Page 54 of Weatherman

His eyes caught mine, and the intensity kept me from moving. “I want to know more about you.”

I wanted to ask, “Why?” again, but the word stuck in my throat. Instead, I took his hand and let him lead me outside.

The air wasn’t really cold, but there was a crispness to it. I wondered for a moment how Pearl would be about winters here. A northern Midwest baby now in the South?

We strolled along the pool deck and out onto a gravel-covered path. Motion sensor lights followed us, winking on as we approached and turning off as we left their area. I spotted several large buildings on the property and a bunch of short square ones. I also noticed that he didn’t let go of my hand.

“Over there is the private garage and workshop. Behind it is maintenance and storage. What you see through here are camping cabins that are used in the summer for overflow guests or when the members want more privacy.”

“I thought everyone had their own rooms in the Lair?”

“Most of us do, but occasionally we need more space. A few of us smoke a little weed now and then, and out of respect for Betsey, we don’t do that in her home.”

I smirked. “Smoke a little weed, eh?”

He laughed out loud. “Well, I’m not without sin. Not like your Pastor Bobby.”

I laughed this time as well. “Robert isn’t my anything. He’s nice, and we’ve gone out a few times, but that’s all.” I paused before making the observation. “You don’t like him much.”

Weatherman stopped at a plain wood bench. The light gave off a bluish hue as it shone down on us. “It’s not that I don’t like him. I just don’t agree with him.”

“You don’t believe in God?”

He sighed and sat, pulling me down with him and keeping our hands linked. “I believe in God, just not the version he spouts from the pulpit. My mom and I used to attend a church when I was little, but we stopped when the pastor started ranting over gay people going to hell. I had a hard time understanding how that could come from a God who claimed to love everyone.”

He shifted, leaning back to gaze at the stars, and pointed to the sky. “See those stars there? The ones that form a big square? How ’bout the diamond shape on the left above it and the arch on the right? That’s the constellation Pegasus.”

It took me a minute to see what he was showing me, but I finally spotted the shape. “Wow, I see it! That’s pretty neat.”

He moved his finger to another spot. “See the one below, another square, and the three above? People commonly call that one the Little Dipper, but the real name is Little Bear or Ursa Minor. The Big Dipper, or Ursa Major, is below it and more upright.”

It was pretty exciting to recognize the star shapes. “Yes, I see them too. What else is up there?”

“Over there is Orion. I showed him to Pearl once. He’s real easy to recognize because of the three stars that make his belt.”

Weatherman spent several more minutes showing me other constellations and groupings of stars.

“How did you learn all of this?” I asked.

“One of my closest friends over in Tennessee was gay. I met him during a stargazing event with a local astronomy club.Even though he was older than me, we still hit it off as really good buddies. He never hit on me or did any of the things that pastor said he would. He wasn’t evil. He wasn’t perverse. In fact, he was a Christian, baptized and everything. Tim was a music teacher and worked at one of those last-chance schools where they put kids who are considered delinquent. The pay was shit and the conditions worse, yet he went to work every day with middle schoolers who’d fallen through the cracks. His side job was playing the piano in a church band. One that never pointed fingers at him. He died last year from a heart condition, and I attended his funeral. Standing room only. There’s no telling how many people that man helped to a better place while he was on this earth for such a brief moment. How can a gay Christian go to hell, especially one who sings praises and works hard to better other people’s lives? Doesn’t make much sense to me.”

He had a point. It was a question that I certainly had no answer for.

“The estimate is that there are around a hundred billion stars in our galaxy, and the visible ones form these constellations.”

My brain could think in hundreds more than billions. “That’s… well… a lot.”

He smiled. “Wanna blow your mind more? There are between two hundred billion and two trillion galaxies in the universe, and that’s only the ones we can see. Counting that many stars?” He put his other hand next to his head and flared his fingers while making an explosion sound. “Bottom line is, the universe is pretty damn big. I can’t believe a God whose power created all of that would be limited to a small group of people on a tiny planet that’s insignificant in comparison to everything around it.”

“I’ve never really thought about it. It’s kind of….”

“Overwhelming?” he supplied.

“Yeah, that’s it. Overwhelming.”

We sat in a comfortable silence, looking up at the sky and listening to random night sounds. I felt at ease, like there was nothing I needed to say or do. I could just be in the moment and let everything go. The worries and the fears all disappeared, and I was fine—truly fine—with my place in the world. Weatherman brought me a sense of peace where Pastor Robert, even with all his kind words and gentle spirit, did not.

I finally broke the quiet. “When I went to his church that one time, Robert preached forgiveness of sins. Is that something real?”

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