Limbo
by Harry Reynolds
[ fiction - april 09 ]
Three a.m. My phone rings. A woman's voice.
Harry?
Yes.
Harry Reynolds?
Yes, who is calling?
It's me, Betty, Betty Flaherty. Y'remember me, Harry? Fordham University '49?
(Jesus, do I remember her. Eyes of blue, breasts of gold, my God, she must be old.)
Yes, I do remember you, Betty.
I hope I'm not disturbin' you, Harry. (She's drunk.)
(Oh, once you did Betty Blue, once you did, God bless you, Betty Blue.)
No, you're not disturbing me at all, Betty. I was just passing the phone and thought I'd pick it up. How have you been?
You wouldn't believe the things they are telling us now, she whispers with a hint of urgency.
(I see her somewhere out there in the United States, bent drunk in the dark over a telephone, paranoid.)
What are they telling you, Betty?
They say the Vatican is abolishing limbo. The baby souls go straight to heaven, Harry.
What's wrong with that, Betty? I often wondered what they did in limbo. You wouldn't deprive the kids of that would you, Betty? If you had had a baby [and I was lucky enough to be the suspected father] and it had died before baptism, you wouldn't want the baby to go to limbo, would you?
[Silence. A drunk thinking.]
But what about all the prayers I said through the years, Harry, what becomes of them? Jesus, all those rosaries, those hail marys, those skipped meals, I didn't eat candy in Lent for four years, all for those kids in limbo! What about that time out of my life, Harry?
(I see a long, long night, maybe more than one. I act quickly.)
That time, Betty [with eyes of blue and breasts of gold], that time by Canon Law, the law of the Church that speaks for God on earth, that time is reassigned to some other equally worthy cause. It's a kind of net, a catch net, like welfare.
Are you sure?, asks Betty.
I'm a lawyer, Betty. And I know these things. All Canon Laws have catch nets to prevent the dissipation of the prayers of the faithful.
Jesus, you're still the bright one, Harry.
Thanks Betty, I have to put the phone down now. My arm is turning blue.
Goodbye, Harry.
Goodbye, Betty. Incidentally, where are you? I haven't seen you for nearly 60 years. You were from Chicago.
I'm in New York on my cell phone, Harry.
Where's the cell phone, Betty?
With me, Harry. I'm in your driveway.