Chapter 3
Ilast three days before I break.
Thursday morning, I drag myself through the routine that's held me together for three years.
Five AM alarm. Running shoes. Out the door before my brain wakes up enough to object.
But today the run stretches to seven miles, not five.
Seven miles trying to outrun the sound she made eating that pie.
Seven miles with her voice from last night's confessional playing on repeat—I only feel real when things are on the edge of disaster—like my subconscious has decided to torture me with a greatest hits album I didn't ask for.
The cold shower afterward is so long my lips turn blue. I stand under the spray counting Mississippi's like a kid playing hide and seek, except what I'm hiding from is the memory of being hard in a confessional while a woman I'd just met described the inside of my soul.
Thirty-eight Mississippi's. That's how long it takes for my body to stop responding to the thought of her saying "fucking relieved" in the dark.
I eat my toast and eggs standing at the counter. Black coffee. Except today I catch myself wondering what she eats for breakfast. If she's someone who cooks elaborate meals for herself or just drinks coffee standing at a sink. The thought is so domestic, so pathetically normal, that I almost laugh.
Thursday's parish duties blur together. I drop a stack of bulletins during the morning mail sort.
Mrs. Alvarez calls about the food pantry schedule and I agree to something without listening, which means I'll probably show up at the wrong time and she'll give me that look that says Father Gabriel, where is your head?
My head is in a confessional last night. My head is at Alma's diner watching a woman eat pie. My head is anywhere but here, and the collar that usually keeps me anchored feels like it's made of tissue paper.
Thursday afternoon confession, and I can barely focus on Mr. Gutierrez's struggles with drinking.
I'm nodding, offering absolution, but behind the screen I'm thinking about her voice, the way it dropped when she said "I chose not to ask questions.
" Mr. Gutierrez leaves. The next penitent enters.
One of the teenage girls from youth group, something about lying to her parents.
I give guidance on autopilot while my mind replays Sera's confession, wondering what questions she didn't ask, what world she inhabited that required such selective blindness.
Friday is worse. The diocese calls about some paperwork I was supposed to file. I haven't even started it. The secretary's voice on the phone has that careful tone people use when they're trying not to sound disappointed. I promise to handle it immediately, then forget the moment I hang up.
"You don't look like a small-town priest," she'd said, and the observation has burrowed under my skin like a splinter. Because she's right. I look like someone playing a priest on television. Hit your marks, say your lines, fool the audience. Except she saw through it in three seconds flat.
Friday afternoon I'm supposed to be working on Sunday's homily. Instead, I'm staring at a blank page thinking about the way her fingers wrapped around that coffee cup. The grace of her hands. The scar on her inner forearm she kept touching.
Build something true to what you actually are.
I said that. To her. In the confessional. Like I had any idea what being true to yourself looked like. Like I wasn't the world's leading expert in building elaborate lies and living in them until they rotted from the inside.
Saturday morning, I meet Tomás at Alma's.
Our standing coffee date, the one human connection I allow myself that isn't wrapped in pastoral obligation.
He's already in our usual booth when I arrive, collar slightly crooked, hair too long for diocesan standards.
Tomás wears the priesthood like a comfortable sweater.
I wear mine like armor that's starting to rust.
"You look terrible," he says by way of greeting.
"Thanks. Very pastoral of you."
He grins, pushing a cup of coffee across the table. Already fixed how I like it, plain and black. "When's the last time you slept? Really slept, not that four-hour thing you do."
"I sleep fine."
"Uh-huh." He studies me over his coffee cup.
Tomás knows me. Really knows me, not the performance everyone else gets.
Seminary does that. Five years of shared formation, shared doubt, shared 2 AM conversations about whether any of this makes sense.
He's the only person alive who knows why I really entered the priesthood.
Not the details, not her name, but enough.
He knows I'm not here because God called. I'm here because I needed a cage.
"Talk to me," he says, and the gentleness in it almost undoes me.
I open my mouth to deflect. To make a joke about parish paperwork or the diocese being demanding.
Instead, I sit there with my mouth half-open like an idiot because what wants to come out is: A woman walked into my confessional and I got an erection and I can't stop thinking about her.
The words are right there, pressing against my teeth, begging to be said.
I almost tell him. Almost confess that something happened this week that's shaking everything loose.
The pause goes on too long. Tomás sees it. Sees me swallow the words, sees the moment where I nearly let something real escape.
"Gabriel," he says quietly. "Whatever it is…"
Alma appears with plates neither of us ordered. Cuban sandwiches, crispy and perfect, the smell making my stomach remember it's capable of wanting things. "You boys are too skinny. Eat."
The moment breaks. I pick up the sandwich. Tomás does the same, but he's still watching me.
"You're not okay," he says. Not a question.
"I'm fine."
"You're a terrible liar." He takes a bite, chews thoughtfully. "You know what your problem is?"
"Please, enlighten me."
"You're not atoning. You're hiding." He says it gently, like that makes it hurt less. "There's a difference, and God knows it."
The sandwich turns to sand in my mouth. "I'm serving the Church. Serving the community."
He just looks at me with those knowing eyes and nods.
Alma refills our coffee. The booth feels smaller, the air thicker. Tomás is still watching me with those gentle eyes that see too much.
"There's something else," he says. "Something new. This week."
I should deny it. Should deflect. Instead, I take another bite of sandwich and say nothing, which is basically a confession in itself.
"You want to talk about it?"
"No."
"Okay." He sits back. "But Gabriel? Whatever it is? Don't let it eat you alive. You're already running on empty. There's not much left to consume."
We finish our sandwiches in silence. When Tomás leaves, he grips my shoulder.
Brief, firm, the kind of touch that says I'm here when you're ready.
Then he's gone, and I'm alone in the booth thinking about how he called me a bad liar. He’s wrong.
I've been lying so long I've forgotten what truth feels like.
Except I heard it. Wednesday night. In the dark. From her.
Saturday night, I lie in my narrow bed and stare at the ceiling. The rectory is silent. The crucifix on the wall catches the streetlight from outside, Christ's bronze body gleaming in the dark.
Tomorrow is Sunday mass. Next Saturday is the gala. Between those two points, I have to hold myself together, pretend that everything is fine and normal.
My phone buzzes. Marisol: Logan is handling your suit fitting. He'll call this week.
Logan. I haven't thought about Logan Cruz in months. Last I heard, he was managing the family's accounts, keeping the Delgado empire legitimate on paper while the real money flowed through La Sirena. The fact that he's handling my suit means this isn't just a gala. It's a return.
Sera's voice cuts through the thought like a hot knife through snow. I only feel real when things are on the edge of disaster.
My cock is hard. My body wants what it wants and what it wants is embarrassingly specific: a woman I've met twice who saw through me instantly.
I close my eyes. Give up. Give in.
My hand moves under the sheet, the cotton rough against oversensitive skin.
The room is too hot suddenly, sweat beading at my temples despite the AC.
I stroke myself and think about her voice.
Her throat. The way she laughed at Alma's ridiculous questions.
I imagine her knowing who I really am, what I really did, and not being afraid.
I imagine the collar off. I imagine being seen.
But worse. I imagine what she'd do if she knew I was behind that screen. Would she run? Slap me? Or worse, look at me with the same recognition I'm drowning in?
I come so hard my vision whites out, back arching off the mattress, her name almost escaping my lips. The pleasure is intense, overwhelming, and then…
The shame is immediate. Crushing. I lie there with my own release cooling on my stomach, the crucifix watching from the wall, and I want to laugh at the absurdity of it. Eight years of cold showers and self-denial, undone by a woman eating pie.
I clean myself up. Take another cold shower. The third today. Stand under the spray and don't pray because what would I say? Sorry, God, I just masturbated to a parishioner's confession, but in my defense, she made this sound when she tasted that pie?
Back in bed, clean and freezing and still wanting. Because the physical release didn't touch the real hunger. The loneliness that sits in my chest like a stone. The exhaustion of trying to please God. The weight of being known by no one.
I'm so fucked.