Retribution

By John Alan Negich

RETRIBUTION is a surreal and very thought provoking love story about how fate or even divinity can bring two people together despite all odds. It is a multi-layered tale about John Stanic, who was a highly decorated member of the first Army Ranger battalion during WWII. He is now ninety years old and spending his last remaining days at a nursing facility in Pennsylvania, and recounting his complex life to a young priest. On the surface, John is a dying, reclusive and vulgar old man who shuns relationships, until the priest uncovers a past that is very dark, sinister and mysterious. John also reveals how the war and a power beyond his understanding led him to find the love of his life. John Stanic, as one reader described him, is an individual who will make you cringe and cheer for him at nearly the same moment. His personal moral code is a strength that will most definitely scare you. This book is his story. He now spends his days staring out of the window in his room, remembering his lost love and resigned to his fate while awaiting death. His life is now devoid of highs and lows, with little to look forward to or dream about, until the day he gets an unexpected visitor.

He is befriended by SHAWN O’DONNELL; a young and ambitious small town Catholic Priest determined to save his soul from hell’s fire and damnation. The priest is pressuring his reluctant new friend and sinner to give his confession before the old soldier dies. The priest, of course, professes a devout belief, but, because of the hand life has dealt him, John Stanic, is a staunch non-believer. However, since John has done unspeakable things so horrific during and after the war in an attempt to strike down evil of all kinds, he is reluctant to share his dark confession with the young priest. Eventually, after much prodding by Father O’Donnell, John agrees that in lieu of a traditional confession he would memorialize his fantastic life journey in writing and have the priest receive the manuscript after his death.

This story is his confession, which takes the reader on a voyage from John’s tragic childhood in a small coal mining town, to an orphanage and into the horrors of war. His life takes many twists which consist of religious doubts, rebellion, RETRIBUTION, reconciliation and finally redemption. It encompasses the entire life and times of John Stanic, leaving the reader to ponder: Is John Stanic simply a deranged seeker of vengeance and justice, or actually an ordained avenging warrior here to eradicate perpetrators of evil from wherever fate has placed him? The book has a subliminal, twist of fantasy, with well-developed characters and contains elements of, love, vengeance, faith, a very unlikely friendship, and in the end, salvation for both John and the Priest.

How does a man of God seeking forgiveness for others and a vigilante seeking vengeance and RETRIBUTION become kindred spirits? The answer lies in the deep recesses of the mind of each man that is only revealed by the uncommon bond they establish with each other. John finds an unexpected peace with his past and the priest finds a true and surprising meaning for his life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: John Alan Negich
• Release date: Oct 23, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463503300

John Alan Negich

John Alan Negich still lives in Export, a small Western Pennsylvania coal town where he grew up. He has been writing most of his life and cut his teeth on reading the classics by authors like H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, Mark Twain and Ernest Hemingway. His most recent work Retribution; reflects the influence that his home town, its people and its memories had on his writing. John is a storyteller who paints a picture with his words that gives the reader the sense they are standing in the locations where the novel takes place and actually seeing, hearing and touching the characters.

Book preview

Retribution

A Fantasy Novel

Dedicated to my wife Polly for her absolute support

John Alan Negich

© Copyright 2017 John A. Negich. All Rights Reserved

How does, John Stanic, a vigilante who sought vengeance and RETRIBUTION most of his life and Shawn O’Donnell, a priest, a man of God seeking forgiveness for others become kindred spirits? The answer lies in the deep recesses of the minds of both men that will only be revealed by the uncommon bond they establish with each other. John Stanic finds an unexpected peace with his past and the priest finds a true and surprising meaning for his life.

Table of Contents

Chapter One – The Promise

Chapter Two – The Priest

Chapter Three – The Child

Chapter Four – The Soldier

Chapter Five – The Socialite

Chapter Six – The Waitress

Chapter Seven – The Journey

Chapter Eight – The Rest Home

Chapter Nine – The Awakening

Chapter Ten – The Atrocities

Chapter Eleven – Bones

Chapter Twelve – Jasper

Chapter Thirteen – The Trip Home

Chapter Fourteen – Dusty

Chapter Fifteen – The Return

Chapter Sixteen – The Reconciliation

Chapter Seventeen - Redemption

Chapter One – The Promise

WAS JOHN ALEXANDER STANIC AN ANGEL? GOD ONLY KNOWS.

It has been eight years to the day since John Stanic left this earth. I was his priest. Or, should I say a priest that visited him at Greystone Manor, a nursing home in Murrysville, Pennsylvania, during his final months on this earth. To this day I am certain that he impacted my life much more than I did his. At the time of our visits he doubted the existence of a God just as strongly as I believed in one. Without knowing why, I simply walked into his room on a cold and snowy day in January. He was sitting in his wheelchair in front of the window looking out on the snow covered hills. I had no idea that I was about to meet a man who would alter the course of my life forever.

He initially resisted my visits and at times acted as if he wished I weren’t there. On a few mornings he simply ignored me, or would hardly speak at all, and the visit was brief. Eventually the conversations became a little more two sided and my relationship with John began. We spent every Saturday morning together for five or six months and in those months I believe I got to know him better and more intimately than I had ever known anyone, including my own father in all my years upon this earth. I suppose he got to know me quite well also. He actually insisted on it, pulled no punches and asked straight forward, pointed questions regarding my past.

At that point of his life, he was thin and frail with a full head of white hair, un-trimmed white eyebrows and a bushy white moustache. He usually wore a pair of well- used loose fitting jeans and an untucked long-sleeved, white cotton t-shirt. The jeans might have fit him at one time, but now they hung loosely on his skinny frame and were kept in place by a belt that fit snugly around his small waistline. He was always sitting in his wheelchair looking out the window when I arrived.

John never had shoes on when I visited, only white sox that usually had holes in them. On cooler days when we ventured outside, his nurse, Kelly, convinced him to put on a pair of black slippers. He would grumble and reluctantly agree. He was barely recognizable from the man he used to be. A framed colored photograph that he kept near his bed on the nightstand was one of his prized possessions. It was the only picture in an otherwise bleak room.

The faded photo depicted two young army soldiers standing with their arms around each other’s shoulders. John told me the picture was taken in Italy and that he was the one on the right. His friend, Danny Susich, was killed in the war and he chose not to share that story with me. John was quite a specimen of a man: about six feet tall, with haunting ice blue eyes, and a lean and mean one hundred eighty pounds or so. His hair was short and dark and he had a black handle bar moustache that nearly reached his chiseled chin. John Stanic was a very handsome man back then looking exactly the way one might envision a well- trained Army Ranger to look.

After I was able to see through the mask that he wore of a vulgar, impatient and profane old man, I slowly uncovered what lay underneath that rough surface. I found him to be intelligent, quick witted and much more embraceable than I initially suspected. Upon his death, he willed equal parts of his considerable fortune, to the America Cancer Society, The Borough of Export and the USO fund. He left me his home as well as the surrounding acreage. In addition to the real estate, he willed to me a handwritten manuscript, wrapped in brown paper.

I remember my surprise when Attorney Steven Voitich requested my presence at the reading of John’s will. Steven, an attorney from Murrysville, was frequently at Greystone during my visits with John. I could have sworn I had even seen him in John’s room as I passed by. John was usually my last stop at Greystone and Steven was always gone when I made it to John’s room. I never thought it my business to ask John why he was there.

I recognized that Export Mayor Jim Bollibon was in attendance when I took my seat in Attorney Voitich’s office that morning at nine, but I did not recognize any of the other attendees.

I believe everyone is now in attendance and since some of you are probably wondering why you are here, I will get right to the task at hand and simply read John’s will. He wanted to make this brief, so here goes, Attorney Voitich said and began reading.

I, John Alexander Stanic, declare this to be my last will and testament. I am certain that I have a sound mind and am also certain my body is not so sound. That being said, and if Steven is reading this to you, that body has finally failed me and I have begun my big sleep. In any case this is what I would like to request as I leave this life behind:

I leave one third of my money and the value of my stocks and bonds to the American Cancer Society and hope it will help in finding a cure for the God damned disease that killed my Natalie in May of 1992.

I leave one third of my money and the value of my stocks and bonds to the USO with the hopes that they continue their efforts to boost the morale of the brave men and women in our armed forces who sacrifice so much in the service of this nation.

I leave one third of my money and the value of my stocks and bonds to the Borough of Export. I certainly hope they use some of that money to clean up the damned sewage and mine drainage that continues to spill into Turtle Creek so that clear, clean water can run through our proud little town once again. However, I also vehemently demand that they finally put in the culvert under my driveway that they have been promising for almost ten years now.

Mayor Bollibon smiled widely and shook his head when attorney Voitich read that line.

For Steven Voitich I leave instructions that my body be cremated and my ashes spread over my parents’ graves in Grandview Cemetery and that there be no memorial service of any kind.

Lastly, to my dear friend, Shawn Aengus O’Donnell, I leave my home, the surrounding one hundred twenty acres of land and the story of my life. Even though our time together was far too brief, he was like a son to me and he may do with these things as he wishes.

That is all. Sincerely,

John A. Stanic

There was some quiet murmuring in the room and Attorney Voitich continued. You should all know I have already completed what John requested from me and that these proceedings are now concluded. I will have the required paperwork necessary that you will all need to sign later today. So after you folks have some lunch come back here and we will button this all up. Shawn, could you please stay for a moment? he asked.

After the others had gone and closed the door behind them, Steven reached into the lower right hand drawer of his desk and pulled out a package tightly wrapped in brown paper and sealed in plastic wrap. At the time I had no idea that the plastic wrap was a well-conceived symbolic gesture by John, but would certainly come to understand its significance when I read the manuscript. Handwritten on the paper was: To Shawn. This is the story of my life. John.

I slowly bowed my head, and was looking at the package in my hands and fighting back tears when Steven said, He thought the world of you Shawn.

And I thought the world of him, I paused for a long moment before continuing, I’ve seen you with him at Greystone. Did you know him well?

I knew him very well indeed. My mother and father were his neighbors and close friends, and I have been his attorney and financial advisor for years.

I knew your parents, Steven; they attended the Lutheran Church didn’t they?

Yes, and they continually tried to get John to attend a service with them, but he always said he had way too much to do and always declined.

That sure doesn’t surprise me. John was not much of a fan of organized religion. You know, until I met John soon after I began my practice, I don’t believe I had ever really spoken to him. He would say hello to me and I to him, but we never had a conversation that amounted to much. I used to see him in town when I was a kid, but he never seemed to interface with anyone. I just knew him as the mean old man that lived on the farm at the top of Italy road.

He was quiet and very private maybe but he was far from mean. John was a fine man. Steven said.

Can you tell me about that man? I asked.

"Sure, my mother and dad were struggling financially. They rented their small brick home that bordered John’s property and were having a hard time making timely rent payments. My dad also would help John around the farm, mostly mowing his grass when John was gone and did small repair jobs for him on the property.

John leased the largest portion of the land to a farmer who lived up near route sixty six for a dollar a year just to help the guy out and keep the place looking like a farm. I guess since he never farmed it himself, he would be referred to by most folks as a gentleman farmer. John would offer to pay dad for his time but my father never took a cent from him. Dad was a proud man that always told me, "Son when you do something for a friend or for family, you never, ever take money from them. Friends just do for friends."

My mother tells me that one day John Duff who was and still is the president of the First National Bank of Export knocked on the door of my parent’s home, and when my mother opened the door Mr. Duff handed her an envelope.

What is this? she asked, fearing it might be an eviction notice.

Why Mrs. Voitich, it is the deed to your home, Mr. Duff said as he peered over his bifocals.

We don’t own this home Mr. Duff. We rent it.

You may have rented it in the past Mrs. Voitich, but you own it now. Mr. Stanic has purchased the home, filed the deed in your name and your husband’s name and prepaid the taxes for a period of ten years. Congratulations I am very happy for you, he smiled as he said it.

I don’t know what to say, my mother wept.

You don’t need to say anything, but there is more. In addition to the deed Mr. Stanic has established a college fund for Stevie that will assure he can get an education at any school he desires. Mr. Stanic has stipulated that tuition, books and lodging will all be paid for provided Stevie maintains a high grade point average and good moral behavior. He did not stipulate exactly what that grade point average should be.

I am very touched by this gesture, but my husband will not accept this.

"I am afraid that he has no choice. All the transactions are complete and final. Mr. Stanic said to simply leave this message with you – Friends just do for friends," and with that, he tipped his hat and walked off the porch.

Things got better for my parents after that. My father got a steady job at the Elliott Company in Jeannette and I went on to graduate from law school and open my practice here. I have been John’s attorney and financial advisor ever since. We owe more to that man than we will ever be able to repay. To this very day my mother calls him her guardian angel.

Thanks for sharing that with me Steven, it means a great deal to me.

Before you go, Shawn, there is one more thing to inform you about. John didn’t bother me much at all. I handled all his money, made investments for him, paid his bills and paid his taxes. I hardly ever saw him and I know for a fact that he kept large sums of cash in that house somewhere, because he never ever called me for money. Hell, he never ever called me at all. Dad once saw him grab a roll of bills from a mason jar that he kept in the kitchen cabinet to pay Bob Marsiglio for fixing the tractor. He was a child of the depression era and I believe he thought his money was safer in a mason jar than it was in the bank. You need to look for that stash or stashes of cash as I think it might be considerable. In addition, John has insisted that I take you on as a client and provide both legal and financial services for you until one of us dies. He also made it clear that the services provided should, of course, be pro bono.

I laughed, thanked Steven, grabbed the brown paper package, tucked it under my arm and left.

Steven was certainly correct about the cash. Most of it was in a suitcase under his bed and the amount was indeed considerable. I was sure that I would find more, and in subsequent years I found money in coffee cans, pockets of his clothing, his tool box and many other places. Every year on the anniversary of his passing I take down that manuscript from the top shelf in my office and read it.

It was a chilly spring night and well after midnight, with a full moon in the sky as I settled into the high backed leather chair in my office, turned on the desk light and carefully flipped the now yellowing stack of paper to page one and began to read John’s story:

Well, Shawn, how’s it hanging today? I asked the young priest as he walked into my room at Greystone Manor Nursing Home after tapping on the door.

I was sitting in my wheelchair, my back to the entrance, watching a female cardinal preparing her nest in the maple tree just outside my window. I loved watching the birds. The leaves were just beginning to emerge and the tree was putting on its beautiful light green April crown. Her mate, a brilliant red male, would occasionally fly in and perch on an upper branch as if he was inspecting the construction. The window was a blessing for me and I spent most of my time gazing out at the trees, the birds, the flowers and the wooded hillside just beyond the edge of the lawn. It was a glorious spring morning.

I have been a resident at Greystone for longer than I care to admit, or expected to be. I don’t remember exactly how I got here but have been here now for nearly three years. I have been told that my neighbor, Steve Voitich, found me unconscious in my driveway, called 911 and the ambulance shuttled me to Westmoreland Hospital in Greensburg, Pennsylvania. I guess I just keeled over while shoveling snow. Hell, I should have known better. I have enough money and certainly could have paid a kid to shovel it, but was stubborn enough to still want to do it myself. One never wants to admit that father time has taken a toll.

They did what they could to save my life at the hospital and when the doctors determined that I needed long term care they sent me to Greystone to live out the remaining months or years of my life. I take a handful of pills each day to fend off congestive heart failure and the final stages of COPD.

The last few years have been quite difficult for me health wise and it appears that my time here on this earth is very limited, so the doctors tell me. Their assessment is that I am beginning to shut down like an old engine and that an oil change will not be any help at this stage and I am too damned old to have a new fucking motor installed. My mind, however, is as sharp as it ever was which makes being trapped in this decrepit ninety year old body somewhat of a challenge getting through each day. Some say that reaching old age is a blessing. I say that is absolute bullshit. When you are unable to do even the little things that used to make you happy and don’t know if you are about to fart or shit in your pants, I say you can have it because I don’t care much for this final chapter of life.

When I heard the tapping, I knew it was the young priest because he was as punctual as anyone I have ever known and has arrived at precisely ten o’clock every Saturday morning for the last ten or twelve weeks. I usually do not keep track of such trivial things as dates and time but his punctuality was so uncanny that I couldn’t help but take note. I was reluctant at first to speak with him based on my fragmented faith and beliefs, or my deep seeded questions and doubts about religion in general, but he seemed to be such a kind young man, and since I was without any living family, he was my only visitor.

Sure, there were other residents that occasionally called on me, but I did not relish the conversations that many of them brought with them. Most were women who wanted to talk about their dead husbands or complain about their children not visiting nearly as often as they thought they should. Since I have no living family that is one thing I cannot bitch about. I do however, bitch every chance I get about the food, the crazy woman down the hall who screams all night long and why the hell they keep it so God damned hot in this awful place.

Of the few men that were living at Greystone, most were feeble and had the memory span of a gnat. However, once they thought they had your attention they would begin a story about one of their life’s accomplishments that seemed to last so long, I would sometimes doze off only to find them still talking when I snapped to. Most of the men were once soldiers, business people, doctors, architects, golfers, hunters, fathers and husbands that were now relegated to living out their lives in what remained of once strong bodies and sharp minds that were both now failing them. I guess we all have a story of whom or what we once were or wanted to be. My story, as you will see, is indeed, not a tale to be shared and to this very day I wonder if my true purpose in life was ever really realized. But, since they seemed to be proud of their past, I think that in retrospect, I probably should have been more receptive to them and a least pretended to be interested. At a certain point in an old man’s life, memories that they are proud of may be all they have left to sustain them.

I, of course, chose never to speak about my past with any of them. After shunning them repeatedly, they now go by my door in their wheelchairs, walkers or motorized carts without even glancing in the doorway. I am sure they think I am a non-social recluse who wants to be left alone, and on that matter, they would be absolutely correct.

Father Shawn O’Donnell, a young catholic priest, had recently accepted a position at Saint Mary’s Catholic Church in Export, Pennsylvania. He was tall, clean shaven, rather thin with a light complexion, wore gold wire rimmed glasses and had fire red hair. I think the ladies would consider him to be handsome. My guess would be that he was about thirty years of age, but I never felt compelled to confirm that. When you are my age everyone else seems young.

Saint Mary’s, Our Lady of Lourdes is a small parish in a town of nine hundred or so people and has been holding mass since the cornerstone was laid in 1902. This historic church with a diminishing congregation certainly was not a desired assignment for any priest. But Shawn was young, full of piss and vinegar and determined to save as many souls in the church as possible, as well as the soul of this old fart at Greystone, before I succumbed to the final Big Sleep as I preferred to call it.

I’m fine, John. How are you? he replied and placed his hand on my bony shoulder and gave me a gentle pat on the back. His touch was comforting.

If you must know, Shawn, I’m feeling rather shitty today. My arthritis is giving me fits, I didn’t sleep well last night, I can’t breathe, my ticker feels like it might give out at any time, this place smells like old people and these God damned oxygen tubes are a real pain in the ass, any more questions? I said without turning my chair to face him.

Shawn moved the chair so he could face me and with a little wink and smile said, Well, some things may never change, you cantankerous old man. May I sit?

Make yourself at home. You always do. What do you have on your mind today Shawn?

I always called him Shawn as opposed to Father O’Donnel, which I’m sure he would have preferred, but he was just a kid in my eyes and young enough to be my great grandson. He was a fine polite young man and we agreed when we first met that we would address each other by our first names and dispense with the obligatory Father O’Donnel and Mr. Stanic.

I always hated formalities and titles. At my age I now thought that if I could not call someone by their first name, I probably had no further use for them or for their inflated egos.

With a much more serious look on his face Shawn asked, John, I know we have gone over this time and time again but, are you sure you would not like to have me hear your confession before it is too late for your sins to be absolved?

Son, you’re beginning to sound like a fucking broken record and it is really starting to aggravate me. If I have told you once, I’ve told you a hundred times that I’m not going to confess anything to you or to your God. I am at peace with what I’ve done in my life and if I did ever share what you consider to be my sins with you, which I won’t, you’d probably have me hauled off to jail and they would throw away the God damned key.

Shawn scowled and lowered his eyebrows and said sharply, Why must you begin or end every other sentence with a profanity or by taking the Lord’s name in vain? I sometimes think that even if I do take your confession, and your sins are forgiven, that there would be additional vetting before they throw the gates of Heaven open for you.

I’ll try son. Not because I want to get into Heaven but simply because I like you and enjoy your company. By the way – how are the ladies treating you and are you getting any skin these days? You do know that the Presbyterians and even the Lutherans allow ministers to marry and enjoy a little poke now and then. Why the hell you decided to be a priest is beyond me. After all, aren’t you all selling the same damned product?

I enjoyed playing around with Shawn regarding his choice to be celibate for the rest of his life. It made absolutely no sense to me why a handsome young man would do such a thing. Besides, why