Author’s Note: in 1859, Charles Dickens founded the magazine All the Year Round, which published serialized novels in weekly formats. Many of Dickens’ own novels were in this format, but he didn’t write a novel and then break it up, he wrote it as it was being serialized in order to maintain proper deadlines, as well as switch up the story based on what people liked and did not like about the work. I hope to continue the tradition with this series for Crasstalk.
The Reconciliation of Lucas Lygram
Prologue
“Forgive me father, for I have sinned. It has been seven weeks since my last confession.”
“What ails you my child?”
In the past seven weeks, I had committed 89 acts of homosexual conduct. I had lied 897 times. I had stolen 37 grapes from the Trader Joe’s in Union Square. I had murdered twelve flies, seven spiders, and thirty seven cockroaches. I had cheated on my taxes. I had eaten shellfish even though I deplore the taste. and I had sworn exactly 1,432.5 times (the half swear was accounted for in 27 interrupted conversations) to name a few infractions. I knew all this because I kept a daily journal with a daily count on all of my sins so that I might go participate in the sacrament of Reconciliation. I went every seven weeks, in honor of the seven sacraments.
The irony was not lost on me that I, at present, could only partake in six of those sacraments, and, given that I was not dying, the seventh, Anointing of the Sick, could not be performed, thus making the number of sacraments that I could partake in at five. However, in reality, I only partook in four sacraments as I had no desire to be chaste or in poverty (I mean, I already was in poverty, it’s just that I had no desire to be in poverty) which was what would have been required of me had I partaken in the priesthood. How savage it is to be so slavishly devoted to a religion that has sent you to Hell.
I nearly forgot to tell the priest about bedding that lesbian lumberjack. We were both drunk. She had short hair. I shave my body hair. Once we’d realized we were with members of the opposite sex, we just decided that we might as well go with it given we were on a flannel electric blanket in a clearing in a wood upstate. This would have come back to bite me had I not noticed the loose page in the back of the sin book reminding me to tell him since, according to the notes, the original page died in a tragic coffee accident. Oh, yeah. The book. I should probably explain that.
Introductions first. Mother taught me to be the consummate example of a proper gentleman . My name’s Lucas. Lucas Lygram. It’s an awful name. I hate it, but mother would kill me if I changed it. At the very least, she’d leave me out of the will and has threatened to do so on numerous occasions. I don’t particularly see how that’s threatening since I wasn’t raised in a wealthy household, but, still, she feels the need to make that threat.
The only other things that are relevant at the moment are that I’m currently dating and in love with a complete ass of a human being named Samuel Grey and that I have an obsession. This obsession stems from an emotionally violent incident with my grandmother after my first confession at the age of nine in which she gave me a very graphic description on the consequences of not accounting and atoning for 
each and every single sin that I committed. Deciding that that certainly wasn’t going to happen to me, that I certainly wouldn’t be a singed, shell of a corpse that Virgil and Dante just happened to come across on their journey to Paradise, I began a quest: to make sure that every single thing that I did that was considered, well, unholy by The Bible would be written down for future reference, and it was. Sam stems from getting drunk at a club. The sin book was truly a masterwork. A series of fine, leather bound notebooks (that I could barely afford), each with the word “Sin” and a number corresponding to their order in the series embossed in gold leaf sat on a bookshelf in my Brooklyn apartment. There’s currently 4,942 of them, but I only keep the latest group in the apartment. The rest are in a storage unit on Staten Island. I just don’t have the space, you know? I head up to Saint Patrick’s Cathedral and take up a few hours of their time every seven weeks before sitting down for Mass. I’m fascinated by the sacraments, particularly Communion and Confession. They say confession is private, but I’m pretty sure they know who I am. Then again, these are the same people who believe in transubstantiation, but I guess that doesn’t really have any influence on their observational skills. Who cares, really?
“My son, you have sinned much. To atone, you must say eighty rosaries, one hundred four Our Fathers and the Act of Contrition, let’s say, thirty times. I’d also suggest going to see Sister Ann about volunteering to help in the Church Bazaar. For the heck of it, toss in a couple creeds. Your choice, Luke.”
I sat in the pews and began to pray. My rosary wasn’t anything particularly special, but I did get it blessed by Pope John Paul 2 when I visited the Vatican as a teenager. I thought I’d start with the Nicene Creed though. That one’s easy. A homeless man had taken sanctuary in the cathedral and sat down on the opposite side of my pew. Mass had already started and he began to sing with the rest of the congregation, until he didn’t. He started throwing up.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life who proceeds from the Father and the Son and is worshiped and glorified. We believe in violently upchucking in the one, holy Catholic and apostolic church. We look for the…fuck it.
I proceeded to leave. I could finish that shit at home.
Sin Catalogue O6.29
Judgement. One Count 13.28
Swearing. Two Counts 13.29
