Unfollow

by Megan Phelps-Roper

  It was early evening, but the sun was still hot, the extreme humidity of our Kansas summer still stifling. I found him sitting in the shade of the apartment building when I pulled into the parking lot. It was late July by then, and I was halfway through a fourteen-mile ride; beads of sweat were forming and falling all over my skin, deeply tanned that far into the season. I got off my bike and sat down on the curb next to him. We talked for a minute. I showed him photos of the results of my own amateur attempts with the curling iron. He laughed and then stood up and said we should go inside where it was cool. I demurred, my heart pounding steadily in my ears. It felt like the world was moving in slow motion.

  Just then, the other salesman darted outside and teasingly grabbed my little black backpack, absconding with it back into the apartment. It was a flirtatious move, but I protested angrily—my phone and wallet were in there, and I couldn’t leave without it. I followed them into the apartment, the corrosive acid in my stomach seeming to multiply with each step until I thought I would vomit. The blast of air conditioning that hit me when I walked in was welcome, immediately bringing goose bumps to my skin, but it was almost completely dark inside. The lights were off and the curtains drawn, so it took my eyes a minute to adjust from the brightness outside. His roommate had thrown my bag into his bedroom, so I followed him there. He sat on the bed. I pleaded with him to just give me the bag, but he insisted I sit down next to him, facing him. I sat. He said sweet things I wanted to believe—that I was beautiful, that he cared about me—and then tried to kiss me. I evaded awkwardly, tucking into myself and bringing my arms up as if to protect my face.

  No. I could not cross this line.

  He tried again, and again I evaded. I stood up. He gave me my bag. I let him hug me. We walked outside. He hugged me again. And then I was off.

  I biked straight home feeling sick and shaky and tortured with guilt. I cried as I rode, overcome with shame and panic that God would curse me for what I’d done. I had let my whole family down. My parents. The church. Myself. I was no longer unsullied. It wasn’t just my actions that were so exceedingly sinful; it was the indefensible thoughts that had led me to them. But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. According to Jesus, the fact that I’d had those feelings in the first place made me guilty of adultery.

  I felt broken, but I tried to clean myself up as best I could, to pretend like nothing had happened. When he emailed a few days later—“You don’t understand how I think about you all day long.”—I couldn’t stand it anymore. I showed the message to my mom and begged for help and forgiveness. She was understanding and kind, but I thought I saw doubt in her eyes when I explained that I’d only hugged him twice, that I hadn’t done anything else (why would I feel so guilty and afraid if that was all we’d done?), and that pained me all the more. She sat down beside me and read me a passage from the book of Isaiah: Neither let the eunuch say, Behold, I am a dry tree. For thus saith the LORD unto the eunuchs that keep my sabbaths, and choose the things that please me, and take hold of my covenant; Even unto them will I give in mine house and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and of daughters: I will give them an everlasting name, that shall not be cut off. My mama wasn’t excusing my behavior, but she was trying to tell me that she understood, trying to help me find comfort in the very likely scenario that I would be a “eunuch” for the rest of my life, trying to help me see that having a place in the house of God—His church—was better than having a husband or sons or daughters. She was preparing me to accept that this was a sacrifice I might be required to make for the kingdom of God’s sake, as several of my aunts had been called to do. I squeezed her hand and cried quietly, something I found myself doing each time I encountered that verse thereafter, without ever quite knowing why—just a nebulous, fleeting sense of loss that I neglected to pursue.

  It was even worse when my oldest brother, Sam, called to talk to me. He’s seven years older than me, and I’d always admired and looked up to him as a near-perfect example of a true servant of God. He kindly chided me, and told me that I couldn’t pursue this. That by wanting something that God hadn’t given me, I was murmuring against Him. That the people in the Bible who’d murmured against God had been destroyed. That I needed to get back to single-hearted fidelity to God and put away this sin. Whether or not I ever got married was God’s decision alone, Sam reminded me. If He chose not to give me a husband, then I should be thankful, because then it would be my happy lot to serve Him without being encumbered by the cares of this life. He reminded me of the Apostle’s words: The unmarried woman careth for the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit: but she that is married careth for the things of the world, how she may please her husband. We don’t get to be mad at God for not giving us what we want, Sam said. How dare we? God is Perfect, Sovereign, and Just—and we are His to do with as He pleases.

  Of course it was true, all of it. I knew all the words by heart. Sam was right, and I was so grateful to my big brother for bringing them to my remembrance, for helping guide me back to sanity and away from sin.

  We got past it. I didn’t bike by myself anymore. Of my own accord, I installed a tracking app on my phone so that I could show my mom where I’d gone if I ever had to leave the house unaccompanied. I wanted to be on the strait and narrow path Jesus spoke of, the one to salvation and eternal life. I wanted to prove—to myself and to my family—that I wasn’t going to continue down a path that would lead me to Hell and destruction. I would pray, and the Lord would help me. I would be vigilant. I would stay close to home. I would avoid going anywhere alone. I would keep my distance from anyone who could trip me up.

  I would be safe.

  * * *

  My phone vibrated briefly and played the already-familiar trill of the Words With Friends tone. I glanced at the screen and read the notification, though I knew what it said:

  “Your move!”

  It’s vaguely suggestive, which I noted and then pretended I hadn’t—as I had every day for the past week we’d been playing. It happened the same way each day: there was no play during the daylight hours, and then at some point in the evening, he’d make a move in the game and we’d start to chat. He’d question me about theology, ask me to explain more about the pickets and verses I’d posted on Twitter that day, and make vague references to his life as a “country lawyer.” I’d answer his questions, describe Westboro’s history and doctrines, and tell him about walking out of the Kansas City premiere of Kevin Smith’s film Red State. (Smith had taken to Twitter to invite me to review the Westboro-inspired film onstage after the showing, and my parents had agreed to allow it. But when we caught sight of two former church members—including my brother Josh, whom I hadn’t seen in seven years—my mom sensed a setup and the whole group of us bailed.) We made our moves so quickly that we’d get through an entire game each night, and then begin again with a new game the next evening.

  In all our conversations, I was careful to maintain propriety; I still knew absolutely nothing for certain about this man—including whether he even was a man. I was hyper-aware that he could be a journalist or otherwise trying to entrap me, to trick me into revealing some titillating piece of information about “The Most Hated Family in America.” I wasn’t terribly worried about this possibility, though; I wrote everything with the assumption that it could be published in a newspaper—exactly as I would respond on Twitter, but without the 140-character limit. “If you ever have a question about whether it’s appropriate to say something,” my mother always said, “just add the word judge to the end of it—as if you were addressing a judge in the middle of a courtroom.” I took my mom’s advice to heart, but I was still amazed at how quickly I had fallen into this pattern with my anonymous friend—and in complete denial about how much I was coming to crave my interactions with him.

  There was also something illusory about talking with a person who wa
s faceless and (presumably) far away. Before Twitter, friendship with outsiders had always been easy to avoid; I’d chat with classmates during school, but since there was no interaction outside of that, the relationships always fizzled. All I’d ever had to do was keep a little distance from them, and outsiders would always be at arm’s length, never close enough to hurt me. And when physical separation failed, like at the salesman’s apartment that summer day, I was still mostly protected; as a child, I had donned guilt, shame, and fear—of God, of Hell, of the church—and I wore them like an impenetrable cloak that could never be shed.

  But this was not like that. It felt different. Is it even real when half of the conversation comes from a person completely shrouded in shadow? Is it real when the words themselves and all evidence of their existence disappear forever after just a few hours? Lying prone on my bed in my pajamas, perched on my elbows with phone in hand, it was easy to believe that it was not—that the vast distance between us made me safe.

  Distance, as I would come to learn, is a relative concept in matters of the heart.

  * * *

  “You’re too much.”

  It became a frequent refrain of his, and one that I adored (vastly superior to the other expression he was so fond of: “You’re okay.”). After playing and chatting for a few weeks, I understood this saying to mean that my attention to detail and ridiculous enthusiasm at the most insignificant of occurrences were a joy to him—or, as he’d put it himself a few times, “I love the way your mind works.” This was a shock, and touched me in ways I could not have anticipated. I’d been getting in trouble all my life for talking too much and too fast, rambling on and on about subjects and ideas that almost no one else cared about—but this anonymous stranger wanted to hear them. Which is how I ended up telling him silly stories like:

  “This morning I was trying to think of an economic principle to describe a situation. I learned it in Microecon, but couldn’t remember the name of the principle. Eventually, I did. I just got to my bed and found an exam from Microecon. The one with the answer I was looking for (principle of diminishing marginal utility). Haven’t seen this in 5 years, and have no idea how it got here. No one even knew I was looking for the answer. Weird stuff!”

  As much as I enjoyed sharing my stories with him, I wanted to hear his stories, too—but it seemed hopeless. I was already consumed with curiosity, and his refusals to open up just made me all the more determined. Since he always balked when I asked questions—especially ones that might reveal more of his identity—I stopped asking (or at least reduced my questions by half; I was truly desperate, though I couldn’t allow myself to admit it). It was clear that my fear that he was an insidious deceiver had a twin: his fear that our friendship—the deepest friendship I’d ever had outside of Westboro—would reflect poorly on him if it became known in his small community. I realized I just had to be patient and not too probing, to let him share what he wanted when he wanted.

  “Do you play an instrument?” I asked him one day.

  “No, but I have DirecTV.”

  I found him ridiculously clever.

  As the weeks and then months passed, my patience paid off. In addition to the information I’d already gleaned, I discovered that he was from a very small town (though not in Nebraska, I was relieved to learn; I still harbored many hard feelings for the state after police officers in Bellevue arrested my mother for lawfully protesting). I knew he was somewhat older than my twenty-five years—early thirties, I guessed. His family had always had a farm, but his parents were professionals: a social worker and a nursing professor. His only sibling, a brother, lived in Chicago with his wife and three children. His family was of Norwegian descent, and he was very tall, with blond hair and blue eyes. I even got part of his name: his initials, C.G. His fear of being connected to WBC made even more sense when I discovered that he was an elected official. I didn’t like his reticence, but I could see where he was coming from.

  Most of our discussions revolved around Westboro and theology, which he wasn’t terribly familiar with. I tried to educate him, but no matter how tenaciously I defended our positions, he just couldn’t get past some of them—especially the funeral protests. “But what about the family?” he would press me. My answer to this question sounded more and more hollow as time went by, but I refused to admit how uneasy—almost guilty—this line of questioning was making me feel. I argued the position I’d believed since I was a kid: that the definition of love was “truth,” and that any expression of truth was, by definition, loving. Truth was love regardless of context, target, or tone—even when it involved holding a sign that read THANK GOD FOR DEAD SOLDIERS on the sidewalk near a military funeral, while singing praises to the homemade bombs that killed them. C.G. strongly disagreed, and it became a point of contention that came up more often than the rest of his objections. When I wanted to talk about commandments and truth, C.G. was focused on humility, gentleness, compassion. To him, our message and methods clearly lacked these qualities—no matter how truthful we believed our words to be.

  I’ve commented on the signs/picketing several times. You’ve never given quarter to any real discussion. (They’re biblically supported, etc.) I’ve said and continue to believe that it’s just BS designed to gather attention. I understand that you need attention to deliver your message; however, I’ve never encountered a family as intelligent or creative as yours.

  You are carrying those signs because of circumstances 20 years ago in a city park and subsequent momentum.

  You can do better.

  I had been raised to view life as a battle between good and evil, and I knew that every person fit into one of those two categories. “There is only Jacob or Esau! Elect or reprobate!” as my mother would say. C.G. didn’t see it that way. He suggested a third group: people who were decent, but not religious. Why would God condemn people who had lived decently in the world? In truth, C.G. seemed to find shades of nuance and complexity in every situation—even when it meant reversing himself on opinions he’d previously expressed in strong terms. I found this tendency perplexing at first—as if I could never know for sure what he was really thinking—but I soon came to admire this quality, too. He was always reevaluating, never so committed to a position that he couldn’t assimilate new evidence.

  As I came to appreciate him more and more, it became distressing to hear of his distress. When Amy Winehouse passed away that summer, my family celebrated: she was a whore and a drug addict, and her death was God’s punishment. But like so many others who filled my Twitter feed, C.G. lamented her early demise—a tragic loss of life and the beauty that her immense talent had brought into the world. How very young twenty-seven was. When a far-right terrorist murdered seventy-seven in a car bombing of Oslo and subsequent attack on a youth summer camp, church members rejoiced again. “My entire Facebook wall is shattered Norwegian innocence,” C.G. told me. He simply could not imagine telling the parents of murdered children to PRAY FOR MORE DEAD KIDS. I insisted to C.G. that God was good and that all His judgments were righteous. I quoted verses wherein God laughs at the calamity of unbelievers because they rejected Him. Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded; I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh. But watching my family track the rising body count with glee, I felt mournful.

  The truth was that I had started to feel sad in response to tragedies even when C.G. wasn’t there to prompt me. On Twitter, I came across a photo-essay about a famine in Somalia, bursting into tears at the sight of the first image: a tiny emaciated child. My mother heard and immediately walked over to my desk, asking what was wrong. I pointed to the photo on my screen and shook my head. “Would you send me that link, hon?” she said eagerly, “I’m going to write a GodSmack about it!” The disparity between my response and my mother’s gave me pause, but she didn’t seem to notice. She was already caught up in composing a celebratory blog post. In the past, this discrepancy would have made m
e wonder what was wrong with me, but now I thought of the prophet Elisha, weeping at his prophecy of the destruction of Israel. As I watched my mother’s fingers fly over the keys, a small part of me began to wonder if there was something wrong with Westboro.

  I couldn’t acknowledge any of this to C.G., of course, or even to myself. Instead I quoted Bible verses and insisted that he needed to stop substituting his judgments for God’s.

  When our discussions became thorny like this, as they inevitably did, he directed us back to music, books, movies. He introduced me to David Foster Wallace and Norwegian cookies, writer and comedian Jake Fogelnest, and the music of John Roderick, Blind Pilot, the Avett Brothers, and Foster the People. They became special to me for the simple fact that they’d come from him, but I also discovered that I really enjoyed them, too. I didn’t want to forget anything he told me, so I started recording everything in a Field Notes Brand notebook—the notebook itself being another item he’d introduced me to. He was a hipster through and through—I’d never known one before—and I quickly came to love all things I-heard-about-this-cool-new-group-months-ago. I was saturated in his digital presence, even though we were worlds apart.

  Throughout it all, we approached each other with the deliberate caution one might employ in the presence of a dangerous, frightened animal; a single false step could be one’s undoing, or it might send the beast hightailing it into obscurity, never to exploit another Triple Word Score again. This sense that so much was at stake with each word was unwavering, almost palpable, and the thrill of it was combustible. There was no thought of speaking openly or directly about any feelings we might be developing, because to do so would be to acknowledge that this was about more than just God, and that would mean the end of it. And yet the subtext was always there, simmering just beneath conscious thought; I saw it, and I refused to see it, limerence disguised by equivocation and the purposefully easy cadence of our conversations. It was in the words we chose to deploy on the game board (“UNREQUITED”). It was in the songs and lyrics we shared (I’ve put no one else above us / We’ll still be best friends when all turns to dust). It was in the way we mocked each other with doting nicknames masquerading as insults (“circus monkey,” “old man”). It was in the literary quotes we presented without comment or preamble (“I am also inclined to overuse the word ‘old,’ which actually has less to do with age, as it seems to me, than it does with familiarity. It sets a thing apart as something regarded with a modest, habitual affection. Sometimes it suggests haplessness or vulnerability. I say ‘old Boughton,’ I say ‘this shabby old town,’ and I mean that they are very near my heart”). We were offering the words of writers and journalists, musicians and comedians, in order to convey what fear and decorum prevented us from saying ourselves.