Sinner's Prayer

by Seth King

  But at the same time, if God didn’t want me to fall for Fabian, he shouldn’t have given Fabian that Tinseltown smile. If He didn’t want Fabian to haunt my dreams and power my daylight fantasies, He shouldn’t have made Fabian’s shoulders so wide and his jaw so square and his chest so rippled. If I am a sinner, then Fabian is my prayer – and that is a truth written in stone.

  ~

  A few nights after the blow job episode, I’m cleaning up after the best interview I’ve had yet. The church seemed fairly progressive, they had a large and engaged congregation, and they’re looking for a junior pastor – perfect for me. I still can’t get the nagging feeling out of my head that something is amiss, but this at least makes me feel more stable for a few days.

  One thing I’m also learning is that he’s changing me. He loves to talk during our drives, and he tells me about politics, racial issues, the way he sees America, etcetera. I never knew how judgmental I was before. I’d just look at a person and decide whatever I wanted about them – but his influence is softening my mind. Maybe a homeless man on the side of the side isn’t just a desperate drunk, maybe he’d faced all kinds of circumstances that had affected his life in a million little ways. Maybe a stripper isn’t a pathetic junkie, maybe she’d independent woman taking matters into her own hands. At the end of the day, none of it had any of it to do with me, anyway, just like I wouldn’t want someone like Kinnan interjecting into my private life. I need to butt out, keep my nose out of peoples’ lives and souls, and Fab is showing me that more and more every day.

  “I have to tell you something,” he says when he returns from getting ice later that day. He looks at me and sets his jaw. But I want to tell him something, too. Time is running out on us. This is the first day of our last week on tour. On Sunday we will have to return home, to reality…

  “Okay. I have to tell you something, too.”

  He deliberates, then his determined expression fades. “Okay? What did you want to say?”

  “Okay. I only have a few interviews left. But one of them is giving me trouble.”

  “Trouble?”

  “So…you know how much you mean to me, right?”

  He smiles that shy, triumphant smile I like so much. “I mean, you could be a little more vocal, but…just kidding, yes, I know. Why?”

  “Well…something happened. You might not even care, but I just wanted you to know.”

  “Yes? Are you okay?”

  “Oh, it’s nothing like that. It’s just…I think I have to go on a date.”

  “What?”

  I swallow and prepare to tell him what I’ve been avoiding for a few days now. “So, long story, but this one church wants to talk to me, and the lady I’ve been in contact with has been…weird. She keeps talking about how handsome my file photo is, and she wants to eat dinner. She’s already being weird and flirty and pushy with me. She’s even kind of…”

  “What?”

  “She’s kind of turning it into this half-date, half-interview situation. She saw my social media, and she knows I’m single, and she’s making comments.”

  “Yeah, but there’s…me.”

  “I can’t do anything,” I interrupt. “She’s being weird and unprofessional, sure, but a job is a job. She’s using it as leverage – go on this date, and I’ll help you out. That seems to be the message.”

  “Um? Darling, that is called blackmail.”

  “I don’t know what else to do. I need a job. I think I’m just going to show up, feel her out, see what she has to say, and if she actually does get weird, I’ll leave. But this is a very good opportunity, and hey, it could be nothing. Maybe she just comes across as weird on the phone.”

  “You’ve been talking on the phone?”

  I blush. “I know, I know. Are you cool with it?”

  He crosses his arms. “I’ll say yes. If I can make a request. Or demand one, actually.”

  “Yes?

  “So, right now, the guy I like is telling me he’s going out on a date with someone else, and regardless of the circumstances, that’s fucked up. Would you agree?”

  “Um…”

  “Yes, you would. So. Remember when I put that toy in you?”

  I look away. I can already feel it right now, the way it stretched me out, the way it made me feel something I’d never even known was possible…

  “You’re going to wear something like it for the date,” he says. “And I’m going to be in the restaurant.”

  “What?”

  “Adam, it’s the future. People are ruthless out there. They don’t care if someone is attached – not that she knows, anyway. But I’m going to sit a few tables away, and if you do anything I don’t like, I’m going to turn on the toy.”

  “T…turn it on?”

  His lips twist into a sadistic smirk. “Last time I went in the sex shop, they had a remote-controlled, vibrating butt plug. And if you piss me off I’m going to turn it on. When do you leave?”

  “An hour,” I gulp.

  “Take a shower, then. Then come back to the bed. And we’ll get you ready.”

  “Okay, then,” he says after he inserts the toy in me half an hour later, sitting back and admiring his work. It’s a small, cylindrical plug that’s already pushing against all my spots, and I have no idea how I’ll even walk there without orgasming. Goodness, want Fabian so much. “It’s in, and nobody will ever know it. So if you get too flirty with her – bzzz. I’ll punish you.”

  I know he’s testing me. I know he’s trying to set boundaries in a boundary-less relationship. And to be honest…it kind of turns me on.

  “And what makes you think you have the right to claim me like this?” I ask.

  “Hey, I respect your career, or whatever this is, but it’s not totally fair for you to be running around like this already.”

  “Whatever. You’re crazy. Do you know that?”

  “Sure I am,” he smirks. “Crazy for you. And that’s the problem.”

  We meet at a tacky Italian restaurant downtown with a low ceiling and faded murals on the walls. Fabian checks in separately and somehow snags a table ten feet away, roughly within earshot. I wonder how he does this, but then I roll my eyes – he’s Fabian Blanco. He could sell oil to a bucket of water. He’s just one of those people who gets things done.

  “So, how are ya, cutie?” Mary Ann asks as she settles across from me, winking. She’s in a nauseatingly-pink top, and her frosted blonde hair is piled high on her little head. It also looks like she’s applied her makeup with a paint gun.

  “Uh, I’m great, I’m so excited to be talking about this job opening. The-”

  “Yeah, yeah,” she dismisses me, waving a French-manicured finger. “That’s all great. Let’s order some starters and turn it to some other stuff, though!”

  Fabian stares at me, warning me, jealousy on his face.

  “Other stuff?”

  “Why, yeah. I was shocked when a young man as handsome as you contacted us, wantin’ to preach. But then again, they don’t make them in other places like they do here in the South, I swear…”

  Oh, no. My ass starts vibrating, right against my prostate, making my eyes roll back into my head. I guess her flirty banter was already too much for him.

  But then it stops. I try to collect myself.

  “Oh, um…thanks. I, um…thanks.”

  “Speakin’ of that, what are you doing, single? You checked that box on your application. Surely a young man like you could find the company of some young women? Even casually?”

  “Wait, who brought that up, again?” I ask, and then I am interrupted by the vibrator.

  Bzzz.

  I squeeze my legs together. It feels like he is drilling me, doing what he did to me with his finger. It makes me want his sex like nothing I’ve ever wanted before. I am a volcano built for him. If I could crawl across this restaurant right now and climb atop him, I would. I want him in me, owning me, claiming me.

  I look up at her.

  �
�Honey, what’s goin’ on?” she asks, looking like I just announced I had to leave for a devil worshipping party.

  “Nothing, um, nothing, I just…stubbed my toe.”

  She glances down. “We’re sittin’ down, though.”

  “Yeah, uh, I have sudden kicking syndrome. Anyway, preaching? God? Jesus?”

  She blinks and sits taller. “Oh, yes, honey. I saw your videos, and I like your voice, and your style. Very smooth, very measured. Also – your broad shoulders and dimples don’t hurt, either, you know.”

  I want to shrug it off, but it’s flattering to hear her say this. “Aw. Really?”

  Bzzzz.

  He’s upped the setting. It vibrates harder, giving me a feeling like I am being tickled and aroused at the same time. I can’t handle this. I can already feel like wetness seeping out of me. My toes curl and my vision blurs, and then I realize it – I am about to orgasm, right here at this table.

  I clench my stomach and feel my legs lift. I see myself in the mirror above the booth across from me – my face gets pale, then flushes, as I screw my face up in an orgasmic expression. Then it comes, and I let out a weird little moan as my eyes roll back into my head.

  Finally I collapse and just stare down at my wet spot for a minute.

  I just came. In a restaurant. With a church employee.

  When I look back up at Mary Ann, she is still. Silent. Expressionless.

  “Honey, what on this Lord’s green planet was that?”

  I’m sure I go even more green as I rise from the table. “Sorry. I’m so sorry, but I think I have to go. I’m sick. Really sick.”

  And I am sick, I think as I head for the door. Sick of not having sex with Fabian Blanco. And sick of being in a relationship that isn’t even really a relationship at all…

  Adam Venus

  So clearly I didn’t get that job. But the next day something bizarre and hilarious happens – we stay in a church. Daybreak Baptist in South Carolina is a massive complex with a dormitory alongside the hangar-sized main sanctuary meant for traveling clergy and such, and after I’m checked in I text Fabian not to raise any eyebrows when he follows me in. My room is small but clean, and there’s a bathroom with a large shower, perfect size for hooking up – not that I would ever do that with him tonight. Not here. That would be too much, even for me…

  “Get dressed,” he says when I finish my interview.

  “What?”

  “I want to take you somewhere. To make up for my…indecision lately. And my little performance yesterday. It’s not your fault that you’re in this situation, and I shouldn’t have blamed you like that.”

  “Aw. Okay? Where are we going? Dinner?”

  His posture relaxes, and he smiles. “Yeah, I’ve been looking around online for a few days, and…yeah. Get dressed.”

  Within half an hour I’m in the car beside him. He makes me promise not to pay attention, so I busy myself with my phone until we eventually hit downtown Charleston. Then we pull up and park near a church that says 5CHURCH CHARLESTON in big fancy letters. As he takes off his seatbelt, I turn to him.

  “Fab? Another church? Really?”

  “Shh. Just come. Wait.”

  And indeed, I was wrong. Apparently 5Church is a fancy restaurant inside an old chapel, and a giant chapel at that. We enter in what used to be the main lobby, then a server leads us into the huge vaulted interior. On the left side is a gigantic bar, probably two stories tall, and on the far side are beautiful stained-glass windows. She sits us at the end, where the altar probably used to be. It feels oddly appropriate, and oddly kinky, too. I like Fabian on his own terms – who wouldn’t? – but obviously the taboo of this whole thing just adds to the intoxicating mix around him. It’s like being told I can eat whatever in the refrigerator I want, except this one thing in the corner. Clearly I’m going to reach for the forbidden fruit when nobody is looking. And man, is Fabian forbidden…

  “Isn’t it cool?” he asks soon, eyes brighter than the stained glass. “I found it online and just had to bring you here.”

  “It’s…cooler than cool. Like you.”

  “I like you so much,” he smiles out of nowhere. “I like every moment around you. All of it.”

  I just smile, my insides warming magically. “You know how I feel. I can’t believe any of this happened.”

  “Neither can I. it wasn’t supposed to happen. But it did.”

  “I like you so much it scares me sometimes, makes me spin inside my own skull.”

  “Same,” I say, drowning in him.

  “Same? That’s all you got?”

  “That’s all I feel like I need to say. Sometimes it feels like my thoughts aren’t only mine, they’re yours, and we share them. Everything that was supposed to be different is the same now.”

  “And that’s why I brought you here,” he says soon, looking around. “A rehabilitated church. Remade. Things can change, you know. Just because God’s presence was here once, doesn’t mean it left. It can be anywhere. Regardless of…certain factors.”

  I gasp a little. He’s right. The wooden beams holding up the ceiling are no less stately, the windows are no less beautiful, now that it is not a church anymore. The grace remained.

  “You’re also teaching me so much,” he says. “I will admit that I was a little…haughty about the religion thing before.”

  “Really?” I ask sarcastically. He raises a hand.

  “Hey – let me finish. My problem was that I always viewed God as…hmmm, like a pacifier. You stick a pacifier in the mouth of a baby to pacify it, to make it stop wanting something else, to shut it up. That’s what I viewed religion as. Instead of dealing with their lives and confronting the big scary questions, I thought people sat back and threw it all up to God. They didn’t have to worry about anything if they just displaced all their mental responsibilities to the sky, and I thought that was a little…spineless. But with you…I see it, I feel it. You believe these things so strongly… the way you pray every night and morning, the way you talk about the Bible. It’s so real with you. You walk the walk, and it’s so inspiring. You make me think that maybe something bigger really is out there. Some kind of plan. Some system of order.”

  “I used to think so, too,” I say, rolling my eyes. “Past tense. It’s getting hard.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You opened my eyes, too. Maybe I was doing some of what you’re saying. Maybe I felt some things I didn’t know how to process, and stuck that pacifier in my mouth.”

  “When you really wanted something else…”

  “Shut up,” I smile. “But really – there are things I can’t deny anymore. The Bible says that what I feel with you is wrong, plain and simple. How am I going to reconcile that? I can’t anymore.”

  “It’s up to you,” he shrugs. “It’s only up to you.”

  “Ugh…”

  He sits back and flashes a weird smile. “On that note, I also brought you here,” he says, setting down his napkin, “because I want to ask you something. Will you be my boyfriend, Adam?”

  I frown a little, taken aback. “Boyfriend?”

  His face falls.

  “Oh no, I didn’t mean anything bad, that just seems so…”

  “So what?”

  “So…weird, and old-fashioned. So…not really ‘us,’ you know?”

  “I feel like it’s us,” he says. “I want to be your boyfriend. I want you to be mine, nobody else’s, just mine. If you didn’t learn that the other night with that lady…”

  “Now that is old-fashioned,” I laugh. “Are there shackles I need to slip on?”

  “Take this seriously, for once in your life,” he sighs, and I lean forward.

  “I do take you seriously, Fabian Judas. Serious as death. Obviously I wouldn’t be here with you if I didn’t. I just thought we were beyond boyfriends. But yes, fine, in a heartbeat I would be your boyfriend. Cheers.”

  We clink the glasses of white wine the server just brought, and I lau
gh.

  “What’s funny?”

  “It’s just – now I really am gay,” I laugh, pointing at the wine, and my tight pants he’d picked out for me. “Not to trade in stereotypes, but come on…”

  “No,” he says soon, “I just think you’re getting closer to the person you really are. The person underneath what you showed to the world.”

  “I wonder why it took you to show me I was hiding?” I ask, and he shakes his head.

  “No. It just took me to show you that you’d already started letting down the mask. You were unhappy with your situation, or else you never would’ve come to that bar with me. I was just a little jump-start, that’s all. The progress should all be attributed to you.”

  I look away. “Which is exactly right. Now I’m a mess. I don’t know where my life is doing. And I’m so scared you’ll wake up one day and not want me anymore.”

  “I think you’re scared of the opposite,” he says, and I tilt my head as he continues. “I think you’re afraid this thing is forever. And you don’t know what to do with forever. You’re only used to right now.”

  I just let my shoulders fall. “I don’t even know what I want or don’t want anymore. I’m nowhere.”

  “No. You’re here. With me. And you need to stop running.” He meets me dead in the eye. “Adam. I would give anything…I would do anything in the world to make you look in the mirror and accept what you see. And feel. Fully, without reservations.”

  “Don’t make it sound so bad. I’m so much closer than I ever was. I didn’t even know I hated myself before. You brought it all out. Now I just want to get to the finish line. I want to wake up in the morning and be fully, totally okay with what I feel. And I don’t know if that will ever happen if I’m…living the life I live right now.”