The Vatican garden was quiet, only the soft splashing of the fountain breaking the stillness. Lenny Belardo, the Holy Father, leaned back in his chair with a half-smile and a cherry Coke Zero resting on the table beside him. The can was unopened. A cigarette lay unlit between his fingers.
“Mel,” he said, his eyes fixed somewhere between heaven and the palm fronds swaying above, “I must thank you. Your prayers are like a hedge around me. Every day I feel their weight—gentle, but firm. They have helped me resist these small, vulgar temptations: the smoke, the syrupy sweetness of this black-canned nectar.”
He tapped the Coke lightly with a finger, as though mocking it.
“Thankfully,” Lenny exhaled, his voice calm yet edged with irony, “I do not drink. I am free of that particular vice. But this—” he lifted the cigarette for a moment and then set it down—“this still whispers to me in the evening air.”
The Pope folded his hands, his face serene.
“Continue to pray, Mel Gibson. A man of passion must pray for a man of silence. And perhaps, in the balance of our weaknesses, God will find strength.”