At the intersection of two busy city streets, a man stood in the pouring rain on the sidewalk unmoving. His head was bent forward, his eyes focused on a spot below in the puddled sidewalk. His clothes were soaked and blackened. He wore no raincoat or jacket, just a cotton t-shirt and jeans. Long strands of black hair clung to his face. Pedestrians splashed and scurried around him. Blinded by umbrella edges, the man's legs would suddenly appear beneath their blurred line of sight. Then they would jump aside to avoid him or occasionally, seeing him too late, barge into the figure blocking their path. The standing man was collecting bumps and curses by the minute but seemed completely unaware of any of it. He was also unaware that a young woman was videoing him with her phone from several yards away. 

"What's this? A protest of some kind?" she thought, water dripping off her baseball cap. “Well, at least he's not going to set himself on fire. Not today anyway. Performance art? That could explain anything and everything these days."

Another pedestrian, a Catholic priest, had been watching the stationary man with growing interest from the protection of an awning covering the entrance to a bodega. The young woman noticed his approach and shifted to bring the priest into the frame. The crisp white square of the Roman collar at his throat glowed in the dimness of rain and spray and mist. Weaving his way to the man through the streaming crowd, he arrived beside him and lifted his umbrella higher to shelter them both. 

Minutes passed as they stood together, silent and wet. Then the priest, juggling his umbrella, removed his black raincoat and placed it gently over the other's shoulders. Passersby slowed to wonder at them but buffeted by the determined flow of the crowd were forced to move on and they quickly forgot the odd couple.      

"Move for Chrissakes!" a voice growled at the young woman. She hopped off the sidewalk and into the street. Even a man standing motionless in the rain could be an Instagram hit, #whatisawtoday. The priest's act of kindness prompted a more compelling hashtag, #kindnessofstrangers. 

Noticing her, the priest’s face lit up. He waved at her dramatically to come closer. Still videoing, she joined him, but slowly and frowning. 

"Oh, thank you for joining us. I can't seem to rouse him." 

Now, close up, the priest reminded her of an actor, of that Irish actor, Peter O’Toole.

"Who is he?" the girl asked, turning off her phone and sliding it into her back pocket.

"I have no idea," the priest answered. "Do you?” 

"No. But I think he's faking it," she said with a skeptical eye on the priest.       

"Oh no, I really don't think so. I did think so but I've been watching his eyes. I'm pretty sure he hasn't blinked."

"I think you're faking it, too, by the way,” she said. Her earlier suspicion that she might be witnessing performance art when the man was standing alone seemed even more plausible now. This ‘priest’ was altogether too animated, too creepily eager to please. If indeed he was an actor attempting to persuade her to believe he was a priest, he was a bad actor. She expected the two of them would break out laughing any moment.

But the priest went on, committed to the part. ”Oh GOD yes!" He answered her accusation with a large smile that could have been seen from the back of the house. Rather than defending himself, it was if she had handed him a most appreciated compliment. 

"I've been faking it all my life. So clever of you. You see right through me."

"So you're not a real priest?" she said, with a smirk of satisfaction.

"Well, yes I am," he insisted. "I have the documents to prove it. Somewhere. But yes, yes, I've been one for forty years. But I've never in all that time felt like one. Whatever one is supposed to feel who is one.”

"You mean, a priest."

"Yes, one of those. Just never felt like I fit in in real life.” He went on in a confidential whisper. “So I've felt like a fake priest every day for forty years.” 

Perhaps he was a real priest. Perhaps he was a bad actor pretending to be one. She didn’t care. 

“This is all too weird--sorry--but don't you think we should, like, do something?" she said nodding toward the man.

"Oh PLEASE," the priest said, lifting his head as if dodging a projectile, "don't say 'like'!" 

"'Like?'" the girl said, too surprised to be offended.

"Yes, well, no. Not the word. The usage! It should be banned by Papal decree!..You seem an intelligent person and I was just getting to 'like' you. Yes, but I used it the proper way. When you used it, you might as well have said, 'Do you think we should, I'm stupid, do something?’"

For a moment, the young woman thought she was going to turn and walk away leaving him to do whatever it was he might decide to do. 

"Oh, I'm sorry. I've overwhelmed you--”

"Certainly not," the girl shot back at him.

“Forgive me anyway, won’t you? When I’m nervous I come on a little too strong. Then to answer your honest question, I have no idea what to do. Which is why I’m nervous. Why don't you try?"

"What can I do? We don't even know what's wrong with him.”

"Catatonia?" the priest suggested with a lift of his eyebrows and a questioning smile. 

"You mean, he's, I'm stupid, stuck like that?"

The priest roared with delight at this but caught himself quickly in deference to his new friend’s condition. 

"Oh my God, you are a treasure! But, yes. I think so." 

"Isn't it rare?"

"Oh no," the priest protested smiling even more broadly now. "I have a classroom full of catatonics."

Evidently this was intended to be a great joke. The girl frowned back at him, shaking her head. She moved closer to the silent rain-soaked man and bent slightly to peer up into his downturned eyes. 

"He's not dangerous, is he?" she asked. "I mean, he's not going to wake up and knife me or anything, right?"

"I don't think so. I hope not," the priest said, the first note of seriousness creeping into his voice.

"Thanks. That's very reassuring."

But suddenly, the priest reached out and pushed her back a step. There was concern in his eyes. "Hold on a minute. Listen. I feel I've been very irresponsible. Neither of us are equipped for this. I should call 911."

"So he could be dangerous?" the girl asked, unnerved by the priest's sudden reaction and now feeling there might, in fact, be real danger here.

"Well, we just don't know, do we?" the priest said. "What if he harms you? I wouldn't be able to forgive myself. We've been having a jolly little talk here under, as you say, the weirdest circumstance in which two people meet for the first time. I--I don't even know your name! I'm Jim Flynn, by the way. And I desperately want to avoid our next meeting to be in the parousia."

"Wait a minute, you're Father Jim Flynn. From St. Augustine's?"

"Yes!" the priest nearly shouted but caught himself again. With the slow-dawning realization that he had so stupidly allowed this pleasant, unsuspecting young woman to put herself at risk, her abrupt and surprising reaction to his name came as a gift of grace (as he liked to think all things came) and in his typically dramatic fashion, left him enraptured. "How do you know me? Isn't this the most incredible of coincidences? It's wonderful, isn't it? Sometimes I think coincidence is more like a god than God. Perhaps coincidence is God. It resembles a hand of fate at times so convincingly, even the modern Epicurean must wonder, don't you think?"

"Yeah, well, whatever," the girl said. It was clear she hadn't understood a word he had said. "But how I know you is, my brother talks about you. He's a junior at St. Augustine's. Richard--Richard Benfont."

“Yes, of course, Richard...Oh dear," the priest said, placing the name. "Oh dear, oh dear."

"What?" the girl asked anxiously.

"A classroom full of catatonics, I said. I'm so sorry! Once again, for perhaps the millionth time in my life, I have to abjectly apologize for my big mouth. I was just making a joke, a bad joke. Richard is not one of my catatonics. Your mind may rest on that.”

She noticed that he was suddenly looking at her in a new way, as if trying to place her.

"Father, look, I'm just going to touch him softly and if that doesn't work I'll wait with you until an ambulance comes. I don't know where he'd hide a knife if he had one...I'm Bella, by the way."

Now the girl reached out slowly, pushed aside the raincoat and touched the man's bare wet arm, rubbing it gently up and down. 

"Hello in there. Anybody home?" she offered softly with a weak nervous smile.

At first, there was no reaction, but as she continued rubbing his arm it moved. Slowly, slowly, his arm drifted up to wipe the hair from his face. The girl stepped back. She saw that his lips were thin and small, too small for the width of his jaws. His cheeks were flat, almost indented, making his face seem like a mask. His nose was long and straight--a good nose. But it was his eyes that disturbed her. Too close together, perhaps, in that flat expanse of dead-grey tissue but so black it seemed impossible any light could penetrate them.

Having brought her into focus, the man’s face took on a mean and threatening expression. He turned to the priest who was leaning in toward him, his face close and anxious. The man stepped away in alarm. 

"Ah!" said the priest, "you've returned to life. Welcome back. Can we help you in any way? Wouldn't you like to go somewhere and get warm? Dry off? You must be so uncomfortable. I know we are and you've been standing here much longer. Come, come with me. You, too, Bella." And he gently took the man's arm. But the man pushed his arm away roughly. With his drenched hair like black slashes across his face, he became a truly threatening vision. The priest moved away from him under the pressure of it but Bella stepped even closer and took the man’s arm, which he allowed or perhaps did not feel or notice. The rain had stopped.

"I'll take him wherever he has to go, Father," she said, removing the priest’s raincoat and handing it back to him. To the priest, she sounded calm and capable and he was much relieved by this. Yet, ironically, Bella Benfont was now herself acting a part--that of a confident, level-headed, not-easily-frightened young woman. The truth was that, for as long as she could remember, she had lived in fear of her own cowardice and for just as long had fought it with very mixed results. In the last few minutes, she had felt the old enemy rising again. She could not bear the thought that it might win this round, not in front of this priest. So she had stepped forward, acting quickly and without thinking. Shaking but determined, she turned and led the man away. The priest watched them go.

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"GOD BLESS YOU BELLA!" he called after them. "AND YOU TOO YOUNG MAN!"

After a few steps, her charge shrugged off her guiding hand and sped up unsteadily, leaving her behind. But very soon he was staggering badly yet he kept going even picking up his pace and not once looking back at her.

"Hey," she called after him. "Are you OK now?" 

Up ahead, the man’s hands had begun to tremble and his body was shuddering violently. A moment later he collapsed on to his hands and knees, breathing fast and shaking all over. Bella ran to him and dropped down beside him, throwing her arm over his back. The flow of pedestrians had fallen off and they were nearly alone on the street.

"You saw," the man mumbled into the pavement.

"Yes," Bella answered softly. 

"It happens...when it wants to happen." 

"You're freezing! I mean, God, you're completely soaked through--c’mon, let me help you up--can you stand?--I’m going to call an Uber."

She heaved the shivering figure onto his feet and fumbled her phone out of her pocket. She ordered the car and looked around to see that the man had staggered several steps away and seemed to be heading blindly into the road.

“Hey-hey-hey! Wait up. I've got an Uber coming. Just stand here." She sprinted up to him and grabbed his arms. Now she held him close as they both stood by the curb. 

"I-I-don't b-b-believe in g-g-gratitude,” the man suddenly said but his voice came with very little force and Bella did not hear him.

"Don't talk. I didn't realize. . . I mean, this thing you've got, it's really awful, isn't it?"

“This is what happens. After. Don't need a car. I live just d-d-down there." He pointed across the street with a shaking finger. 

“OK, c'mon, I'll walk you home." She took his arm, holding it firmly, and with her other arm around his back they crossed the street looking like a pair of lovers.

A few blocks down a street with several boarded up houses on both sides and almost all of the rest run-down and shabby, they stopped in front of a dirty white single-story ranch that had two entries, the front door for the main, larger part of the house in which all the windows were boarded up, and another door which seemed to be a secondary entrance to an addition or attached apartment set back from the front of the house. There was a window beside this door which was not boarded up. The man listed onto the dirt path leading to this door and together they mounted a broken step to a small porch. 

The man opened the front door (it was unlocked) and they entered a scene of dishevelment and decay that took Bella's breath away. It was a single large room with a single door in the back wall into a bathroom. This door was open, or rather the doorway was open, as the door itself leaned against the wall beside it. It had been ripped from its frame. Bella could see pieces of the wooden doorframe still screwed into the hinges. Nails had been pounded into the door from which hung several pairs of jeans. In the main area, sweaters and sweatshirts and T-shirts, socks and shoes, were scattered across the floor and piled onto every surface. The long low couch along the right wall evidently also served as the man's bed. A sheet and blanket were crumpled up in a pile near one end with a throw pillow peaking out from between them. A low coffee table in front of it sat at an odd angle to the couch, as if the man had kicked it out of the way upon waking. The center of the room was taken up with a large square table and three matching chairs. There was a laptop computer on the table crowded into one end by a chaos of dirty plates, used coffee cups and drinking glasses and assorted silver ware. A hotplate at the table's other end, surrounded by cans and jars and three stacked cooking pots with handles, was connected to an extension cord that ran across the floor to the single outlet in the wall opposite the couch. There was no rug on the floor and no ornamentation or artwork on the walls. There were no bookshelves or closets. The walls themselves as well as the ceiling were stained with years of grime, possibly from a former heavy smoker, and the yellowed and filthy wallpaper was peeling off in several places. In the ceiling over the table hung what must have been the original fixture. An old and fraying electrical cord extended from a hole in the cracked ceiling and twisted down toward a small ancient glass globe covered in dust and grime. Inside, dead insects threw spotty shadows on the table top.

It was several moments before Bella recovered from her first reaction of disgust and even alarm to notice that the furniture beneath all the detritus was in fact new and very expensive. It might have been lifted straight out of a Crate and Barrel showroom. The rocking chair positioned in the corner in front of the one window which looked out onto the street was sleek and minimalist, with a tubular frame wrapped in light blonde leather. The couch was long, low, grey, and uncomfortable-looking in classic Swedish design. Both the table with its matching chair set and the coffee table were made of blonde wood with tubular steel legs.

As the initial shock wore off, Bella's first clear thought was that she had made a terrible mistake. Her constant battle with the charge of cowardice which she was so quick to level against herself and in which she had won her most recent round back on the street, had gotten her into this situation. "What have I done?" she thought. "What am I doing here? Look at how he lives! What kind of a crazy bastard have I got myself hooked up with! Oh God, I just want to go home!" Without realizing it she had begun to back toward the front door. She bumped up against it and pressed herself into it. 

"Go ahead, run away," the man murmured in a dead voice. He had stumbled into the room and now stood weak-kneed, propping himself upright with his hands pressed and splayed against the table top, his head hanging loose.

“Well, what do you expect?” she responded with a defensive glare.

“I expect you to run away,” he murmured. Then he turned slowly, leaning his back against the table edge for support, slid along it to the nearest of the three chairs. He fell sprawling onto it, legs fanned out, hands between his thighs, his head thrown back as if it was too heavy to hold up. Bella knew that he was watching her, though because of the angle, it appeared that his eyes were closed. A slight twitch of his lips greeted her.

"You. Look. Ridiculous," he said, each word requiring its own breath to escape.

Bella felt that was exactly how she must look and, ashamed, stepped purposefully away from the door and into the room. She searched for a dry towel and found one tossed in a corner.

"If you want to see ridiculous, look around," she said, throwing the towel over his shoulders. She could not see those black eyes and was glad of it.

For a long time neither spoke nor moved, but finally with an effort the man began to adjust himself into a more normal sitting position. His breathing had become less labored and color was returning to his flat mask of a face. He began to study her more closely. His eyes moved over her as if he was seeing her for the first time.

She had dark brown hair cut short with a natural curl that softened her square jaw and accented her brown eyes. She was not pretty in any conventional sense. Most people would not notice her in passing. But there was something about her that acted on certain people very strongly, those that happened to be face to face with her like store clerks or pizza delivery drivers. If anyone afforded her more than a mere glance, they would sense a kind of aura of femininity about her. It was a subtle effect. She was not outgoing and did not expect to be noticed or particularly wish to be. But in the way she held herself, in the unconscious movements of her body, and especially in the loveliness of her hands, which were long and thin with beautifully molded fingers, she displayed a kind of genius for evoking sympathy and good-feeling in others. Yet--and adding to the effect--of all this she was completely unaware. In fact, her own image of herself was as a very ordinary, inconsequential person, unattractive but at least not repulsive, unintelligent but not a complete dope, flat-chested, narrow-hipped, with a nice enough smile and decent teeth.

“What,” the man challenged as he watched her eyes assess the space.

"Nothing. I mean...how can you live like this?"

"Rich parents," he said with a sneer. 

This produced an involuntary snort of nervous laughter. “Wow, it’s a wonder what money can buy these days,” Bella said with a sideways glance anticipating some kind of reaction but he ignored the comment.

"I told them I'd disown them if they didn't support me without question. And of course they did. But I will disown them anyway.” This he pronounced with evident pride. 

They were silent for a moment, each now more at ease with the other.

"Why did you think I was going to run away?” Bella asked at last, hoping her voice sounded matter-of-fact, indifferent. 

"I'm surprised you're still here.” 

"What's so surprising about it?"

He tilted his head and peered at her from half-closed eyes, contemptuously but also somewhat amused. Earlier that morning, before his fit had stopped him in his tracks, he had been on his way to a meeting with his uncle whom he had not seen in years. He had been anticipating this reunion with a nearly frantic intensity. Of course, now he had missed the meeting but was only waiting for the after effects of the attack to end before starting out again. His amusement arose from her question, to which the answer was that her presence had truly surprised him. In his weakness, he had been forced to abide her help and now as he regained control of himself, his contempt for her was only surpassed by his contempt for that weakness. But, then again, he considered, perhaps there was...Yes. Why not? Let’s have a little test.

“Since you're not going to run away, sit down."

Bella moved to the far end of the couch, the only space free of tossed off clothing, inspecting it critically, perhaps for bugs or evidence of mice. She wiped at the fabric while not actually touching it then lowered herself onto its edge.

The man had watched her movements with interest, but Bella was growing accustomed to his penetrating manner of looking at her.

“Isn't it about time you told me your name?” she said.

"You first," he said.

"Bella."

"Bella what?"

"Benfont. Your turn."

“Nicholas."

"Nicholas what."

"Shelley."

“Would you please change into dry clothes. It's uncomfortable trying to talk to someone who’s uncomfortable."

Nothing in his demeanor changed and she at first wondered whether he had even heard her, but then decided his silence was due to a kind of ongoing assessment, as if he were trying to make a decision about her candidacy for some project or purpose.

Finally, he stood and, steadier now, walked through the clutter to the bathroom. He emerged dressed in a black hoodie with the hood up, black pants and black Chuck Taylors. Sitting on the edge of the couch with her elbows on her knees and hands clasped, Bella involuntarily jerked upwards.

"Oh! Now I get it," she said half-smiling with sudden insight. "You're antifa! Where's your balaclava?"

He came to an abrupt halt in front of her, as if he'd walked into an invisible wall. Standing only a few paces away, between her and the table, his mouth hardened and almost disappeared as his lips tightened and shrunk. He turned the nearest of the kitchen chairs toward her and sat.

"First of all, I am not antifa. Let the children rage. They are inconsequential. In the extreme!" He paused, regarding her with his attitude of precise and focused attention.

"Here's a situation and I'd like to know what you think of it," he finally said. It was clear to Bella that some kind of decision had been made, and in her favor.

"OK," she said, taking a deep breath of relief and leaning forward.

"You are sitting at a red light," he began, "waiting for it to change. The oncoming cars have an advance green light so they get a head start of a couple of seconds before your light turns green. You are bored and turn your attention to the drivers in these cars as they slowly accelerate toward you. Maybe only three or four cars pass by you before your light turns green, but in those few seconds it dawns on you that you are a whole universe unto yourself, not a part of any other, and they are too. And you realize that all along you've taken it for granted that your universe is the only one that matters, because of course it is the only one that matters. And yet there they go, those other drivers in their cars, unconsciously secure that their universes are each the only universes that matter, each one representing an absolute denial of your own certain existential knowledge that there can be only one pure universe--your own. Of course yours is the only universe that matters! How dare they exist! And with that, the light changes and you drive off to pick up the milk, feeling a little sick in your tummy."

He stopped and Bella watched him, waiting for some direction, but none came. "I don't know what you want me to say," she said. "What am I missing?"

Nicholas didn't answer but rose in disgust from his chair and turned his back to her, then planted his hands on the table top again, leaned forward and dropped his head, the same posture he had taken earlier. 

Bella was all too aware of the inadequacy of her response but was so completely baffled by his 'situation', what it meant and what he expected her to say about it, that she couldn't even feel guilty for having disappointed him. She felt lost and suddenly very tired.

"I--I--" Bella began, but he interrupted her.

"No, no, don't speak."

"I should go. I don't feel--"

"Run away,” he demanded into the table top.

With effort, Bella lifted herself off the couch and shuffled to the door. She reached for the doorknob but stopped and turned back into the room and joined him at the table. She scanned the rubbish, found a torn-open envelope and a ballpoint pen. She wrote on the envelope, slid it between his hands and left.

"Bella 737-8550"

After several minutes, Nicholas raised his head (his eyes had been closed the whole time) and saw the note on the table top in front of him. Absently he crumpled it up and rolled it away, just another item of rubbish. Alone now, his eyes swept over the disorder in the room and he found that it calmed the disorder inside him. In fact, he used the room and its chaotic contents as a kind of touchstone to remind and reassure himself in those moments of doubt which he was struggling to make less and less frequent. To remind himself that he had risen above the human rubbish all around him. And to reassure himself that an occasional slip backward--as with the little test--was only to be expected. He smiled. He was rather impressed with himself, remembering how the early doubts, so intense, so debilitating, had left him longing for the comfort and warmth of the rubbish heap of ordinary life. And why was that? Because of self-pity! And cowardice! Now, months later, he could call up the memory like an anti-Muse, not to be inspired by but to be repulsed by. And thus had he won significant victories over himself. 

He glanced up at the wall clock. He would be very late for his uncle but he didn’t care. He was fully recovered now and there was a small precious flutter of excitement in his stomach.

"Breathe. Just breathe." He closed his eyes and took several deep breaths. When he opened them again, they fell upon the crumpled note on which Bella had written her cell number. With a quick, sharp motion, as if trying to hide the action from his conscious mind, he retrieved it and hurriedly stuffed it in his pocket. Then he left slamming the door behind him.