0 comments/ 34231 views/ 0 favorites Passion of the Priest Ch. 01 By: J.B.Shelton The first time I saw Nineveh, I had cotton balls in my ears. And I was drunk. I once considered that to be the worst of my sins. I was in a coffeehouse I'd never been in before, writing a review for a band I'd never heard of and was certain I'd probably never see again. The smoke choked me, and I sat near the door for quick escapes into the fresh air and away from the toxicity of screaming guitar riffs. "It's called Alternative music," Sharkey told me. Alternative music, I wrote in my notebook. Alternative to what? Two metal trash cans rolling down a rocky cliff? Two 18-wheelers smashing into each other at 80 mph on the freeway? I guess I'd had three or four beers. It didn't take me much to get drunk back then. I must've had at least two, cause that's how many it took me to drown out the voice of my mother in my head. "Ministers don't drink," she'd been telling me since high school. "Ministers' children don't drink, either." To avoid argument, I always agreed with her, keeping my strange and sinister thoughts, and my beer, to myself. Mother was still alive, although she'd had a few rough years. A heart attack followed by the diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease left her and my father in their own worlds, unable to bridge the gap suddenly formed between them. I didn't even try. I went to classes, studied my scripture, passed through seminary, and took over Dad's church. No one forgot them, as they sat in the front pew every Sunday morning, watching their son live out their dreams for them. Yet, they were slipping farther and farther away, if not from the congregation, at least from my self, and each other. I know I couldn't have heard Nineveh when she'd entered. In spite of the cotton seclusion, the deep-throat vibrato of an untrained tenor still crept in, accompanied by fuzzy chord progressions I imagined would still be fuzzy without the benefit of the fluff in my ears. I must have felt her, sensed her presence. I turned my head in slow motion, visual images swimming past in a feverish sort of blur. She was wearing a brown leather duster tied at the waist, caked in dirt and smelling like puke and booze. Her hair was bottle black, that blue black color little old ladies are so fond of, the one that goes well with whore-red lipstick. Nineveh wore no lipstick, no makeup at all, just a look of shock and surprise. I stared until she passed me, then continued to stare at her back, as she ordered a coffee from the counter. She has no eyebrows, I thought to myself. That's the strangeness of it. Then scolded myself. Ministers aren't judgmental, Mother said, sitting across the table from me, clucking her tongue in that way I hated. I hung my head, officially reprimanded and feeling sorry for my state in life. Her fist pounded the table, sending my beer whirling around on the edge of its base, and I was so hypnotised by it, I almost didn't catch it in time. I looked up, and she stood there before me, her eyes staring down deep into mine. I then realized, She's albino. It was a shock to the system to look at her. Her face was sheer porcelain beauty, soft and luscious lips, high cheekbones sculpted to perfection, and her eyes - they were magnets sucking me in to her soul. I watched her mouth form silently juicy words, several which I discerned as "fuck". I shook my head, pointed at my ears, sort of shrugged beneath a stupid grin. She turned and began to walk away. Her hips swung from side to side, and, even underneath the disguise of the coat, I could tell her body was as amazing as her lips. She untied her jacket with one hand, raised the coffee to her face with the other. Then, as if sensing my eyes still tracing her form, she turned and gave me the finger. It was then that I saw her shirt. I AM GOD. Two days later, guilty from lust and liquor, still nursing a hangover, I sat and prayed for my soul and for the sermon I needed to write. But I couldn't seem to get past that t-shirt, and the powerful message with which it taunted me. I AM GOD. Surely, this strange and dirty young woman did not believe she was God. She would go to hell. I must pray for her soul. I closed my eyes again, rested my head on my desk in front of the computer, and conjured up an image of this creature in my mind's eye. How dangerous she is, I thought. How rare. How tempting. I lifted my head, my eyes wide. She was Satan. She had to be. That was the only conclusion for why I was so tempted. She was Satan tempting me away from my rightful purpose of writing this sermon. She's trying to destroy you, Stephen, I told myself, to ruin your concentration, to take away what you've worked so hard for, what you've always wanted. There was the crux of the biscuit, though, as Frank Zappa says. Was it really what I wanted? If I wanted to be a minister more than anything, if I'd wanted to devote my life, my soul, my body even, to God, then why was I sitting in that coffeehouse/bar drinking beers and writing some shit-ass review of some shit-ass band for some literary disaster of a local rag? My heart was racing, and I ran into the kitchen and opened the freezer to stare at the bottle of Absolut inside. I took it out, the bottle frosty and cool in my hand, and I tilted it back and forth, watching the thickness of a quiet mind slosh lazily around inside. No, you can't keep doing this, Stephen. It's not the answer. It's not the way. What is the way? * * * I awoke in a frenzied state of sweatiness and arousal, my erection poking the blanket up into a mouse tent. I gasped for two or three minutes, it seemed, before being able to rise and make it to the bathroom. I looked at myself in the mirror, at the blackness forming under my eyes. My hair needed cutting, my face shaving. I needed a shower. I turned the water on cold and let it run while I stood in front of the toilet until my excitement had dissipated enough to let me piss. In the shower, though, she was there, that satanic slut, just as she'd been in my dream, naked with amazing perk tits, white and soft, with dark, hard nipples that tasted like red hots. She pressed against me, and I begged her to go, to leave me, Get thee back, Satan. But I wanted her, and that I couldn't deny. I wrapped my hand around my cock and stroked until I once again could think clearly. I could live with the guilt of sin one more day. Passion of the Priest Ch. 02 The phone was ringing when I cut the water off. I let the machine pick it up, too lost in my own guilty mind to talk to anyone. Especially my mother. "Stephen, this is your mother. Phyllis Johnson called me. Harry's in the hospital. He had another coronary attack. The doctors say it's not good. They think he might go home this time (Mom's strange way of referring to Heaven) , so you need to drive over there and handle it. Your father is on his way to pick you up. I'll pack you a peanut butter sandwich to take with you. Love you, baby boy." Mother had packed me peanut butter every day for eight years, until I became a sophomore and told her I could no longer stand peanut butter. Then she switched to tuna. I ate tuna every day for the remaining three years of school, dreading the days I had gym class, because I would smell like fish after sweating for an hour, and the other guys would tease me, their jibes nasty and sexual in a way that offended me once to the point of tears. The biggest guy in class approached me. "Are you cryin', boy? Are you a cry baby?" He grabbed the collar of my t-shirt and smacked me against the lockers. "Maybe you're not a boy at all, just a strange-lookin' girl with a smelly pussy." He was holding me with one hand, against my throat, and I couldn't swallow, my breaths shallow gasps. "Whatcha say, freak? Can I see your little pussy?" He grabbed at my shorts with his other hand and yanked them down to my knees with his long arm. My dick hung out, and no one spoke. He looked at it for a moment, then dropped me on the floor and walked away. My father arrived just as I was putting on my tie, and I yelled for him to come in. "Good morning, Stephen," he said, sticking his hand out towards me. "Father," I replied, shaking it firmly. He'd been teaching me the importance of a strong handshake and a polite greeting since I was old enough to say "father". "I brought you a cup of coffee," he said, leafing through my notes on my desk. The hair stood up on the back of my neck, although there was nothing there but sermon ideas and personal biblical translations. I put on my sports coat and slipped my socked feet into some loafers while I grabbed some Pop Tarts out of the cabinet. Father didn't say anything, just shook his head. I was the perpetual bachelor, he told all his friends. I would just as soon eat junk food and drop my clothes off for laundering as I would settle down with a good Christian woman. The only problem was I didn't know any good Christian women. At least not any I could stand. Half way to the hospital, I found my voice again. "How's Mother?" Father fiddled with the radio stations, pushing buttons up and down the face of the dash, finally locating a station of gospel and bible talk, and he nodded and turned up the volume. I rolled the window down an inch and tilted my head towards the cool morning breeze. September was my favorite month of the entire year. "Your mother is fine," he said. "She has good days and bad days, of course." Good days being days when she left him alone and was together enough to drive to the mall or to meet her lady friends for women's studies. Bad days being when she screamed at him from the kitchen that the milk was sour again and Stephen wet the bed and she knew he was fucking Miss Betty Lou Simmons, and she wouldn't allow him to be in her house or her hole ever again. Yeah, I guess that qualified as a bad day. The hospital parking lot was packed tight with an assortment of old, dilapidated vehicles, SUVs and the cars that belong to the physicians, mainly Bentleys and BMWs, although an occasional Porche broke up the monotony. "She told me she'd fix me a peanut butter sandwich." Father nodded and tipped his head back. I looked into the back seat. There sat a brown paper bag, just like the one I'd carried for all my years of grade-school torment, my name written on the outside in black magic marker - Stevie Wayne Kilroy. I grabbed the bag and tossed it into the trashcan as we entered the revolving door. The hospital was cold, much like hospitals always are, and I remember wanting to do nothing but scream. Father was silent as we rode the elevator, and Mrs. Johnson was sobbing in the hallway outside Harry's room when we arrived. Father hugged her, whispering soothing words and scripture in her ear. I just walked right past and into the room. It smelled like piss, silence thick as molasses, and I felt a gag in my throat. I sat near the bed and noticed Harry was awake, his eyes darting around the room until they focused on me. A fleeting smile passed across his thin, tight mouth, and I felt the reflex in my throat again. I took his hand and leaned in close. "Let go, Harry. It's time to move on. This place sucks anyway." His eyes loomed large, but I continued. "You know what happens if you go home this time? You wear adult diapers, and nurses come in to wipe your ass, and Phyllis puts all your food in the fucking blender so you can suck it through a straw. They roll you around in a wheel chair, and you can't have liquor anymore, not to mention red meat or sex." I let go of his hand and sat back. "It's your choice, Harry. You can decide to stay or go. If you stay, though, you need to know what it will be. Cause it certainly won't be a life." I stood and walked to the door, then turned around. Harry's eyes were focused on the cloudless blue sky through the open curtains. "Hey Harry?" He rolled his head towards me. "I'll say a prayer you make the right choice, okay, buddy?" Two hours later, the doctors pronounced Harold Johnson dead. Would I preside over the funeral? No, I don't think so. I just kept thinking, that lucky bastard. Passion of the Priest Ch. 03 I was shocked by Sunday’s arrival, but not surprised at my lack of sermon material. I’d always been meticulous about my work, beginning on Wednesday and working every morning straight through until Sunday’s a.m. perfection. This Sunday, I had nothing. I showered, fought with myself to ignore that woman with me, then turned the water to bone-killing cold and buried my face in it. I dried off and grabbed the first suit my hands came across in the closet. I think it was the same one I’d worn the week before but somehow couldn’t remember anything before Monday, before Nineveh. At the church, I stood sweating outside the entrance to the pulpit, pulling on my collar, which was suddenly choking me, my heart thumping along to the morbid sounds of organ and badly harmonized hymns. Before I could open the door, though, I felt a hand on my shoulder. When I turned, tears burst from my eyes. It was she. It was the girl. And she was real. I threw my face against her neck, smelled sweat and patchouli, and let my weeping increase to deep guttural sobs. She quieted me with back pats and shushes, and then took hold of my shoulders. “Come with me, Stephen. I have something to show you.” Her voice sounded different than I’d imagined, melodic, gentle, and I was trapped in the sound of it, and turned to go with her, dropping my cassock onto the sofa in the fellowship lobby as we moved towards the door. In the parking lot she asked me, “Which one’s your car?” I pointed to a silver Honda Accord, and she walked to it, opened the passenger door and got in, while I stood there, feet melded into the concrete. She knew my name. How did she know my name? Why is she here? What could she possibly show me? In my mind’s eye I envisioned her again, in the shower, naked, and felt a familiar twitch in my crotch. Goddamn, Stephen, pull yourself together. I opened the car door and got it. She had her seat belt on, and was sitting still as glass, and I was afraid to look at her or breathe too closely for fear of shattering her into millions of shards. I turned the key in the ignition, and more gospel music surrounded me. My hand was a blur as it shot out and disconnected the sound from my ears. “Where are we going?” I asked, before I put the car in reverse. “To your house,” she stated flatly. I nodded and drove from memory. I opened the door for her, and she walked in as though she’d been here a hundred times and could navigate her way with eyes closed. She headed into my office, and as I walked in behind her, she was already booting up the computer. She never looked at me, just talked to the air. “I’ve met your parents, Stephen. I think there is something you need to know.” I didn’t speak, just nodded an agreement, and watched her fingers fly over the keys she knew so well. Then, “How do you know my name?” She turned and looked at me with an expression of curiosity. “I was sent here to help you. I am here for you.” She turned back to the blinking screen, and finally pulled up the website she’d been trying to locate. It was a site for an adoption agency in Philadelphia. My breath nearly choked me, thickening in my throat. Confusion broke out in beads on my forehead, and I wiped my sleeve against it, then took off my suit coat and tossed it across the room. “What is this about?” “This is about you, about your family. Who you are, Stephen.” I shook my head. “No, I know who I am. I know who my parents are. I know what my purpose is.” Then she just pointed. I saw it. How she drew it up, I’ll never know. She might’ve been a hacker of some sort, able to link into sealed secure files. Maybe she’d made the entire thing up, but I don’t think so. The other possibility was almost too difficult to swallow. Maybe, just maybe, she was God. “Read, Stephen.” I leaned forward, closer to the screen, to see it all, in black and white, before my face. I was adopted. These people, this minister, this good Christian woman, were not my parents at all. I was not a minister’s son, a preacher’s boy. I was not even a minister now; I could feel it in my chest when I breathed. I’d known it, without knowing, for some time now. It explained my gagging, as though my body were trying to purge something foreign from inside itself. Something toxic, something wrong. “Who am I then?” I asked her, and realized I still didn’t know her name. “I’m here to show you,” she smiled. “My name is Nina.” I smiled at her. Nina, I liked it, and it suited her well. I wouldn’t know her true name until later. She stood in front of me, and my eyes ran down the length of her body. She was closer than I could stand, and my hands twitched with the uncontrollable urge to reach out and feel her, to trace her curves, to finger all her holes, to squeeze her flesh so tight only bruises remained. When I met her eyes again, she was smiling. “You’re seeing now, aren’t you?” she asked. Uncertain what she meant, I sort of shrugged. “It’s okay. Don’t be afraid.” She took her jacket off, and there was a picture of the Christ on her t-shirt. He was wearing the thorny crown he’s so familiarly depicted with. Underneath read the caption “Kill your Idols”. I shook my head, as she pulled it over hers, her breasts hanging free, just as I’d pictured them in my mind. She moved closer to me and straddled my lap, lifting one breast and then the other to my watering mouth. I sucked, the hunger in my groin growing stronger and stronger, and my tongue couldn’t get enough of the salty taste of her skin. I pulled her hips closer, could feel the heat between her legs, moist and steaming, and my consciousness exploded. I raised up with her wrapped around me and carried her to my room, all the while with her whispering in my ear, “Yes, Stephen, you know, you’re learning.” I wasn’t certain what she meant, and I didn’t really care. I just knew I had to slip my tongue between her thighs right away. She was naked in seconds, and I pushed her back onto the bed. At that point, I can’t really say what happened. It’s as though my mind, the conscious mind, shut down, as though what I was about to do was just too graphic, violent, twisted or whatever, for it to conceive being present. When I awoke the next day, I was sore all over, my cock had bite marks on it, and Nina was gone. I lathered my privates gently, listening to the phone ringing in the other room. I wasn’t ready to deal with the barrage of questions and accusations I knew I’d be facing in regards to my sudden disappearance act the day before. I wondered if my father stood and preached on my behalf, laughing me off, you know Stephen, the perpetual bachelor. Probably forgot to set his alarm clock or pick up his laundry from cleaning. No mention of “had his tongue up some strange witch-woman’s crack.” That’s my dad. What a guy. I ignored the blinking light, went to the kitchen and grabbed some Pop-Tarts out of the cabinet. While they toasted, I boiled some bottled water, and ground some fresh beans for a French press of coffee. A note lay on the counter near the coffeepot, probably the only thing my father thought I did right. “Meet me at 7, same place as before. N.” I smiled inside, a hand unconsciously grazing across my cock. I snorted. That hurt. Passion of the Priest Ch. 04 I headed downtown a little early, parking next to a sushi bar on Lexington Avenue, figuring I could walk up to Max & Rosie's for a sandwich or maybe to Salsa's for something with plantains. I was dressed casually, as I usually did when going downtown, with the exception of my collar, which I wore faithfully, in spite of my recent revelations with Nina. As I passed the gates outside the courtyard near Vincent's Ear, where I was to meet her, I looked through to see my father, or at least the man I once thought was my father, standing away from the tables which were crowded with the usual assortment of Goths, punks and chess geeks. I pushed the gate open and headed towards him, anger pulsating through my veins. "Your neighbor thought you might be here," he said, reaching out a hand for me to shake. I slapped it away. "What the fuck are you doing here?" I asked loudly enough to draw some attention from the nearby tables. "Your mother was worried about you when you didn't show up on Sunday. She asked me to speak to you." I was sweating now, in spite of the crisp fall breeze, and I dropped my backpack to the ground, ready to fight if the opportunity presented itself. "My mother!" I shouted. "My mother? Who the fuck are you kidding, old man? You're not my father, and that bitch -" I spat "- is certainly not my mother!" Everyone was staring now. He turned and walked back toward the street, and I followed. "Yes, Stephen, you were adopted," he said quietly. "That doesn't mean we loved you or love you any less than if you were our biological child." I felt as though I was going to throw up, and the beads of sweat were starting to puddle together and run into my eyes. I brushed them away with my hand and could feel the heat of my rage beneath my thinning skin. "That's not the goddamn point, and you know it." "Don't take the Lord's name in vain, son." I think I could've punched him in the mouth right then, pinned him to the sidewalk, choked the life right out of the bastard, but I just continued to pace and shout, purging my mind of the poisons that had been polluting it since I read the computer screen the day before. "In vain? I'll take the Lord's name any fucking way I please, thank you very much. The Lord knows who I am, and I don't even know who I am? What the fuck kind of sick joke is that? I'm no priest, and I'm no priest's son." To say my adoptive father was a cold man is like saying Antarctica is a little chilly. He stood there stoically, watching me with gray eyes I'd once been envious I didn't inherit. "Stephen, you've always desired the priesthood. When you were eight years old, you told me you wanted to be a priest." "So?" I screamed, now beyond any rational tone of voice or logic of conversation. "How many eight-year-old boys say they want to be firemen? How many actually grow up to BE firemen? We'd have a lot of fucking firemen running around if every guy followed his eight-year-old dreams! I was eight-fucking-years-old! What if I said I'd said I wanted to suck dicks for a living? What the fuck!" I turned my back on him and looked back into the courtyard to see a dozen pairs of inquisitive eyes quickly turn away. Near the door of Vincent's I recognized Nina, her brown leather jacket tied at the waist, her hair pulled back tightly from her face like a geisha girl. I wanted to run to her, to bury my face between her small pink-tipped tits and scream until my throat was raw, but she just nodded and disappeared down the stairs. I didn't bother to turn around when I spoke. "Go away. Just get the fuck out of my face. You make me fucking sick." I stood there, shaking, the minutes seemingly stretching into infinity, until I heard the sound of his black polished wingtips clicking away down the pavement. I pushed the gate open and picked up my backpack. Sharkey was now standing outside near one of the tables, a guy with long black hair, crusty smeared eyeliner and fake pointed ears talking animatedly at him, his arms flailing wildly as Sharkey just nodded. I mopped at my forehead with the sleeve of my shirt and stopped next to them. "You okay, Rev?" He asked, his expression one of honest concern. "If that man ever comes around here again, tell him I'm dead, okay?" Sharkey's eyebrows raised. "Who is he?" "He thinks he's my fucking father." Nina was inside, tucked into a booth in the cool darkness, drinking something frothy from a mug. Another mug sat across the table from her. I sat and wrapped my hands around it, watching the steam rise into the damp stale air, wishing for something cool instead. She suddenly stood and walked to the counter, returning with a glass of iced tea. She placed it in front of me. Sitting back down, she untied the belt of her coat, shrugging it off to reveal another poignant t-shirt message: Satan is my Co-Pilot. What in the holy hell...?