Vicarious

by Jon F. Merz

  “Thanks goodness there’s some good folks like us around, huh?”

  Lauren looked uncomfortable. “Yes.”

  Curran eyed her. “You okay?”

  She started to nod but then stopped and looked up at him instead. “Steve. We need to talk.”

  Curran’s stomach dropped. “Something tells me this isn’t going to go down on my list of all-time favorite conversations.”

  She smiled weakly. “After everything we’ve been through. After everything that…happened. Now more than ever…I need to continue on with my plans.”

  “You mean entering the Church.”

  “Yes.”

  “I feel like some love struck fool.” Curran sighed. “What about us?”

  “Steve,” she held his hand. “What happened between us was probably the single greatest event of my life. Your love for me was the most sincere display that any man has ever demonstrated. I didn’t think that was possible. I didn’t think I could ever love a man. Not after what happened in my life.”

  She squeezed his hand. “But you showed me that I could.”

  “You fell in love with me?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “But you’re still going to become a nun.”

  “Steve. I know this won’t be easy for you to understand. But there’s more to this world than just the two of us.”

  “Two of us seems a pretty good place to start, Lauren.”

  She nodded. “But we wouldn’t stay that way. Don’t you see? You’re a cop, Steve. A good cop. And you won’t put your badge down. I wouldn’t ask you to. You’re needed on the streets. You’re needed to go after the bad and evil people out there breaking the law. You help restore justice in this world.”

  “And what would you do?”

  “I can help fight evil, too, Steve. But in my own way. I can’t do it by being your girlfriend or even your wife. I can’t do it out here. I can’t help the cause of goodness out in the world as an ordinary citizen. But I can do it in the service of the Church. As a nun, I can help fight evil in a spiritual sense.”

  “Darius told me you were one of the most benevolent souls in the world.”

  Lauren smiled. “I’m not that presumptuous.”

  “But it’s true.”

  “Maybe it is. That’s not for me to say.”

  Curran looked around the room, suddenly aware of the growing lump in his throat. “I don’t want to let you go, Lauren. You brought my life a sense of happiness I haven’t felt in a long time.”

  “And you helped restore my life, Steve. But we have a chance to take that goodness and spread it around to other people now. If we kept it for just ourselves, it wouldn’t be right.”

  “Feels like it would be.”

  “It’s wishful thinking, Steve. We’d get bored after a while. Each of us would be too busy trying to make the other one feel better that we’d lose our focus. We each have a path to take. Mine is in the service of the Church. I need to go follow that path now.”

  “You love me, though. And…I love you.”

  She nodded. “And nothing will ever change how I feel about you, Steve. I’ll always love you. But I can’t live my life beside you. I have to live it in spite of you.”

  Curran’s face felt hot. He looked at her. “I don’t know if I’ll ever stop loving you.”

  She smiled and squeezed his hand. “I have to go now.”

  He started to stand, but she stopped him. “Don’t. Just let me go. It will be easier this way.”

  “No,” he said. “It won’t.”

  She looked at him for a long time. “No. Probably not.” She stood, leaned over him and kissed him lightly on the lips. “I’ll always love you, too, Steve. Never forget that.”

  And then she was gone.

  He watched her leave and then waited five minutes.

  Outside, the rain was gone. He looked up at the night sky and saw a few bright stars stand out among the brilliant haze of the city lights. Was it worth it to make a wish on one of them?

  He almost grinned. Why not?

  Maybe some day he and Lauren would get together after all. All he needed was a little faith.

  A breeze swept over him.

  But Steve Curran no longer shivered.

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  -Jon F. Merz

  March 2012