he reads bonhoeffer on the drive home. i quote psalms like a guy who went to a baptist summer camp once and it stuck. we’re the only two in the van after we drop off tasha and kevin.
it’s saturday night. we played the youth retreat set—two new songs, the one where the drums come in too fast, “goodness of the lord” which always makes me cry a little during the bridge even though i’m supposed to be holding harmony. my voice is tired. his fingers are still doing the bass line on the steering wheel while he drives, muscle memory.
he’s arguing something about suffering being a theological category not a bug in the system, citing chapter three, and i’m laughing at him because he brought the book to a saturday youth retreat and actually read it between sessions, and he’s giving me that look like: you don’t think this is serious, and i say, “psalm 13, ‘how long, lord? will you forget me forever,’ doesn’t that count as theology about suffering,” and he goes quiet.
that’s when i know i have him.
we pull behind the fellowship hall. the parking lot’s empty. the saturday group is already gone. the saturday group has no idea that every other week we sit here and argue about bonhoeffer and the psalms and the way his hands move when he talks about community and costly grace. today, though, there’s not a lot of arguing.
he kills the engine. the van sits there. his hands drop from the wheel. mine are shaking a little and i don’t think it’s from the adrenaline of the set.
“okay,” he says. not a question. a statement. like he’s been thinking about it the whole drive, and now that we’re alone it just comes out.
“okay?” i say.
“don’t quote psalms at me like that and expect me not to—” he stops. he doesn’t finish. he doesn’t have to.
the van smells like bass strings and my perfume and the air freshener that says “new car” but it’s a 2003 dodge and it smells like regret and coffee. his cologne, green and clean. the bible app on my phone pinging the psalm of the day. grace. it’s always grace.
he’s looking at me. the light from the fellowship hall is just enough that i can see his face. quiet face. serious face. the face that argues about bonhoeffer like it matters. like suffering matters. like i matter.
i unbuckle.
“you sure,” he says.
“yeah.”
“like. absolutely.”
“i’m gonna go to hell for this anyway. let’s commit,” i say, and i’m already moving, already on my knees on the van floor, and he’s laughing this surprised laugh and then stopping the laugh because i’m pulling down his jeans.
he’s hard. he didn’t think he was ready but he is, and his cock is dark and beautiful and i want to spend time with it, do something right with it, but he’s got his hand in my hair and he’s breathing like he’s been holding his breath since september.
“you came down here to do this,” he says.
“i’ve been thinking about it for three months.”
“during praise?”
“during that key change you always nail in ‘goodness of the lord,’ yeah.”
he makes a sound. a low sound. a surprised sound.
i wrap my hand around him and he’s already leaking, already so ready for me. i lick the head, tasting salt, tasting him. the bass case is still wedged against the bench seat behind us. his jacket is on top of it. my water bottle is in the cup holder. this is a van full of the evidence that we are people who go to church and sing about god and come here to fuck.
nobody repents.
i take him in my mouth and he moans and it’s so loud in the quiet van, in the quiet parking lot, in the dark behind the fellowship hall. his hips move and i let him, let him fuck into my mouth, slow and then faster, one hand gripping my shoulder and the other twisted in my hair.
“fuck. oh my god. yes. like that,” he’s saying, and it’s so good, he’s so good, and i’m loving this, loving the weight of him on my tongue, loving that he’s losing his mind in the church parking lot twelve hours before he has to play in the sanctuary.
“you’re so pretty,” he says. “like. the way you—god, the way you—”
he pulls me off. he’s shaking.
“i want to fuck you. is that—can i—”
“lube?” i ask.
“glove box. condoms too.”
he reaches down and i grab them, and he’s got me turned around, pulling down my shorts, my underwear, his hands on my hips like they’re prayer hands. he’s careful. he’s always careful. he licks two fingers and opens me up while i’m bent over the middle seat, and it’s so much, the intimacy of it, the fact that he’s thinking about this, about me, about doing this right.
“you good,” he says.
“yeah. more than good.”
he gets the condom on with one hand while he keeps the other on my back. he lines himself up. the bass case is right there. the psalm of the day is still pinging on my phone. the van is warm and smells like us now.
he pushes in slow.
it’s a stretch. it’s deep. it’s the exact thing i’ve been thinking about. he’s got one hand on the bass case for leverage and the other on my hip, and he’s going slow, asking me with every inch if this is okay, if he can go deeper, and i’m saying yes yes yes and he’s all the way in, buried in me, breathing against my shoulder.
“oh god,” he says, into my neck. “you’re perfect. you’re so perfect.”
he starts to move. the van rocks a little. the bass case shifts but holds. we’ve wedged it good. his rhythm builds. he’s not arguing theology now. he’s too busy fucking me to quote bonhoeffer, and i’m too busy loving every second to quote psalms.
except maybe psalm 139. that one that says oh, you have searched me. known my rising up and lying down. known my thoughts from far away.
“keep going,” i say. “don’t stop.”
he doesn’t. he picks up his pace, and the van is rocking, and i’m pushing back into him, and his hand is wrapped around my mouth because i’m getting loud, because the fellowship hall might be dark but it’s not deaf, and my phone is pinging and pinging with reminders about grace and all i feel is him, all i feel is this, all i feel is holy.
he comes first. i feel him tense and lose his rhythm and push all the way in and stay there, and his cock is pulsing inside me, and he’s saying my name and it sounds like prayer and it sounds like sin and it sounds like both at once.
i come right after. his hand’s still over my mouth. he’s still inside me. both our hearts are pounding like we’ve been running.
we sit there. he’s still inside me, softening. the van is dark except for the light from the fellowship hall. the bass case is still wedged against the bench. the chord chart for tomorrow’s 10:45 set is on the dashboard. his bonhoeffer book is on the passenger seat. the van’s mileage log is clipped to the sun visor: 127,483 miles.
he pulls out slow. gets the condom off. fixes himself up. i’m leaning against the back of the front seat, my shorts around my knees, his jacket hanging off the bass case like it’s judging us.
“okay,” he says.
“okay,” i agree.
he pulls me up, fixes my clothes, kisses me on the mouth like he’s still not done with this, like he’s never going to be done with this.
“same time in two weeks?” he says.
“why two weeks. saturday’s coming up.”
he laughs. “right. we could just—every time. we could just do this every time you quote psalms at me.”
“that’s a lot. i’m a baptist. i quote psalms all the time.”
“i know,” he says. “that’s the problem.”
he starts the van. the engine turns over. we pull out from behind the fellowship hall, back into the normal world, back toward the streets where normal people live. the mileage ticks to 127,484.
tomorrow the 10:45 set starts with “goodness of the lord.”
he’ll nail that key change again.
and i’ll be in the second row of the praise team with his cum still in me, singing harmony, looking anywhere but the bass player.
