Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 53965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 270(@200wpm)___ 216(@250wpm)___ 180(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 53965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 270(@200wpm)___ 216(@250wpm)___ 180(@300wpm)
I need church. I need a real church.
Somehow, I keep myself busy—which means my mind is occupied—the rest of the day. I help Papa change a tire on his truck. I proofread some of the pamphlets Paul is putting together to source more donations for his church. I dive deep into baking with my mother, until the entire kitchen is covered in flour and smells divine. I even put headphones on and go for a long, muscle-aching run, even with how sticky and hot it is outside.
All of it to clear my mind of Gabriel Marsden.
By dinner time, the afternoon’s horrible thoughts, not to mention the ones from last night, are a distant memory. Mostly. I finish doing some dishes in the kitchen and head upstairs to my bedroom, and once the door is closed, I collapse onto my bed.
It’s exhausting keeping your mind from thinking about what it wants to think about all day.
But no sooner does my head hit the pillows does the wall I’ve built around those thoughts come crumbling down. In seconds, actually. I blush, and my core clenches as I start the endless replays of Gabriel moving to me last night. I bite my lip, and I remember the feel of his huge body moving against my smaller one. I remember the way he smelled like aftershave and peach moonshine. The way the touch of his lips on my ear sent feelings and desire through me I’ve spent my whole life pointedly ignoring and pushing away.
There’s never been a boy, let alone a man. In Canaan? Please. The only “couples” in our high school were married by graduation, and most of them are expecting their first child by Christmas of this year. Again, I have a phone, and the internet, and Netflix. I understand that not everywhere is like here, and that there are high schools where people my age “date casually” and experiment in carnal lust and try pretty much everything before marriage.
I’ve been told my entire life how wrong that is, and that it’s shameful, and wicked to be trying to those things with anyone but the person who is your husband or wife under the eye of God. I’ve been taught that premarital anything is a sin worthy of eternal damnation. Or at the very least, a sin worthy of never finding your one and only, because anything besides an actual “white wedding” is a mockery of the celebration itself.
The thing is, I’ve never been sure if I really believe that. I mean, I understand the message of love behind the overbearing fearmongering involved with shaming people into “waiting.” I knew a girl in school a year above me, Laura, who went out with James Lahey for years, and who most certainly lay with him, on multiple occasions. I know this because James Lahey is a disgusting, Hell-bound little cretin who told the whole school about it. Her family ended up moving her senior year, to Savannah, and I remember most of the school avoiding her like she was tainted goods the last week she spent in Canaan.
The thing is, I’ve looked Laura up online, out of curiosity. And you know what? She’s doing great. I’ve stalked her on social media, and she’s at Clemson University, looking like she’s having the time of her life. She’s on the Dean’s list there, majoring in biochemistry, and she plays on the girls’ soccer team. She’s got a handsome boyfriend who looks really nice, and she’s a prominent member of the youth ministry on campus.
Point being, she’s not an outcasted harlot or leper. She’s still with the church. Presumably, God is still a part of her life. Her boyfriend even has an anniversary post to her that mentions that he had to “get through some bad ones to find the good one,” so, presumably, they both know they’ve “been with” other people. And they’re still happy and together.
It’s things like that that make me question everything. And I’m not so sure that questioning things is a bad thing. I’m not sure if the God I believe in would be mad at a few questions.
What he would be mad at, though, is the sort of thoughts I’m having concerning Gabriel Marsden. This isn’t some boy my age I’m curious about “dating.” Gabriel is a man, older than me, and my thoughts aren’t about “dating” him.
…They’re much, much more wicked than that.
The thoughts I’ve done my darnedest to avoid all day, ever since last night actually, don’t involve Gabriel taking me out to dinner and a movie. They don’t involve holding hands or taking a stroll at dusk. They’re… more carnal than that. A lot, lot more carnal, actually.
I flush, and my body tingles as I sink into the comforter in the darkness of my bedroom. My skin feels electric, and a devilish heat begins to pool between my thighs, no matter how hard I try and clench them together. No, the thoughts I harbor concerning Gabriel are wicked, sinful thoughts. They involve him grabbing me and kissing me in a way that’s nothing like the chaste, Hollywood kisses in romantic comedies. They involve him biting my skin and ripping my very clothes from my body piece by piece.