He snorts a humorless laugh. “I suppose the bishop would call it that, but I feel more like it’s the Church that’s having the crisis. The new pope is dancing around the issues, trying to carry on the prior pope’s more ‘tolerant’ stance,” he uses Kelsey’s finger quotes, “without alienating the more conservative wing of the cardinals who elected him.”
“Saint Sebastian’s is pretty progressive, isn’t it? Kelsey told me they have an LGBTQ ministry.”
“It folded for lack of participation,” Jason says flatly. “There are a couple of churches in Manhattan that have more active ministries, and I hear that the Archbishop of New York more or less leaves them alone, but I’m fucking tired of tolerance.”
He sighs and closes his eyes. When he opens them, he looks straight at me. “I’m angry, Victor. I’m so angry that I can’t focus on the parts of my job that I love, and I’d rather leave it than continue this way.”
Our server returns with my second bloody Mary and Jason asks her for a beer. She takes our plates away and I want to reach across the table to him, but I have no idea whether he would be okay with that.
“What will you do, then?” I ask, for lack of anything better to say.
He shrugs. “I’ll be fine for a while. Leah’s trust paid the house off years ago and I’ve got some savings.”
“I didn’t mean about money,” I say. “I meant…” I wave my hand vaguely in the air. With his time, his talent, his life, I mean.
“I don’t know,” he says. “I’ll figure something out, I guess.”
I’m about to ask if he’s leaving the Church, too, on top of resigning from his official position with Saint Sebastian’s, but Jason shifts in his chair like he’s shaking off a bad memory and says, “What’s going on with you? How was L.A.?”
I marvel at how far we’ve come since Kelsey’s wedding trip. Look at us, sitting in a restaurant, having a meal and conversation, like we haven’t spent the fifteen years before that week in Costa Rica avoiding each other.
So I tell him about Stella and the work we’ve been doing to get her ready for her new role. He asks questions about my YouTube channel and how I manage not only planning and recording my fitness classes but also managing my social media presence. I don’t tell him why I’m in New York this time.
It still feels too much like asking him for what I want.
Forty-Two
Jason
We finish our meal but I’m not ready to give up on Victor’s company yet. It’s strange. I’ve spent the past fifteen years avoiding that very thing, but during that one week in Costa Rica, Victor’s burrowed under my skin and—what’s that the kids say?—now lives rent-free in my head.
Do the kids say that anymore? Whatever, it’s true that when I’m not agonizing about my career, I’m thinking about Victor. Of course, it’s also true that it’s in large part because of Victor that I’m agonizing about my career.
Not that this is all Victor’s fault. Would I be facing this dilemma about my faith and my sexuality if I hadn’t spent that week fucking him every chance I got?
Maybe, maybe not. I’ve never pursued (or been pursued by) another man before, and maybe Victor is the only man I’d ever want to pursue.
What I do know is that I want him. Not just for sex. For…everything. I just don’t know how to tell him that.
“Want to come back to the house with me?” I risk asking as we leave the restaurant. I’ve no idea if Victor has other plans today.
“I’d love to,” he says immediately. My shoulders drop under my coat and I realize I’ve been tensing them for who knows how long.
It’s a short walk to the house and we don’t speak much on the way. When I let us in and Barnaby comes to greet me and investigate this stranger entering his home, Victor stops in his tracks, a couple of steps inside.
“I forgot you said you had a dog.” He sounds delighted rather than disconcerted, so that’s a good thing. He holds his hand out respectfully for Barnaby to sniff at, but then crouches down and promptly rubs all over Barnaby’s muzzle, neck, and shoulders. “Hello, puppers, are you a good dog? Oh yeah, you are, aren’t you? What a good dog you are,” and other such nonsense.
“Don’t get him all riled up,” I say, but obviously, it’s too late. Victor and Barnaby are romping around the living room, tussling and playing with each other like they’ve been best friends for years. “Go on, then. Outside, both of you.”
I point to the door in the kitchen that leads to the back deck and then down into the yard. Barnaby leads Victor to the door and waits impatiently for him to open it. Once outside, they bound down the deck stairs and race each other around the perimeter of the yard. Victor finds a tennis ball and throws it four or five times for Barnaby to fetch, until he collapses at Victor’s feet, panting, a big doggy smile on his face.
“That’s it?” Victor says. “That’s all you got?”
I’m leaning on the deck railing, watching them. “He’s a retired racer. Greyhounds are built for short bursts of speed, not endurance. He’s got about five minutes of intense energy in him and then he naps like a cat the rest of the day.”
“That’s gotta be convenient for a dog in the city,” Victor says.
“Yeah,” I reply. “I mean, he’s big, but he hardly ever barks and he’s the laziest, most chill dog I’ve ever known.”
