Chapter 17
SAMUEL
Icouldn't breathe.
The hallway walls pressed in, the air too thick, too heavy.
My chest heaved with sobs I couldn't control, couldn't stop.
Everything President Dalton had said echoed in my skull—serious sin, eternal consequences, your family, your future—and underneath it all, the question he'd asked three different ways.
Did Elder Vance pressure you? Manipulate you? Take advantage of your faith?
He'd offered me an exit. A clean narrative.
The golden boy led astray by the faithless companion.
I could almost hear how it would sound in my disciplinary council back home—He struggled with unwanted attractions, tried desperately to overcome them through faithful service, but his companion exploited his vulnerability.
I'd told President Dalton no. Told him the truth. That Eli hadn't forced me, hadn't coerced me, that I'd wanted everything we'd done. That I'd gone to his bed that night and kissed him first.
President Dalton had written it all down with his careful, measured strokes. Then asked the questions again, differently. But he initiated the first physical contact, didn't he? He told you the Church was wrong about homosexuality? He encouraged you to act on your feelings?
And I'd said yes. Because those things were true. But not the way President Dalton meant them. Not as manipulation. As—as love.
The door opened.
Eli walked out.
My head snapped up. Our eyes met for half a heartbeat, and I saw something in his face that made my stomach drop. A resolution. A terrible, final calm.
He looked at me like he was memorizing me. Like he'd never see me again.
Then he kept walking, following Sister Roig down the hallway toward the conference rooms.
No.
I wanted to stand, to call after him, but President Dalton stood in the doorway.
"Elder Price. Come back inside, please."
I stumbled back into the office. President Dalton closed the door and returned to his desk, his expression grave.
"Elder Price, I've spoken with Elder Vance about what happened between you."
My throat closed. "What did he say?"
"He's taken full responsibility for initiating the sexual contact.
For manipulating you emotionally and spiritually.
" President Dalton's voice gentled. "He admitted to exploiting your vulnerability, to telling you the Church's doctrine was wrong, to persistently pursuing you despite your attempts to resist."
The room tilted.
No. No, that's not—
"Elder Vance has a troubled record," President Dalton continued.
"Multiple companion conflicts in Madrid.
Reports of disobedience and lack of commitment.
And now this—a deliberate seduction of a faithful companion.
" He paused. "I want you to understand, Elder Price, that while you bear responsibility for your choices, there are mitigating factors here.
You were targeted by someone who had no intention of honouring his covenants with the Lord. "
"That's not true." My voice came out strangled. "He didn't—he didn't manipulate me. I went to him. I wanted—"
"Elder Price." President Dalton's tone firmed.
"I know you feel loyalty to your companion.
That's only natural. But Elder Vance has confessed to seducing you.
To wearing down your resistance over time.
To telling you things about the Church and its doctrine that directly contradicted your testimony, to weaken your commitment. "
Eli had said that. Had confessed to seducing me.
He'd lied. Taken the blame. Made himself the sexual predator so I could be the victim.
"He's protecting me," I whispered.
"No." President Dalton leaned forward. "He's accepting the consequences of his actions. As he should."
My hands shook in my lap. Because I understood now what Eli had done. What he'd sacrificed. He'd painted himself as the villain—the faithless, predatory companion—so the Area Presidency would go easier on me. So I'd have a path back to the Light.
He'd destroyed himself to save me.
"Elder Vance will be sent home tomorrow morning," President Dalton said. "His case will be referred to his stake president for Church discipline. Given the severity of his actions, excommunication is likely."
Excommunication. The word landed like a stone in my chest. Not just sent home. Completely cut off. Cast out.
"Your situation is different," President Dalton continued. "You've admitted to serious sin, and there will be consequences. But your record of faithful service, your genuine remorse, and the coercive nature of Elder Vance's pursuit—these are factors the Area Presidency will consider."
"I wasn't coerced." The words scraped out. "I chose—"
"You were manipulated by someone you trusted.
Someone who held authority as your senior companion.
" President Dalton's voice gentled again.
"Elder Price, same-sex attraction is a difficult trial.
One of the adversary's most cunning deceptions.
You've been fighting it faithfully. But Elder Vance told you to stop fighting.
Told you to give in. That's spiritual abuse. "
I wanted to scream. To flip the desk. To tell President Dalton that Eli was the only person who'd ever told me I wasn't broken, wasn't damned, wasn't a mistake God needed to fix.
But the machinery had already started grinding. The narrative was set. And if I fought it now—if I insisted Eli hadn't manipulated me—we'd both be destroyed in its gears and machinations.
Eli had known that. Had taken the fall anyway.
"I'll be consulting with the Area Presidency about your case," President Dalton said. "In the meantime, you'll be transferred to a new companion. Someone who can help you rebuild your spiritual foundation."
"Where?"
"You'll companion with Elder Kempton. He's returning to Barcelona proper after his companion, Elder Torres, goes home next week. You'll move into his apartment and serve there for the remainder of your mission."
Kempton. The district leader who'd searched our apartment. Who'd found the evidence. Who looked at me now with barely concealed disgust.
"Elder Kempton is a faithful, obedient missionary," President Dalton continued. "He'll provide the spiritual leadership you need right now. Help you refocus on the work."
I nodded numbly.
"You'll return to your current apartment tonight to pack your belongings. Elder Kempton will accompany you. Tomorrow morning, he'll bring you to his area, and you'll begin serving there."
"And Eli—Elder Vance?"
"Will remain in the conference room here until his flight tomorrow. You will not see him again. You will not speak to him. Is that understood?"
"Yes."
But my mind was screaming. Because Eli was down the hall right now, alone, believing he'd saved me. Believing his sacrifice had been worth it.
And I'd never get to tell him the truth—that without him, I was already dead.
Elder Kempton didn't speak during the metro ride back to the apartment.
He sat across from me in the rocking car, his posture rigid, his scriptures open in his lap. Reading. Or pretending to read. I couldn't tell.
I stared at the dark window, watching my reflection flicker and distort. I looked like a stranger. Empty eyes. Slack mouth. A missionary-shaped shell with nothing inside.
The apartment felt wrong when we entered. Too quiet. Too empty.
Eli's sketchbook sat on the kitchen table. His jacket hung on the back of his chair. His toothbrush stood in the cup by the sink, next to mine.
Kempton pulled two duffel bags from the hall closet and handed me one.
"Pack everything," he said. "We're not coming back."
I moved mechanically into the bedroom, glancing at Eli's carefully made bed where we had…
I looked away.
My clothes went into the duffel bag. My scriptures. My journal. The items laid out on my desk—the photo of my family, the baptism date calendar, the nametag I'd worn for eighteen months.
Elder Price.
I didn't feel like Elder Price anymore. I felt like Samuel. Bare and exposed and drowning.
Kempton appeared in the doorway. “We need to pack his things too. President Dalton wants them brought to the office. Elder Vance will take them with him tomorrow."
My hands stilled on my scriptures. "I can pack them."
"I'll do it." Kempton's voice was clipped. "You're too emotionally compromised."
He moved to Eli's side of the room and began pulling clothes from the drawers, folding them with sharp, angry precision. Like touching Eli's things contaminated him.
"He manipulated you," Kempton said without looking up. "You know that, right? Elder Vance is a sexual predator and deviant. He saw your faith and your dedication and decided to take pleasure in destroying it."
I said nothing.
"I tried to warn you." Kempton shoved a stack of shirts into Eli's bag. "Told President Dalton weeks ago that Elder Vance was spiritually dangerous. But no one listened. And now look what's happened."
He pulled open Eli's nightstand drawer. Froze.
"What is this?"
He held up a small sketchbook—not the one on the kitchen table, but a smaller one. Private.
Kempton flipped it open. His face went white, then red.
"Did you know he was drawing these?"
He turned the sketchbook toward me.
The pages were filled with me. Sketches of my face in profile during scripture study. My hands folded in prayer. My eyes, rendered in careful detail, with an expression I'd never seen in a mirror—soft and unguarded and full of something that looked like hope.
The last page showed me sleeping. My face peaceful, my hair falling across my forehead, my lips slightly parted.
Eli had drawn me the morning after we'd first kissed. Had sat on his bed and sketched me while I slept, unaware.
"This is obsessive," Kempton said. "Predatory. He was stalking you."
"He wasn't—"
"He was documenting his conquest." Kempton's voice rose. "This is evidence, Elder Price. Evidence of his manipulation. President Dalton needs to see this."
He snapped the sketchbook closed and shoved it into his own bag—not Eli's.
"Wait—"
"You don't get to protect him." Kempton turned on me. "I know you feel confused right now. Conflicted. That's what predators do—they make their victims feel complicit. But you're not. You're a faithful elder who was targeted by someone who had no business being on a mission."
My chest tightened. Because that was the narrative. The one Eli had created with his lies. The one President Dalton had seized on. The one that would save me and destroy him.
And there was nothing I could do to fight it. Because fighting meant admitting the truth—that I'd wanted everything we'd done. That I loved him.
That losing him was going to kill me.
Kempton's apartment was smaller than ours. One bedroom with two narrow beds, a kitchen the size of a closet, a bathroom with a broken fan.
"You'll sleep there." Kempton pointed to the bed against the far wall. "We wake at 5:30 for prayer and study. Breakfast at 6:15. We leave for our area at 7:00 sharp."
I dropped my duffel on the bed.
"Mission rules will be followed exactly," Kempton continued. "No exceptions. No gray areas. You'll be with me at all times. We'll study together, eat together, work together. I'll be monitoring your spiritual progress daily and reporting to President Dalton weekly."
I was a prisoner. A child who needed constant supervision to keep from sinning again.
"Do you understand?"
"Yes."
Kempton's expression softened slightly—not with kindness, but with pity. "I know this is hard, Elder Price. But this is your chance to repent. To rebuild your testimony and your relationship with the Heavenly Father. Don't waste it."
He pulled out his scriptures and settled on his bed. "We'll study the Law of Chastity tonight. Start rebuilding your spiritual foundation."
I opened my scriptures. Stared at the words without seeing them.
Somewhere across the city, Eli sat alone in a conference room, waiting for a flight that would take him home in disgrace. Waiting to face a disciplinary council that would excommunicate him. Waiting to lose everything.
Because of me.
Because he'd loved me enough to lie.
That night, I lay in the unfamiliar bed and stared at the ceiling.
Kempton snored softly across the room. The streetlight outside cast shadows on the wall—shifting, restless shapes that reminded me of nothing.
I thought about the sketchbook Kempton had confiscated. The drawings of me—sleeping, studying, praying. The evidence of Eli's "obsession."
But I'd seen his face when he drew. The softness in his eyes. The small smile that tugged at his lips when he captured something just right.
He hadn't been documenting a conquest. He'd been trying to hold onto something beautiful in a mission that had given him nothing but loneliness and shame.
He'd been drawing hope.
And I'd let them take it from him.
I rolled onto my side, facing the wall. Pressed my fist against my mouth to muffle the sob building in my chest.
President Dalton had said there was a path forward for me. A way to salvage my mission, my future, my family's expectations.
All it required was accepting the narrative. Playing the victim. Letting Eli be destroyed so I could be saved.
I thought about the last look we'd shared in the hallway. The way he'd memorized my face like he was saying goodbye.
He'd known what he was doing. Had chosen it deliberately.
Had loved me enough to sacrifice everything.
The least I could do was survive it.
Even if survival felt like drowning.