Chapter 13: A Year of Grace
The rectory door groaned its familiar welcome. Riley wiped his boots on the mat, the scent of salt and diesel peeling off him in the warm, still air. Inside, the light was honey-thick, falling in slants across the worn floorboards, catching the lazy dance of dust above a scattered fortress of knitted blocks. A tiny yellow sock was wedged behind the leg of the sofa.
He found them in the living room.
Paul was asleep in the rocking chair, his long black hair slipping loose from its tie and curtained across one shoulder. His face, softer now in rest, was turned towards the window. And on his chest, rising and falling with each of his breaths, was Abby.
She was a compact bundle of sleep, one miniature fist knotted in the fabric of Paul’s shirt, near where the soft swell of his breast made a pillow for her head. Her lips, the same shape as Paul’s, were parted in a tiny ‘o’. A bubble of milk rested there, catching the light.
Riley’s breath hitched. He leaned against the doorframe, his work-weary muscles going slack. This was the sight that undid him, again and again. The brutal, beautiful alchemy that had turned a place of guilt and hidden fear into this: a home. The pot roast dinners, the whispered jokes about Bev’s flannel, the butter-soaked lobster feasts—they had all been stepping stones here, to this silent, sun-drenched room.
Paul stirred. His eyelids fluttered, brown eyes focusing slowly, landing on Riley. A smile bloomed, effortless and deep, carving lines of contentment at the corners of his eyes. “Hey,” he murmured, voice gravelly with sleep. “She’s been good. Just… contemplating the universe, I think. Then she surrendered.”
Riley crossed the room. The floorboard near the armchair gave its specific creak. He bent, pressing his lips first to Paul’s forehead, tasting sleep and warmth, then to the downy, impossibly soft crown of Abby’s head. She smelled of clean cotton and sweetness.
“I love you both so much,” he whispered into the space between them.
Paul’s hand found his, calloused fingers interlacing with Riley’s own, still cool from the outside air. They sat in the quiet. The chair creaked a gentle rhythm. Abby snuffled, her fist tightening, then relaxing.
A year had settled over them, a gentle blanket. Things had, against all odds, settled perfectly.
For whatever reason—and entirely not the result of a fed-up Erin chastising Bev in the middle of service one day for her “persistent cloud of judgmental gloom”—Bev Keane had finally calmed down. She had, astonishingly, come around to be… pleasant. It had shocked Paul to his core the first time she’d approached them after mass, her hands clasped tightly, her eyes on her sensible shoes.
“I owe you both an apology,” she’d said, the words seeming physically painful. “My conduct was… uncharitable. This community has found a new kind of grace. I was slow to see it.” She’d looked up, meeting Paul’s astonished gaze, then Riley’s wary one. “The child is a blessing.”
Now, there was gossip that Bev and Erin were dating. Riley had cornered Erin about it on the dock, grinning as she mended nets with violent efficiency.
“So. You and the former dragon of Crockett? You’re taming her with your sharp wit and store-bought cookies?”
Erin hadn’t even looked up. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Flynn. And if I did, I’d tell you that some mysteries are meant to stay on the deep-sea floor where they belong.” But the faint blush that crept up her neck was confession enough.
Paul had blossomed. Freed from the shadow of the angel and the weight of a single, rigid truth, his leadership had become something organic, rooted in listening. He held services that felt like conversations. He visited the sick, not with grand prayers, but with soup and silence. And the people responded. The congregation grew, not from fear, but from a pull toward the quiet peace that seemed to emanate from the man himself and his small, cobbled-together family.
Riley’s hard work on the fishing boats, his sober, relentless reliability, paid off. He was first mate on the St. Anne’s Pride now. The money was good, steady. They lived comfortably, their needs simple but met without strain. Annie Flynn knitted a ceaseless river of tiny hats. Ed told Abby long, winding fishing stories she gurgled at. Tim was her favorite, making ridiculous faces that sent her into peals of laughter that sounded like breaking glass.
No one ever questioned the strange priest who was married to a man with a past and had himself borne a child. Why would they? To look at Paul holding Abby, or to see Riley come home to them, his rough hands gentle as he took her, was to witness something that felt fundamentally right. Holy, even. Why question a holy man and his equally holy lover?
And the island itself… bloomed.
It was subtle at first. Old Joe Collie’s arthritis, which had knotted his hands for twenty years, simply loosened. He could tie his own lures again. Sarah, Paul’s daughter, mentioned her friend’s little boy, born with a clubfoot, was now running, the foot straight and strong as if it always had been. Miss Mildred’s glaucoma receded; her world, she said, was bright and sharp again. Young Lewis Finch, who’d been paralyzed from the waist down after a fall from a ladder, felt a tingling in his toes one morning. A month later, he was walking with a cane. A year on, he was painting his own house.
No one could explain it. It was inexplicable. The island whispered it was all Paul’s work, a reward for his faith, for the purity of the love he’d fostered here. They brought him jams and mended nets in thanks.
Paul, holding Abby in the soft dark of their bedroom, watching her nurse, would feel a profound, humbling confusion. He assumed the island had probably blessed them. That after all the darkness, the very soil and stone of Crockett had decided to heal. It was the only theory that made any sense. A reciprocal grace.
One afternoon, Riley came home early. He found Paul at the kitchen table, Abby in a sling against his chest, as he penned the weekly newsletter. The scene was so normal it ached.
“Early catch?” Paul asked, not looking up.
“Engine trouble. Day off.” Riley grabbed a ginger snap from the jar—they still bought them, a tribute. He nodded toward the sling. “How’s the boss?”
“Demanding. Excellent editorial feedback on my sermon notes.” Paul finally glanced up, his smile fading into something more curious as he looked at Riley. “You okay?”
Riley chewed the spicy snap. He looked out the window at the quiet lane, the vibrant green of the summer grass, the net menders on the dock who moved without their usual grimaces of pain.
“Yeah,” he said, the word full of wonder. “It’s just… have you looked around lately? I mean, really looked?”
Paul followed his gaze. He placed a hand on Abby’s back, feeling the steady beat of her heart against his palm, a rhythm that had become the tempo of his own life. “I see it,” he said softly.
“It’s like we’re living inside a… a benign mystery,” Riley said, walking over to them. He kissed Abby’s head, then leaned down to kiss Paul, slow and deep. “I’m not asking why. Not today.”
“Good,” Paul murmured against his lips. “Don’t. Just be here.”
Outside, the sun warmed the roofs of Crockett. A breeze carried the smell of brine and healing earth. Inside, the only sounds were the scratch of Paul’s pen, Abby’s contented sigh, and the solid, grateful beat of Riley’s heart where it pressed against them both. The world outside was not just calm; it was, in small, impossible ways, being remade. And inside, there was only peace.