Kim chuckled. “A bottle, you say? Seen a few of those.”

  “Yep. Practically impossible, right? But this bottle is really important. If I could find it, it would change someone's life.”

  Kim scratched his salt-and-cinnamon beard and winked. “Does it have a message in it? Or a genie?”

  “Neither, but could you put the word out in the neighborhood that I need it? I’ll be at the collection tomorrow morning down at the Savesmart, and I'll pay a dollar for every liter-sized square bottle.”

  “A dollar per bottle? You’re kidding.”

  “Like I said, it’s important. Will you tell people?”

  “Sure thing, Rev.” He took off his right glove to shake my hand.

  “Thanks.”

  Next, I called Suzannah.

  “What's up?” she asked.

  “Hold on. I'll loop Lily in, too.”

  She accepted the call, and I had two of my best friends on the line. “I need your help tomorrow morning.”

  “Sure,” they both said, simultaneously and without knowing the request. “I have a meeting, but I can move it,” Lily added.

  Could a girl have better friends?

  “Great. Wear work clothes. It could get messy.”

  Lily emitted a nasal, nervous giggle

  “How messy?” Suze asked. Her quick offer of help did not include having stale liquor spilled on her designer jeans.

  “As in, clothes you never want to wear again. Meet me at St. Giles’ at 9 a.m. tomorrow.”

  If I told them any more, they might both suddenly have appointments that could not be rescheduled.

  “Thanks.” I hung up before they could probe or protest.

  Kayla texted, The coast is clear.

  Back at the office, I told her my plan. She designed a flier about my bottle search and ran off photocopies. Then we hung a Closed sign on the door of the office and took to the street armed with our staplers and tape gun—what a needlessly violent name for a tool whose danger lay in its serrated blade.

  Before 5:00 p.m., we’d distributed all two hundred fliers. Kayla posted hers on telephone poles and streetlights. I passed mine out to the folks who would put them in the hands of the bottle collectors or make a special foray into the world of career recyclers to earn extra cash.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  The next morning, the Chronicle’s headline read, “Software Engineer Charged in Lesbian Bar-Owner’s Murder.” In the picture, David wore a goofy look under his shorter, neatly combed hair. I’d have put money on it being the photo from his security badge at the start-up where he worked.

  I double-checked my phone. Naomi hadn’t called. Hopefully her mom was providing the support she needed.

  It didn’t come as a surprise when Tish failed to show up to Morning Prayer the next day. Jenny, Lois, Hazel and I enjoyed the service, but I had no time to check in with my new warden afterward—I was a priest-detective on a mission.

  Lily and Suze arrived promptly at nine in Suze’s BMW and hopped out of the car. Lily wore yoga pants and a fleece, like she was ready for a hike up Mt. Tam. Suze wore jeans, rain boots, and an oversized hoodie from her husband’s last concert tour.

  “I’ll drive.”

  Suze tossed me the keys. Why she assumed I had a driver’s license, I have no idea. Cesar had taught me, but I’d never bothered to take the test.

  Lily clicked in a seat belt. “I saw they made an arrest.”

  “He didn’t do it.”

  “How can you be sure?” Suze asked.

  “Let’s just say, I’ve followed the Holy Spirit to this conclusion.”

  Lily snorted.

  I zipped down South Van Ness, then cut over to Mission at Cesar Chavez.

  Suze had a death grip on the Oh-shit bar. “Where are we going?”

  “Savesmart,” I replied, as if I routinely asked them to ditch work and come grocery shopping with me.

  “Right. Only I left my reusable bags at home,” Lily said.

  “I have everything we need.” I patted my tote bag on the console between Suze and me. I’d packed a whole box of heavy-duty yard-waste bags along with several hundred dollars in ones. Hopefully that would be enough.

  In the back corner of the grocery store’s parking lot, a line had formed at the shed where the collectors could redeem their bottles and cans for five-cent deposits. I pulled up to the front of the line in Suze’s luxury car. The attendant tried to wave me past. I parked and bolted out of the car. Lily and Suze followed.

  An empty plastic milk crate stood against the shed. I nabbed it and turned it upside down, climbing atop where everyone in the line could see me.

  “Hi there, folks. I’m looking for a very important whisky bottle. Liter sized. For every one you have, I’ll pay you a dollar. Be sure you grab them like this.” I borrowed a vodka bottle to demonstrate holding it by the mouth. “We want to preserve any fingerprints.”

  “You can’t do this.” A pudgy man in a neon vest waved at me.

  “Sure I can.”

  “I’ll call the cops.”

  “Please do. This search was their job to begin with.”

  Suze had crossed her arms, and Lily’s mouth gaped open. I hopped off the milk crate and handed them each a black garbage bag and an envelope of dollar bills.

  “This is about the murder.” Suze put her now-full hands on her hips.

  Lily slapped her hand over her mouth. “Oh my Gosh, we'll be arrested for interfering in the case.”

  “Nope. The case is closed. We’re not doing anything wrong, but if we get lucky, we might save an innocent man.”

  The collectors carefully handed us enough bottles to fill four black trash bags. They were too heavy to lift and would never fit in Suze’s trunk.

  Fortunately, just as the last collector accepted his cash from us, Cesar pulled up in his truck. He gave a wave to the attendant in the shed, then strode our way, frowning so fiercely anyone in their right mind would shake with fear. Anyone but me, of course.

  Lily clenched the top of her trash bag. “Uh, oh. A storm just blew in.”

  Suze leaned down to whisper to me. “Remind me again why you left this guy for girls?”

  That wasn’t exactly what had happened, and she knew it. But instantly I remembered the feel of Naomi’s lips on mine, and my mouth went dry.

  “Suzannah, Lily, can I please speak to Alma for a minute alone?”

  They both nodded obediently and dove into the car, being sure to roll down the windows for maximum eavesdropping opportunity.

  “I said no, so you did it anyway?”

  “You said you couldn’t spare the officers, so I organized help.”

  With an index finger, he scratched his eyebrow. “What are the chances it’s in there?”

  “I can't say. I was never great at math.”

  “You’re perfectly good at math. Whenever you did it without also watching TV and chatting with friends online, you got straight As.”

  He was right, and I stood a little straighter to know he remembered.

  I hefted my bag and moved it toward him an inch. “So, I realize you can’t check them all for fingerprints, but I…"

  He scowled, and I swallowed the end of my sentence.

  “Oh, please, don’t stop telling me how you think I should do my job now.”

  “Well, if blood isn’t visible like it was on the shoes, try luminal?”

  He nodded. “I was thinking the same thing.”

  “So, you’ll do it?”

  He studied my face. “I don’t understand you. If you suspect someone else, just tell me who.”

  The back of my brain itched, my subconscious trying to tell me something. But it wouldn’t surface.

  “Or is this some cockamamie plan to confess you're the killer? Were you tired of fighting a campaign for justice that was really about bad business when there are kittens to save and homeless people to feed?”

  I crossed my arms. Was he serious? He hadn’t considered me a suspect from the start, based on our relationship.

  “It’s David who saves kittens. I focus on the humans.”

  Cesar rolled his eyes, and I sucked in a deep breath. He was joking.

  “I don’t know who it was, only that it wasn’t David.”

  “Right.” He effortlessly hefted all four bags into the back of his truck and drove off without another word.

  A subdued Suzannah drove us out of the lot. At a stoplight, she angled toward me where I sat in the backseat. “So… Cesar?”

  I shook my head.

  Lily huffed. “It’s not fair that you meddled so much in our love lives, and you won’t even tell us enough about him to know how we’re supposed to meddle.”

  “He and I are over. Currently, I’m trying to figure out how to get a hot lesbian rabbi who wants to meet a nice Jewish girl to choose me instead.”

  Suzanna burst into laughter, then caught sight of my face. “Oh, you’re serious. Sorry. It’s hard to know with you.”

  Lily giggled. “Thank God for Alma. Without her, our lives would be so boring.”

  Suze pulled up to St. Giles’. I hopped out of the backseat, then leaned into Lily’s window. “Thanks for your help today. Maybe we’ll get the rabbi’s brother off the hook.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  I hated waiting on Cesar to process the bottles. Was he even bothering or just humoring me? But waiting was my only option. I considered buying a lab coat and sneaking into the lab in SOMA for about two seconds before I quit the idea. One thing I could not even pretend at was forensic science—aside from turning wine into it, blood was not on the seminary curriculum. Neither were fingerprints nor luminal.

  The police informed Lynn of the arrest and promised to release Cindy’s body within 48 hours. I didn’t want to discount their promises. From over in Oakland, she video conferenced with me about the funeral, picking music and some readings.

  “I’m considering selling the house and moving to L.A.,” she said. “It's cheaper to live there, plus I’ll be closer to my niece and nephew.” Behind her on the screen, her sister bustled around kitchen tidying and cooking.

  The muscles in my neck relaxed to know she was well cared for, and her plan seemed wise. “Just give yourself time. You don’t have to decide this week.”

  “Yeah. Good point.” She sucked in a breath, nodding and wiping her eyes with a lavender handkerchief. A letter C was embroidered on its corner.

  “Call me if you need me.”

  Her sister appeared over her shoulder. “Thanks for looking after Lynn, Mother Alma.”

  I hated that particular form of address. To add injury to insult, it now reminded me of tea poisoning. Could Lynn have been the one to send me the toxic courage concoction? She didn’t have an alibi to offset her significant motive, and now she was making plans to leave town. Maybe I’d been too quick to accept her grief as genuine.

  I should text Cesar about my new suspicion. Except he’d imposed the breakup distance between us again.

  I forced a smile for Lynn’s sister. “It looks like you’re doing a good job caring for her, too.”

  Lynn turned to hug her, burying her face in her older sibling’s shoulder and agreeing with a muffled, “yes.”

  With the best of intentions not to procrastinate, I tried to work on my sermon. Who had assigned these stupid lessons for the seventh Sunday after Pentecost? Why did Jesus have to resurrect his dead friend Lazarus this week of all weeks? He’d made everything better for Martha and Mary, but I couldn’t do a damn thing for Lynn or Naomi.

  Kayla appeared in my door. Since witnessing Tish’s guerrilla tactics yesterday, she’d stopped shouting questions and requests at me from her desk. The kinder, gentler Kayla asked, “Can you take a call?”

  “Sure.” Anything to avoid thinking about how Cindy would not be coming back to life and my bishop’s committee was staging a coup d’état.

  I answered the flashing line. “This is Alma.”

  “Hi, this is Sydney, Al’s daughter. He's home, and he'd love a visit when you're free.”

  “Great. Does now work?”

  See what I mean? I preferred to hear his laundry list of my failures than to write a sermon about Lazarus reunited with his happy family.

  “Sure. Come on by. You know the address?”

  “I do.” I’d been to a vestry Christmas party at their flat on Church Street back in December. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

  “Twenty minutes. Great. He’s giving me a thumbs-up.”

  I arrived at their 1920s era building with two flats and rang the bell. Al’s daughter came down to open the gate. I followed her up as she filled me in. “They kept him an extra day to make sure his digestive tract was operational, but otherwise he’s doing great.”

  They hadn’t warned me in seminary that part of pastoral care involved getting way too much information about people’s gastrointestinal health. I’d quickly learned not to ponder what the euphemisms actually meant, for my dignity and that of my parishioners.

  “I heard from Jenny Wong that your mom was worried and wanted your dad to resign from his leadership position.”

  “She’s always worried and stressed, no matter what. If Dad leaves the house without her, she resents the reason.”

  I glanced around.

  “Oh, don’t worry. She’s out to lunch with a friend. I was hoping you could come when she’d gone because she doesn’t want him exerting himself or getting wound up. And Dad’s upset about her scheming to get him booted off the committee.”

  “Sydney—is that Reverend Alma?” Al’s voice drifted down the hall.

  “Yes, Dad, she’s right here.”

  We arrived at the doorway to his bedroom where he sat upright under a neatly tucked bedspread. I’d never seen him out of a coat and tie, but his blue, pinstriped flannel pajamas were far more dignified than a hospital gown.

  “You’re looking well,” I said, which on this occasion wasn’t a pastoral nicety.

  “Feeling much better, thank you. And thanks also for coming.”

  Sydney pulled a wooden armchair over to his bedside. “Sit here.”

  “Thanks.” I took the seat, and she slipped from the room. I inhaled a deep breath, then tried to exhale all of my defensiveness. I wasn’t a perfect priest by any means. I had flaws, and things to learn. Whatever he had to say, something in his words would help me grow.

  “Al, I’m sorry I kept missing you before you went into the hospital.” Avoiding him had been a mistake, like running from one angry villager when a whole mob stood at the ready with their pitchforks.

  He exhaled. “I know how busy you are, dear. I didn’t want to bother you with all your committees, and your visiting, and those long sermon-walks you do, and of course your secret food pantry at the BART Plaza.”

  I listened for the double edge of criticism in his tone but didn’t hear even a hint of it. And had he said…? “You know about that?”

  He smiled. “I saw you once on the way home from a baseball game. You had your hood pulled tight, so I could tell it was a private moment for you, and I didn’t want to interrupt.”

  How sensitive of him. “Thanks.”

  “The bishop called me last week to discuss your work as our priest-in-charge, and if St. Giles’ wanted to hire you as our rector. We’re three-quarters of the way through your term of appointment, and he reminded me you would need to know whether to begin looking for another job, if we didn’t plan to keep you.”

  “Right.” Another job, in another part of the city, or further. Upside: I would never run into Cesar, and I’d never have to cross the threshold where I’d found Cindy’s body. Also, it would not be spitting distance from my parents, I wouldn’t know my neighbors, it wouldn’t be the place where I’d learned I could help the community, that I could make peace.

  “Honestly. The time had gotten away from me, Alma. How has a year and a half already passed? Things at St. Giles’ have been so busy since you came. So many new people, so much activity. And everything so seamless and natural… People are raving about the pastoral care team Hazel organized, we’ve embraced a spirit of hospitality under your guidance, and your preaching has been topnotch.”

  “Um, thanks.” My heart raced. Enough with the compliments. If this was that supervision strategy where the bad news came sandwiched in praise, he was giving me a thick slice of bread on top, and I was ready to get to the tofurkey.

  “All that is to say, I forgot we had to decide to keep you. I just hoped you’d bless us with your work for a good long time.”

  Okay. Clearly something was wrong with his brain.

  “Al, did anything happen in the hospital? Minor stroke? Did they drop you on your head?” The latter seemed unlikely, but no more so than this entire conversation.

  He laughed uncertainly. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, I’d gotten the impression you were less than pleased with my work as priest-in-charge. You’re often scowling during coffee hour, and in the bishop’s committee meetings, you are bursting with suggestions for what else we can do…"

  He looked sheepish. “I’m sorry about the scowling. I’m a bit shy in settings like that. My daughter tells me I have a fierce resting bitch face.”

  I laughed aloud.

  “And I’m sorry if my suggestions seem critical. I don’t mean them that way. You’ve inspired me to dream about what’s possible, instead of trying to pinch pennies to keep our doors open longer while our little church dies. We aren’t dying anymore. You brought us back to life.”

  My heart stopped racing and flew up into my throat. Al had just written my sermon about Lazarus. Or more likely, it was the Holy Spirit speaking through him. I glanced up at the ceiling and said a silent, Thank you.

  “First of all, a priest can’t bring a church back to life on her own. We’ve done it together. And I’ve seen lots of churches resist a resurrection because they didn’t want to change, or welcome different kinds of people, in order to grow.”

  He beamed like I’d slapped an A+ sticker on his spelling test. “We have, haven’t we?”

  “But help me out here. During church services, you’re writing feverishly on your bulletin, every time I make a mistake in the liturgy, or say something controversial, or a baby cries loudly in the back.”

 

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