Chapter 28 Ewen
EWEN
“Hey there, stranger,” Caleb says in greeting as he walks up to the table.
He called me yesterday and asked me to meet him for coffee.
I haven’t seen him since Declan was in the hospital and I miss my friend, yet I’ve been so distracted that I hadn’t noticed.
The guilt weighed on me after he pointed it out.
You have guilt for not seeing your friend yet you feel nothing for the sinning you do in the dark?
That annoying inner voice pops in to remind me how much I’ve changed.
It’s not wrong. I let Declan do the filthiest things to me at night, with no single emotion except joy.
More joy than I knew one person could experience.
I stand in front of my congregation, preaching morals and sins, yet I feel zero guilt.
I’m becoming darkness with him. How far will I let myself slide into his world? I shake away the thought. Now is not the time to delve into that. Now is the time to spend with Caleb.
“Hi. Life has been chaotic. How about yours?” He laughs and pulls me into his signature hug.
“My life is always busy.” Sitting down, he reaches over and I hand him the coffee I already ordered. “So, tell me how you’ve been.”
“Just busy. The church has been keeping me busy.”
He sips his coffee, staring at me. “And a certain someone hasn’t?”
Caleb knows me. He knows I don’t connect with people. He’s giving me an opening to come out with things. If there’s anyone I could talk to without judgement, it’s him.
“Let’s go for a walk,” I suggest because I do need to get things off my chest but fear someone overhearing.
“Sure, it’s a great day.” We grab our coffees and head outside. It’s lovely and sunny and the humidity is surprisingly not suffocating today.
We walk down the block to the park. The park itself has paths leading in many different directions. I take off toward one that is more shaded and less traveled.
“Okay, now spill.” Caleb breaks our silence. “I can see it on your face. You have something to say.”
We continue walking as I collect my thoughts. Taking a deep breath, I start at the beginning. “Do you remember when we were in college and went out for St. Patrick’s Day?”
“Yeah. Fuck that was years ago.”
“Well, that was the first night I met Declan.”
Caleb stops. “Wait, you’ve known him that long? I thought you met when you moved back here?”
I motion for us to continue. I know if we stop or I look him in the eye, I won’t confess. He understands and we carry on with our stroll.
“No, we actually met that night when I was walking home.” My mind fills with the memories. “We met under…unique circumstances.”
“How so?” he asks. I won’t divulge Declan’s second job. I will take those details to my grave.
“We met in an alley. I was pissing behind a dumpster.”
He laughs. “What man pees behind a dumpster? Why didn’t you just go a couple steps in, piss, and make sure it didn’t hit your shoes?”
“A man who wanted to be respectful but still had to piss.” I shove him lightly. “And really? You call me out for hiding myself from possible eyes?” We both laugh at that. “Anyways, we met then. It was an interesting meeting, to say the least.”
Caleb says nothing, just listens. I’m thankful for his silence, so I continue. “That night, I received my first blowjob.”
“Wait, what?! I thought you were a virgin through and through?” He comes to a halt.
I stop walking and turn to look at him. I’m nervous but now that I’ve started talking, I can’t stop. “I was, I mean…I still am. I’ve just done more than a celibate man does.”
“Okay, no sex but plenty of BJs and handies, got it.”
“Not at first. It was just a single, one-sided encounter. I never thought life would bring us back into each other’s lives.
I went on with my life. But then I came back to Boston.
He would come to confession just to talk to me.
I didn’t know it was him at first, but once I figured it out, he pushed his way into my life.
Coming to the church to help with the soup kitchen, showing up and attending Mass. ”
Caleb puts his hand up and rests it on my shoulder. “That’s why he jumped at the opportunity to come with Fiona and I that day?”
“Yeah.”
“Was that why you looked so agitated?”
I take a sip of my coffee. “Yeah. I was trying to push him away. My mind would become jumbled around him.”
“Jumbled how?” he asks, the doctor in him coming out.
I process my words before I answer. “He made me overthink. But about things I never thought of before.” I’m not going to tell him how even though I know he’s a killer, I understand his stance. “And he pulls emotions from me I’ve never been able to feel.”
“So, he makes you feel more human than you did before, got it.”
I point with my chin for us to move over to a bench that’s a bit off the path, and he follows. It’s shaded and seems like a good place to be more private. I sit down and he follows.
“I have always been human, you know.”
He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “You are. I’m sorry, that was the wrong term. What I meant was he made you come out of your shell. A shell you’ve worn all your life because you never knew where you really fit.”
“Yes and no. I always thought I wanted to be a priest because the church was the only place that felt right.”
“Okay. Continue.”
I do as instructed. “Declan refused to allow me to hide from him. He pushed until my walls collapsed. I thought I was fine living with those walls. Then…” I stop myself because the images of him almost dying hurt to recall. I really thought he would die that night.
“Then, what? You can’t leave me hanging here.”
I smile because if anyone can break tension, it’s Caleb. “Then he showed up after his attack. That was the first time I felt true fear.”
“You were a mess when that happened. I’ve never seen you so…
what’s the right word?” His eyebrows furrow while he ponders it.
“Devasted, maybe. Heartbroken is more fitting. I’ve known you for years and I can tell you I was more worried about you than him.
I see death and their family. You looked like a grief-stricken mother saying goodbye to her child. ”
Turning to look at him, I ask, “I did?”
“You did. That’s why I stayed with him. I needed to help ease your pain somehow. Even if you didn’t know you were in pain.”
“I knew I was in pain. It just took my mind a bit to catch on. I finally admitted to myself that I have feelings for him—feelings I shouldn’t be having.”
He drains his coffee and reaches for my cup. I hand it over and he gets up to throw them in the trash can on the other side of the trail. It gives me time to collect my thoughts, which I’m thankful for.
“So, you have feelings for him, but they’re not feelings you’re allowed as a priest. Am I right?” He sits down but angles himself so he’s looking directly at me.
I nod. He’s right. I want more of Declan and less of my religion when I’m in his orbit. “Yeah.” My head drops. I’ve never said those words—not even to myself. It took Caleb saying them for me to admit it. “Catholicism is all I needed.”
“Until Declan,” he finishes for me.
We’re both quiet. I think he’s absorbing it all while I’m internally struggling.
He finally breaks the silence. “Do you love him?”
Do I love him? The question repeats on a loop, forcing away any other thoughts.
“I’m not sure. I assumed I wasn’t able to love, not in that capacity. But he’s in my head all the time. When I’m not with him, I’m thinking about him. And when I am with him, my mind is quiet. Quiet in a way I’ve never experienced.”
“That sounds like love to me. I truly believed I was in love with Trish, but it wasn’t like that.” He runs his hand through his hair. “Yes, I loved her to an extent, but it never felt like true love. I get like that with Fiona though. I told her I loved her recently.”
I turn to look at him, feeling slightly guilty because I’ve not asked about his life. Who am I anymore? “You did? How’d it go?”
“It went very well. She showed me her feelings in return,” he says, then he winks, telling me they had sex.
What would sex feel like? Declan said he’ll fuck me one day. How would that feel?
Even my brain goes to the depraved things he does to me at inappropriate times.
Trying to get our minds out of the gutter, I say, “Okay, got it. So, where’s that leave you two?”
“We’re good, taking things slow. I just got divorced and she’s been running the bar since Declan’s attack. We’re letting life just be. No rushing, just enjoying. Now, enough of me. Back to you and these feelings.”
“I’m not sure it’s love.”
He shoves me back, playfully. “You, my friend, are in love. You have hearts in your eyes whenever you talk about him.”
“Let’s not go there,” I chuckle.
“Hey man, I’m all for you being with Declan, if that’s what you want in life. You just need to let him have a place and not as your dirty little secret. I know you, and you’ll destroy yourself trying to hold it all in. Do what’s right for you.”
Can I really carry Declan in my heart and still wear the collar, pretending he doesn’t exist? Can I live a life built on vows if the truest part of me has to stay hidden? The questions won’t leave me alone. I’m torn between the life I thought I wanted and the one that feels right.