she was so worn down. So all I have to say is—don’t make any decisions from a position of weakness. Take your lawyer’s advice. I know you’re not greedy and the most important thing is getting your life back, but don’t let him trick you.”
“Is that what you’re doing? Trying to fight back and be patient?”
He laughed uncomfortably. “Lauren, my ex-wife wants everything. My house, my business, my boys, my soul. She’s made similar offers—if I just let her come home, she’ll promise to leave the business alone. But I know she doesn’t keep promises. And let’s be honest, that ship has sailed. No way I’m going to live with her again.”
“I completely understand that,” she said.
“There’s only one problem in my life at the moment,” he said. “I get lonely.” He reached across the small table and took her hand. “I never thought that would be a problem. Then I met you.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Tim left an unpleasant meeting with the archbishop of the diocese; His Excellence was understandably disappointed. He had plans for Father Tim, but Father Tim had plans of his own. He had already begun transitioning out of the priesthood. He felt a rush of fear and grief at the prospect, but there was no question in his mind it was the right thing to do. It was not a question of faith; his faith was deep and strong and he would find a way to do the Lord’s work as a civilian. But his political disagreements with doctrine were too strong.
The archbishop might be disappointed in his decision but he found a great deal of support within the diocese from other priests and a great deal of compassion and understanding from one of the bishops. His Grace, Bishop Michael Hayden had been ordained forty years ago and Tim would have expected him to think of Tim as just another flaky young priest with doubts and worries and selfish whims to break through the barriers that bound him, but instead they talked it over and the bishop was kind and sympathetic. He reflected that when he’d only been a priest for a dozen years, he’d spent a lot of time praying over his own commitment. “We’re not a vague lot,” the bishop said. “We wouldn’t be here without tremendous passion and a powerful urge to be of service. That alone comes with a price. But what will you do?”
“I’m not concerned about finding a place to be useful,” Tim said. “We’re surrounded by need. More than I can ever remember. I’ve been a priest for twenty years.”
“Of course I’ll pray for you,” he said. “You’ve been a good priest. The Lord will light the way.”
His kindness softened the unhappy words of the archbishop. It was not a good priest who screwed with the political plans of an archbishop. His Excellence had wanted Tim to serve as his assistant while he was en route to the hierarchy of Rome. And Tim was not on board with that whole scene. He never had been.
To lighten his mood, to feel more human, he headed for Angela’s Pantry in Oakland. His trunk was full of the last of the produce from the vegetable garden at the church. His volunteer board selected the pantry for the third year in a row. It was a charity outpost of free food, open only twice a week in a crummy old warehouse on the north side of the airport. There were a lot of homeless people in the area and further inland there were a lot of run-down neighborhoods. There were also a great many rich and well-tended neighborhoods, not to mention aristocratic homes speckled around the Bay Area. Angela Velasquez had started the food pantry five years before out of a rented storage unit about the size of a two-car garage. She was burglarized several times while she applied herself to writing grant applications and searching for a larger, more secure facility. It wasn’t long before her pantry was absorbed by a larger nonprofit that operated a number of facilities from soup kitchens to food pantries in Bay Area neighborhoods. That allowed Angela to move to a safer warehouse, draw a modest salary and retain a number of dependable volunteers.
Angela was young and so beautiful. She must be thirty, but to Tim she looked like a mere girl of twenty. She had been raised mostly in the central valley, the daughter of a migrant farm worker, but had somehow managed an education and citizenship. Her