unbalanced triumphant and trying again

The pancake breakfast was always criminally understaffed when it came to volunteers, but this morning seemed to be challenging just how much they could pull off with so little. Walking back from the kitchens where Millicent was running a tight ship-- it was truly sight to behold, this 86 year old woman barking orders and keeping her subordinates in line-- Jack stopped to straighten a few chairs as he made his way towards the front. Since the induction of the breakfast two years ago, attendance only seemed to go up, and Jack knew would work himself to the absolute dregs if it meant he could feed a hungry belly or foster relationships within the community he’d grown to love so much. Setting to work on the finishing touches before the doors officially opened and the hoards rushed in, Jack caught sight of someone from the corner of his eye. He straightened, smiling, and called out to them. “The breakfast isn’t for another half hour.” His eyes flicked to the large clock on the opposite wall and back again, a hopeful, if not a little mischievous, glint to them. “Unless you’re here to volunteer...?”

Maisy’s shoulders bounced up in excitment, turning on the ball of her foot to turn the other way. She lead him back down the side walk, heading towards her home. Her boots scuffed against the sidewalk, filling the silence between them for a moment. Maisy’s eyes traced his shoulder as he looked off away from her, losing herself in thought for a moment. Not many people intrigued her so much, beyond just pure attraction. Everyone had a story, but rarely could you just look at someone and know their story was compelling. His voice pulled her attention, turning her eyes up to meet his. “I know very little about you, Father.” Her brows furrowed. His friendliness was part of it, she assumed. He’d talk to everyone like he already knew them.  

Maisy turned the corner to her white house, with a lush green yard. She unlocked the door, pushing it forward kicking away Annie’s shoes left in the middle of the entrance. “I’d make some comment about how my daughter never cleans up after herself, but half theses shoes are mine.” She joked lightly, running into the kitchen to grab a bottle of wine and two glasses. She emerged.  leading him out back to the porch. “I write scripts, which isn’t really something I share for reasons. Anyway, I’m find people who aren’t what.. you expect interesting to write, but honesty is important to writing people, characters. I always want them to feel real.” She began to ramble, sitting in one of the chairs around a little table as she spoke. 

“I don’t know if I’d be writing a priest exactly, but - you’re terribly alluring.”

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Despite the small secretive smile her words drew out of him, Jack felt the small stirrings of guilt. Certainly there was a line to be drawn between what little personal life he had and the rest of himself that he dedicated wholly to the church and his parishioners, but there were still walls he’d erected and fortified regularly, parts of him he selfishly refused to give away. It was his own cross to bear. But when he spoke, his words were teasing, lighthearted as though they weren’t simply more walls he locked up tight. “And that, Miss Rhodes, is by design.” 

His eyes traced the lines of her house as they made their way towards the door and even though what he knew about Maisy was only surface level, something about it felt like an extension of her. Especially when they made it inside and a medley of shoes greeted them. He only smiled, stepping around them, as he followed her outside. He hadn’t known that about her, actually, and he filed it away as another facet to Maisy Rhodes he hadn’t seen before. He listened quietly, nodding along as she spoke. In another life, his world had revolved around literature-- reading, writing, eventually teaching. It dragged a sort of melancholy into the air between them that he batted away as he took his glass of wine. 

It was the word alluring that dragged his attention from the drink to the woman across from him and he let out a single surprised laugh. “Alluring?” He questioned, lips pulling down as he considered the word. “I don’t think that’s the word I’d use. Mysterious? Maybe. Charming? Definitely.” He grinned. “But alluring? I think you’re giving me way too much credit here.”

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Ryan didn’t know what the literal definition of anything was, but absolutely was happy to argue her side of things until she ran out of breath. “For the hell of it? Are you allowed to say that or is that against the Bible?” Ryan asked, eyes narrowing a bit. “But, yeah, not my fault at all. If it weren’t for the dickhead wolf whistling at my mom, I wouldn’t have had to get into a fight. If I hadn’t gotten into a fight, I wouldn’t have tackled someone through the window. So, his actions started it all. Therefore, his fault.” Ryan didn’t see him in there sweeping up around the church.

There was a beat of disappointment that the man hadn’t ever been arrested and a slight sigh escaped her throat. “Consider me disappointed,” she confirmed before falling quiet to let the man speak. It didn’t surprise her that he was taking the opportunity to speak on God and her face twisted up slightly before nodding. Though she’d been raised in a fairly religious household, Ryan had fallen away from it herself, unwilling to believe that anyone could be there for her unconditionally. Her life had proven that people couldn’t be that reliable, so why would some hypothetical God up in the sky be? “So, since you’re basically a little offshoot of Jesus or whatever, that means you still love me despite me going flying through a very old stained glass window?”

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“Hell is mentioned well over one hundred times in the Bible, so I think we’re safe.” Jack’s eyes danced in amusement as he watched her narrow hers in on him. There was something refreshing about her sharpness. He loved what he did-- well and truly-- but after nearly a decade of it in this place, he’d grown used to the everyday. There were the people who resented him for the unconventional way he chose to lead his church, there were people who came simply because they found him attractive (and no, he wasn’t oblivious to it for as often as he pretended to be), and then there were those who truly sought out the kind of sanctuary the church could offer. But all of those were soft edged in their predictability. Ryan, though? He could never anticipate what might come out of her mouth and as she explained exactly how she wasn’t at fault, he decided he liked that about her. The corners of his mouth threatened to pull into an amused grin. “Well, can’t argue with that logic, right?” 

He shrugged, unapologetically apologetic that he hadn’t been arrested, hands lifted as if to say what can you do? “Hey, what I lack in prison stories, I make up for in seminary ones.” They likely wouldn’t hold up to her standards, but he’d seen a would-be priest or two let loose with the encouragement of a few stolen bottles of communion wine. It was always the quiet ones, wasn’t it?

Again, she hit him with a question he hadn’t seen coming and he blew out a small, breathy laugh. “A little offshoot of Jesus,” he repeated, amused. “You get one fly-through-a-window-free card, but after that, it’s between you and God.”

"It was the possibility of turning pain into healing, the idea that I could make a difference in someone else's life the way people have made in mine. I also believe people in positions like mine too often abuse their power, so I choose to make a difference where I can. This gives me that."

"Seems like there's a lot of that going around."

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Somehow, even though he was sat far from her, as the man sat down, she felt her own heart speed up. He hadn’t intended to, Lotta was sure, but now she was trapped in the middle of the pew. She tried not to let the panic show. She was bad with feeling trapped.

“There is definitely such a thing as a bad Christian. Isn’t there a whole thing in the book about that? Following the teachings wrong, and all that? Not on purpose just- misguided?” It felt like an odd thing to get hung up on, especially arguing with somebody who arguably an actual God-expert. Still, his next words made her pause, and though she had finally turned to look at him, she turned away once more. “I’m not good at being not put together. But it seems it’s all I am.” Immediately, she bit her own lip to stop herself from continuing. She didn’t mean to be telling this stranger so much of anything. 

The question surprised her, but she nodded. “In town, yes. I’m new, though. If it wasn’t obvious.” Gesturing to her own mouth as an indication of accent, she added, her tone somehow joking, even as her voice quivers, “From San Francisco.”

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Jack lifted one shoulder in a small shrug. “Maybe. But I don’t think misguided equates to bad necessarily. And if you’re using the Word to hurt people, past a certain age, I don’t believe you can claim misguidance. But I’m ‘controversial’ depending on who you ask around town, so what do I know?” His lips quirked in mild amusement and he scratched at the stubble on his jaw. It seemed people either loved him or hated him and the way he led his church, and that suited him just fine. 

He met her eyes for a moment and traced her delicate profile with his eyes as she looked away. He watched the way her teeth worried her bottom lip and his eyes swept down to his hands which now rested on his knees. “Mind you, this is only an opinion from someone who doesn’t know you from Adam, but we’ve been here for a few minutes? And I see so much more than that.” Another simple shrug and his eyes drifted back to the portrait of St. Augustine. 

Her answer to his question drew him back and he chuckled lightly despite himself. “Is that not a Boston accent?” His grin widened, but the heaviness between them remained and it fell into something quiet once more. “I’ve never been to San Francisco. What brings you here?”

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Ryan almost rolled her eyes like a sullen teenager at Jack’s insistence that she wasn’t getting out of this, but managed to hold it back. At least, until she was out of eyesight and could roll her eyes like a child all she wanted. “Was it really my mess, though? Was it me that went flying through the window, yeah, maybe. Was it my fault? Up for debate,” Ryan countered. It was fully and completely her fault, the thinly veiled anger that constantly coursed through her having made it’s appearance in the worst possible moment. 

Reaching to take the broom, Ryan frowned when Jack pulled it back, brow raising with a curious look. “Spend a lot of time in prison, then?” she asked, admittedly kind of hoping that he had done a stint in prison just to make him feel a bit more relatable. She let her hand grasp around the broom to tug it away from the man, pulling it to her so she could get to work. “Would God be chill with it if you went to prison?” Her mother had raised her religious to some degree, but Ryan didn’t know what she believed in anymore. It just didn’t make sense to her that there was something else out there looking after her, not after the life she’d had growing up.

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Jack blinked several times, tamping down a smile by pressing his lips together. “Don’t quote me on this, but I’m pretty sure the literal definition of fault is responsibility for an accident, so...” He raised his brows as if to say what can you do. “But I’m willing to hear your argument. For the hell of it.”

Jack’s eyes traveled from her to the broom and back again, running his free hand through the hair at the back of his neck. “I haven’t, sorry to disappoint you.” His smile still bordered on teasing, but it fell a little at her question. It would be easy to write it off as a joke, to say something snarky and move on. But Jack never let a Moment pass by. If there was even a part of her that wanted to understand the depth of God’s love, then he wasn’t going to squander the opportunity. “I don’t imagine He’d hang your arrest record on the fridge or anything, but that’s kind of the beauty of Him. His love really doesn’t have any limits. Even if, say, someone were to go flying through a very old stained glass church window.”

praying 4 u

"I do. There are hard days like there are with anything else, and I would be lying if I said I never thought about what my life would be like if I'd never taken the vow. But knowing I'm in a position to help people makes it all worth it for me."

"I have an ear for anyone in town, I feel like that's probably a lot more useful."