#atsap

🖤All Things Sacred and Profane- Chapter 4 Preview 🖤

From the outside the little book looks so like the leather bound bibles lining the church pews, that you initially mistake it for just that. With all due reverence you pick it up in gentle hands, turning it over just to feel the binding glide beneath your palms. It’s only then that you notice there’s no cross, no Holy Bible emblazoned on the cover. In the bottom right hand corner, burned into the umber leather and stamped with gold foil are the initials R.P.B

You glance to the door, then down at your hands. You’ve time enough to peek.

You can’t figure out how an R could turn into “Bo”, but flicking it open to the first page, you immediately recognize the handwriting as his. You turn to where a red ribbon marks the page with the latest entry. It’s dated three days ago. The morning he jilted you after the storm.

~~~

I am bound by faith and decency to guide this girl along the path of salvation, but everything inside me longs with unspeakable ferocity to do the contrary. When I look at her, my whole body aches with the desire to undo her—twist her into something perfectly and utterly depraved. These thoughts are enough to damn me, but what’s worse is that I have neither the strength nor intention to separate myself from this temptation. If the devil is after my immortal soul, it’s his. Just let me have her at least once in this life.

~~~

“He keeps a diary?” you whisper to yourself.

Why the fuck is that your first thought when the contents are so shocking?

Father Burnham keeps a diary and it is filled with all the thoughts that he cannot utter aloud, not even to the good lord in his infinite mercy. Those dark writhing thoughts without form ignite with clarity in his mind. With each stroke of his pen he puts a shape and a name to the destructive feelings.

Lamb.

Sweet lamb.

My lamb.

It’s you; scrawled all over each page. By the way he writes, it couldn’t be clearer: your presence on the paper is insufficient, you’re even etched inside his skin.

The sharp sound of porcelain breaking expels your heart from your chest and snaps your eyes to the doorway.

Bo stands statue-still, the mug of cocoa he made for you lay shattered at his feet.

He swallows so hard you can hear it. Expressionless he stares you down and says, “Bo is short for Robert, if you were wondering what the R is for.”

It’s not the explanation you were expecting, or the one you need. He doesn’t ask you how much you’ve read. He doesn’t address the problem of biblical proportions, swirling vortex-like around you.

“You should go home.” He says thickly. “I need you to g—”

“Father Burnham,—” you interrupt, “I have so much on my mind, and I can’t deal with it by myself anymore. I want to go to confession. Please, I can’t go on with my conscience this heavy.”

Hearing your petition, Father Burnham grinds his jaw, his features, previously steeled against the legion of conflicting emotions roiling inside him, shift that much closer to hunger.

“I can’t refuse the administration of a holy sacrament. Take your coat, it'll be freezing in the church.”

You wonder if your presence within their quarters at this time of night would really raise any alarms. Would you be able to save face should the senior priest stir? For a moment you can convince yourself that yes, you’re simply a layperson seeking guidance in an hour of need. But as you trail a hair's breadth behind father Burnham, you can’t deny the true nature of your spiritual crisis.

The rectory walls carry sound like all old houses do, jarringly and bone-hollow, making each forward step one closer to discovery.

You know what—I do!! A journal entry from when Father Burnham was still plain old Bo.

Slight Spoilers for ATSAP Chapter 4 ahead!!!

~~~~

2-20-2008

I always pictured it happening in math class.

I think people tend to think math is antithetical to art, but to me, numbers are just as poetic as words. Math requires symmetry, math poses infinite questions and presents an equal number of solutions to be formulated and worked out. I think poetry and comedy are the same way.

Others might think calculus is where artists go to have their dreams killed.

So if they were ever gonna call me out for my songs, why wouldn’t it happen in math class?

Mister Burnham (me, by the way. My offense is somehow weighty enough to warrant a “Mister”, but not the dignity of my first name) is summoned to the administrator's office over the loudspeaker without ceremony (the jeering and scattered laughter of my fellow teenage boys)

Somehow, it still feels like a death march.

Brother Mark watches me sulk in through his Jeffery Dahmer glasses.

Ma is waiting there in the office for me too, wearing her nurse's scrubs. I sink down in the open chair next to her and ask if anyone we know has died.

Silence.

Brother M clears his throat and begins by turning his computer screen towards me. There’s a thumbnail image of a lanky kid in a blue tee hunched over his cheap keyboard in his too small bedroom.

“We all know what this is about Mister Burnham” he says. Sure, we do, but the kid on the screen isn’t Mister Burnham, it’s just Bo. In my mind that’s a pretty crucial difference, but I know I wouldn’t be here if they could make that same distinction.

“Why now after two years?” I ask as humbly as I can (not very). “Unless we’re here to celebrate it hitting a million views.”

“We’re not, Bo.” No nonsense from my mother. Naturally. This isn’t a joke.

“I know, Ma.”

Brother Mark, sounding like a joyless Yogi Bear, a lobotomized Tony the Tiger scrolls through the rest of my channel and says, “These things could easily jeopardize your future Robert.”

I, the nasally idiot with the wavering courage, put on my best Big Boy voice and remind him that I’d already been accepted into three ivy leagues and NYU.

From the diary of Father Burnham

~~~

Feb 2022

I probably should’ve called ahead to announce myself, or to ask if she would mind me coming by. It’s not as if I’m out to convert her— I can’t abide by that evangelizing crap. I wanted to check in, though my reasons were selfish.

Still, if she was expecting anyone, I was probably the last on her list, if the way her jaw went slack with surprise was any indication.

I couldn’t bring myself to ask her what was on her mind right out of the gate, but something clearly was.

Her lips were raw—like she’d been worrying them between her teeth. Fretted with them until they were a ripe, ruddy pink. I didn't want to make her feel self conscious, like I was judging her for not coming back to mass, or inspecting her for signs of emotional damage. So I ignored it and looked away.

I’m such a fucking liar.

In my mind's eye, I saw my mouth collide with hers. I saw myself run my tongue along their seam—soothe the swollen flesh. I saw myself take them between my teeth and bite down until she bled. I saw myself kiss her in a dozen different ways. I had to look away.

Thank you for your dedication dear anon!

I’m currently working on chapter four of All Things Sacred and Profane, after which my attention will be back with Fix Fuck Make Worse. I know my posting schedule is pretty sporadic, but I try to keep folks in the loop here on tumblr with little previews and the like.

Some personal things came up that prevented me from writing much at all since new years but I’m back at it!

All Things Sacred and Profane- Chapter 2 🪦🖤

All Things Sacred and Profane: Chapter 2—Dropping tomorrow on Ao3!

In the meantime here’s a little playlist to whet your blasphemous appetites!