6. Theo
SIX
THEO
I sit on the edge of my bed in my boxers, smoothing my hands up my thighs. Tonight is the night. It has to be. For the sake of my marriage, I need to make this happen.
I mean, what thirty-year-old has a hard time having sex with his wife?
No pun intended.
I see Clara in our bathroom clad in her fluffy robe with her hair in a messy bun as she moisturizes her face. “So, Father Matteo seems great, right?”
It’s the reiteration of the same conversation we had had earlier, but I don’t point that out. “Yeah, he seems very nice.”
Nice might not be the word I would use. Father Matteo’s homily managed to capture my attention during the period in Mass where I’m usually fighting not to doze off. But, no, I can’t put it all on the homily because he’s the one that truly caught my interest.
Father Matteo is… arresting. I think that’s the only word I can use to describe him. His presence enthralled me, from the way his eyes smoldered as they stared into my soul, to the lilt of his slightly accented voice as he preached. He came out to the pews, engaged with us like we were his friends, and I felt a familiarity as if I was regarding someone, I’d known my entire life. But his words. It was what he said that spoke to the deepest parts of me, making me reflect on everything I think I hold true.
How do I know I’m making the right decisions? How can I be certain my life is going the way it should? I think it was meant to inspire us, but it nearly shattered me. His homily made me realize I have little faith or belief in my marriage.
Then when our hands touched, I felt it. It was a whisper of understanding like maybe he could get what’s so wrong with me. It’s like—I don’t want to say God—but something reached out and told me he’s the key to figuring out this particularly brutal phase in my life.
And it is a phase. Shit, it has to be.
Clara comes out of the bathroom and smiles at me, cocking her head to the side after a minute. “Theo?”
I stumble as I stand, nearly knocking into her. I wrap my hands around her waist, dragging her against my chest. I settle my lips on hers, a routine we’ve practiced over the last decade of being together and try to let things come naturally.
They don’t.
When I slip my tongue into her mouth, my movements are clunky and robotic. We fall onto the bed with her on top of me, and I don’t have the urge to run my hands down and explore her body. When she reaches for my boxers, running her small hand against my crotch, it’s a soft cock she finds.
She lifts her head, confusion mixed with a lingering hint of sadness in her eyes. “Not in the mood?”
“I…” I shake my head. Apparently, I can’t force sex after all. Not if my body is unwilling to cooperate. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she tells me, but I spy a hint of frustration in her voice. I don’t blame her for it though. If it were me in her place, I’d be frustrated too that my partner doesn’t want to have sex with me. She slides off me, lying on her side, and frowns. “Is it me?”
I don’t actually know what the answer to that is. It’s definitely me and my inability to get hard for my own wife but does that mean it’s her fault too? I settle on the former because, to the modern eye, Clara is perfect. Long blonde hair, pretty green eyes, and pouty lips you just want to kiss again and again and again.
If only I was the one that wanted to kiss them.
“No,” I say, leaning forward and doing just that, but nope. No spark. No flicker of arousal. No pressing need to just fuck her until I lose myself in the process. “No, I think there’s just a lot going on in my head.”
This sparks her interest. She sits up comically quickly, eyes wide as she smiles. “Yeah? About what?”
Fuck, I feel like a dick. She shouldn’t be this excited over me simply just confiding in her. But I can’t tell her what I’m thinking, it’d be too risky, too painful for both of us.
The idea that maybe I don’t love my wife the way I used to.
“I think I might go for a walk,” I say, pushing aside the uncomfortable subject. All I need is some air. Some air and some time to figure out how to come up with an answer to her question because Clara is relentless in the best way possible, and she’s not going to stop until she figures out what I’m talking about.
She raises a brow as she glances over at the nightstand. “Isn’t it too late for one of those?”
“It’ll be quick.” I peck her on the nose before I get up and rifle through my drawers for a pair of sweats and a t-shirt.
She looks like she wants to argue but bites her tongue. Again, just more words that are being kept from each other, more walls neither of us know how to climb in fear that the foundation is too weak to support us.
I go downstairs and snag my keys off the table. It’s approaching the time of the year when we’ll have to start wearing coats, but it’s warm enough to go without one tonight. I lock the door behind me as I leave, even though most of our neighbors don’t bother anyway when nothing of significance happens in Smallville.
Our house is right behind Main Street, so I round the block and head there. I pass by all the closed little shops that make our town a picturesque tourist destination in the summer. The General Store that was built in Western fashion, the once movie theater that’s been converted into a coffee shop, the bookstore that at one point was the only bar in town. All these details remind me I’m living the dream life, in a dream small town, with a dream wife. It makes me feel guilty, everything does nowadays, that I’m just not happy.
I wander around Main Street and find myself in front of the church. It’s the only religious house of worship in Smallville and it might be the most stunning building in town, but it looks so ominous at night, nearly untouchable. I think about what happened earlier today, the damn near epiphany I had, and feel a shiver course through me. Why can’t I get that encounter out of my head? Why has it affected me so much?
I’m about to turn around and head home, when the church doors open, and Father Matteo walks out. He has trash bags in his hands, and I gawk at how he’s dressed. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a priest outside their regular uniform, so I’m momentarily stunned.
He’s got on a pair of light gray sweats that hug his thick thighs and a tight black T-shirt that leaves nothing to the imagination. I never imagined priests to be so… muscular . Almost like a real person. He’s got his head down as he descends the steps, walking to the trash can, and I must make some sort of noise because his head snaps up. For a second, it looks like he’s seen a ghost before an easy smile crosses his lips. He places the lid back on the trash can and walks up to me. “Theo, right?”
I don’t know where my words go. I nod, taking a step back for some unknown reason. He chuckles, an arm reaching up to run a hand through his wet hair, his biceps bulging at the movement. “Yes, a priest out of uniform is a sight to see. I didn’t think anyone would be out and about at this hour.”
“Just needed some air,” I blurt out before I can think better of it. I shake my head, cursing myself. “I mean, I like walks.”
He raises a brow, looking me up and down, probably noticing I’m closer to wearing pajamas than athletic clothes. He looks back at the church before turning at me. “Mind if I join you?”
This was supposed to be some quiet contemplation for me, but it would be rude to say no. “Sure. I’m almost done though.”
He shakes his head. “If that’s fine by you, it’s fine by me. I think I spotted a small trail behind the church. Want to walk there?”
I know the trail he’s talking about. During the day, it’s a beautiful field where tiny gophers pop out of their holes when you walk by them. I’ve never been there at night, but I know it’s not very well-lit. Either way, I don’t want to lose face with our new priest, so I nod and follow him behind the church.
We start our walk at the beginning of the circular trail. After a moment, he clears his throat. “So, tell me about yourself.”
I shrug, kicking at a pebble. “There’s not much to tell.”
“Well, that doesn’t seem true.”
For some reason, I blush at his words and finally look up at him. He’s smiling so nicely, so approachable, and it makes it easy to start. “I guess I’m just your average thirty-year-old. I didn’t go to college, but I have a good job. I have a wife and a house.”
“Average thirty-year-old,” he repeats as if he didn’t hear the latter part of my sentence. “Tell me, what makes you not average?”
My steps stutter. I think it’s been a while since anybody’s asked me about myself. Having known Clara for over a decade, we know everything about each other. Everyone in this town knows my story, so it’s slightly awkward to try to think of things to say. “I don’t get much time to, but I like hiking. I played soccer in high school but tore my ACL.”
“Any hobbies?”
“I…” No, it’s too embarrassing, but Father Matteo raises his brows at my hesitation. “I used to be into model trains.”
“Model trains.” He chuckles but there’s no malice in it, if anything, he looks interested. “What made you like model trains?”
I think about it, trying to come up with a better answer than ‘they’re cool’. “I was born and raised in Smallville. I haven’t traveled that much outside of Wyoming. I guess I liked the idea of trains going places that I’ve never been to and probably never will.”
He frowns as we hit the bend of the trail. “What makes you think you never will?”
“Responsibilities,” I scoff, realizing that it came out a bit sarcastic and snippy. “I’m sorry. I just meant?—”
He cuts me off with a wave of his hand. “I know what you meant. Adult life comes with burdens and responsibilities we must accommodate. But that doesn’t mean there’s no room to enjoy the little things. What made you stop?”
“Stop what?”
“Your model trains?”
Clara wanted to make the room into a nursery, but I won’t tell him that. Even though he’s easy to talk to, that’s too personal, and it’ll raise questions that are too uncomfortable to answer. “Responsibilities.”
He doesn’t look like he believes me, those dark eyes piercing through the moonlit trail, examining every inch of my mind. He can’t know I’m teetering around a subject, but it looks like he does. When the feeling of his gaze sends shivers down my spine, I clear my throat. “How about you? Any hobbies?”
“God,” he deadpans, and I can’t help but burst out into laughter. He cocks his head to the side, brows pinched in confusion. “What?”
I’m still laughing, but I sober after a second. “Oh, you weren’t kidding. Um, that’s it?”
“Is there something wrong with that?” he asks, but he doesn’t sound offended, if anything he’s curious.
I shrug. “I get it. You’re a priest but everyone needs an interest, right?”
He clicks his tongue and raises one shoulder. “Guess I’m just your average priest.”
“Tell me, what makes you not average?” I mimic, wagging my brows at him to which he laughs. “What? You said it.”
“Yes, but I didn’t say it like that .”
“Like what?”
“Like I’m having some sort of fit.”
We both chuckle and it feels nice. I can’t remember a time when I’ve had this good of a time, pushing away everything that’s plaguing me for just a few minutes. I’m about to ask him something else, but we reach the end of the trail, circling back to the church. We both stand there for a second, looking at each other, but neither of us makes a move to leave.
“Um, will I see you and Clara at the soup kitchen in Cheyenne?” he finally asks.
I nod. There aren’t many church-related activities I don’t attend. “Clara has a baby shower in Casper that day, but I’ll be there.”
He smiles, reaching out to shake my hand. “Sounds good. I guess I’ll see you then?”
“Definitely,” I say, taking his hand. “It was… It was good to get to know you, Father.”
“Matteo.”
“Sorry?”
“You can just call me Matteo,” he clarifies, but there’s something off about his face when he says it. “Or Father. Father Matteo. That works too. I’ll answer to anything.”
I like that. Father Matteo seems so untouchable, but Matteo is someone I can easily see myself spending endless time talking to. His name is said almost like a secret, something between the two of us, and that feeling of gravitation towards him grows.
So, I squeeze his hand, a tease in my voice as I speak. “Even ‘hey, dude’?”
He grins, letting go of my hand slowly. “Even ‘hey, dude’.”
Again, we just stand there. One of us must be the first to go and when I look down at my watch, I realize it has to be me. I give him a small wave, looking back over my shoulder to see that he’s still standing there watching me.
The walk home is spent thinking of our encounter. I… I don’t have friends that I’d consider my own. I know Father Matteo— Matteo —is my priest, but he can be a friend too, right?
When I get home, Clara is already fast asleep, and I strip down to my boxers and join her. Like normal, we stay on our sides of the bed not facing each other, but it doesn’t bother me the way it normally does.
No, I fall asleep with a smile on my face.