Angel 86 (salvation)

During afternoon association Angel picked up a Mars bar from the low table in front the blue cushioned seats on which she sprawled listening to the chit-chat. But when she went to open the packaging her cellmate Pippa bounced up from the seat beside her and grabbed it out of her hand. She mimicked using it as a microphone. ‘Go now, Go out the door, Don’t come back now and Don’t leave me no more.’ She held up an index finger as a baton as she signalled, ‘No-No-No—I Will Survive.’ Her spiked hair which reached down to her waist was the purplish colour of a thistle swung and she swayed as if on stage.

‘Shut up,’ shouted one of the other girls, doubled with laughter. ‘You’re absolutely fuckin’ rotten.’

‘Where else would you get this kind of entertainment you hoors?’ She pointed to her customised white training shoes covered with pink glitter which matched her tracksuit and like a drunken karaoke singer she belted out Gloria Gaynor’s anthem with renewed vigour.

When the young guard on the gate sauntered across Angel assumed like the rest of the girls it was to tell Pippa to shut up. But it was to Angel she signalled. ‘Can I have a word?’ she asked.

‘Aye,’ said Angel.

The entertainment was finished. Pippa splashed down on the seat beside Angel just as she got up and shuffled over to stand beside the guard.

‘Follow me,’ said the guard. ‘There’s somebody to see you.’

‘But it’s no’ visiting hours,’ Angel protested.  ‘Who is it?’

It had been a few weeks since she’d been off the basic regime and her thoughts jumped to another visit to the Governor or even a visit by a brief here to discuss her case, but she’d long ago given up on that idea. The worst part was a feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach, it would be something about Adam.’

The guard was already sorting keys for the next set of gates they would go through past the dining area and wasn’t really paying attention to her.  ‘It’s a civvy,’ she said, ‘a vicar, I’ve to take you down to the church,’ she quickly rephrased that, ‘The multi-faith arena’.

A noise escaped from Angel’s lips like a whine and she felt her legs going from under her. The young guard grabbed onto her keeping her upright, panic in her eyes. ‘It’s in the diary,’ she tried to explain, ‘and it’s been there for about a week. Do I need to call for the medics?’ she asked.

Up ahead another group was jostling and laughing at another gate, waiting for it to be unlocked by another guard.  

‘No,’ Angel replied, ‘I’m alright.’

When they got inside the church they were greeted by set of floor mats piled up on one another and washing up near the altar. The vicar was sitting on the front row of plastic seats hands clasped and head bowed in prayer. He quickly got up to meet them. Angel recognised his craggy features from officiating at Lisa’s funeral.

‘I said I didnae want to see you,’ Angel spat out, angrily.

‘I was told it was OK to come up,’ a smile fluted on the Vicar’s lips.

‘I’m sorry, it’s booked,’ the young guard explained, scrambling for the bit of paper on the clipboard that would make it official and absolved her of blame.

‘I’m already here,’ he said, in a genial voice. ‘Can you not spend ten minutes with me?’

‘As long as you don’t talk about God,’ said Angel.  

His eyes twinkled laughter, ‘That’s my job, it’ll be a long ten minutes. That reminds me of the time when one of my parishioners said to me “I think I’ve broke every one of them there Ten Commandments – apart from that one about doing things with animals.”

‘And I said to him, “I don’t think there is one about doing things with animals.”

‘And he said, “Thank God for that”.’   

Angel laughed, she followed him along the rows of makeshift seats to the front row and sat with their knees pressed together. She didn’t know him and despite Bruno’s stories of vicars that liked all kinds of dirty things she’d never have heard of, it was a relief to talk to him.  

‘I’m scared,’ she said. ‘I’ll n’er get oot of her. And when I dae, my son will be a stranger to me. It’s already happening now. Bruno and Tony brought him up and he was all smiling, cuddly in my lap, and then he screamed the place doon and didnae want to be wae me.’

She started sobbing, ‘Tony had to comfort him and that’s my job – I’m no’ even sure my son remembers me.’

She felt his warm hands slide over hers and squeeze them.   

‘And I’m pregnant.’

He handed her a tissue and she blew her nose and sat a little straighter.  ‘That’s a total fuck up!’

She squinted at him, ‘Sorry, about the swearing.’  

‘Well,’ he said. ‘Where I come from pregnancies usually have to do with “fuck ups”.  And there’s no virgin births in my religion.’

‘Aye, but I don’t know if I want the wain…I’ve been on the stuff and although I’m coming aff it noo –it’s hard. I don’t know if I can dae it. And anyway,’ she flared up, ‘even if I dae have the wain, they’re going to get an order and take it aff me right away and take it into care. Whit’s the point in that?’

‘Life,’ he said. ‘That’s the point. Without life there’s no point. You’d still be the babies mum.’

She wagged a finger into his face. ‘How can you believe in a God that took me wee girl away.’ Her head dropped and with it her hand and she grew teary, staring into her lap. ‘And my wee boy. And noo I’ve got another one, that I didnae want then, but want noo. And they’ll take that away tae…And don’t gee me all that pish about God takes care of the poor and aw that shite, because I’ll tell you noo – does he fuck. Most women in here have a story just like mine.’

Her hand covered her mouth, ‘Excuse my language’.

‘We all know that the rich have got it easy, with their fancy houses and fancy cars and fancy ways. God shows no partiality but His life speaks for itself. Born without a home in a barn. His father Joseph worked with his hands. He didn’t seek out the rich or the powerful, because these things,’ he shook his head and squeezed his lips together. ‘Don’t matter.’

‘When John the Baptist sends his followers to ask if he was the Messiah, he didn’t say I’m the big guy, he said tell them what you see - the blind see, the deaf hear, and the dead rise from their graves.

‘And when he was nailed to a cross, there was two robbers with him, one on the left and one of the right.’ He paused, as if seeing it. ‘The one on the right said, take me with me to your kingdom…The one on the left mocked Him, said you’re a fucking idiot. You can’t even save yourself.’

He patted Angel on the leg. ‘That was me,’ he said. ‘Always telling God he was a fucking idiot and didn’t exist.’

The young guard wandered along the row of chair.  ‘I need to take you back,’ he said to Angel.

‘Can I come back and see you again?’ the vicar asked.

‘Maybe,’ she said, with a smile.      

‘Rise up within yourself,’ said the vicar. ‘And be strong. God’ll find you.’