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Demesne. Chatoyant. Bucolic.
His fingers tangled through his brown hair, coating the tips in ink.
The clue “Half of a dance” made the answer CHA (half of the cha-cha), and “Is it acquired by breaking the law?” made WEALTH.
Not enough things in life were black-and-white. The murky crevices, the obscurities of day-to-day living, were not in Brother George’s vocabulary. He preferred the world of crosswords, where for every block down, there was an across to be made.
The Bible and black habit might’ve helped him fake maturity, but his teal-blue eyes only highlighted the boyish pinkness that still clung to his dimples.
It was only in the darkness that one could see the depth behind his shallow, daytime eyes.
A black-and-white yo-yo fell from his hand in sync with his tapping pen. Scrawling crosswords allowed him to order his own chaos, to bring everything to a conclusion.
His word was SKIM. The clue: “It’s less rich than the one percent.”
The sound of footsteps came from behind him, and he turned toward the woods to find an adolescent, frizzy-haired boy staring at him with bulging eyes. He quickly hid the crossword puzzle inside his Bible, snuffed his cigar out on the porch deck, and pre- tended to be humming hymns.
The boy was spooked by the sight of a monk. The cape. The crucifix.
He froze at the edge of the walking trail, mouth agape as though he’d just seen a centuries-old relic come to life. When Brother George waved, the boy turned red-faced and ran down the muddy hill, sliding on his butt, and scampering to the edge of the abbey pond.
Ducks quacked and flew out of the water, running away from him. Even the abbey’s stray cats, the freeloaders who purred their way to chicken wings and obesity, kept their distance from the boy as he flailed downward. He looked back at Brother George who pretended to be reading. And then he dunked his head into the