Ring Game by Pete Hautman Page A

tell him I was thinking about giving him Michelle for his birthday. I would tell him some tiny detail I’d noticed about her—new earrings, or a little mole on the corner of her mouth, or the fact that some of her coworkers called her Mish—and Todd would laugh and pretend he didn’t really care. But we would always have extra-hot sex that night. Imagine my surprise when I came home from my aerobics class on my birthday and found Michelle in our bed wearing nothing but her A&P apron and a large red bow …
    That Gruenwald, what a character. The Reverend Buck smiled and placed another communion wafer on his tongue. Interesting how tasteless they were, as if the manufacturer had attempted to create a food utterly devoid of character. There might be some sort of theological sense to that, but whatever it was, he couldn’t agree with it. It seemed like they could at least put a little salt in them, or a touch of garlic. Maybe sell them in assorted flavors. Buck laughed again, “ Ha ha ha ha ha !” He’d have to suggest that to Hyatt Hilton. He could see it now: Garlic ’n’ Onion Communion Wafers. Extra Crunchy Cheese Hosts.
    The priest would ask the parishioner, “Body of Christ?”
    “Yes, the Spicy Jalapeño, please.”
    “ Ha ha ha ha ha !” Maybe he shouldn’t mention that idea to Hyatt. The guy might actually run with it. Flipping through the magazine, the Reverend noticed one page that had been handled many times, a story titled “A Common Confession.” He skimmed the text: Young Courtney goes to church to confess having had sex with her boyfriend, one of the altar boys. Turns out that Courtney and the priest have something unexpected in common. The Reverend Buck imagined Andy Gruenwald poring over that story repeatedly, sweating right through his collar. What a guy.
    It was nice of Andy, though, to let him borrow his church for a couple of hours.
    The call from Hy Hilton had been unexpected. The last he’d heard, Hy had been promoting his own brand of religion with that pair from the health food store. Apparently it hadn’t worked out. Hy had a talent for getting in his own way. Always had. Now he was getting married. Poor girl, he’d probably screw up the marriage, too. Buck placed another wafer on his tongue and sucked on it contemplatively. It was all the same to him.
    Since receiving his ordination certificate from the Northern California Institute of Theoretical Christianity three years ago, the Reverend Buck had performed more than eighty marriage ceremonies. He had a talent for it. He could do anything from Catholic to Greek Orthodox to Baptist renditions of the marriage ceremony. It felt good to bring people together, to unite two individuals in the sacrament of marriage, no matter what their faith, no matter how unwise the union. Marrying people was, in many ways, the perfect part-time job. He usually received from one hundred to five hundred dollars per ceremony, depending on the generosity of the bride’s father, and there was always plenty to eat and drink at the receptions. But most important, it provided both spiritual and material counterpoint to his primary profession, which was that of a divorce lawyer.
    The Reverend Buck, also known as Buck Manelli, Attorney at Law, believed in balance. He believed in Karma, he believed in vertical integration, and he believed that in this day and age, it paid to specialize. He was a marriage specialist. He married them, and he un-married them.
    He had agreed to perform the wedding ceremony for Hy the Guy because Hy was an old friend, and because he had agreed to Buck’s standard fee of $250. This prenuptial meeting with the bride’s parents wasn’t usually part of the package, but Hy had insisted.
    “The mom’s kinda hinky,” Hy had told him over the phone. “I don’t think she trusts me.”
    Buck had gotten a good laugh off of that.
    “Seriously,” Hy had said. “I need you to meet with us. Put on your collar and convince ’em you’re