Agents of Change

‘Business no good lately?’ I ask. 
‘The truth?’ The glass in his eyes breaks and punctures me. ‘Shithouse.’ 
That’s when I have to ask him. ‘Can you really talk like that? Being holy and all?’ 
‘What? Because I’m a priest?’ He finishes the dregs of his coffee. ‘Sure. God knows what’s important.’

In “part two: the priest,” the ace of clubs sends Ed to a local priest of a dying church, Father Thomas O’Reilly. As Ed and Father O’Reilly converse over coffee, Ed tries to discern what his message for the priest should be. Father O’Reilly has just characterized his church as having a steadily dwindling congregation. If it were a restaurant, he says, it would have closed down years ago. Ed has a stereotype of members of the clergy as prim and proper paragons of virtue. Ed thinks that the priestly vocation forbids profanity. Holiness to Ed’s mind is inconsistent with vulgarity. With these words, Father O’Reilly explains that the forms of holiness don’t matter as much as a person’s intentions. Ed takes this insight to heart when he plans the Meet a Priest Day celebration to fill up Father O’Reilly’s church. The lesson learned from Father O’Reilly’s honesty and grounded spiritual understanding allows Ed to feel free to offer free beer as a gesture of hospitality to the kind of people the priest ministers to. This idea ultimately leads to another successful mission. 

‘You know, they say that there are countless saints who have nothing to do with church and almost no knowledge of God. But they say God walks with those people without them ever knowing it.’ His eyes are inside me now, followed by the words. ‘You’re one of those people, Ed. It’s an honor to know you.’

In “part two: juveniles,” the day before the Meet a Priest Day celebration, Father O’Reilly pays a visit to Ed to thank him for all he’s done to help boost attendance at his church. Ed welcomes the visit and extends hospitality in the form of a shared meal of soup. This quote occurs partway through their lunch, when Father O’Reilly becomes overcome with emotion as he says that God walks with Ed. His observation has a biblical context as a reference to the handful of men scripture speaks of as having walked with God. Father O’Reilly recognizes in Ed the requisite humility and goodness of heart that characterize holiness. Ed recalls Sophie’s asking if he was a saint. The priest’s declaration that he feels honored to know Ed foreshadows the scene at Ed’s father’s grave where Daryl challenges Ed to not end up like his father. Earlier in the story, readers learned that at Gregor Kennedy’s funeral, not one person stood up to honor the departed man by delivering any words of remembrance or eulogizing him. With Father O’Reilly’s words here, readers understand that Ed is already on the path of giving people something to say about him when his time comes to pass.

‘You see, Ed, you were always an absolute no-hoper—just like your old man. No offense.’ 
‘None taken.’ 
‘And we’ve been employed to test you—to see if you can avoid this life.’ He points casually to the grave.

Here, in “part five: the end is not the end,” Daryl and Ed have a conversation at Ed’s father’s grave. The final card, a joker, has been delivered, and Ed himself is the focus of the mission, the recipient of the message that has several stages of revelation. In the first, Ed obeys a directive to go to his father’s grave on the first anniversary of his death. He expects to find out that his father masterminded all the aces and messengers he received. Here, at the gravesite, the messenger Daryl explains why the joker card is all about Ed. Like his father, Ed never learned to envision good things for himself. Parents often unwittingly perpetuate the cycle they lived with their children. Daryl gestures to Ed’s father’s grave to indicate the end of a person with no hope—Gregor Kennedy’s early death from alcoholism and his funeral at which no eulogy was delivered to honor his life. The sender of the aces commissioned Daryl along with his partner Keith to put Ed through trials where he could learn a new approach to life, and thus avoid a fate similar to that of his father’s.

The Strength in Connection

Audrey will never feel the arms of that kid, Angelina, wrapped around her neck or see the pieces of the mother all over the supermarket floor. She’ll never know how cold that gun was or how desperate Milla was to hear that she’d done right by Jimmy—that she’d never let him down. She’ll never understand the shyness of Sophie’s words or the silence of her beauty.

In “part two: just ed,” Audrey asks Ed what he did at the addresses on the ace of diamonds. As he ponders how to describe his interventions, Ed flashes back to their supercharged emotional impact. He revisits the scenes in his mind, connecting with the deeper needs that the emotions conveyed. Angelina wraps her arms around Ed's neck out of fear of her father as he brutalizes her mother. Ed's own conflicted feeling about his responsibility to end the brutality once and for all with the gun. Milla imagines Ed is Jimmy out of unresolved grief over the loss of her husband. Sophie's shyness indicates crippling social anxiety. The connections Ed makes with strangers are forged by empathy and a desire to ease their pain. He feels fierce protectiveness toward these struggling souls. Ed doesn't trust Audrey to understand his investment in their lives. Because Audrey avoids pain, having had enough of it in her childhood, he feels she would not want to appreciate his involvement.

I want to tell her how sorry I am for showing up like I did the other morning, but I choose not to. We’re okay now, and there’s no point going over something I can’t change. I come close a few times but let it go. It’s better that way.

Here, in “part two: the priest,” Ed decides how to address the awkward incident that resulted from his uninvited early-morning visit to Audrey that precipitated a breakdown in their connection. Ed came to her in need of her counsel. The presence of a man, the scent of body fluids, and her dismissal of him as "just Ed" reminded him of the limits of their connection. When she refused his request that she step out to talk to him then and there, he walked off indignantly. Ed wants to apologize because his behavior resulted from jealousy that he has no business feeling, given his agreement not to pursue a romantic relationship with her. Audrey, on the other hand, handled it in character, her cool imposition of boundaries consistent with her stated requirement that their relationship be platonic. Ed debates being transparent with his feelings because he craves a deeper connection with Audrey. He rationalizes away his impulse to apologize for the past as an irrelevancy in the present. He's satisfied with maintaining the status quo if the alternative of pushing for understanding means risking damage to their already fragile friendship.

It makes me think about all the people I’ve run into. What if they’re all messengers, like me, and they’re all threatened and desperate just to get through what they have to do to survive?

In “part three: the woman,” Ed considers the words of a visitor who came to deliver a message the night before. The man had become irritated with Ed's nagging question, "Who's sending you?" and told him to consider that there are others getting aces, as Ed does. The rebuke implies that Ed's self-absorption gets in the way of the greater good.  Here Ed reevaluates his perception of reality. Ed had thought of himself as a unique, lone vigilante, bearing the weight of the world's problems. He had even been feeling sorry for himself. Suddenly, the concept that other people's success depends on him expands his sense of connection. He imagines these strangers pressed into service on his behalf, enduring threats and pressure to complete their missions as if their survival depends on Ed's success. Ed sees life as a confluence of people trying to complete their destinies just to survive. In this light, he develops a new appreciation of connection as essential. Interpreting the cryptic messages on the aces has been training Ed to look beyond appearances to the substance of people's lives.

The Importance of Purpose

In a way, I wish I could be like that. You’d never worry or care about anything that really mattered. You’d be happy, in the same pitiful way someone like our friend Ritchie is. Nothing affects you, and you affect nothing.

In “part two: the stones,” Marv has just joked with Ed that thinking is bad for mental health, referring to the idea that too much introspection runs the risk of unsettling the status quo. Ed had just been deep in thought that he can't share his missions with his friends because he has to accomplish them alone. Here, he reflects on the hidden truth of Marv's joke, that ignorance more often than not can feel like bliss. The theory is that the less a person knows, the less they worry. Ed immediately recognizes this approach to life in the carefree Ritchie, who has no job, no dependents, and no concerns about the future. Ritchie lives for the day, taking welfare money that he spends on booze and gambling. Ed thinks through the implications of Ritchie's lifestyle choices and decides that he is to be pitied most of all. Ed understands that to care about things that matter is to develop a sense of purpose. In the absence of purpose, a person can't meaningfully interact with their environment.

Maybe I truly am shedding the old Ed Kennedy for this new person who’s full of purpose rather than incompetence.

In “part three: clown street. chips. the doorman. and me,” Audrey expresses her worry over the changes she's sensing in her and Ed's friendship. His new activism destabilizes their fragile status quo because he’s growing, he’s evolving, and his newfound self-esteem is encouraging him to go after the love he wants from her. Ed is becoming different and he knows that's true, but he wants to hear why she thinks he might not be "just Ed" anymore. Audrey characterizes the difference as most certainly improved, and Ed recognizes the subtext of her fear. His statement shows he fully embraces the new Ed Kennedy. Even though he's not quite comfortable in his skin, he doesn't want to go back to the impotent, passive person he used to be. He attributes the change to a new sense of purpose. The purpose is energy and competence is a result. Purpose has given Ed confidence, no matter what the outcomes might be of his actions.

‘I’m twenty years old, and’—the Hendrix-Pryor tattoo winks at me under the moonlight—‘look at me—there isn’t a thing I want to do.’ 
It’s impeccable how brutal the truth can be at times. You can only admire it. . . .

‘There’s only one thing I want.’ 
‘What’s that, Ritchie?’ 
His answer is simple. 
‘To want.’

This conversation between Ed and Ritchie takes place in “part four: ritchie’s sin.” Ed has delivered his message that Ritchie disgraces himself by wasting his life away and not living up to his full potential. Once he has time to process the blow, Ritchie reflects on why he exploits public assistance to live an indolent lifestyle. Drinking and gambling distract him from the emptiness where ambition should be. He lacks a vision for himself. Despite sporting a tattoo that looks like two high-achieving artists who succeeded early in life, Jimi Hendrix and Richard Pryor, Ritchie has no sense of purpose. Not only that, but he's also clueless about how to find any purpose. Ritchie has never wanted anything he doesn't have. Once Ritchie articulates his need for motivation, he realizes that there's no magic answer for a person who's never learned to envision achievement. Ed’s rebuke gives him a new motivation, to restore his honor. To spring the hopelessness trap Ritchie’s caught in requires taking a step away from his dependency on charity. The next day Ritchie begins the search for a job.

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