They said he didn’t take the Lord's Supper.
I don’t quite know if that’s as big of a deal to them as it is to me. They might think he has some personal problems to deal with, or some serious spiritual concerns to take care of. But they don’t know him as well as I do. They don’t understand the gravity in his eyes of rejecting the wine and passing on the bread without touching it. They might think it’s a difficult time in his life. Maybe he’s searching for himself and strayed. Maybe the path isn’t as appealing as it was when it was easy and we were all kids, no temptations lurching themselves at us as if we were targets and they cannonballs.
They might not know what is going on, but I think I do.
I’ve known him for a great deal of time. If not years, I’ve known him for decades in my heart.
I know him too well to think this is a petty act of rebellion or some simple deed done because of something as meaningless as a spiritual mix-up. I think I know what the real reason for his rejection is.
He's having sex with her.
They may never suspect it. No. He's such a good boy, raised so well, so dedicated to practice the mandates and commandments of the Lord, he would never do such a thing. That's not what they've taught him in the infinite years of Christian church attendance and schooling.
Fornication is the deadliest sin. Care for thyself and be vigilant like the eagle; at all costs avoid this temptation. For he who sins shall beware, for a sinner is with the Devil and if thou art with the Devil, thou cannot be with God.
How many times have I heard that coming out of the mouth of his father? That righteous man that admits to having committed the most lustful transgressions known to man and repented. I guess the rotten apple didn't fall too far from the tree, after all.
I feel a little lied to. I feel a little disheartened. All those years expecting him to be the perfect man, hoping against reason that he would actually be different, as everyone professed him to be. He was going to be mine, once upon a time, and I his. But those things are no longer the subject of my thoughts or feelings. The things that were are not, and will no longer be what they once were.
I know I was deceived time and time again by the childish blush and the sheepish eyes. My words might have faltered once or twice, when he unexpectedly tilted my chin upward ever so lightly and looked into my eyes ever so tenderly. My breath might have caught when he bent down and gave me a simple kiss on the cheek, one of his hands on my back and another snaking around my hip.
All the dreams, shattered into pieces.
All the promises, evaporated into nothing.
So, he chose her; I'm willing to live with that. Even though there was still a sliver of hope that he was mistaken, and would realize the best of the two was the one not chosen.
There's a strange mixed drink of bitterness and relief that I'm swallowing down, my throat burning as if the Vodka of disillusion was stronger than the Red Bull of contentment. I'm let down at his actions, thinking he knew better than to fall into the trap of the wicked. But he is just a foolish mortal, after all. He knows, as do we all, that the Devil was made so much stronger than a man. I don't excuse him because of that reason. He should know better than to think with the head below his waist. It angers me, really, that it had to come to this. Literally.
The other half of me smiles, finally being given the sign that he's not worthy. All those years thinking I'd missed out on a good, serious, Christian boy; all those years shattered by a couple of minutes and a physical action so small as the one he did not do. I'm thrilled, actually, that it ended this way. Now, there's nothing to regret. There's no one to miss. He isn't the one I loved.
The him that I loved died years ago. He died when He left me.
