There were not enough hours in the day for Malachi. This was something that had only become true after joining the priesthood.

Morning mass revived what energy he lost on his sleepless nights, but the summer days felt short once daily services were done. There was much to do, much to figure out before he settled in completely. The parish liked him well enough – from what he could tell – and yet he sensed a reluctance in so many of them to linger in the church. They avoided the confessional most of all, but a few had broken beneath the weight of their sins and called upon him to listen.

It made him wonder just how bad Father Kemble had been before him. What he’d heard of the man had been less than flattering, but that was just the way it went with some priests, wasn’t it? Some of them were too strict, too judgmental, too lax, too much. Some viewed the confessional as a means of shaming the unfortunate congregants on the other side of the grate, and others still took too much pleasure in it.

The parish would come around. Malachi was certain of that. Given enough time, they’d come around, and they’d see that there was nothing to fear with their new priest.

Not in that sense.

By the time he allowed himself to be done for the day, ‘day’ had already faded into the cooler twilight hours of the evening. While his parishioners were… meant to be his primary focus, his thoughts had been occupied instead with the young Reynolds siblings he’d just recently met. Were they doing alright? Had the owners of the hotel kept their word and given them meals when reasonable? Or had they wandered off into the night again, to find themselves in the dark of some other town’s streets?

Malachi was not an especially worrisome sort. He had, however, always possessed the tendency to obsess over the few things in life that brought him any sense of purpose: helping those in need, especially children, and…

And things that he really shouldn’t even think about anymore because he was a good priest, and he kept his vows, and if he ever hadn’t kept them then it was clearly just a rebellious phase and it didn’t represent him at all.

He made his way back to the hotel, dressed in his black vestments and his saturno, too, just because. He hadn’t caught sight of Edmund or Mable along his way, nor did he spot them hanging around the outside of the building, and he hoped that meant they were in the room. Once he’d found his way to it (and heard the muffled sound of something hitting off the wall), Malachi took a breath and knocked firmly on the door.

“Hello?” he called, low enough so as not to wake anyone should they be sleeping. “Are you in there, Eddie? It’s Father Brennan.”

Huh. It felt different to call himself 'Father' when the children didn't seem to have one of their own.

While the girl had to tilt her head to look up, the priest had the opposite problem of having to look down.

He had known that she was small, and she’d only looked smaller in her brother’s arms, but it hadn’t occurred to him that she could look even shorter up close. Most people he met could be considered vertically challenged next to him, sure. But shit, he felt like some kind of big shadowy monster in the doorway when she looked up at him like that.

Uh- maybe he should have waited. Should have found time to come by when it was still light out, so that everything didn’t feel quite so drastic, or at least he could still leave and come back when the girl’s brother returned.

“Oh,” he mirrored, taking one step back. Partly to save her the strain of having to look up so far, and partly so that she didn’t feel caged in by his presence at the door.

Mr. Brennan, she called him, and he’d just said the proper way of addressing him seconds before, so it had to be intentional. Or was she simply unaware? God, he didn’t know, but ‘mister’ had always left a bitter taste in his mouth when it preceded his father’s last name.

“Hello Mable,” he adjusted. “No, nothing I need. I just wanted to make sure that you and your brother were settling in alright – is the room nice enough?”

Malachi cast a critical eye over the room behind her, but didn’t find anything immediately offensive about the quality of the room. It had looked nice from the outside, after all, and he doubted they cared, but he did. A lot.

How cheerful she was, compared to her brother – and so talkative, too. He was taken aback by just how easily she welcomed him into what he assumed was the only safe space she and Edmund had.

Malachi’s head lowered slightly as she expressed her gratitude, but whether it was out of shyness or habit was hard to tell. In truth he never knew how to respond to being thanked; never managed to convince anyone that he did things just because he wanted to.

Her enthusiasm, though! It was infectious. He felt a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, against his will.

“Oh,” he said again, readying an excuse to leave, but then the door was opening farther and he’d have felt bad if he said no. He didn’t have to imagine how lonely it could be when you were stuck in a room by yourself.

“Ah- sure, I can stay for a moment. Thank you.”

That was that, then. Malachi stepped into the room, already surveying it again. Nothing looked any worse than it had from the doorway. The furnishings were solid, the beds looked comfortable, and with any luck the food they provided was decent. His head turned upon hearing the girl’s inquiries, and he blinked before the words seemed to register.

His coat and hat? He supposed his cassock did sort of look like a coat, buttoned up as it was. It felt hot enough to be one.

“Sure,” he said again, his low voice kept softer now that he was in the room. He removed his hat and held it out to Mable; the scent of lavender clung to it.

“You hardly made for poor company. Traveling is hard on anyone,” Malachi assured, “and a tour would be wonderful. Have you been able to explore town much yet?”

Oh. She was just… holding onto the hat. Good thing he hadn’t worn a coat as well.

It was much easier getting information out of Mable than it was her brother, that was clear. Years of caring for the children in his parishes had long made Malachi a master of patience, and he was all too glad to follow at a slower pace behind her and let her speak uninterrupted.

Was she always so upbeat, or was it her nerves that compelled her? She did not seem at all uncomfortable once he had introduced himself… and that was as deeply appreciated by Malachi as it was shocking.

He tore his gaze away from its inspection of the room, finding instead the girl’s smile when she glanced his way.

“Not at all,” he promised with a small smile of his own.

Besides – he would rather hear too much than not be trusted with anything at all.

Malachi reached out and touched the table. No dust. From the sound of it, the people running the hotel had kept their word thus far.

(Some small, naïve part of him hoped, perhaps unrealistically, that she was just always so enthused about food, and that her excitement was not for lack of having it. A larger part of him chose to ignore the things he could not change; to pray that he had the strength to.)

Happy to oblige the girl’s request, Malachi stepped closer to the beds after that and tested a hand against the blankets. She was right – they were soft, and he couldn’t help but compare them to the stiff sheets that covered his bed in the presbytery. At least these beds were seeing some use.

“I’m glad you like the room,” he said, withdrawing his hand so that it could join the other behind his back. “I was not sure if it would be as… nice, as I hoped.”

It was nicer. A lot nicer, but that was alright. The siblings probably deserved things like this after making do with whatever accommodations they might have had while travelling on their own.

Malachi took a seat at the table, conscious of how the chair brought him closer to eye-level with the young girl. “I don’t know if your brother said much about me, but I’m new to Whitby too, and I haven’t had the time to explore much of it either.”

The nights were his best chance, until things were all sorted out at the church. The priest’s head tilted then, dark eyes curious as they observed Mable.

“Do you know if your brother will be out long? We could walk along the river, if you’re bored in here – but I don’t want to worry him if he gets back before we do.”

Mable’s comment about her brother, while unfortunate, was not all that hard to believe. The boy had been respectful and polite as anyone else once they had moved beyond the initial wariness of one another, but Malachi figured there was more under the surface of that one. There usually was, when it came to people backed into corners and doing their best to defend.

“It isn’t that far at all, no,” though it followed the bank to the ocean. Perhaps he would not take her that far, though, at least not without her brother’s knowledge. He was hesitant as it was to remove her from the place that he probably expected her to stay, but there wasn’t any real harm in taking her for a walk, was there?

It had to be more entertaining than… whatever she had been doing with those pebbles on the floor.

Malachi lifted, pushed his chair back into place, and was caught off-guard by the sight of Mable in his hat when he turned.

Oh God. Oh God. His heart felt like it melted in his chest, and yet something pricked, too, at the corners of his eyes as he watched her pose. She was just so… happy. The thought of her making it all the way from the states, sleeping God knows where, dealing with all the clamor and chaos of ships and traveling that were hard enough for a privileged adult – he was not the type to cry. Not easily, not often. But God it hurt to think of all the girls just like her that he would never get the chance to help.

“Ah, right!” he nodded, shaking himself from the sudden emotion. “I’m afraid I can’t promise that I won’t get us lost either… but I’ll do my best.”

He smiled as he opened the door, and held it open until she’d passed through.

“Eddie mentioned that you two were from Pennsylvania? What is it like there?”

Once they were out of the building, Malachi gestured to the nearby street that ran along the river, walking towards it at a casual pace.