12.

Even though their parents were atheists, McKenna and Toby were sent to St. Monica’s Elementary. One of the Mapeses’ Christmas rituals was to join hands in a circle and have a moment of boisterous laughter in honor of all the suckers who were kneeling in a cold church instead of at home in their pajamas, sipping hot cocoa and unwrapping presents in front of the tree. Murray called religion “the opium of the people” and a “mass neurosis,” digging up well-worn sound bites from Marx and Freud to make his plebian purposes sound intellectual.

What Murray ignored, or willingly forgot, or never read, was the line that preceded Marx’s opium quote: “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.”

Murray hated and mocked all organized religion, but he skewered Christianity in particular. His jokes had earned him official reprimands at Hanson Mold, which wasn’t a Christian company, according to Murray, but was a company that nevertheless “puckered up for the two zealots on Line Six.” Murray was responsible enough not to risk losing his job over such a trivial matter. Or, looking at it another way, he was too cowardly to stand by his convictions. Whichever the case, he began to tell his jokes exclusively at home, where the only resistance came from his mother-in-law.

Murray: “What’s the difference between Jesus and a picture of Jesus?”

Twins: “I don’t know.”

Murray: “It only takes one nail to hang up the picture.”

Guffaws from Toby and McKenna. Giggles from Misty. Tongue clucks from Grandma Pencil, followed by her exit to the bathroom.

Murray: “An Iranian man dies and arrives at the Pearly Gates. ‘Hello,’ says Saint Peter. ‘How can I help?’ ‘I’m here to meet Jesus,’ answers the Iranian. Saint Peter turns his head and shouts, ‘Jesus, your cab is here!’ ”

Knee-slaps from the twins, who don’t know why they’re laughing but know that Dad’s voice is funny. A chuckle and nod from Misty. No reaction from Grandma Pencil. Feigned sleeping, perhaps.

Murray: “Hey, honey?”

Misty: “Yes, my love?”

She sometimes called him “my love.” Hearing the phrase always gave McKenna a little stab, a sort of nerve pinch in her chest.

Murray: “How does Jesus masturbate?”

Misty: “Why don’t you tell me?”

Murray places his open hand, palm-first, against his groin. He moves the hand like he’s patting the front of his pants in slow, rhythmic motion. Misty groans, and then covers her mouth in laughter.

This visual punch line, viewed by McKenna and Toby as they finger-paint at the table, won’t make sense for three more years, when they learn about stigmata.

Misty was less pointed in her criticism of religion. In fact, she never claimed to be an atheist. She was a spiritual being, she said. When pushed for an exact definition of her dogma, Misty described a belief in humanity, in the cosmos, in the interconnection between all living things. Grandma Pencil was unsatisfied by such vagaries. She pushed: “How can you tell your problems to some quack with ink blots, but you won’t tell the One who created you?”

The twins sometimes thought an argument would break out, but Grandma’s provocations were only answered with halcyon smiles and the dusty 1967 compendium Myths from Around the Globe, which Grandma Pencil always accepted with a smirk and then inevitably “forgot” on the coffee table, under a planter, or once, in the bathroom trash can.

Grandma Pencil bore Murray’s jokes by crunching pretzels to drown out his punch lines. If no pretzels were handy, peanuts worked. The fingers-in-the-ears method was always available as a last resort. Murray’s mouth formed a satisfied grin when his jokes made Grandma Pencil change the subject or turn to ask Toby why he was doing pushups and sit-ups in the corner there, was it for a special game?

Undoubtedly, Murray’s dream was to see Grandma stand from her chair, wag a gnarled finger like she did at the neighborhood “no-goodnicks” with their boom boxes, and hobble furiously out of the house, so consumed by indignation that she forgot to grab her hat from the rack. But Grandma never gave him this satisfaction. It was a psychological war between bully and victim. Or better yet, fisherman and bass. Day after day, bait was dangled before Grandma’s face, tempting her to bite and be dragged to the hostile surface . . . but the metaphor stops there because what Murray did was far worse than inviting her into an argument.

He threatened her core, her spiritual foundation, that bubble of peace into which she’d climbed decades ago—since the Philippines—and risen to a place of calm high above the nightmare of her father’s brutal murder.

In April of 1977, on a day when the rain rattled the windows as if the Almighty Himself was getting impatient, Grandma Pencil strolled unannounced through the front door. Without wiping her shoes, she crossed the room and handed Murray a one-inch stack of fifty-dollar bills. Her hands were wet and dripping. Murray stood with one slippered foot propped on the coffee table, taking a brief respite from pacing to tap the air with his index finger (his invisible calculator).

“The twins will be given a Godly education,” Grandma said.

She knew what she was doing. Undoubtedly, she had planned this encounter detail by detail for months, maybe years. Possibly even for a decade, beginning when Misty had first brought home the dry-skinned, scrawny kid with the flattop and horn-rimmed glasses and introduced him as “Murray. My man.” It’s likely that Grandma saw the future at that moment and had planned accordingly, chucking away a dollar or two a week into some secret, secure place—the bottom drawer of her dresser?—waiting patiently for the chance to regain control.

Such an idea wouldn’t be tough to believe. Grandma Pencil knew the virtue of farsightedness. She was all about the long haul. She also knew the perils of complaint. She knew the value of the human ability to suppress instinct, to control urges, to mentally leapfrog the miserable present and land in the future, where a better day waited.

She arrived in early evening, after dinner, with money in hand and a glint in her eye. Her timing was precise. She entered while Misty napped, Toby changed Audrey into pajamas, and Murray paced the living room, mumbling random ideas to the air.

Murray took the cash from Grandma Pencil. He studied it, turned it over, mocked it with his eyes as if it was a primitive ashtray sculpted in a child’s art class.

McKenna looked up from the circus train she was pushing on the carpet. She watched the exchange.

“You will enroll them in Saint Monica’s,” Grandma said. “It is nearby enough that they can walk. They will get exercise of the body, mind, and soul. Free of charge for you. Everyone is happy.”

Murray scratched his earlobe, frowning. “Do you know what I could do with this much money?” he asked.

“It’s enough for one year’s tuition,” Grandma answered, turning. “Next year, I’ll bring another stack, and the year after that, another.”

“This isn’t funny,” Murray said, to her backside.

“AND SO ON!” she screamed, as the door slammed.