Stay With Me (13 page)

She was amazed that Chris never found fault with
her and never made her feel stupid, despite her naiveté or ignorance. They had
spent a lot of time flipping through his books and talking about “Catholic
stuff” without him ever pushing her or belittling her. One of the books he
loaned her was about Mary, the mother of God. She would have thought that book
would have made her uneasy, even more than what he called the Theology of the
Body books, but it didn’t. Chris had talked about Mary being a mother to everyone,
and since she had few memories of her own mother, that idea appealed to her.

Out of nowhere, tears came.
Thank you, Lord, for
sending Chris into my life. Please let me be worthy of his
—dare she even
think it?—
his love
.

***

Whistling as he went, Chris walked through his
apartment gathering dirty socks, unopened mail, and other debris that had
accumulated since Rebecca’s visit a couple of nights earlier. Father John had
called while Chris was on his way home from work, offering to bring a pizza.
Father John didn’t have a free night often, and he said he wanted to spend it
watching a Pirates baseball game over beer and a meat-lover’s deluxe.

Particles of food dotted the kitchen table and
counters. Chris wiped the surfaces with a damp cloth and took a big sniff as he
shook the crumbs into the trash can. Something stank. He yanked the plastic bag
out by the straps, tightened, and took it to the door where he nearly bumped
into Father John. He’d raised his hand to knock below the screen.

“Hey, come on in. I’m just taking this out.” Chris
went out, and Father John went in. In a couple minutes, he returned to find
Father John slinging large slices of greasy pizza onto paper plates. The aroma
of oregano and sausage filled the air. Chris washed his hands and grabbed a
couple of bottles of beer from the fridge and removed their caps.

“What time does the game start?”

Father John glanced at his watch. “Five minutes.
Let’s say grace here, and then we can take this in the other room.”

After they prayed, they headed back to the living
room, and Chris turned on the game while Father John took a seat on the sofa.
“How are things with Rebecca?”

“Good.” He spared Father John a big smile before he
bit into his pizza.

“It still blows my mind that you two even met, let
alone that you’re dating.”

“She left here Tuesday night with two Theology of
the Body books and one about Mary.”

“Really?” Father John stopped mid-chew to assess
Chris’s veracity.

Chris nodded while he downed the pizza. He recalled
the flicker of excitement he felt when she had accepted his offer to lend her
the books.

“I’m not pushing. If she takes an interest in it I
want it to be genuine and not something she does to please me. She noticed the
books and asked me some questions, and I answered them the best I could. When I
said she could borrow them, she said she would.”

“Hmmm.”

He had expected a more encouraging response than
the noncommittal noise. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I’m a little surprised is all, but I only knew her
for a short time a long time ago.”

“Why does it surprise you?”

“Let’s just say the Bible camp wasn’t the most
Catholic-friendly thing I ever attended.”

Chris was momentarily distracted by a line drive
over second base. Once the runners slid safely into second and third bases he
spoke. “How so?”

Father John interlocked his fingers behind his
head. “I think six people informed me I wasn’t saved.”

“Was Rebecca one of them?”

“No.” His hands dropped back to his lap. “She heard
someone say it though and told them only God knows our hearts.”

 Taking the final bite of his crust, Chris chewed
and swallowed. “Sounds like her. I’m praying she keeps an open mind and heart
about it.”

“I’ll join you in that prayer, then.”

After using a paper napkin to wipe the grease from
his fingers, Chris set aside his plate and took a sip of his beer. “I’m anxious
to see what she thinks of the Theology of the Body ones.”

“Why’s that?”

He let out a sigh. How much of this did he want to
share? His thoughts were based only on his impressions, not something Rebecca
had actually said, but Father John would be his best sounding board on
something like this. Having this conversation with Alan would be like trying to
discuss wine pairings with a teetotaler.  Except in reverse. Whatever. Alan
wasn’t the one to talk to about this. “We haven’t spoken about it directly, but
I suspect her thinking’s kind of messed up when it comes to sex.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Well, we agree about sex being for marriage, but
I’m coming at it from ‘sex is such a great thing we’ve got to save it for
marriage,’ and I think she’s more like, ‘sex is so unholy we’ve got to confine
it to marriage.’”

Father John nodded in understanding as if he’d
heard that a couple dozen times before. “Did you ever talk to her about what
kind of sex ed she had? Did she get it from her dad or church or what?”

The thought of her dad talking to Rebecca about the
joys of marital intimacy made him laugh. “Somehow I can’t imagine her dad
delicately explaining the birds and bees to her. How the man single-handedly
raised two daughters, I have no idea. I don’t think I’ve ever met a man I’ve
liked less.”

“That doesn’t bode well, Chris.”

“No, it doesn’t, but I can’t see breaking things
off with Rebecca because of it.”

Father John had finished both his pizza and beer
and leaned back on the couch and stretched his legs out. He folded his hands
behind his head. “I’m not saying you should, just that you ought to think long
and hard about what it would be like to have him as your father-in-law.”

A shudder rippled through him. “He called me a
papist over dinner.”

Father John laughed and leaned forward to rest his
elbows on his knees. “Oh, man. You must have really lost your heart to put up
with that garbage.”

The blunt truth of that statement struck him. It
looked more and more like his heart was a goner as far as Rebecca was
concerned. “Maybe his bark is worse than his bite. I guess time will tell.”

He thought back to their game of Yahtzee the other
night. “You know, I thought I had her all figured out.”

Laughing, Father John shook his head. “Never. I may
be celibate, but I have five sisters. Just when you think you’ve figured them
out, you realize you don’t know a thing.”

“I guess so. I’ve wanted to take her for a ride on
my motorcycle, but I thought for sure she’d resist and claim it was unsafe and
all that crap I have to hear from my mother all the time. So, I thought of a
way to get her out there.”

“Oh yeah?” Father John glanced at the TV screen
before turning his attention back to Chris. The Bucs had a man in scoring
position with no outs.

“How?”

“I thought I was so clever. I challenged her to
best of five in Yahtzee. Winner gets to choose the loser’s punishment. So, if I
won, I’d make her ride with me, but I let her go first, and she said—get
this—‘if you lose, you have to take me for a ride on your motorcycle.’ I
couldn’t believe it. I had to scramble to come up with something else in case
she lost.”

“Who won?”

“I did. I almost threw the game, but now that I
know she wants to go, I guess I can just ask her.”

“What did you come up with for her to do instead?”

Darn it. He’d walked into that one. “There are some
things a man doesn’t share, even with his closest friends.” Chris’s lips
twitched as he crumpled his napkin, laid it on his plate, and set it on the end
table.

“How about with his confessor?” Father John
smirked.

“No need for confession.”

“Good.”

“So what’s up with you? All we’ve talked about is
me and Rebecca.”

Father John leaned back into the couch again and
rubbed his hands over his eyes and face then gave an audible sigh. “You know, I
used to think everything was black and white. Now that I see all these shades
of gray, it’s not so simple anymore.”

“Care to be a little less cryptic?”

“I’m not talking about sin or anything, just that
even with prayer and trying to discern God’s will, sometimes it’s hard to
decide on the most prudent course of action. I’m drowning in freedom.” He stood
and started pacing Chris’s small room, betraying his Italian heritage by waving
his hands this way and that as he spoke. “I mean, freedom is being free to do
the right thing, right? But what if you’re not sure what the right thing is, or
maybe there’s more than one right thing? Maybe there isn’t any right thing—only
different choices with different consequences.”

Something sure had him worked up. Usually Chris
came to Father John with his dilemmas, but it seemed the tables had turned, and
Chris wanted to offer his friend some kind of wisdom. Too bad he didn’t have
much to offer.

“Well, you’ve studied a lot more philosophy and
theology than me, but in homage to the great Stan Lee, I would say, ‘with great
power comes great responsibility.’ Whatever this is you’re talking about, your
free will, your ability to choose the good, is your power. Whatever you choose,
you need to own what happens as a result. I guarantee no matter what you
choose, it won’t be perfect, but God will work with that, right? It’s all raw
material for him.”

Father John stopped pacing and stared at the
television. He was looking through the screen more than at it while he digested
the wisdom Chris had gleaned from his childhood obsession with Marvel
superheroes.

 “Maybe I’m overanalyzing or making the decision
too personal.”

Chris scratched his cheek. “Hard to say. Do you
want to tell me any more about it?”

Father John shook his head and reclaimed his place
on the couch. “Not yet. Pizza, beer, and baseball with a friend. That’s what I
came over here for.”

***

“So, explain to me again why you’re staying with
your dad tonight,”  Chris said.

“The girls that live in the other apartment claim
they have bed bugs. So, the landlord is having the whole building sprayed or
bombed or whatever it is they do. I would stay with Abby and Joel and the kids,
but Joel’s mom is coming in from New York City for a visit. It’s been on the
calendar for months, and I don’t want to intrude or disrupt their plans.”

Rebecca didn’t mention that it wasn’t mandatory
that she leave or that in spite of her mother-in-law’s visit, Abby offered her
Emma’s bed. While she didn’t relish staying with her dad, she did still have a
bed made up there, and it was only one night. Her dad’s proximity to Chris was
the real draw. Harrisburg to Gettysburg didn’t constitute a long distance
relationship, but a forty-five-minute drive each way on weeknights was plenty.

“So, I can thank the bed bugs for the pleasure of
your company tonight.”

“I guess you could say that.”

Chris had taken her to Mister G’s for homemade ice
cream so good it made waiting alongside a crush of summer tourists worth it.
Afterwards, they had walked hand-in-hand around her old neighborhood. Their
pace had slowed considerably as they got closer to her dad’s house. She didn’t
want their evening to end, and she guessed Chris didn’t either.

“If I didn’t tell you earlier, you look great
tonight.” His glance flitted up and down her new ensemble, courtesy of Abby.

Rebecca ducked her head but couldn’t stop the smile
spreading on her face. She tugged the lacy shrug across her chest with her free
hand. “Thank you.”

“You’re a babe, Rebecca. I’m a lucky guy.”

She stopped moving and peered up at him. “What did
you say?”

“I’m a lucky guy.”

“No, before that.” It couldn’t be a coincidence. He
had used the same word as Abby.

“You’re a babe?” His eyes shone as he studied her
face and then her shoulders and on down her body.

A chill pricked her forearms and ran up her spine.
“Have you spoken to my sister?”

He wrinkled his brow, puzzled. “No. I wouldn’t even
know how to get in touch with Abby. Why?”

She started walking again and shook her head. “I
thought maybe she put you up to saying that, but I guess not.”

“Nope. I came to the conclusion you’re a babe all
on my own.”

As the sky turned a dusky pink in the west, they
mounted the steps to her dad’s porch. It was hot, but the humidity seemed to be
dropping. The fragrance of the neighbor’s rose bushes wafted on a light breeze,
and she also caught a whiff of someone grilling—probably hamburgers. “Do you
smell that?”

Chris stopped and sniffed. “What?”

She smiled. “Summer.”

“So that’s what summer smells like to you, beef and
flowers?”

Rebecca laughed. “Yeah, I guess so.”

He stopped, and so did she, and he put his hands on
her shoulders and turned her to face him. He stepped closer. “And what does
summer sound like to you?”