meantime, a doctor found signs of a potentially unwelcome illness on my back, prompted by a strange discoloration on the skin. So far, I have undergone only one examination and am still waiting for the results. For now, it remains only a suspicion.

Life is always a box of surprises, isn’t it?

I went to pick Nick up at the airport. He looked exhausted—the very portrait of fatigue—but it was a portrait that greeted me with a broad, lingering smile.

“You shouldn’t have come,” he said. “You should be making pottery. I’ve got two more commissions lined up for you.”

“You’re going to kill me one of these days,” I replied as I relieved him of the heavier bags.

We stopped at a café while waiting for the ferry home.

Between bites of toast and sips of coffee, I told him how concerned I had been about what had happened in California. He then recounted the whole story in detail.

How that accidental meeting with a former companion from his years in prostitution had shaken him to the core. How the man had become a ragged wreck in his sixties, still enslaved by drugs. How Nick, burdened by shame and guilt, had suddenly longed for the sensation of those drugs again, despite having been clean for so many years. How his determination to stay sober had driven him to leave California altogether and spend time in cities where he had no past to haunt him.

In the end, another source of tension had come from his family. His gay nephew, upon learning that Nick had begun flirting with Catholicism, had reacted with disbelief and anger.

“He just couldn’t get his head around it,” Nick said. “A gay guy wanting to wade into the swamp of Catholicism. According to him, the Catholic Church lives to oppress people and fight against free expression. Catholics are always starting wars, they're racists, and God knows what else. I listened to him, and I kept thinking about you. My friend doesn’t fit any of that stuff. You were the one piece of evidence I had that Catholics weren’t the monsters my nephew was describing. But man, it drove me crazy not having any arguments to push back with.”

I smiled faintly and asked him a question.

“Would you like to stay at my place for a few days?”

“Why?”

“This wasn’t an easy trip for you, was it? Not from any angle. I was thinking that spending a couple of days at my place might give you some time to process all of it.”

He chuckled.

“You know I’m not some damsel in distress, right? I’m okay. Really. The turbulence is over. Now, it’s true that I want to study this catechism thing a little more and get a better handle on it. I need to find out whether my nephew is right—which, honestly, I doubt. But if he’s wrong, how do I answer him?”

He paused, then looked at me.

“You really want to be my white knight?”

“I always have been, fair maiden.”

“Pervert,” he muttered under his breath, his voice thick with mock indignation.

We both laughed.

But I said nothing about the threat of the possible malignancy.