Between These Walls (42 page)

“And here,” said Ellen as she ran her finger along a threshold so tight, at first Hunter didn’t realize it lined an open space, “is a linen closet.”

The closet sat before them at the end of the hallway, at an angle perpendicular to the guest bedroom. It reached as high as where the ceiling would sit. Judging from its threshold, the closet would require a door of full-size height but half the regular width, the same size as the linen closet at Hunter’s home.

Ellen stared at the closet. She smirked while examining it, as if she knew something this linen closet didn’t. Rubbing her thumb along one side of the doorway, Ellen slinked inside the closet and turned around to face Hunter.

The closet was so narrow, when she pressed her hands against the sides of its framework, her arms remained bent at the elbows. Her body filled most of the empty space. In fact, with her body inside, the closet left only enough room for her hands to reach an inch or two away from her body. Once the builders finished the walls and shut the door, Hunter imagined, a person might suffocate inside that linen closet.

Ellen stared at the horizontal beams above her. Hunter watched her and couldn’t help but grin. As cramped as she was, she looked like a little girl trying to squeeze herself into a dollhouse. A modern Alice in Wonderland, too gargantuan for her own surroundings.

“Have you ever noticed how life does this to you?” said Ellen.

“Life?”

“Life tries to fit you into a box,” Ellen continued, as if she hadn’t noticed Hunter’s reply. One by one, she gazed at the wooden beams that surrounded her. Scrutinized them. “It builds walls like these. And you want to shout, cry out, release all the shit that stacks up around you and smothers you. But you can’t say anything, because not even you yourself can figure out what’s wrong. You just know something isn’t right.”

She traced the manufacturer’s inked imprint on one beam and continued, “So you can’t let anyone know because, even if you wanted to, you couldn’t find the right words.” She turned her head and looked into Hunter’s eyes. “Do you know what that’s like?”

Hunter stared into her eyes.

“Yeah,” he murmured, “I think I do.”

Hunter studied his friend, the sincerity in her face. She sounded neither discouraged nor stressed. For that matter, Hunter couldn’t detect
any
expression in her demeanor. If anything, she seemed as cool as the breeze that swept through this naked house.

“Ellen, is everything okay?”

She pondered his question a moment, then said, “What if I don’t love him?”

“Brendan?”

“Yeah. I mean, I love him, but what if I don’t love him like I
should?
What if I’m making a big mistake getting married? Is it possible I said yes to him because I
should,
simply because it made sense? Sure, I said yes for myself. But what if it was more because it would make
him
happy?”

Hunter weighed whether he should say more, dig into why she had made those strange observations.

“Ellen, you can talk to me if you want to.”

With her lips sealed tight, she twisted her mouth into a smile, then rolled her eyes.

“Wedding jitters,” she said. “That’s all it is.”

“Are you sure?”

“I promise.” She blinked her eyes once in a speed that made time look like it had slowed. “I’ll figure my way through. Always do.”

“And you love Brendan, right?” he asked, perhaps for his own reassurance more than hers.

“Of course,” she said, her confident demeanor on the rebound. “I’m fine. You have enough going on in your life, Hunter. Don’t worry about me.”

And with that, she gave him one of her trademark winks.

CHAPTER 41

Hunter couldn’t shake his curiosity about the preaching Randy had mentioned at the grocery store. So that Sunday morning, when Hunter left for church, he headed in the opposite direction than usual. Turning from Route 91, he weaved along a side road and made his way to the little church with the stained-glass window. The building had resided there long before many residents had moved to town. It had a whitewashed exterior. A skinny steeple sat atop its roof.

The tiny parking lot wasn’t paved. Gravel crunched beneath the tires of his car as he drifted into the lot. At the sound of gravel pinging against metal, he cringed, hoping he wouldn’t discover nicks along his car’s finish. A smattering of vehicles sat parked around the lot, and he pulled in beside a beige sedan. He checked his watch again and noted the time as 9:24. Sure enough, the service was about to begin, but the only people walking into the church building were a couple who looked, from this distance, in their late fifties.

The heaviness of the church’s ornate front door took Hunter by surprise. Solid oak, he guessed. When he walked through it, he discovered two ushers standing on the other side, engaged in conversation. The nearest one, a somber man with close-cropped hair, seemed hesitant to smile, preoccupied with his conversation, but handed Hunter a bulletin and, in what struck Hunter as an afterthought, offered him a frosty handshake. Neither usher seemed to recognize him. Hunter thought he caught the word
budget
in their conversation, but he didn’t want to eavesdrop, so he sauntered through the next set of doors.

The silence in the sanctuary struck Hunter as eerie. He detected a draft coming from above, not enough to make him uncomfortable but sufficient to keep him from dozing. He slid into an empty pew toward the back. Straight ahead, behind the altar, he located the familiar stained-glass window depicting a shepherd and sheep. Given the scarcity of cars in the parking lot, he was surprised to find the pews half full with people. Then again, the room wasn’t large. If he closed his eyes, he could picture the comfort of a rural church.

The blast of a pipe organ startled him. The congregation rose to its feet, pulled hymnals from their slotted nests beneath the pews, and paged through them. Hunter turned to the hymn noted in the bulletin, then studied the people in the sanctuary. Most of the men wore suits and ties. Hunter, dressed in his typical Sunday sport shirt and khakis, wondered if he should have called ahead to inquire about the dress code. Although the majority of the congregation looked past retirement age, Hunter saw a few young kids and a couple more school-age individuals sitting with their parents. Back in school, Hunter had several friends who belonged to churches but seldom attended. Maybe that explained the lack of young people here today. The older kids looked less than thrilled to be here. Then again, Hunter wondered how excited the adults were, since none of them smiled as they sang. He concluded it was a sign of reverence.

In one row, toward the middle of the sanctuary, he noticed a teenager who looked the age of a high school student, a lanky guy with an aquiline nose and blond hair pushed to the side. The teenager looked toward his right, which provided Hunter a glimpse of his face. Hunter couldn’t put his finger on what was wrong, but he sensed the young man was unhappy—not about sitting in church, but about life. He looked the way Hunter had often
felt
at his age: alone. Hunter wondered if the guy dealt with the same issues Hunter did. Probably not. Regardless, Hunter felt compassion and whispered a quick prayer for the guy.

The hymn ended and the congregation sat down. They followed a litany of Scripture readings and call-and-response affirmations, followed by another hymn on their feet. Hunter found the entire church service structured in his bulletin. Though it was a Christian church, the environment felt foreign to him. Yet when he looked around, the congregants appeared to know which words to say, as if from memory, and he figured many had engaged in this style of church service for years. He could understand the comfort such tradition might bring.

Upon completion of the latest hymn, the minister stretched out his arms and motioned for the congregation to be seated. A tall man, he had dark hair well into the graying process. Donned with a clerical collar and a long, white robe, he matched the stereotype Hunter had held of a minister before Hunter had become a Christian. Near the middle of the minister’s chest, a cross, three or four inches tall and made of polished silver, hung from a chain around his neck. When the minister turned at a particular angle, the cross reflected a light that shined from above the pulpit. Hunter had seen such giant crosses before, but on rare occasion, and had always been suspicious that the size of the cross was meant to distract people from noticing other, less flattering details about the wearer. He didn’t mean to judge the wearer; he just couldn’t shake the curiosity.

The minister smiled little, which, to Hunter, helped explain the lack of smiles he’d noticed since his arrival here. He couldn’t determine if the congregation had followed the lead of its pastor, or vice-versa.

The minister began preaching in somber tones, but as he progressed through his sermon, his bass voice grew in intensity and echoed off the hard walls and floors. He seemed to conjure extra inflection or fervency when he was about to reach key points.

But Hunter’s mind didn’t focus on the eloquence of the man’s speech or the flawless weavings of his robe. Sure enough, as Randy had said, the man preached about homosexuality. And while Hunter hadn’t expected the minister to express approval in his sermon, he also hadn’t expected the sermon to sound laced with anger. The man’s words left Hunter aghast. They came forth like gunshots to Hunter’s soul, their shrapnel biting into his skin, as various sermon phrases rang in his ears.

“... abominable acts in our community ...”

“... issue that has infected people for millenniums. God destroyed two ancient cities, Sodom and Gomorrah, because of homosexuality ...”

“... don’t need to be patronized. They need the Law, God’s Law. Before we can give them the good news of grace and forgiveness, we need to present them with the Law so they will recognize their sinfulness and repent of their actions ...”

“... won’t like hearing what I have to say, but it’s necessary. First the Law, then the Gospel ...”

Hunter shifted in his seat. From the corner of his eye, he searched for clues on how the parishioners responded, yet they remained chiseled marble sculptures, silent as they stared straight ahead. The teenager Hunter had noticed earlier sat with his arms crossed and his attention focused on the pew in front of him.

The sermon ended. More call-and-response litany followed. Hunter tried to pay attention, but the minister’s words echoed in his mind. His struggle had never been about a lack of desire for God or a lack of respect for Him. Hadn’t Hunter tried to find a resolution for years? Hunter hadn’t tried to persuade anybody to follow in his footsteps and, for that matter, wouldn’t wish the struggle upon anyone else. Had the minister ever
talked
to anyone who dealt with this? He’d spoken to neither Gabe nor Hunter. If he had, he would have discovered the
painful
aspect of such desires. For Hunter, it wasn’t a matter of theory or of finding the right words to preach away his inclinations. On the contrary, the struggle was tangible. Real.

A final hymn occurred before the church service concluded. At the sound of the organ, the congregation turned pages in their hymnals and began to sing of how the world will know they are Christians by their love. Hunter tried to sing, but a sour sensation emerged in his belly. He recalled the Bible verse that served as the basis for this hymn. Hunter
believed
that verse. He had tried to live by that verse, treating people with love.

Yet, in this context, the song sounded rusty, corroded. After hearing such harsh words aimed against him by a man who had never met him, listening to this hymn made Hunter feel
unloved.

Hunter wasn’t a guy trying to corrupt a community or disrespect people around him. He was just a guy dealing with a challenge, like the rest of the people in this sanctuary.

The service ended 45 minutes after it began. “Go forth with joy,” the minister had instructed them, and they filed out to the dreary sounds of the organ.

Too confused to move a muscle, Hunter hadn’t stood to his feet yet, his thoughts concentrated instead on what he had heard as he repeated the phrases to himself, over and over. When he looked to his left and noticed a line of people had filed out of the pews, Hunter shook himself to attention and joined the end of the line in the center aisle, which progressed in a slow fashion. He looked ahead at the main doorway to which the line led, the doors through which he had entered the sanctuary, where the minister now stood, shaking hands with congregants. The man remained solemn, thanking the congregants for coming and offering them his words of blessing. Hunter couldn’t bring himself to look at him. He doubted the minister would know who he was by sight, but Hunter would know.

Hunter peered over his shoulder. In the front corner of the sanctuary, beneath an
Exit
sign, he noticed a small door which led to the lawn at the side of the church building.

One more glimpse of the minister, then Hunter strolled toward the side door and departed the sanctuary.

The lawn felt mushy from melted snow and left mud streaks on his shoes, but at this point, Hunter didn’t care. He could wipe them off later. In an attempt to remain casual, he made his way across the lawn as if he weren’t the only one who had chosen to take that exit, then quickened his pace across the gravel parking lot.

When he climbed into his car, he checked the time. His own church’s service hadn’t begun. A second church service in one day would provide the perfect lift to his spirits, he decided. After the last 45 minutes, Hunter needed to connect with God.

* * *

The next attempt to help Hunter—if you could call it that—arrived that evening in a phone call.

Hunter had known Al Brickman for a few years through the weekly Bible study meetings. A father of two in his late forties, he and Hunter had prayed together on several occasions. Al had prayed for Hunter during critical junctures in his career and relationships, and had encouraged him as he grew in his faith. Hunter, for his part, had prayed for Al the best he could, though he didn’t know from firsthand experience how to pray for people to have strong marriages or to be good fathers. Nevertheless, he had prayed from his heart and trusted God to take care of the answers. Hunter knew Al was a genuine Christian and valued his perspective.