The Fancy Dancer

the temptations for such a priest when parents shove their sons at him.
    Their pushing didn’t panic me, because I wasn’t attracted to Jamie. But it must have panicked Jamie, because the poor kid finally talked to me about it.
    One Saturday night in August, Jamie came to me for his regular confession. After the usual recital of little sins (inattentive while serving mass, nasty to his little sister), he hesitated a few minutes, then stammered:
    “Father, you’re the kind of guy that people can really talk to. So I’ve got to tell you something that’s really bothered me a lot. I know the Church says it’s evil, and I hope you don’t take it wrong. Anyway, Father, I’ve got a crush on you.”
    He had to know that this fact wasn’t exactly news to me. Was this a play for my attention, but a less tortured and elaborate one than Vidal’s? I would have to handle this very carefully, putting him off without crushing him.
    He waited on the other side of the grille, a handsome but owlish seventeen-year-old boy who wore bifocals that magnified his blue eyes. He always wore a sweater vest over his shirt and tie, and was the best chemistry student in Cottonwood High.
    He took my pause for moral indignation. “I hope you’re not shocked, Father.”
    “Jamie,” I said gently. “I’m not shocked, just thinking. This is something a lot of people go through. Especially getting a crush on a person who’s a little older. Girls go through the same thing. Don’t let it worry you.”
    “Did you have crushes when you were my age?”
    “Sure, I did. The thing about crushes is, you get over them. A year from now, you kinda laugh at yourself, and you think, Boy, what did I ever see in him? or her?"
    “Supposing I never get over it? I mean, there are 116
    guys who never get over . . . having crushes on guys.”
    So this might be the real thing. Jamie was not playing for attention. He was scared to death about himself, and the only person to whom he could scream for help was the object of his affections.
    “That’s true,” I said. “There are people who never get over it. Men and women both. Either they don’t want to change, or they can’t . . . But just because of one crush, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re that way. A crush is one thing, love is something else. Part of growing up and being a man means that you leam to handle your feelings for other men, and you decide what place those feelings are going to have in your life.”
    Now that Jamie was sure I wasn’t going to threaten him with hellfire and damnation, he relaxed a little.
    “For a long time I was afraid of losing control,” he said. ‘Then I realized that I picked you because I didn’t have to be afraid of losing control. Around you, I was safe, Father.”
    My head reeled. He really thought I was straight, when the only reason he was safe with me was that I didn’t go for what Vidal called “chickens.”
    “My parents, are pretty naive, I’m afraid,” he said. “They keep nagging me to hang around you. Be a priest like Father Tom. Be a priest like Father Tom. And you know, Father, I respect the priesthood and everything, but I want to study biochemistry.”
    I had to smile again, at the awareness and maturity that the boy had, compared to the moral simple-mindedness of his parents.
    “Would you feel better not serving Mass anymore?” I asked him. “Maybe we’re putting you in an occasion of sin by keeping you there under my nose every day.” He sounded relieved. “I’m awful glad you thought of that, Father. I wanted to ask Father Vance to replace me, but I was scared he’d wonder why I wanted to quit.”
    “Don’t worry,” I said, “M fix up something. You’ll be going away to college anyway. Can you hold on till we train someone else?”
    “That’s great, Father.”
    “And just remember that Our Lord is merciful and ready to help you when you stumble—more merciful in His judgments than people are in theirs. Now say a good act of contrition, and for your penance ten Our Fathers....”
    I pronounced the absolution while he mumbled his act of contrition.
    My mind was still reeling at the hypocrisy and sacrilege of me, a priest fallen from grace, absolving this boy from mere thoughts of a sin that I myself was actively engaging in. Every time I absolved a penitent, or baptized a baby, or gave Holy Communion in the state I was in, it compounded my guilt to a monstrosity of mathematics that I’d already lost track