Unrest

fiction.

My friend Carter is a priest. He knew he wanted to be one since we were both cherubs in catholic school. We’ve been friends for just as long. I was the star to his wise man, the sheep to his shepherd, the faith to his Joseph. We were the only boys in the class to grow our hair long. His waved across his shoulders whereas mine curled towards the sky. Either way, we could never be seen apart.

As teens, Carter was always wary of eye contact. He would never look at someone directly into their pupil, he was scared that the “devil may enter him through them”. I, of course, would laugh in his face but by that point I was no longer a faithful student and instead I was a lost soul. Better to be lost than scared. Carter would always look at me with this forlorn look, as if there was something so fragile about me due to my lack of faith. One evening in August I told Carter I liked men. In that moment, my heart kept trying to leap out of my throat. Sweat coated my body like a second skin and no amount of self-soothing could shake the fear that I could lose Carter. All of that was for nothing. He held my hand in that gentle grip of his and said, “Okay.” I let out a sigh of relief. His acceptance was a relief to both of us.

See the thing about Carter was that he held onto his belief. He knew what he wanted to be, he knew what he needed to do. Whatever it was, Carter always believed. I, on the other hand, was a lot less certain. So uncertain that I tended to end up hurt but it was fine because I was fine and always had to be— will be. When Carter left for his seminary, we tried to keep in contact as we usually would but in the end, busyness turned our daily calls into monthly check-ups. Whenever he would message, I always made sure to make it seem like everything is great. He would tell me about all the other people at his seminary, all the great things God would show him and how glad he chose this calling.

Lying was my only option because how can you tell your friend life is beating you like a drum and you have three new addictions? The answer is you don’t. Life got so bad that in a desperate bid to escape, the furthest place I landed was in the hospital. Carter left his seminary and sat with me, for those few days and nights with his hand in mine. Judgement never passed over his face and he never let me feel alone. In that moment, I knew I loved him. It was useless loving him in that way for the only person Carter would love is God.

After that incident, Carter kept his eye on me as best he could . He called and texted like a desperate girlfriend. If I took too long, one of our mutual friends would be knocking at my door. It was like that for a couple months before I had enough and he had to leave for a voluntary trip. I let him think that it was his idea to relinquish the reins of my safety, for his own peace of mind. His trip took him to some town up north where violence was the local currency. In his calls he told me there was all sorts of trouble going on up there, drugs, prostitution, fights. I told him it was my kind of party, he told me that wasn’t funny because I nearly died. Yeah, so the joke didn’t land well with him but I told him that as a priest he can try and help these people but only if they want to help themselves. Carter looked at me with a knowing look. As if he knew that I was still escaping life through damaging myself.

Just before Christmas, Carter’s first term at the seminary was done. He came to stay with me at my university flat. He came to my door in the rain and the night. He looked as if he carried the weight of the world on his bony shoulders. I pulled him into my arms and my shirt slowly started to dampen. We waltzed our way to my bare living room where we folded ourselves onto my sofa until I was in his lap and his head was on my heart. My heart beat so loudly I knew he could feel it through his sobs. After a while, he quietened down and with his tear-filled eyes, he looked up at me. He looked at my eyes and at my lips, it wasn’t long until his lips met mine. His body met mine.

The morning after the sun rose and with that so did my sadness. It didn’t matter that Carter lay in my sheets breathing deeply not that long before day-break. As he dressed, he muttered bible verses in his breath. John 1:9, Colossians 3:13, Acts 2:38. If he could he would have said them all. I let him walk out of my flat without a goodbye.

He left me with a, “Sorry,” that sat in the silent apartment long after he had left. His apology sat alongside my silent tears and my silent breathing. It didn’t matter that in a a few hours I had been devastated. I knew I would get no explanation because of the unrecognizable look that painted Carter’s face. He became someone I had never known and that was the one thing I understood from this mess. That, in Carter’s mind, what happened never happened and we would never speak of it.

In fact, we would never speak again.