Chapter 31
CHAPTER 31
E lijah. Sunday
I lay in bed the next morning, mentally kicking myself for having not invited Corinne over. My thoughts were full of the idea of her lying here with me and my face being down between her thighs, and it was sending hot blood right down below to my dick.
Stupid, I thought. You’re going to have to make up for this.
Well, think of the angel and she calls. Or, actually, texts.
The invitation in Corinne’s text couldn’t have been a more different kind of proposal than what I was just thinking about her. It caught me totally unprepared and instantly turned my dick from steel-hard to semi-flaccid.
Want to come to church online with me? There’s a church back home that I used to go to every Sunday. It’s really special to me. Want to come over and watch with me?
My dick softened further. What was it about religion and sex anyway? I thought One of the reasons I’d never cared for religion is that it doesn’t get along well with anything human or anything natural. In the eyes of religion, sex, which is the most purely human, purely natural celebration of being alive, is something dirty and corrupt and only for making babies with someone that you’re married to — more bodies to get into church pews and more wallets and purses for the church to get money out of. And yet, the sweet, beautiful woman whom I’d just been thinking about celebrating being alive with was asking me to church?
I decided it was best to be as honest and above-board about my feelings without hurting hers. I texted back, Church isn’t really my thing.
That’s okay, came Corinne’s response. You’re not really going in person. It’s on a Web feed.
Was there any way to get out of this without possibly offending her and setting back the progress we’d recently made? I decided not to risk it.
Well...okay, I’ll be right over, I sent her back, reluctantly.
I climbed out of bed, still thinking of the ways I would much rather hear Corinne calling out the name of the Almighty, and went to my closet to find something to wear.
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When she opened the door to her apartment, Corinne broke out laughing, and the reason was obvious. I had put on a suit such as I’d wear on any given day at work.
Corinne, slapping her thighs with laughter, was wearing sweatpants on those lovely thighs and a T-shirt above the waist. A T-shirt, I might add, that just showed the roundness of her boobs and a hint of her nipples. I smiled a crooked little smile at her reaction to the difference in our wardrobe. Under any other circumstances on a Sunday, I’d be dressed much more casually and would soon want to have both of us wearing nothing at all while I went right for those aforementioned boobs.
She let me step into her living room and shut the door behind me. Composing herself, but still snickering, Corinne said, “You are so silly! Why did you get all dressed up for an online sermon? No one can see you!”
Squirming at her mirth at my expense, I feebly answered, “When someone says church, I think of people looking and dressing a certain way.” I gestured at myself up and down, feeling like a pure idiot.
“It doesn’t matter what you wear,” she said, holding out her hand to me, “only that you’re here. Come on.”
I took her hand and she led me to the couch where, by some people’s reckoning, some very unholy things once went on between us. She had her computer set up there for a video streaming, and we sat down to watch.
I didn’t catch the Pastor’s name, but he was a gentle and kind-looking man with a grey and black beard. Thankfully, he was not one of those “Thou Shalt Not,” fire-and-brimstone-spewing characters who were the ones I hated the most, the people who bellow and scream at you that you’re going to Hell just for breathing. I would have been very disappointed to know that Corinne, who was kind and compassionate and not a raging, judging bigot, liked to attend the church of someone like that.
Instead, he talked about, of all things, not being a hypocrite — about the need to feed the hungry and treat the sick. He talked about being kind to strangers and those who are different from yourself. He talked about not “laying up your treasures on Earth,” but about how the real “treasures” in life are the gifts of relationships with other people. It was nothing that I’d been afraid of, but also nothing that I was expecting.
And, it got me thinking. The person that I’d once been — the person that Kathleen couldn’t accept that I’d been and the one that I needed to convince Corinne that I no longer was — would have sneered at a sermon like that. He would have suspected this pastor of being a closet alcoholic or pedophile or some other such perverted thing, preaching one thing and raking in his parishioners’ money while doing something else entirely. The guy that I once was would not have been impressed.
The guy that I was today, sitting in a suit next to a girl in a T-shirt and sweats, was still not into religion and still uncomfortable being in “the house of the Lord.” Even sitting in Corinne’s living room, watching the service on her computer, I felt totally out of place.
At the end of the service, Corinne leaned over and closed the laptop, then faced me and asked, “So…what did you think of that?”
I tilted my head a bit, very unsure of myself, and said, “He seems like he’s a nice guy. He’s got a good message.” I was much more certain of what I said next. “Corinne, honestly, with my past…this kind of thing really isn’t my element. It makes me feel…” I struggled with exactly the right word to tell her before settling on, “really uncomfortable. If this is your element, that’s well and good; I respect that. I just don’t feel like it’s mine.”
Corinne said, sincerely, “I’m not pressuring you, Elijah. But, I know this man very well, and if you were in his church in person and he knew your story, he’d welcome you. He wouldn’t hold anything in your life against you; he’d just be glad you were there. Maybe one day, you will get to meet him and you’ll see for yourself.”
Taking a deep breath while weighing her words, I said, “Thank you, Corinne. Thanks for asking me over for this. And, thanks, I guess, for still being willing to see something good in me and not giving up on me. I suppose I’m kind of a work in progress, still.”
“So is everyone.” She smiled back at me.