Page 29 of His Elder

I walked into the bedroom and closed the door. Leaned against it, scriptures clutched to my chest, and tried to remember how to breathe.

Through the door, I heard nothing. No footsteps. No movement.

Just silence, heavy and damning as any testimony I'd ever borne.

8

SAMUEL

Isat on my bed, scriptures open but unread in my lap. The words blurred together, meaningless marks on paper. My hands had finally stopped shaking, but only because I'd clenched them into fists so tight my nails bit crescents into my palms.

I know exactly what I'm saying and it's killing me.

The confession echoed in my skull. Stupid. So incredibly stupid. All the prayers, all the fasting, all the desperate pleas for strength to keep this locked away—and I'd thrown it all out in a moment of weakness. To my companion. The worst possible person.

Except.

Except Vance hadn't followed me into the bedroom. Hadn't demanded answers. Hadn't run to President Dalton.

He'd just... asked.

You were talking about yourself, weren't you?

The question had been gentle. Almost kind.

I pressed my palms against my eyes until stars burst behind my lids. This was it. This was how it ended. Vance would report me. I'd be sent home in disgrace. My father would have to stand before the stake and explain why his son, the golden boy, the example to all the youth, had failed so spectacularly. My mother would cry. My siblings would be mortified.

And I'd deserve it. All of it.

A soft knock on the door made me jerk upright.

"Price?" Vance's voice, muffled through the wood. "Can I come in?"

"No."

"I brought you water."

"I'm fine."

"You're not fine. Neither of us is fine." A pause. "Please."

I stared at the door. Every mission rule, every handbook directive, screamed at me to maintain the boundary. Keep the separation. Don't let him in, don't let anyone in, don't ever let them see.

"It's open," I said.

The door swung inward. Vance stood in the frame, two glasses of water in his hands. He'd taken off his tie, unbuttoned the top button of his shirt. The casualness of it felt obscene somehow, like he'd stripped down to his undergarments.

He crossed to my bed, held out one of the glasses.

I took it. Our fingers didn't touch.

"You don't have to talk about it," Vance said. He sat on his own bed, facing me across the narrow gap between them. "But I'm not going to pretend I didn't hear what you said."

"Then what are you going to do?" The words came out flat, defeated. "Call Dalton? Kempton? Request a new companion?"

"Why would Ido that?"

"Because I just—" I stopped. Swallowed. "Because I basically confessed to having same-sex attraction. That's a serious issue. It requires intervention."