In the dark, I slipped against mud and sweated as the night drew close. I filled my crushing lungs with humid misery.
The parking lot was full, and I dodged parking cars and swarms of people milling outside the festival. I burst to the sidewalk and yanked on the back door.
Locked.
No.
I didn’t have time to catch my breath. I ran to the front, tripping over my dress and falling to my knees at the front steps of the church.
Before the crosses out front.
Beneath the sculptures and shrines warning me of my transgressions.
I stared at the crucifix, my words twisted in my own revelation and revulsion.
“I have to tell him.” I confessed as I forced myself to my feet. “Please, forgive me.”
The vestibule was unlocked. The door clattered behind me, and I plunged into the silent dark of the church. The doors to the sanctuary were opened wide.
I walked to the entry.
Just as I had done so many times before, but never for the right reasons, and always in pursuit of that selfish and destructive desire.
Was this time any different?
Did I have the strength to deny this temptation, this final unrelenting desire to find him, see him, talk to him…
Tell him how I felt?
But wasn’t this the darkness he had tried to cleanse? We had failed in so many ways, and we drowned in every sin we tried to right. Was I that wicked that I couldn’t accept the one lesson he offered?
I had to let him go.
No apologies. No declarations.
No matter how much it hurt.
I turned at the door. Too late.
“Honor.”
His rolling, righteous voice had the power to fill the entire sanctuary or whisper just for me to hear. Once, it rumbled in confidence and power. Now it strained in an anguish he didn’t deserve.
I should have left.
But I was a sinner. I was tempted.
I was lost.
And it was because of him.
Father Raphael waited at the altar, shielded in the cassock that once drew me to his wisdom and heart. Now I understood the truth. I realized just what that collar meant.
A box rested at his feet. He’d packed his office.
“You weren’t even going to say goodbye?” I asked.
“I couldn’t say good-bye to you.”
I didn’t trust myself to step closer, but his eyes met mine. Dark. Hardened. Was it my weakness or his that called to me?
“I shouldn’t have yelled at you,” I whispered. “I’m not mad. I’m not hurt. You were right about everything, Father.”
“Honor—”
“You mean too much to me. I can’t let you go without apologizing for the way I acted. You always tried to help me. I know you want to save me.”
“You don’t need to be saved, Honor.”
“Yes, I do. I know I do. And I’ll repent for those things we did one day…” I wished I hadn’t taken the breath. It rattled in my chest, weakening me as my eyes blurred with tears. “I just can’t do it now. I can’t have you leave and then destroy those memories we had all at the same time. It’s too cruel.”
Father Raphael clenched his jaw. He looked to the altar, the candles, and finally the crucifix hanging above. His lips moved in a silent, unfinished prayer, and his hand trembled before he finished crossing himself.
I shouldn’t have shivered when he spoke, shouldn’t have let his words wrap over me, center in me, and crush what fragile bruise of a heart remained.
“You once asked me why I became a priest.”
I didn’t speak. His words weren’t meant for me.
“I did it to hide.”
The truth burned in the holy silence of the sanctuary. I stared at him, memorizing the angle of his jaw, the strike of the candlelight in his hair, the pale loveliness of his skin that contrasted more with my color than the blackness of his robe.
“I became a priest to heal everyone but myself. I wanted to shed the pain of my past without confronting it. I didn’t trust my desires, and I could deny them if I were celibate. I thought that made me…untouchable. Protected from the truth. From myself.”
He turned, his expression softened.
“I thought it’d protect me from you, my angel.”
I’d have held his gaze forever if it weren’t burning my soul into ash. “Why are you saying these things?”
“You healed me, Honor. You awakened me. You touched me, and that shame, the hatred I felt…faded.”
“Father?”
“I’ve forgiven him.” His voice was hard, but it edged only in pity. “My father was a man destroyed by his own demons…because he didn’t have an angel to guide him.”
If he meant to praise me, it hurt.
If he meant to thank me, I wouldn’t accept his gratitude.
If he meant to break me…