Happily Ever After

by Jenn Faulk

~Cammie~

  “So, Paul Connor is gone, thankfully.”

  Camille heard his voice and turned around to get a good look at him.

  His hair was still a little wet, evidence that he’d hurried out here to her. He’d thrown on a T shirt and some jeans, giving definition to all the parts of him that were so different than the weird little guy she’d grown up alongside. He smelled so good. She barely refrained from closing her eyes, leaning up against him and taking in a long, slow whiff.

  And his face? Clean-shaven and handsome enough to send her pulse racing.

  So weird. So, so weird, feeling like this.

  He smiled at her, as if he could hear all that she would never say. That just made her heart beat faster.

  “I always liked Paul Connor,” she said, taking a breath with the joke.

  “Well, glory be, Cammie Evans,” David drawled, imitating his father perfectly. Wow, Camille could remember Paul Connor saying that to her when he’d ask her something about the sermon over lunch at the pastor’s house, when she’d answer correctly, and when he’d gesture to her as if to say someone got it.

  She had. She always had.

  “Glory be,” Camille said right back to David.

  “You liked him,” he noted. “He was likeable some of the time, at least.”

  “But as far as Connor men went,” she said, “I always liked you best.”

  “Bull,” David said after a long moment.

  “Okay, maybe not,” she laughed. “Not back then, at least. But I do now. And I’m glad to see that face instead of Paul Connor’s.”

  He had no idea just how glad she was to see him, every day of her life here.

  “Well, I’m honored,” he said with an exaggerated bow.

  “And you smell better than you ever did back when you were twelve,” she smiled, looking back down at the meal she’d been making.

  “Though I didn’t thirty minutes ago,” he said. “You never know how dirty you get out there until you come back to modern plumbing.”

  “Hmm,” she murmured, watching him from the corner of her eye, like she did so often these days.

  “You can shower here if you’d like,” he said. “If you’ll excuse all the sand I left all over the place back there.”

  “I’ll be content to just get my laundry done,” she said. “After we eat.”

  “Fajitas,” he said, grinning, leaning over her shoulder to watch what she did.

  Him, this close... thrilling. She closed her eyes and shook her head just a little at the surprise of this, a smile still playing on her lips. The temptation to just lean up, brush her lips across his cheek –

  “What can I do to help?” he asked, completely without a clue.

  “Um... help me carry it all to the table, huh?” she said softly, forcing her mind back to where it needed to be.

  And he took care of it all for her, somehow managing to pull out her chair at the table for her, even with his arms full. As soon as they were seated, he reached out for her hand and prayed over the meal, just like he’d done all the other times before.

  He mentioned the student he’d been talking with earlier, praying for him to think on these things, asking God to move in his heart even more, and saying, above all, that he would trust the work to the Lord. Like always.

  “Amen,” Camille said, even as David gestured for her to fix her plate first. “Eager to see how it all unfolds with him.”

  David grinned. “Yeah, and with all the girls you were always in such deep conversation with this weekend. I’d come by to see what was going on, and they’d all stop talking as soon as they saw me. David Connor, conversation killer.”

  “Just Elizabeth and Esther, being girls,” Camille said, thinking of the two girls and the drama going on with them.

  “What was up?” he asked, reaching over to begin his plate as well. “I mean, if it’s not so serious that you’ve been sworn to silence.”

  “You know how girls work,” Camille chided.

  “Two sisters,” he said. “I’m practically a girl myself.”

  Not quite, Camille thought, watching him serve himself a huge helping of everything she’d set aside for this meal.

  “Well, I can share with you as long as I can stay vague,” she said. “Boy problems.”

  “Boys are generally a problem,” David nodded at this, falsified wisdom in his voice.

  Camille thought of the problem, that the boys these girls were around weren’t saved, weren’t born again, weren’t living for the Lord. How they knew it was a problem, dreaming about a future with a godly man when godly men seemed to be in such short supply. Even with the group that David was leading, the church that they were seeing grow, the boys were less serious about the faith than the girls were.

  It was just that way sometimes.

  Boy, did Camille ever know that.

  Well... she had. But ever since that first night at that party, David confronting her with his guitar on his back, real sincerity in his eyes even as he’d said difficult things, she’d seen differently.

  Godly men weren’t in such short supply after all. Not here, at least. Not when it came to David and who he was, who she’d seen him be all these months. In every encounter, every relationship, every word of Scripture shared here in his ministry and in his life, she’d seen the godliness in him.

  When she wasn’t trying to prove a point about women on the mission field or her own capabilities, she was content to work alongside him. He valued her opinion, looked to her as an equal, and didn’t ever talk down to her. The natural and shocking outcome to that had been that she’d followed him gladly when he’d taken up leadership, when decisions had to be made, when everyone was looking for someone to give direction, someone to speak truth from Scripture.

  She looked to David, too. And she was so surprised to find that there was tenderness in the way he led, in the way he ministered even to her here, and how he had somehow become her pastor over the last few months.

  She hadn’t said one word since that first night about men and women, about their roles in ministry, or tried to reason away Scripture about it all.

  She’d simply done the work of the ministry that she’d been called to do, comforted to find that it was under David’s watch as well, and that he looked out for her in ways she hadn’t known she wanted someone to.

  He was, very frankly, changing all of her opinions. And her world, if she was honest about it all. It was no wonder that she had feelings for him now that exceeded anything she would have thought possible.

  “What did you tell them?” he asked, his mouth full. And she found herself smiling, thinking about him talking with his mouth full so many times when she’d gone over to the Connor house for dinner, and he’d spent the whole meal trying to keep her attention.

  Hey, Cammie, so are you going to the movies with the youth group next weekend? Me, too! Maybe we can sit next to each other on the van ride over there, huh?

  That boy... grown up into the godliest man she’d ever known.

  How strange. And wonderful, of course.

  David reached for a napkin, remembering his manners, even as he swallowed and wiped his mouth. “My bad,” he murmured. “But it’s fajitas. I can’t help myself.”

  “You’re fine,” she said.

  “So, the girls,” he prompted. “What did you tell them about problematic boys?”

  “I told them,” she said, “that this is not the time in life to be concerned about boys. That they have a whole long list of other things that should be taking priority. School, serving Christ, becoming the best women they can be for His purposes.”

  “Sounds like good advice,” David nodded.

  She took a breath at this. “I could hear my parents even as I was saying it, though, you know,” she said softly.

  At this, he looked up at her. “Did they say that?”

  “Oh, yeah,” she answered around the bite she’d taken. “Go to college. Get a degree. Get a job. Take care of yourself
. Then, Cammie, then look around and see who’s walking the walk right alongside you.”

  David watched her for a long moment. “Well, that’s great advice.”

  “Must have been,” she sighed, “because I took it to heart. And I did everything they said to do.”

  She thought about how she had. About how she’d done everything right and how it hadn’t changed what she wanted. She thought of Chelsea, about how critical her parents had been of her young marriage, the choices she’d made because of Kyle, and how every negative word had made an impact. Not on Chelsea, who was happy, but on Camille, who heard their words, who began to see things like marriage and having a family as secondary, as not as spiritual, as something she shouldn’t want if God alone was enough.

  She still wasn’t sure how to sort it all out. Especially now, so far from home, still single... sitting across from David, who had her feeling things she wasn’t sure she’d ever felt.

  “You did everything they said?” he asked, taking another bite.

  “Yeah,” she nodded. “College, then right onto the mission field. From one assignment to the next to, and I quote, feel out the possibilities. Meanwhile, my sister rushed right into marriage at eighteen, dropped out of college, started having babies too early… she did everything wrong. And she’s blissfully happy. And I’m here half a world away, wondering what in the world I’m doing with my life.”

  He grinned. “You’re doing great things with your life,” he affirmed. “Changing the world for Christ. I see it every day. See what He’s doing through you.”

  And this felt so inexplicably good, hearing this affirmation.

  “I hope so,” she said softly.

  “But,” he said, “there’s something else.”

  “Something else?” she asked.

  “Something else that you want, obviously.”

  And there was. And she wanted it when she looked at him, more than she wanted it when it was still some unnamed, unknown part of her future.

  David Connor. A future with him in it.

  How crazy was that?

  “What did you want?” he asked.

  She took a breath, ready to be honest. In part, at least.

  “Marriage, family… things that seemed foolish when compared to what I could do for God,” she said. “Which is dumb, isn’t it? As if anything I could do is something He needed from me. Or that He couldn’t have worked through me if I had still gotten everything I wanted.”

  David nodded at this, silent for a long moment. “Could have been,” he said softly. “You’d have been happy, I’m guessing.”

  “Maybe,” she said. “Or not. Because even as I was doing what I should have done by everyone else’s standards, I looked around. I was always available. Chelsea just lucked out and found her happily ever after earlier on. Me? I never did meet anyone. Might have just gone for it if I did, and I’d be no different than her.” She thought of her sister and the home she’d made. “Happy, that is.”

  “You’re not happy?” David asked.

  “Happy enough,” she said. “Happier here than I’ve been anywhere else, that’s for sure.”

  And it was true. And she felt the truth of it even more as David smiled at her.

  “Not that I’m unhappy at all,” she said, trying to explain, “but we all probably have something that could make us happier, don’t we?”

  He nodded at this.

  “Besides,” she said. “I wouldn’t be here if something else had worked out.”

  “And that,” he said, smiling, “has made me happy. You being here.”

  She appreciated this, even as she looked back down at her plate. “Because you got fajitas tonight.”

  “There is that,” he conceded.

  And she laughed along with him.

  “So, no one, huh?” he asked, taking a breath.

  “What?” she asked around another bite.

  “You never met anyone,” he clarified.

  “Dated around a little,” she shrugged, thinking about the few boys in high school, a few more in college. A few dates with some, several with others, and no real relationship, no lasting and meaningful relationship to speak of at all. “Nothing serious, though. Ever.”

  “What about that kid from youth camp?” he asked, looking over at her curiously.

  Kid from youth camp. She was drawing a blank, unable to recall much about him, apart from that last night when he’d made her cry by kissing some other girl, how David had been the one to cheer her up.

  “Jeremy something,” he said.

  “Was that his name?” she asked. “He cheated on me. Last day of youth camp. You were there. You remember his name. That’s better than me, so surely you remembered that little unfortunate detail as well.”

  “I did,” he said. “But, you know, maybe you worked it out.”

  “It wasn’t that serious,” she said.

  “Oh?” he asked, a sparkle in his eye. “Because you told me back then that you were going to go onto the mission field. That he was, too, and that it just might be God’s doing that He had called you both at the same time. God’s very will that you and this boy had gotten together for His glory among the nations.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Oh, that sounds like me, David. Very fatalistic about the will of God.”

  “You were,” he said, still smiling.

  “But that was long before I started delivering fiery edicts about inequality between the sexes in church polity,” she said. “Not too long, though, because I think his moral failure played a big part in my view of men called to ministry.”

  “Way to go, Jeremy,” he said. “Messing things up for the rest of us.”

  “Not you,” she said, smiling over at him. “You were never lumped in with him.”

  He grinned. “So, where did he end up? God’s will for you? Your happily ever after and all?”

  “Haven’t seen him since youth camp,” she said. “As it turns out, those sweet words and kisses weren’t as serious as I thought they were at the time.”

  “You kissed him?” David asked, obviously surprised by this. “I mean, it’s not my business... but you kissed him?”

  “Yeah,” she said, watching him curiously.

  And for a brief moment, David looked like he had back at that youth camp, aghast by her romantic choices, how she was supposedly meant to marry him instead.

  Wow, she hadn’t thought of that conversation in years. But it came back to her as he watched her, that wounded expression on his face, and she could remember very nearly every word David had said that night.

  It struck her as odd, how she couldn’t remember much of anything about Jeremy, but she could remember David so well. Sweaty, squeaky-voiced David, following her around youth camp...

  “Well,” he said softly. “Didn’t realize things got that exciting at youth camp.”

  “Well, I probably shouldn’t have been acting like that,” Camille said, suddenly embarrassed by how easily she’d given her kisses away to a boy she hardly knew. At youth camp, of all places. “It probably would have helped me focus more on what I should have been focusing on if I’d set some better boundaries for myself.”

  “You were plenty focused anyway,” David said, shrugging.

  “Maybe. And it wasn’t all that exciting,” she said. “Teenage boys. And older boys.” She sighed, thinking of how little she felt for all of the men she’d dated, all the men she’d kissed.

  There weren’t many. There hadn’t been many. But David watched her with such sadness even as she said this.

  It made her rethink every last one.

  “Glad and sad, all at the same time to hear that,” he said.

  “To hear what?” she asked.

  “To hear that there was never anyone who left you feeling something exciting,” he said. “You deserved exciting. Still do.” At this, he smiled at her again. “I hope you know that now, grown up Cammie.”

  She looked over at him, her heart warmed by his smile and
by the sentiment. “I’ll bet you’re exciting,” she said softly.

  He raised his eyebrows at this, and she heard, belatedly, how he could have taken what she’d said. What she meant, honestly, but...

  “Well, I mean,” she said, stumbling over her words, “I’m sure you’ve made many girls happy over the years. You grew up just as soon as I left town, so... years and years of you with girls, and...”

  She stopped short, not really liking where she was going with this. David and other girls. Other women. David with anyone but... well, but her...

  Not right, somehow. And disturbing, in and of itself, that she was thinking this.

  “Yeah,” he said, not even noticing her discomfort. “There were girls. Not too many in high school. Late bloomer and all. And I wasn’t sneaking around youth camp, kissing like everyone else apparently, because I was spending all of my time those last two years teaching the junior high group.”

  “Your time was better spent then,” Camille murmured quietly, imagining the David she’d missed out on, learning youth ministry as he did it, while everyone else his age went on with insignificant things.

  “But I dated around in college,” he said. “Seems I wanted the same things you did. Marriage, family. Things that were good. And not,” he said, looking to her to emphasize his point, “things that were unspiritual to hope for.”

  She was more inclined to believe him, each and every day, the longer she stayed single, honestly.

  “Was there anyone special?” she asked. “Back in college?”

  “No,” he said, shaking his head. “And I was serious about Christ and knew that a godly marriage was worth pursuing. So, I did. Took out lots of girls, kept looking for the right one. Never got serious with any of them. Never even kissed any of them.”

  Her eyes widened at this. “Are you serious?”

  “Dead serious,” he said.

  “You’ve never kissed anyone? You’re twenty-five, and you’ve never kissed anyone?”

  “Remember that purity study?” he said, smiling. “That my dad forced me into after...”

  “Yes,” she said, blushing again. “My pink underwear sealed your celibacy. Wow.”

  “Not your underwear, per se,” he laughed. “But... in a way. Kinda. Thank you, Camille.”

  “Well.”

  “I got it,” he shrugged. “Talking through purity with Jay. I got it. I understood I was saving everything for the glory of God. Covenanted to do just that, even before girls got all that interesting to me, honestly. And it made a difference. And if I wasn’t serious about a girl, wasn’t planning on forever with her, I wasn’t going to make any physical overtures towards her. So, I never did. And would you believe,” he said, smiling, “that it makes a difference in what I’m doing here? To be able to speak purity from experience to all of these students who face some really hard issues because of immorality?”

  She could see a difference. Had already seen it many times. He lived what he believed, and it inspired others.

  “So, I’m not very exciting,” he said. “I think that was the word you used.”

  “You,” she said, thinking of David committing himself like this, treating the girls he’d known with such respect, honoring God. “This... propensity to be such a gentleman, to be so godly...” She shook her head at the enormity of it.

  “What?” he asked. “What are you thinking?”

  And she thought of how everything David said lately left her feeling more than she had counted on when she’d joined him here unknowingly.

  “It just makes you sound more exciting,” she breathed, even as he smiled softly at her.