Page 111 of Audacity

My jaw drops open, because I’ve belatedly realised what his endgame is here.

‘You want to hear myconfession?’

CHAPTER 56

Athena

He laughs softly. ‘Not in the traditional sense of the word, no. Of course not. This isn’t about me trying to make you feel in any way exposed.’

I squint through the grille, drinking up every shadowed fragment of his profile as he speaks.

‘What is it about, then?’

‘These days, the act of confession is known as the Sacrament of Reconciliation. I’ve always far preferred that term. It’s less about exposing sins and more about restoring harmony and communion when there’s been a rupture. And it’s pretty clear there’s been a rupture between us, my darling, even if neither of us are to blame in the slightest.’

I’m quiet. His priest voice is soft and reassuring. It makes me feel safe and warm, even in this alien space, and his choice of words soothes me, even if he’s spot on about the rupture element.

Harmony. Communion. Restoring.

For the first time, I can see how speaking one’s truth in an enclosed space like this can lead one to feel less claustrophobic and more cloistered.

‘I know.’ My voice is small. I’m aware that he blames himself for what happened on Thursday, yet I’m the one who’s walled myself off and frozen him out. Just as Gabe has confessed to rallying his inner alpha male to advocate to his family for me, all my actions have been to protect him. To save him.

‘Are you willing to try something?’ He shifts again in his seat.

‘Why not?’ I know this man. I trust this man with my life. Taking a leap of faith on him in this moment, in this wooden, womb-like space, feels more like a baby step than a giant leap.

‘Okay, let’s try something.’ He clears his throat. ‘Athena, I’m Father Gabriel. I thank the Lord for your courage in coming here today and in seeking to open your heart.’ A weighty pause, during which I’m unsure whether to speak. But he continues in the softest voice: ‘I hear you’ve been having some troubles with your partner, and I wondered if you would feel comfortable telling me what scared you on Friday.’

So this is his game.

He’s not asking me to talktohim.

He’s asking me to talkabouthim.

I blow out a breath, my innate scepticism warring with a desire to try this for Gabe’s sake.

‘I’ve never done this before… Father.’

‘There's no wrong way,’ he says gently. ‘Just speak what's in your heart.’

He’s firmly back in priest mode, and I can already see how fully he embodies all those years of pastoral care. ‘He wanted to be’—I stumble over the words—‘intimate, and vulnerable. He kissed me, and he told me he loved me, and I wasn’t ready.’

‘Good. That’s good. Why do you think you weren’t ready?’

I squeeze my eyes shut, reliving that moment, trying to understand what it was about that conversation with the man of my dreams that felt like falling backwards off a cliff.

‘It was the way he looked at me. Like—like I was this precious, sacred thing, right at the time that I was feeling at my most humiliated and shamed and?—’

I stop dead, my eyes flying open.

He waits, but his silence feels less unnerving than accepting, as if he’s holding space for me.

‘Unworthy,’ I admit, hating the word while knowing it’s the truth.

‘What exactly did you feel unworthy of?’

‘Everything. The job he’d offered me. His love.Him.’

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