1

I

               "What we really need, Monsignor, is a few more holidays."Father Feinstein's ass stuck to the

vinyl desk chair. He resented that. "I mean, look at our best days: Christmas, Ash Wednesday, Palm

Sunday. Let's face it, they like getting free shit-- Oh. Sorry Bish."Father Feinstein stared at the

telephone in his hand. He was hoping it would disappear. It didn't. "Don't worry about it, Bish-

man," Feinstein continued, "we've got a good four weeks. Besides, the supernatural is making a

come-back. We can sit here all day and the pews will fill up by themselves, so to speak."

               Father Feinstein sat alone in his office, his pupils scurrying across the surface of his eyeballs.

It seemed that whatever they found on one side of his face scared them off to the other. Frankly,

Father Feinstein had no clue how he was going to meet the bishop's parishioner recruitment schedule.

Until today, he thought he'd be safe as long as he kept the bishop believing in the mythical marketing

plan. Now the senile old bastard wanted answers.

               Father Feinstein wiggled in his chair. The window was down, but the rectory was still nearly

as hot as it was outside. He fidgeted with a binder clip between his dirty, goldfish-dropping shaped

fingers, and with the other hand, rubbed the top of the phone against his second chin. If "plump"

implied a jolly sort of man, then Father Feinstein was a fat disgusting slob.

               Several beads of sweat survived "the great rubbing", and continued their pilgrimage down the

grooves of Father Feinstein's face. Younger droplets were sucked into Velcro eyebrows, which

convulsed randomly, pulling in nearby particles like two linear black holes. Two more beads of sweat

braced the edge of eyeballs the color of faded jeans, the pupils squirming like exposed knee caps of a

hyperactive child. A more daring droplet accelerated down the length of Father Feinstein's drooping

nose, almost providing enough pressure to snap it right off. Unfortunately, the joyride was over for the

young droplet when it landed on a hanging lower lip, then rolled to its doom inside an ever-open

mouth. For a bead of sweat, Father Feinstein's face was the amusement park from hell.