Page 27 of Gay for Pray (Arport Sacred Sacrament University #1)

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Jude

“THIS IS brEAKUP BEHAVIOR.”

Nick finds me on the couch in the shared space between our rooms in a state he correctly deems “breakup behavior.” Maybe it’s my sweatpants and messy hair. Maybe it’s the fact I’m eating an entire bag of chips and staring blankly at the TV. Either way, he’s right. And I hate that he’s right.

Even so, I say, “I’d have to be dating someone to break up with him.”

“Yeah, then what the hell is this?”

He waves at my general state of slovenly malaise, and again, I wish I had some way of proving him wrong.

“Can a man relax?” I say. “I have somewhere I have to go. I was trying to kick back before I need to head out.”

I roll up the bag of chips and use a clip to seal it shut, then stand and brush the crumbs off my sweatpants. Nick quirks an eyebrow in accusation, but I put my back to him and march to my room.

I don’t actually have anywhere to go, but I get changed anyway, simply to prove him wrong.

If I keep acting pathetic, he’s going to push for answers, and I’m not ready to explain this thing with Theo even to my best friend.

Besides, like I said, we’d have to be dating in order to break up, and we definitely weren’t dating.

I was just an experimental phase he’ll brush off the second he gets a chance.

Hell, his dad did more of the breaking up than Theo ever did.

Nick has planted himself on the couch by the time I leave my room looking a little more put together but at a loss as to what to do with myself.

Maybe some fresh air will help, I decide.

I have to make it look like I have somewhere to be, which means killing enough time walking around campus to seem like I went somewhere important.

Maybe I can hide in the library for a bit, but the memories of being there with Theo put me off that plan instantly.

“You’re sure this isn’t a breakup?” Nick says.

I sigh, but I hate having to lie to him. It’s simply too hard to tell him I’m in this funk because I let myself get tangled up with some virgin who wants to be a priest. We both did some desperate things last year, but this is desperate desperate.

“I’m sure,” I say.

“Is it your mystery man?”

“It’s not. Really. I swear.”

Nick narrows his eyes, but let’s me go. “You know I have your back, right? If you want to tell me what’s going on here, I’ll always listen. It’s not like I haven’t made some bad calls.”

He gets a faraway gaze that promises secrets I’d love to prod at, but I dare not reopen the conversation right when he offered me an out.

“I know,” I say. “And thank you. Really. I just… I’ll be back in a bit. I need to…”

I don’t manage to come up with a convincing lie, but Nick blessedly doesn’t push, allowing me to leave with a wave.

It’s not callousness. He lets me go because he trusts me to come to him when I really need him.

We know each other well enough to open the door to a tough conversation, but not shove each other through it until we’re both ready.

I’m lucky to have a friend like him, way more lucky than I deserve. Despite my trepidation, Nick will be nothing but supportive when it’s time to come clean about this. The news might shock him, but even if he gives me a little shit for it, he’ll always have my back when I need him.

That thought lifts my spirits, but doesn’t stop me from fleeing our dorm room and heading out into the waning evening.

It’s not yet dark, but red streaks the sky like a warning of the night to come.

I threw on jeans and a hoodie, which is plenty here in Southern California.

Insects chirp and titter as I pass, but I don’t pause to appreciate the sunset painting the campus.

I stare at my feet and move, eyes unfocused and seeing nothing but the cobblestones beneath my shoes.

Predictably, my thoughts go right to Theo.

I never did find out who spiked his drink.

I asked around a little, and put Nick on the case as well, but as expected that party was huge.

We weren’t even able to narrow it down to a guy in the frat.

I wish I had a name, someone I could let my frustration out on with no regrets, someone who would deserve to take some of the hurt boiling inside me tonight.

I’ve refused to interact with Theo since our meeting with Professor Demsky.

Partly it’s anger, but another part is hurt.

Hurt that he didn’t push back, that he didn’t even try.

He just let it happen. I don’t know why I expected more from him.

It was stupid of me. Of course when his back is against the wall he’s going to choose the path his father chose for him before he was even born.

Whatever might have happened between us, however special it felt in the moment, it’ll never be enough to overcome his family’s expectations.

I replay that meeting and the confrontation in the hall too many times. When I can’t take it anymore, I shake my head, and the motion finally drags my gaze upward. And there, towering just ahead, is the God damn church.

Of course.

Where else would my feet go? Where else would fate drag me?

It’s so absurd I actually laugh out loud.

A passing student shoots me a look, but hurries on without investigating further.

Whatever. Who cares what she thinks? Who cares what anyone thinks?

I’ve spent this whole semester agonizing over a priest, and here at my lowest, I wandered to the church where we hooked up for the first time.

Well, who am I to deny divine providence?

I stuff my hands in my pockets and head right for that church, my steps almost defiant.

All this religious stuff is what’s been in the way this whole time.

If it wasn’t for this place, things might be easy between Theo and I.

I might have an actual boyfriend to break up with, and not a weird, flaky, closeted hookup to mourn.

I take the steps to the church as though I mean to kick open the doors, but of course they’re already ajar.

The university likes the idea of people coming in here and praying at random times all day, though I have to wonder if anyone takes them up on the offer.

Who would bother aside from someone like…

Theo.

Theo hunched in a pew near the front of the church. Theo with his shoulders shaking. Theo’s voice scratching the quiet, echoing church as he mutters something to himself.

That’s who.

I freeze in the entrance, torn between anger and grief and pain and longing, not sure which to pick until a choked sob echoes through the building. It makes no sense, but that doesn’t matter because it’s not my brain that responds to the noise.

It’s my heart.

My feet start moving. Theo sits up straighter, wiping at his face.

He whips around on the pew, his eyes going wide when he finds me striding toward him.

The candlelight brings out all that gold that only emerges in the dark, and there’s no hope of me holding onto my anger by the time I slide onto the bench beside him.

Red rims his eyes. His cheeks are ruddy and damp, even his scraggle of pale beard insufficient to roughen his features when they’re all so soft and open from crying.

I’ve never seen him this way, and it makes me itch with the desire to bundle him in my arms, but I hold myself back, not letting any part of us touch.

“What are you doing here?” he says, voice ragged from tears and prayers, if I had to guess.

“I don’t know,” I say truthfully.

“No one comes here.”

“No one but a nerd like you.”

He smiles, a tiny, flickering gesture like the dancing shadow cast by a votive candle.

“I needed a walk,” I say. “Went out to get some air. Ended up here somehow.”

He scoffs, but at himself more than me. “I was doing the same, actually.”

His gaze flicks to the crucifix hanging over us, as though to suggest we were drawn here by some force larger than ourselves. I won’t agree, but I let him have his faith. I certainly don’t have a better explanation.

“I…” He looks down at the hands folded in his lap, then back up at me. “I’m sorry, Jude.”

The words punch through my chest. “I know,” I say. Because it’s true. Because I knew it from the start. I knew he was sorry about this, sorry about how this would inevitably collapse on us, sorry for the hurt coming our way. “I’m sorry too.”

“You have nothing to apologize for.”

“No, I do. I was angry. Really angry. But only because that was better than feeling hurt.”

He shrinks in on himself, as though my words are hail and he’s seeking cover.

“You’re right to be angry,” he says. “I screwed this up. I just…” His gaze goes back to his hands, and his voice softens so much I have to lean closer to hear him.

“I’m not supposed to love you.” He meets my eyes, and suddenly our faces are so, so close.

“But I do. No matter how hard I try not to, I keep loving you anyway.”

My breath vanishes. My heart stops. Time freezes around me, every candle in the church refusing to flicker as the whole world crystallizes around Theo’s words.

Then I cradle his head in my hands and kiss him for all I’m worth.

His fingers tangle in my shirt, clinging on as I kiss the breath out of both of us. It’s a light, tenuous hold, but it’s there and it’s real and I never want him to let go. Because the second he said those words, there was only one possible response.

“I love you too,” I say when I pull away.

His smile flickers in and out of existence. “What a place to say something like that.”

“Hey, if God was so against it, wouldn’t he smite us or something? We’re right here.”

Theo’s mouth twists like he’s torn between disagreeing and laughing.

“Maybe God left it up to us to decide,” I say. “Maybe that’s the point. Free will and all that. Maybe we’re the ones who get to choose.”

“Then I choose you,” Theo says.

From this close, I can’t miss the fear that mingles with the joy of that statement.

“But my father will be furious,” he adds.

“I won’t ask you to lose your family for me, Theo. I’d never ask that.”

“Am I really losing anything if they don’t love me as I am? If they really care about me, I won’t lose them. And if they don’t…there was nothing to lose.”

He says it like it’s so simple, but I know it’s not. His family pays for him to go to this school. They have high expectations. And now he’s saying he’s going to do the one thing they’d disapprove of most. The enormity of his bravery stoppers my throat.

“You don’t have to do this,” I say. I was angry before, but faced with this…I can’t possibly ask him to go through with it.

But Theo says, “I do. Otherwise my whole life will be a lie, and I don’t think that’s God’s plan for me.”

I pull him in against me, simply holding him for a few moments. His hands wrap around my back, and he clings to my shirt. When he shudders, I squeeze him tighter, trying to say with my whole body that no matter what happens, I won’t leave his side.

When he pulls away, fresh tears dance in those gold-flecked eyes of his.

“What first?” I say.

The future has never been so uncertain…or so thrilling.

Theo cracks a genuine smile. “First we finish our philosophy project.”

“Professor Demsky will tell your Dad.”

“Yeah,” he says. “She will.”