Man of God

It is the morning of my sister’s Confirmation. As far as I can tell, she’s not much more devout than I am, but I’ll still go to support her. I step into the church and am greeted with the familiar scents of balsa wood and incense. I have actively avoided this building for years. Still, everything is exactly as I remember it. The wooden ceiling fans hum from the vaulted ceiling. The stained glass Saints stare back at me with blank eyes from their positions in the window. I join my family in a front pew and watch the kids begin their solemn march to their pews on the other side of the aisle. My sister sees us and gives a little wave. I am so busy watching her that I don’t notice the priest who follows them in until he is standing behind the podium. My pulse races as a million not-safe-for-church memories race through my brain. He makes the mistake of looking up, and his eyes meet mine. He pales and opens his mouth, but nothing comes out.

Of all the priests who could have been here leading the Mass, it's him. What are the odds that we would both be here today?

I guess you could call it divine intervention.

~~~

From the moment I laid eyes on Colton, I was hooked. It was impossible not to stare at the tall, tanned guy with the perfect smile and blue eyes, whose dark hair flopped every which way when he shook his head. The problem was that in addition to being gorgeous, he also seemed pretty religious. I shouldn't have been surprised; we went to a Catholic college, after all. But plenty of the students (including myself) were there for the degree; the religious aspect was incidental. Colton, though, bowed his head and closed his eyes somberly during opening prayers, and he always wore one of those Jesus fish necklaces. I wasn’t sure how to get a religious guy’s attention, so eventually I decided on the tried-and-true method known to get any guy’s attention—low-cut shirts, short skirts (luckily, our dress code wasn’t strictly enforced), and sultry glances in his direction. It worked. Once, when we were praying the Our Father before class and we got to the “lead us not into temptation” line, I peeked over to see him staring at my legs with one eye open. He blushed furiously and closed his eyes again as soon as he noticed me looking. So he was interested in me, too.

It was time to shoot my shot. When the professor asked everyone to pair up to work on a project, I scooted my chair next to his. “You wanna be my partner? You seem like a really hard worker,” I added earnestly.

He smiled. “Thanks. Yeah, I’d love to. You wanna come over Sunday afternoon and we’ll work on it? My roommate goes home on the weekends.”

We were only supposed to have visitors of the same sex in our dorms. This was also not really enforced, but it excited me to know that Colton was willing to break the rules for me. “Yeah, I think I’m free. Would noon work?"

"How about 12:30? I go to the late Mass." 

This should have been a red flag, but I shrugged it off. Lots of students attended Mass out of obligation, only to resume their regular heathen lives as soon as the last hymn was sung. As I got dressed, I thought about Colton’s shaggy hair and dark eyelashes. I decided to change from my boring beige bra and underwear to a silky red push-up and matching rhinestone-studded thong. Colton didn’t strike me as a casual hook-up kind of guy, but it never hurt to be prepared.

As soon as he opened the door, I was glad I'd changed, just in case. His piercing eyes sparkled and he flashed his heart melting smile as he ushered me in. I followed him and couldn't help but stare at his firm, tight ass in his thin athletic shorts. He didn’t wear those to Mass, did he? He had to have changed for my benefit.

“Sorry there’s not much room to sit,” he said apologetically, gesturing around the tiny dorm room. There was barely enough room for two small desks and a beanbag chair in addition to the bunk bed. “You can sit on my bed if you want. I’ll sit on the floor.”

“Doesn’t matter,” I said casually. But I took his suggestion and sat on the edge of his bed, crossing my legs under my tight denim miniskirt as I did so. He stretched out on the floor in front of me so that our feet almost touched. It felt as if we were trapped in an elevator or a closet together; our own tiny universe. I could feel the tension between us as I struggled not to stare at him, knowing that if I did, I’d be tempted to pull him over to me and do all the things I’d been daydreaming about. I noticed him desperately averting his eyes from my legs and wondered if he was thinking the same thing.

“Thanks for coming over, by the way,” he said, clearing his throat. “We probably could have waited till later, but I wanted to get this knocked out right after Mass.” He jiggled his foot back and forth, shaking his tanned calf along with it. “I didn’t see you there today. Do you go to the early service?”

“I don’t always go.” I never went, but I didn’t want Colton to know that. He had asked the question as though it were a given that I went to one of the services.

Sure enough, “Oh. Do you go to another church sometimes?”

Time to change the subject. “Why? Were you looking for me?”

He shrugged and smiled. I noticed his face redden as he ducked and pushed his hair around his forehead. His t-shirt sleeve slipped up as he did so, revealing stretch marks on his upper bicep. “I used to be really scrawny,” he said, pulling the sleeve back down when he caught my eye. “I started working out last year. I got muscle pretty fast, so I got stretch marks, too. Kinda embarrassing.”

“I think they’re cute,” I replied. The ridged scars were the first physical imperfection I had seen on Colton thus far and there was something about them that felt like a relief, like he was human rather than god-like. I hopped off the bed and came to sit beside him. “Can I see again? Seriously, I don’t think they’re embarrassing. I like them.”

He smiled and replied, “You gotta show me something embarrassing too, then.”

“Oh. Easy.” I pulled down the collar of my t-shirt and pointed to the “Daddy’s Girl” tattoo above my right breast. “How’s that for cringe?”

He didn’t answer. He just stared, as if it was his first time seeing a girl’s chest. I felt heat building in me from his eyes on my body. Finally, he blinked and shook his head. “Yeah, um, pretty bad,” he replied slowly. He pulled his eyes up to mine and repeated, “Pretty bad.”

I leaned in and ran my finger along the shiny stripes on his shoulder. “Really bad,” I agreed. I could smell salt on his breath. He reminded me of a surfer, long-haired and tanned. Salt was appropriate.

I tasted it eagerly as he leaned in. He kissed me gently at first, then harder, our teeth clacking against each other. I tugged on his shirt until he pulled it off, then ripped off my own, proud of the foresight I’d had to change bras.

Colton pulled away just long enough to gently place his hand on my chest. “Look…I’m not really looking for a girlfriend right now. I can't make that kind of commitment. You should probably know that.”

"That's fine." I didn't even know if I wanted to be Colton's girlfriend; I didn’t see myself as a good match for a devoted Catholic. Deep down, though, I had to admit that something about Colton was different. Yes, he was a goody-two-shoes, but he also seemed like a genuinely good person. The kind of guy who would treat me right.

But, if it wasn't a possibility, at least he was honest about it. I pushed the thought out of my mind and wrapped my legs around him as I climbed into his lap. Feeling him rock-hard underneath me heated my whole body from the inside out. “You got something on you?” I whispered.

"Oh. No," he said, wide-eyed. "Do you?" I reached for my purse in response. Right as I went to take off his shorts, he pulled away again. “You should know something else,” he said awkwardly. “I, uh, I’ve never done this before.”

That threw me for a loop. “Really?” Tanned, muscled, gorgeous Colton, a virgin? “Why not?”

“I don’t know,” he mumbled. “I guess most of the girls I've dated were pretty religious. The kind that wanted to wait until marriage."

“Oh.” I sighed. “Is that what you want, too?"

He gazed at my chest for a few seconds, then finally pulled his eyes up to mine. "Here's what I want," he breathed. He reached for the button on my jeans, pulling them down and caressing the front of my panties. Just his touch made my body scream for more. I ripped them off impatiently and grabbed at his shorts until they were a heap on the floor. “Am I the first girl to ever see this?” I wrapped my hand around his cock. “All your exes don’t know what they missed out on,” I said as I guided him to the bed and straddled him. I was only half-kidding. It was bigger than I'd imagined, yet somehow perfectly proportionate to his physique. Colton could have fucked a hundred girls by now, if he'd wanted to. 

“I’m not thinking about my exes right now,” he managed to whisper as he put his hand between my legs and ran his fingers up and down. I could tell he’d never actually touched a girl there before, not because he was doing anything wrong, but because he was so slow and deliberate about it. I guided his hand up and down my wet lips, spreading them just enough for me to grab his cock and guide it inside of me. “How does that feel?” I asked breathlessly. It felt incredible to me. 

“Mmmm,” he groaned. I began to move up and down, loving the control I had, loving the way he began to move his own body in response as he got the hang of it. I moved my hips in a circle and rubbed my clit against him, closing my eyes and stifling a moan as every part of my sex burned with pleasure. At that moment, I didn’t care if it was his first time. I didn’t even care how he was feeling. I just wanted to keep going, keep moving against him, until I couldn’t take it any more.

“Oh, oh, fuck, yes,” he whispered frantically as he began to move faster, bringing me back to earth. He was about to come, and I wasn’t ready for this to be over. It took all I had to slide off of him at that moment and teasingly whisper, “Not yet.”

“Yes,” he whispered back, his eyes burning with an intensity I had never seen from him before. He squared his jaw and laid me on my back, fucking me exactly the way I wanted it. Face-to-face with him. I wanted to see his face when he came. 

He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth, sweat dripping off his forehead and onto mine as he moved. “Yes. Yes. I’m gonna.”

“Gonna what?” I whispered. I knew, of course. I just wanted to hear him say it.

“Come,” he replied breathlessly. He opened his eyes and fixed them on me as he took a shaky breath and finished so hard that the headboard bumped against the wall. His face softened into a smile of sheer ecstasy, and it began to dawn on me that I had just given him one of the most important and exciting moments of his life. I felt exhilarated, my heart pounding and my pussy aching, but he had to feel something more than just physical pleasure. He looked as if he had gotten a glimpse of Heaven. The power of knowing he felt that way for the first time, because of me, was something I’d never experienced before.

He rolled off of me and exhaled heavily. “Christ,” he murmured, staring blankly at the bunk above us. 

“So? Was it okay?” I tried to make my voice sound light, but his expression was so solemn, mouth turned down and thick eyebrows knitted together, that I had to ask.

He gave a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Yeah. You were more than okay.” The smile faded as he added, "But maybe I shouldn't have done that."

What was I supposed to say to that? “Why not? You were amazing,” I replied.

He sighed and shifted slightly away from me. “I don’t know, I just feel a little guilty,” he admitted.

If he was trying to play some kind of victim, I was going to shut that shit down right now. “You told me you wanted to do it,” I reminded him. “You sure as hell acted like you wanted to do it.”

“I did,” he said quickly, shifting back to me. “I just…surprised myself, I guess. I didn’t expect to do that today, that’s all.”

"Well, you can't undo it," I pointed out. 

That seemed to break him out of his spell. He ran his hand along my leg. "You're right. I can't undo it."

"So now what?" 

He smiled again as his hand reached my thigh. "Might as well do it again."

~~~

Colton made it clear that he was serious about not wanting me to be his girlfriend. He never asked me to dinner, or to a movie, or even to Mass with him. All he ever asked me was where and when I wanted to hook up. I told myself I was fine with that. We met up in his dorm, in a conference room at the library, in the backseat of his car late at night. Sometimes during class, he'd shift up the sleeve of his t-shirt to expose his stretch marks and throw me a sly look. It was enough to make me want to drag him out of class and go at it right there in the hallway, and he knew it. He’d barely have his sleeve rolled back down before I’d send him a text from across the room: w/w. Where/when.

I wanted to get to know him better. His dorm room provided few hints about his interests outside of church. He had a crucifix above his doorway, and a Rosary on his desk. He also had a Bible on his nightstand and a small painting of Jesus on his wall. Okay, so he was pretty devout. But that didn't mean we couldn't still have our fun. I secretly loved the taboo of an affair with an innocent church boy, especially at a Catholic college. We could have gotten expelled if we'd been caught. I told myself that he probably felt like the taboo of having casual sex with a more experienced girl and the risks he took to do it was just as fun and exciting. 

I might have convinced myself it was true, if not for the way he acted afterwards. He'd stare at the ceiling, or the floor, anywhere except at me. I finally asked him about it one day, as we sat slumped against the cinderblock wall in the stairwell we'd just christened. "What's wrong?"

He stiffened and gave me a guilty look. "What do you mean?"

"You always act like something terrible happened after we finish. Am I that bad?"

I knew that wasn't it, but I didn't know what it was. Or maybe deep down, I did. 

"I'm fine." He twisted the heel of his sneaker into the floor. "I just… I know the Bible says not to have sex before marriage. I know this isn't right."

"God's not mad at us," I countered indignantly. For someone who went to Catholic school, I rarely thought about God, but I felt certain that He had bigger problems than Colton and me. "He knows we're just having fun." I gently lifted his chin and grazed his lips with mine. "We are having fun, aren't we?"

He kissed me back, then traced the outline of my lips with his finger. "We are having fun," he agreed with a smile. I smiled back, grateful that things seemed back to normal. 

And then one Sunday afternoon, I texted him. wyd tonight? 

Tonight's not good, he responded after a few minutes. Tomorrow?

Okay, no big deal. But he brushed me off the following Sunday, too. We met up the next day, and it was as if the brush-offs never happened. "Sorry I was busy yesterday," he said as he threw his shirt back on.

"You're allowed to be busy," I replied.

"Well, I wasn't really busy, I guess." He fastened his Jesus fish necklace. "I feel like Sundays just aren't a good day for us to meet up. I go to Mass, and then…I don’t know. I should probably set aside one day for God, you know?"

"Sure," I shrugged. I didn’t see what the big deal was. God wasn't checking the calendar before He decided whether or not to smite us for fucking in the A/V room. 

Colton came up with an excuse the next two times I texted him. I was starting to think he was ghosting me when he casually rolled up his sleeves toward the end of class. My phone buzzed. Come over after class. I tried to make eye contact with him, but he stared resolutely ahead.

Maybe I should have punished him a little bit; left him on read a few times; said no once or twice. But I didn’t see the point. I spent every waking hour thinking about him. Thinking about his body, obviously, but also his smile. His voice when he said my name. I thought about him all the time.

“You should be a model,” I told him as I ran my hand from his bare stomach to the button of his baggy jeans. “You always look like you stepped out of a Hollister catalog.”

He laughed. “A model. With these striped biceps?”

“Your striped biceps are so hot, Colton. They’re my favorite thing about you.” I flicked my tongue along the tip of his cock. “Well, maybe my second favorite thing.”

“I don’t wanna be a model,” he answered. “Who knows, I might become a priest.”

It struck me as a weird thing to say when I was about to suck him off. I considered making a joke about why I was on my knees if he was the one becoming a priest, but I didn’t. Instead, I flicked my tongue around him some more, slowly sliding it up and down. I opened my mouth and looked up in surprise as he took a step back. "You thought I was kidding, didn't you?" he asked.

"About what? The priest thing?" He nodded. "I don't know. I don’t think you should worry about it right now. You have all the time in the world to become a priest someday."

"I think I need to decide soon." He exhaled and stared at the wall. "I don't think we're supposed to be doing this."

"Speak for yourself," I said irritably. This was not the conversation I'd expected to have with him.

"Okay, fine. I'm not supposed to be doing this." He pulled his shorts back up and retreated to the bed with a frown. "I've felt the call ever since I was a kid, off and on. It's been getting stronger and louder ever since I met you. It's like God is telling me to stop."

"Oh, don’t sit there and act like I’m some fucking Jezebel temptress leading you astray," I snapped. “You don’t even talk to me outside of us fucking. You’ve just been using me to get off a few times a week like it’s no big deal.”

His face darkened further. "First of all, if I've been using you, you've been using me right back. Second…" he looked away again. "I have desires. I'm human. And I do like you."

"I like you, too." More than I'd ever intended to. I didn’t know how to tell him that I had begun to want more than what we had. “Colton, you don’t want to be a priest.” You want to be with me, I added silently. “You can be a good person, even a good Catholic, without doing something so drastic. Don’t you want to get married someday? Have kids?”

I knew I did, which made our situation all the more complicated.

“I don’t think I want kids,” he said, shaking his head. “I don’t even know if I want to get married. I feel like if I had a family of my own, I’d be tempted to put them before God, and I really don’t want to do that, you know?”

Resisting the urge to groan, I joined him on the bed and put my hand over his, guiding it along my body. “But if you were a priest, we couldn’t do this anymore.” I ran my other hand over the front of his shorts, knowing without even having to look that he’d be hard again. “Wouldn’t that be sad?”

“Come on, stop,” he said hoarsely. But instead of pushing me away, he pulled me closer, running his fingers along the waistband of my jeans, slipping them around my thong. I decided to rid him of this crazy priest idea once and for all. I pulled off his shorts again and took him in my mouth, gently at first, then a little bit harder and deeper.

I glanced up at him. He watched me with an expression I couldn’t quite read. “You good?” I asked, although I was pretty sure I knew the answer. “You want me to keep going?”

He nodded and put his hand on the top of my head. "Keep going," he panted. "I want you to prove me wrong."

Challenge accepted. I licked the tip of his cock again, swirling my tongue around until he glistened. As soon as I parted my lips, he groaned and thrust himself in so deeply that I felt him against the back of my throat. I took him again, gripping him as hard as I could, fist against my lips.

"Oh my god," he breathed as my fingers tightened around his marble erection. He liked when I gripped him. He liked when I was rough with him. I knew Colton's body so well by now. As soon as he began to push himself further into me, matching my rhythm, I automatically slowed down to keep him from coming too soon. "Not yet," I said, just as I had the first time we were together. "Stand up."

I knelt down and took him again in my mouth, tasting his skin, feeling his veins and shaft and every inch of him that I'd become so familiar with. As I sucked eagerly, I gently reached around with my other hand and began to massage his taint with my fingers. I'd never done that to him before. He cried out, "Fuck. Oh my god," with such surprise and pleasure, I felt myself smile around his cock. There was something about knowing that no other girl had ever done this to him before. As if I had unlocked a secret door. 

I bobbed back and forth, my slippery wet lips and hand gripping him and moving with increasing force and strength, my other hand still behind his balls. He began to draw ragged breaths as he reached out to grab a fistful of my hair. I absolutely loved the rough, intense, passionate way he grabbed me and swore and thrust himself at me when he was about to come. He wasn’t thinking about being a nice little church boy. He was only thinking about how good I made him feel. 

He clenched his teeth and hissed, "Jesus, you are so. Fucking. Good," and I knew he couldn't wait any longer. I tilted my head back and swallowed greedily as he came with a long shudder, certain that this wouldn't be the last time I felt his hot, metallic taste in my mouth. We were both breathing heavy, catching our breath.

I looked up at him and felt the smile slip from my face. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

The fire I'd seen in his eyes just a few minutes ago was gone. "We can't do this anymore," he said sadly. "It's not you. It's me. This isn't what God wants me to do with my life. I'm sorry."

I wanted to blame someone. Him, for hurting me. His precious God, for making him do it. Even myself, for failing to change his mind. I wanted to beg him to give me another chance. I wanted to slap him. I wanted to curse him out. 

Instead I looked into his eyes one last time and said, "Okay." 

I left in silence, waiting to hear him call my name as I walked down the hall. He didn’t. I walked into class a few days later with a knot in my stomach, wondering if he would look at me, if he would roll up his sleeves and text me like everything was back to normal. When I saw his empty chair, I wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or disappointed. Then one of the other students asked, "Does anyone have Colton's number? He was supposed to give me his notes from Wednesday."

"Colton transferred out of this class," the professor replied. "He emailed me to say he's joined the seminary program." 

The knot in my stomach became a knife. He was really, truly, officially gone.

I slowly transitioned back to my regular routine of casual dating, random hookups, occasional semi-serious boyfriends. I graduated college, got a teaching job, tried every dating app in existence. I still never found anyone who made me feel the way Colton had. When I was seeing him, I was always either with him or thinking about the next time I would be with him. Nobody else has lived in my head like that before or since.

~~~

After the Mass, he stands in the lobby, greeting the congregation. I deliberately hang back and tell my family that I have a question for the priest about his homily. I wait until everyone else has filed out to the courtyard before I shut the heavy wooden door and turn to him.

"Hi," he says awkwardly, shifting his feet. "This is, um, quite a surprise."

"It's my sister’s Confirmation," I reply before glancing at the program in my hand and adding, "Father Charles."

"My middle name," he explains. "How have you been?"

"I'm fine. I teach fifth grade." He glances at my left hand. "Nope," I say in response to the unasked question. He blushes. "But maybe someday." I stand face-to-face with him. His hair is shorter now, so it doesn't flop over his forehead anymore, but his eyes haven't changed one bit. They are still as round and blue as those satellite pictures of Earth from a distance. "There was never another you," I confess to him. 

He presses his lips together. "If I'd known you would be here, I don't know if I would have been glad, or if I would have traded Masses with another priest," he sighs. "I wish I didn’t still think about you. Do you know you were the only girl I ever…?"

"I figured that." I feel my body stir at the memories, knowing what we're both thinking about, knowing what we'd meant to one another. "I must not have been very good, if after one woman you decided to swear off of them forever. That, or I ruined them all for you," I say half-jokingly.

His eyes travel up and down my body. He knows exactly what I look like under my paisley dress, right down to the stupid tattoo. And I know exactly what he looks like under his flowy white robe. I'm wondering if I could pull him into a confessional room and rip it off of him when he finally says, “You know that’s not true. Just because something feels good, doesn’t make it right. You were incredible, but every time we were done, I felt guilty. That didn’t have anything to do with you.”

"Do you regret it?" I ask as I inch closer to him. I'm not sure I want to know the answer. No matter what he says, it's going to haunt me. 

He looks down at the statue of Mary near the doorway. She is weeping, wooden tears trickling down, wooden eyes turned heavenward. "It was sin," he says carefully. "It was wrong. I repented of it. I've been forgiven."

I am now close enough to smell the Communion wine on his breath and the cologne on his neck. "But do you regret it?"

He closes his eyes and leans in. My heart begins to pound. Is he really going to kiss me, in the church lobby, wearing his priest outfit? The thought gives me a thrill I haven't felt in years. Probably not since…

He whispers in my ear, "I have to go. May the Lord bless you." He pushes open the wooden door and steps out onto the sunlit courtyard. 

Dazedly, I follow him out. My mother waves me over. "So?" she says. "Did Father Charles answer your question?"

I look at him standing just a few feet away, talking to a group of proud parents. His back is turned to me. I wonder if he overhears my mother. Does he know I'm watching him?

And then, with his back still turned, he carefully adjusts the sleeves of his robe. It is almost as if he is pretending to push them up. 

"Oh, yes," I say without taking my eyes off of him. "I think he did."