Sinner's Prayer

by Seth King

  I smirk to myself as I try to get used to it. “Is that right?”

  “Yes, baby.”

  “Do you…do you like it?”

  “I love it, and I love this new dirty talk of yours even more. Now just breathe.”

  My mind tries to get used to this, but it won’t. Someone is entering me. I am being entered. It is the wildest and most amazing thing I’ve ever felt in my life.

  “Now I’m going to hit your prostate, your G spot.”

  “My what?”

  “This.”

  He does a downward motion, and a hot thrilling feeling spreads up to my core. Oh, that. Not to use His name in vain, but Jesus Christ this feels good. I can’t believe I’ve never explored this before.

  “Right there,” I moan, arching my back. “Yes, right there. Harder.”

  He really gets into it then. He does me with his thumb harder and harder, and the pressure starts to build inside me. Oh, Fabian…

  Soon my whole body goes numb, then tenses, and voila – I come onto the blanket under me, shaking and trembling and sighing.

  “Did I really just get fingered?” I ask soon, half smiling, half in disbelief.

  “I guess you did, didn’t you? What’s the verdict?”

  Verdict – the word suddenly makes me feel weird and guilty. I think of trials and condemnations and crucifixions. Everyone pays for their sins in the end. Will I pay for this?

  I try to smile up at him. No, I won’t repent. Not for something this beautiful. “My verdict is that I’m about to fall asleep within thirty seconds or so, because that just put me out.”

  ~

  The next morning, we talk and laugh and giggle. My life is perfect – I never saw him coming, and I will never be the same. He smashed everything and then remade it in a new image. His own image. In fact, he’s not unlike my own personal savior…

  He gets up to make some coffee, and at around nine fifteen, as I curl up in bed alone, I get an email that sends my world crashing into hell.

  Act II

  Magic

  Adam Venus

  “I’m leaving,” I tell Fab as soon as he returns with two coffee cups. He frowns and sets them down.

  “What?”

  “I don’t know how else to say it…but I’m leaving. I have to leave. For two weeks. We just started to figure things out, and I’m leaving…”

  He still doesn’t get it, so I hand him my phone, which is displaying the following message:

  Greetings, Senior! You are receiving this message because we’ve run into some logistical issues and have had to make some scheduling changes. As you know, Seniors all undergo Interview Tours, where you tour various churches and congregations throughout the region and hope to be blessed enough to find a good fit. Traditionally, half of the seniors take this trip in December, and half take it before the conclusion of the semester in May. However, the national conference has decided to meet in May, meaning we’ve had to combine the two teams. All seniors are now embarking on their tours in December, during the Christmas break – starting this Monday. All churches are in agreement, and have made the appropriate changes. You’ve also been excused from any finals which may interfere with this new schedule. Barring an emergency, we expect you all to be thrilled with this new development, as you are now one step closer to spreading God’s beloved word.

  In His faith,

  Professor Harry S. Linklater

  When he finishes, he looks at me, apparently speechless. “So…you’re leaving? What?”

  I explain the basics to him. The Southern system of pastors and pastors is unique in that no church likes to have any one leader in place for too long. It can lead to too much fraternizing between clergy members, small-town scandals, etcetera. Therefore, church leaders usually take two-or-three-year jobs, moving all across the country all the time. My school does things differently from others, too. They help us more than many others. Every year the school sends out notices of who they have graduating, and if a church has a vacancy and needs someone, they go over our resumes and request interviews with select graduates. For whatever reason, I got ten requests, and was scheduled to take two weeks driving across the Southeast doing essential job interviews. That process is now set to begin in two days.

  When I finish, he is staring at me, aghast. “But…we just got to meet…we haven’t even figured this out yet…”

  I fall against him. “I know…I know. Gosh, I know.”

  “Fuck, this sucks.”

  I smirk against his skin. “Unless…”

  “Yes?”

  “It’s the start of winter break. You won’t have work.”

  “Okay?”

  “And…what do you have going on?”

  I hear him take several breaths. “You mean…you’d invite me?”

  I nod against him.

  “Already? You’d be comfortable being around me for that amount of time? And…you’d be comfortable…with me being there at all?”

  I inhale. “I mean, I’m traveling alone. They don’t know who you are, or where you work. And it’s not like you’d be sitting in on the interviews with me, and touring the churches or whatever. You’d basically just get a free vacation, with a pretty cool dude.”

  “What would I do?”

  “Walk around town, hang out in the hotel room, whatever? I mean, I know it’s crazy…”

  “Not really. I know you’re not a murderer, or anything. So that step is out of the way.”

  “Good point.”

  “Yeah. The thing is…I just don’t want to be hidden. It would hurt my feelings.”

  I take a deep, shaky breath. “Okay. I get it.”

  “You do?”

  “Of course. We’ve already made some progress, though. I will promise you that if you come, I will do my best to never make you feel like that. Trust me, it’s the last thing I want. But I want you there. I want you included.”

  “I mean, I could give my cat to that other janitor, Debbie, she worships her…”

  “Okay.”

  “And I’ll be done after tomorrow, after I wrap up some last-minute decorations…”

  “Okay…”

  “But…what about when we get back? What, then, when it’s become more public than ever that we’re hanging out all the time?”

  “We face it then, Fabian! Please, just say yes. We can cross all those bridges when they come. Right now…well, all I know is that I need you there.”

  Finally he just turns to me. “Okay. This is absolutely crazy, but okay. Let’s go on this pastor tour together. Let’s do it.”

  I’m so excited and nervous and terrified I want to scream and shout, but I hold it all in.

  We spend the day together as I make preparations and shut up my house and do laundry. It’s weird how much it takes to simply leave. As we finally eat dinner, he looks at my arm and gets kind of weird.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask him.

  “So…what about…sex?”

  “Um. What about it?”

  “How am I going to control myself around you that long? Think about it – sharing a bed, sharing a room, sharing a shower. What am I supposed to?”

  I frown. “I hadn’t thought about that…”

  “Exactly. You are irresistible, Adam. The only thing is…do you still want to resist?”

  I blush, then put a hand on his. “All I can say is this. I will try to do more and more things with you, if it happens that way, but you’re going to have to be patient. Let me do it on my time. Okay?”

  “You got it, sir.”

  ~

  A few hours later, I’m reading as night falls outside. Fabian comes up behind me and plants a kiss on my neck, like a grandmother to her granddaughter or something. It makes me feel like a Sunday morning. And in that moment I realize I never “fell” in love with him at all. I was already there. If all I could ever be was his, it would still be the best thing I ever did. He is a deity inside a set of bones, my angel in a devil suit.

  “W
hat you reading?”

  “Nothing interesting,” I smile.

  “Well it looks interesting.”

  “It’s not, now that you’re here.”

  He plops down next to me, and I run my fingers through his silky black hair and realize again that I love him.

  “What’s so special about my hair?” he asks quietly. “You can’t keep your hands out of it.”

  “It’s yours. That’s what’s special about it.”

  “Damn,” he sighs, smiling. “So we’re really doing this, huh? We’re really road tripping together?”

  “Guess so.”

  His eyes bulge. “This is all moving so fast. I can’t believe we’re leaving tomorrow…”

  “I know. Trust me, I know. We’re officially in crazy town.”

  He motions at my Kindle again. Then he motions at the space between us. “Hey, say we were a book. You and I. What would our last page look like?”

  “You mean, would I be there? On your last page?”

  He nods, a little nervous.

  “I can’t read the future, you know,” I say as I playfully nuzzle his head. Then a thrill jumps up my back, and I smile. “Actually, yes I can. Spoiler alert: I stay.”

  Adam Venus

  The next morning starts cold and gloomy, but it matches my mood perfectly – I just want to settle into this passenger’s seat and be with him while he drives. That’s all I want. My feelings for him are like cold weather – soft and calm and permeating everything. And fine, I want other things, things we haven’t done yet, but we will get there. We will get there.

  We stop at one of those Southern gas stations that is forty percent Dairy Queen, fifty percent gas station, and ten percent bait shop. After we look around, we head north again, and it’s already getting colder outside.

  “Can I ask you more about your life?” he says after we hit the state’s main freeway.

  I fidget a little. “Not much to tell. It was almost aggressively boring. Two older brothers, parents who split up early, then college.”

  “Oh, come on. I’m sure you had to have some adventures between those three little points.”

  “Honestly…not really. I was…sheltered.”

  “How sheltered?”

  “Like…okay. My dad didn’t let us have Lucky Charms because luck was a game spun by Lucifer. If a radio station played a song about love or dating or sex, the channel was changed. I couldn’t watch most TV shows, either. They were all considered demonic. I remember we adopted a dog named Helen and the name was immediately changed because her name sounded like ‘hell.’ And don’t even get me started on dating.”

  “You mean, besides the obvious reasons?”

  “Yeah. My dad fears women, distrusts them, says they’re basically all harlots trying to trap me into something or somehow trick me.”

  “Well good for you, you won’t have to worry about women at all.”

  “Hey, we haven’t figured that out yet, for sure…”

  He rolls his eyes. Or did I imagine that? “Yeah, yeah. Sorry. And…what about your mom?”

  I glance away. “Still don’t want to talk about that…situation. Sorry.”

  “Gotcha. But Jesus, that childhood. Er, I mean, not Jesus, but…you know. Jesus! I can’t imagine a life more different from mine.”

  “Yeah?”

  “I moved around every few years, I was exposed to everything and everyone on the planet, my mom didn’t even care enough to attempt to shelter me…by the time I was in second grade I was walking to the gas station and buying groceries there.”

  “Wow.”

  “I don’t mind, though. That’s why I am the way I am – nothing phases me. I never had that freak-out moment when I grew up and entered the real world, because my whole life was the real world.”

  “Good point.”

  “I’m glad you told me all that, though.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I want to be let into your world. I don’t just want to see you smile. I want to see you sad, too.”

  I don’t know what to say to that, I’m too overwhelmed, so I change the subject. “You already told me about your past. But tell me something else. What kind of guys did you always like?”

  “Ha. Well…I always had a thing for the cheesiest-looking, most all-American blonde guys you could imagine. If they looked like they belonged in a Republican politician’s campaign ad, I liked them.”

  “No wonder why you saw me, then…”

  “Nah, it wasn’t like that at all. I just felt…like, stuck in you, somehow. I couldn’t look away.”

  I look away from his overpowering eyes, his glowing skin. “Neither could I,” I say softly. “I still can’t.”

  “Well…I feel very similar.”

  “Why, though?” I ask soon.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Is it…chemistry? Is it physics? What is it?”

  “You’ll spend your life trying to figure that out, and never get an answer. Just let it happen. Fall into it. That’s my best advice.”

  “Ugh.”

  “What?”

  “I’m just so complicated. Like even right now, I can barely talk about this. I’m a big ball of contradictions…why would you ever be interested in me?”

  His hand finds its way to my heart. “Adam. Stop. I’m so used to being bored with people that I’m bored with being bored by people. But you are so interesting. You make me feel like a human exclamation point. Everyone else was just…a minor yay.”

  I look over. I know we’re totally different people, from different worlds. Different solar systems. But lately it feels like the ocean between us, that vast gulf, is shrinking. And what will we find in the closeness?

  “But,” I begin. “It’s not just the religion thing. I don’t even know myself. I’m so afraid I’m…not enough, so I hide myself with all this other stuff. What if I show you the real me, and it’s not enough?”

  He drops my hand, takes my palm in his. “You’re right. You’re not enough, Adam. You’re everything.”

  The first church on the tour is in the most rinky-dink South Carolina town I could ever imagine. Well, actually, coming from St. Marys, I can. But we settle into a tiny motel with brown carpeting, and I kiss him extra hard before I leave him for the fellowship hall. (He hid in the car while I checked in, of course. We can’t be that reckless.) I’m attending their weekly church dinner, and the people are friendly and welcoming. Still, though, I take a moment to think of the sublime irony of my life. I’m in a church that voted against the Baptist coalition approving of gay marriage, and I’ve got a guy waiting for me back in my room…

  I have to admit, I speed through everything without even really paying attention. I’m supposed to be meeting everyone and seeing how I gel with the congregation, but I just don’t care. I’m probably being rude, but I just can’t wait to get back to him to start our “vacation.” Within a few hours I find myself back by Fabian’s side walking down the cutest little street imaginable. These towns in the Deep South – they’re stuck in time, in ways good and bad, but architecture-wise it’s definitely a good thing. I look over at him and just smile – I don’t even care about the rushed interview today, because he makes me feel so brave, so fearless. He said he just read one of my books in the hotel, and he didn’t seem to mind the boredom at all. He makes me feel like I could put on my best suit, try again, and do anything. Like I could walk in a small Southern town with another man and not be afraid at all…

  “What is it, babe?” he asks soon, and I note it’s the first time he’s ever called me that.

  “Nothing. I’m just glad I met you.”

  “Feeling’s mutual. Now let’s get back to the hotel before we catch pneumonia.”

  “You just want to make out with me in bed,” I tease, slapping his big arm.

  “Hey, I’m not denying that. But let’s go.”

  ~

  The next day is roughly the same – and by that I mean, perfect because Fab is ther
e. He just makes me happier. I know this trip won’t last forever, but that doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy him while he’s here. I drop him at the hotel, then stop at a church and head into their tiny administrative office. The interview today is grueling. They want to know about my past, my personal life, my interests, my standing with God, how social I am, how I get along with kids. I didn’t even think about this in the beginning, but I’m having a surprisingly hard time not focusing on the Fabian issue. Say I did be honest, and just mention that I had a guy waiting for me back at my hotel, a guy who lit up my world. They’d probably smile politely and immediately ask me to leave, and I can’t get it out of my head. They’re all very nice, though, and soon I even start imagining a future as a pastor – just somehow with Fabian along for the ride. That’s still possible, right? I can make room for him in my life if I really try…

  Time starts melting, and I travel from town to town. Spending time with Fab is easier than I ever knew it would, or could, be. (Even if he’s a bit sloppy in the hotel room department, and never knew a mess he knew how to tidy up.) I don’t even notice he’s there most of the time, because it just feels like a built-in feature already. We tour the little towns, and the moments that spark between us are a golden magic. We walk down main streets that look too homey and old-fashioned to even be real, we hear trains in the distance like from some old Christmas movie, we drive by fields of rolling hills with cows and horses swatting flies off themselves lazily in the mild December air. But always, always with the knowledge that this is probably a fantasy for us. We have to go back where I am a student, and he is my janitor, and I cannot be with him in this way. Or any man, if I want to keep the current trajectory of my life. I just can’t. Right?

  “Have you ever loved anyone?” I ask as we sit in a Wendy’s on Friday afternoon. That morning he’d sent me yet another note on Snapchat, as usual, scrawled on Days Inn stationery while I slept beside him. I’m reading it again when I blurt out the question. He looks up at me, startled. Then he blushes.