Priest

There are many rules a priest can't break. A priest cannot marry. A priest cannot abandon his flock. A priest cannot forsake his God. I've always been good at following rules. Until she came. Then I learned new rules.

We are told God will punish the wicked; that sinful men will reap what they sow. We are told to scourge our souls with prayer and pain to become clean once again. Well, here I am. Wicked and sinful. Desperate to become clean - even though it feels so good to be dirty. But even I never expected what came next. Even I never expected my punishment to come so soon.

I'm not a good man, and I've never pretended to be. I don't believe in goodness or God or any happy ending that isn't paid for in advance. What do I believe in? Money. Sex. Macallan 18. They have words for men like me - playboy. Womanizer. Skirt chaser. My brother used to be a priest, and he only has one word for me: sinner.

I can’t have Elijah Iverson. I can’t have him because he’s my older brother’s best friend. I can’t have him because I broke his heart five years ago; because he’s now engaged to someone else - someone kind and dependable who deserves his whiskey eyes, his soft mouth, his fierce intellect.

I have nothing left. One moment of weakness seven years ago, and I lost my job, my art, and my only friend. Now I’m working nights at a gas station to scrape together a living and a way to care for my sister, and I’m completely alone. And then I see him on the front page of the newspaper, my former college student and the man who ruined my life seven years ago. Ryan Bell. So I carve a statue of the devil and I give the devil Bell’s face.