By the time Cathy left that day I had a much better understanding of who I was.
Cathy tried telling some really off the wall stories, but I caught on pretty quick that Einstein would never have participated in these stunts so I told her to smarten up, that I really needed to know the facts about my life. She settled down after that and told me things like when I had my first period, where I was and how upset I had been. She was a veritable fountain of information about my personal life and most of which I would never have thought to ask and even more that I'm sure Ann didn't know about.
My first kiss from a boy had been during a school trip to Niagara Falls in grade six, but it didn't go any farther than that. While Cathy was chased after by a lot of boys in our last year of school together, I was pretty well left alone. Seems that most guys in grade eight are more interested in tits than they are in brains, duh! And Cathy liked to show hers as well. Besides having gotten us our first cigarette and bottle of wine by showing them to Jimmy Broadbent, she had gotten all kinds of favors from exposing herself.
Damn... where had the girls like her been when I went to school!
One thing I was sure of, as much as Cathy loved sharing her sexual exploits with me, we had never fooled around together.
Sunday afternoon, Father Roberto paid me a visit after mass. There wasn't much to watch on Sunday daytime television, and I was thoroughly immersed in a novel that Linda had snuck in to me the night before. Xaviera Hollander's "The Happy Hooker."
To say it was interesting was an understatement. I was so engrossed by her autobiography that I didn't hear Father Roberto come in. I suppose I should have blushed or tried to hide the book, but my mind was much more mature than my body, and my sense of morality hadn't felt threatened by books.
Father Roberto on the other hand was livid. Didn't I know the church had banned this book? Didn't I know that the writer would spend eternity in Hell? Did I realize the penance I would have to do because I had read part of it?
Sigh!
I really didn't have room in my new life for this kind of grief. I wanted my future to be full of hope and promise. I certainly didn't want this kind of guilt trip hanging over me or following me for the next few years. At least I knew enough about Catholics to know what direction to take.
I asked Father Roberto if I could make a confession right now, and the look of pleasure on his face was enough to make me want to puke. Self righteous prick was the only term that came to mind.
He took out one of those fancy neckpieces out of his pocket and kissed it before slipping it over his head and sitting on the chair beside my bed.
I'm not sure what titillating words he thought were going to come out of my mouth, but the minute he declared this was a sacred act, I knew that he could never repeat what I was about to lay on him.
"Okay," I said. "This is the deal. I admit I was reading that book, so that prevents you from telling Mom or Dad."
He started to sputter.
"I'm not finished," I said. "I've got a history lesson for you. In about ten years the truth about all those orphanages your church ran in the west, where you took native children away from their families for 'their own good' is going to hit the fan. It will rock the Catholic Church harder than Martin Luther splitting in 1520. But it will be nothing compared to the scandal the church will face in the following decade when literally thousands of boys and hundreds of girls will seek justice for having suffered for decades at the hands of priests who harbored homosexual and pedophilic tendencies. Then just as the 'End of Days' seems to be bringing the church to its knees, the Vatican will declare that there really is no Hell."
"That's impossible," he declared.
I held up my hand. "There is no end of the world by the new millennium and no return of Jesus, but the Anglicans beat you to this profound revelation by a good year." Then I leaned closer to him and whispered, "Do you want to know the name of the Pope who will make this declaration?"
He scrambled to his feet, backing away from me and though he was furious, I could tell that the church already knew in 1974 it had these problems. I could see it in his eyes.
"There's no way you could know this," he hissed.
I just looked at him calmly and said, "You know Father, I had my doubts before last week, but now I know there really is a God, and She's got a sense of humor. I also believe in miracles. I know I'm going to do penance for a lot of things, Father, but nothing that you will give me. I have a higher authority to answer to now, and if you break the sanctity of this confession, mention anything I have said to you to anyone, and I will deny it, and then tell everyone that the confessional is no longer sacred."
He blessed himself, suggested something that sounded a lot like blasphemies and beat a hasty retreat out of my room. Well, at least that was one problem solved. If my ending up in Patricia's body had been an act of divinity, I sure didn't need organized religion messing up my plans.