Chapter 9 Callahan
“For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before me.”
— Psalm 51:3 KJV
Callahan replaced the last spent candle and wiped the soot from his fingers. The flame had burned down to a stub hours ago, but he had let it die rather than snuff it early. Waste not, want not—some old habit from childhood that still clung to him. He swept the narthex slowly, each stroke deliberate, as though the rhythm could keep his mind from running ahead to the quiet Tuesday afternoon.
It didn’t.
He checked the clock above the doors again. The hands crawled. Dorian might not come. He might have found someone else after Callahan fled Nirvana’s on Friday night—someone younger, freer, able to give him what he asked for without a rosary clenched in one fist and a lifetime of vows in the other. Callahan pictured it too clearly: Dorian asleep in another man’s bed, sheet riding low on his hips, the silver chain at his throat catching the morning light. The image lodged behind Callahan’s eyes like a splinter.
He set the broom aside and sat heavily in the front pew. The wood creaked under him. For a moment he simply breathed, listening to the hush of the empty church. Years ago he had not needed to fill every silence with motion. Before the priesthood, when he was still careless and hungry, sin had felt like oxygen—easy, necessary. Now stillness brought the old man rushing back, the one who took what he wanted and left wreckage behind.
He remembered the seminary warning: idleness is the devil’s workshop. So he had kept busy—endless busy—until Saint Jude’s shelter became his penance and his refuge. The work had been hard, honest, absorbing. For years it had been enough.
Then Dorian Koller walked through the doors one Sunday and the old hunger woke up snarling.
Callahan rubbed a hand over his face. Dorian reminded him, painfully, of the woman he had loved and ruined more than a decade ago. He had wanted everything from her—control, devotion, more than she could give—and when she finally left, he had tried to drown the loss in whiskey. One too many black mornings later he had stumbled into the recovery meetings at Saint Jude’s. The program had saved him. The priesthood had finished the job. He had thought the grave was dug deep enough.
The great doors groaned open.
Callahan stood. Sunlight slanted through the stained glass and caught on the silver chain resting against Dorian’s throat. The links gleamed, delicate and deliberate, the small ring at the front begging to be hooked. Callahan’s pulse kicked hard. He imagined the pressure of metal biting skin, the way Dorian’s breath would catch if he tugged.
Dorian’s gaze traveled over him—slow, assessing—then curved into a half-smile. “I’ve come to confess my sins, Father.”
Callahan adjusted his glasses, buying a second to steady his voice. “Of course.” He gestured toward the confessionals at the back of the nave. “This way.”
He kept his eyes fixed on the back of Dorian’s head as they walked, but the chain flashed at every step. Matthew 5:29 whispered unbidden: If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out. Dorian paused in the doorway of the booth, leaned a shoulder against the frame, and toyed with the ring. The metal pressed a faint line into the skin beneath.
“Don’t forget to share your sins too, Father.” He winked and slipped inside.
Callahan crossed himself and entered the other side. The latch clicked like a verdict.
“In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”
“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. It’s been one week since my last confession.”
Callahan’s mouth went dry. “I admire your dedication, my child.”
“I’m glad it pleases you.” Dorian’s voice dropped, velvet and deliberate. “I have really only one sin to confess these days. Lust. And it’s all because of a certain priest.”
Callahan’s fingers found the rosary in his pocket, beads smooth from years of worry.
“God, I want him,” Dorian went on, softer now, almost wondering. “I’ve tried to scratch the itch with other men, but it doesn’t work. All I can think about is him shoving me face-first over the back of a car, yanking my jeans down just enough, taking me hard and rough—exactly how I like it.”
Callahan swallowed a sound. Heat pooled low in his belly. He could see it too vividly: the fogged windows, the slap of skin, Dorian’s breath fogging the glass.
“Shall I go on?”
The rosary creaked under his grip. “Continue.”
“Only if you go first, Father. Fair’s fair.”
Callahan stared at the grille between them. The words sat heavy on his tongue, bitter and sweet at once. “Greed,” he said finally. “When I was younger I wanted too much. Control. Sex. Everything. I took until there was nothing left to take.”
Silence stretched. Then the faint rustle of fabric—Dorian shifting closer to the screen.
“Does it still make you hungry?” he asked, voice low.
Callahan’s throat worked. The honest answer burned behind his teeth: I starve for you.
“Does hearing me talk about it make you hungry?”
He tasted copper; he had bitten the inside of his cheek. “Finish your confession.”
“That’s answer enough.” Satisfaction curled through Dorian’s words. Then, softer, almost shy: “I’ve been overindulging lately. Can’t keep my hands off myself most nights. I picture this priest edging me for hours—bringing me right to the edge, stopping, starting again—until I’m leaking and shaking and can barely string words together. He makes me beg anyway. Makes me say exactly how desperate I am.”
Callahan’s breath came shallow. The beads cut into his palm.
“And I keep coming back to the same fantasy,” Dorian continued. “He punishes me. Spanks me until I’m crying, but I don’t ask him to stop. I ask for more. Harder. Until I come just from his hand on my skin.”
The image flared bright: Dorian bent over the rectory desk, wrists bound, back arched, skin blooming red under Callahan’s palm. Callahan’s grip on the rosary went white-knuckled.
“A glutton for punishment,” he managed.
“I love it,” Dorian admitted. “Is that a sin too?”
“Gluttony is a sin,” Callahan said. His voice had roughened, slipped into an older register he had not used in years. “But seeking penance is not.” He drew a careful breath. “Do you need penance, Dorian?”
A beat of silence. Then, quiet and clear: “Yes, please, Father.”
Callahan straightened. The priest’s authority settled over him like a familiar coat, darker than he remembered. “Finish your confession.”
“I’m sorry for these and all the sins of my past life.”
“Your penance,” Callahan said, “is to abstain from self-pleasure for two weeks.”
A sharp inhale from the other side. “Father—”
“Would you prefer three?”
“No, sir.” Quick, almost breathless.
The submission hit Callahan like whiskey after a long fast. “At the end of those two weeks you will return here for confession. Only then will your penance be lifted. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Father.”
“Good boy.”
A soft, stifled sound leaked through the grille—half whimper, half laugh. Callahan’s blood roared in his ears.
“Go in peace.”
The door on Dorian’s side opened and closed. Footsteps receded down the aisle. Callahan stayed seated long after the church fell silent again, rosary cutting crescents into his palm, tasting the lingering sweetness of sin and the sharper tang of fear.