Falling Away by Jeremy Orlando

Author:Jeremy Orlando
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Quest, Search for Salvation, Mortality, Moral Ambiguity, Forgiveness, Poetry, Sibling Rivalry
ISBN: 9781785386879
Publisher: Andrews UK Limited 2017
Published: 2017-05-17T00:00:00+00:00

II

The two men sat in front of the blank television screen in contented silence. Father Nicolas Lane sat pensively with pen in hand and his densely filled notebook resting on his lap. They had been at this for hours and he felt he had begun losing his friend’s attention after the last slice of pizza had disappeared. Why, in a family of seven, had he been the only one cursed with this wretched left handedness? Being the sixth child had branded him Nicky Six, which to this day still stuck among family and close friends.

He had grown up in this town and for all the problems there had been and continued to be, with its disenfranchised youth and the constant race issues, he stayed. He had never understood why there had always been plentiful funds for the reinvigoration of the town’s main street or the vast construction on the town’s waterfront while so many of the town’s youth were sleeping rough. It was his will to do that kept him here when so many took flight was that this was his chance. This was his chance to do more than stand behind a rostrum and preach. Despite all his other siblings who had left in the years since the passing of his parents, he had made a silent vow to stay but the most important thing now was concentrating on the notepad on his lap.

***

His youngest sister, Sam, was the only sibling still left in this town and it was through her that he was able to keep track of the others. He had been the odd one out of the bunch, not rowdy enough to make his presence noticed, not athletic or academic enough to be paraded in front of the parents come end of year speech nights. Sometimes it gave him a headache to try and place where the Lane children were, what they were doing and how many children were being added to the family tree. At last count according to Sam, there were twenty two children spread amongst the Lane Dynasty.

Sam had always been the pretty one, the one most likely to change the world, the un-sanctimonious one, the one to make something of the family name; but now the world was at a loss as to explain how one so intelligent and vivacious had found herself confined to managing a corner store and tied to an endless stream of men who, as her brother had told her on more than one occasion, “weren’t fit to speak her name much less hold her hand.”

The last time he had seen her was a Sunday service weeks ago, a week before his latest crazy scheme had been hatched. She had waited for the congregation to disperse and bashfully asked him if he would like to spend the afternoon with her. She had worn a floral dress and flat white shoes that day and after lunch, they had walked through the church gardens and sat on a bench as she anxiously held the thick manila folder on her lap.

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