Some part of me knows I should be freezing. Some part of me is aware that it has to be in the mid-thirties outside. Beneath the glow of the streetlamps, rain shoots down toward the concrete like shooting stars. But I no longer have the capacity to care. Every part of my mind and body is screaming at me, working at 120 percent of normal, and all I can feel is pain and embarrassment and anger. I hate myself. I hate whatever it is that’s making me feel these things. That’s stopping me from holding on to any sort of joy. I’m tired of it. All of it. I just want everything to dissolve away.

I’m not even sure where I’m going until I slow to a stop at the foot of Saint Anthony’s Catholic Church. The stoic brick building rises out of the ground like a stern guardian: always available, but with a firm hand. Wiping my wet hair out of my eyes, I mount the steps to the entrance. This late at night, Father Griffin will have locked up, but I search my coat pockets and withdraw the key.

Evora has always forced me to help her clean the church, to help keep our community from dirt and disrepair. She would frown upon me using it now to break in, but it’s time the church did something to help me instead.

Father Griffin will understand. I have nowhere else to go.

Shivering. Soaked. Anguished. I take one last look around before slipping inside.

The interior of the church is dark and cold—though slightly less cold than outside. The sound of the pounding rain is amplified by the tall stained-glass windows whose depictions are nonexistent without light behind them.

Hurrying to the left, I feel around for a bit before finding the matches. I strike one, the tiny orange flame springing to life. Then I begin lighting the prayer candles, muttering things even I don’t understand. Vague prayers. Promises. Desires to change. I don’t know what any of it means anymore. I need light and warmth, and that’s all I have the mental capacity to focus on.

When all of them are lit, the church glows with an austere beauty. I look around, unused to being here at night and all alone. Everything looks so different: the empty pews, the darkened lanterns, the empty altar. Even the suspended Jesus on the cross. Light from the candles doesn’t quite reach his face, shrouding his somber expression in shadows. The brown hair which cascades down from his head takes on the appearance of a dark hood. I feel the fear I used to feel as a boy, staring up at the ominous, floating figure.

Dripping rainwater everywhere, I stumble over to my usual seat and sink down onto the pew. I bow my head before him.

How ironic that despite my unrelenting inner turmoil, this place brings me an odd, reluctant comfort. It’s the comfort of familiarity—of normalcy. I have spent so many Sundays here listening to readings about God’s love and the path to it. Singing melodies about forgiveness and compassion. Words about how to be a better person. And I can’t fit any of them.

I just want to be happy. But it seems that time and again I will be denied that.

I will deny myself that.

Maybe it’s because I’m not meant to be happy. Do I not deserve happiness? I am so utterly lost and confused because maybe Aunt Evora is right. Maybe my parents are right and that’s why it’s all crashing down on me. I am the one in the wrong.

Hot, desperate tears stream down my face. I collapse onto my knees, not bothering to lower the kneelers. I don’t deserve the relief of cushions. I need to feel the pain of the hard tiles against my kneecaps. I wince, but remain where I am, shutting my eyes and raising my clasped hands to my forehead.

The crucified Jesus, who died for my sins, hovers before me to judge the living and the dead. Arms outstretched in either love or condemnation.

Please, God, please.

I reject the pleasure of sexualizing Milo Reid.

Please, God, please.

Rain patters against the windows. Applause for my confession.

I reject the pleasure of holding his hand.

You are the word and the word is with you.

Wind gusts and the roof creaks, loud enough to disturb my prayers.

I reject the pleasure of kissing his fucking lips.

Please, God, lift me above my sins. My homosexual desires.

The sky flashes with lightning.

I reject the pleasure of stripping off every damn stitch of his clothing.

I promise to follow the narrow path to righteousness. You are the one and only true God.

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Thunder rumbles through the air and in my chest.

And I reject the pleasure of sitting on his stiff, swollen sex.

Take me, Jesus. TAKE ME.

A loud crack like a whip echoes through the dark church. My eyes fly open in startled terror, just in time to watch as the statue of the son of God falls to the ground with an almighty crash. The floor shakes. I duck, shielding my head behind the cover of the pew in front of me. Pulse drumming in my ears, I stay huddled, terrified as the church around me seems to break amid the crashing storm outside. In a matter of seconds, it’s all over, though the wind still howls and the patter of the rain continues to race my heart.

The statue can’t have fallen. The cross was tethered to the roof with cables. Strong cables. It can’t have fallen.

And yet, when I raise my head to look, the statue no longer hangs above the altar.

My body trembles.

No. I am supposed to be safe in a house of God. They can’t—they can’t have followed me here. I don’t feel them.

I stand, stepping out into the aisle.

Shards of broken tile lay everywhere at the head of the church along with splinters of wood. The statue must have struck the altar on the way down, for it’s canted on only two legs now. Above, the frayed cables swing uselessly from the ceiling. All three can’t have snapped at once.

The cross lies out of sight amid the wreckage.

Fuck. It dawns on me that if I’m caught in here, the only conceivable explanation will be that I vandalized the church. I cut the statue down somehow. I destroyed the altar. I will be held accountable. It’s all my fault.

Maybe that’s true.

Smelling the iron of my own blood from when the monster shredded my back, I turn to leave.

And hear movement.

My ears ring, straining to eliminate the white noise from outside. I can’t have heard movement—or if I did, it’s only the debris settling.

But it comes again. This time, not a single, sharp noise, but the sound of scraping. The sound of ceramic against stone. Statue on tile. Against my better judgment, I take a few steps toward the front of the church. It’s the last place I want to go—I have little desire to see what’s waiting for me there—but I need to eliminate the only possibility in my head. At the sight of the broken cross, my blood turns to ice.

The body is nowhere to be seen.

It’s my imagination. I have finally lost my grip on reality.

A shape moves in the dark, crawling over the debris. It’s pitch dark, clawed hands still painted with my blood. But this is no human form. This is no savior. This is something I should never meet and it’s headed in my direction.

I run, sprinting back down the aisle as fast as my feet will carry me, knowing that if I am not safe here, then I’m not safe anywhere. They promised me sanctuary in God’s house. They promised me forgiveness. I throw myself at the doors, but somehow, they’re stuck. As rigid as any of the walls. Panicked sobs escape my throat. I grasp at the deadbolt, but it’s already unlocked.

“Please.”

Behind me, I can hear the thing crawling over the last of the detritus. I glance back in time to see a shadow at the end of the aisle. There’s no sense in it hurrying—I can’t go anywhere. We’re trapped in here together.

“Someone help!” I scream, pounding my fists against the doors. They remain resolute, not even an inch of give when I throw the full force of my shoulder against them. “Milo! I’m in here! Please, help!”

The air is still and yet the candles extinguish in unison, plunging me into a darkness that permeates my entire being. I shrink away from the door, clutching myself with trembling arms. The tears are painful now, pouring so heavily I might be bleeding from my eyes. Behind me I feel the presence. It towers over me, growing larger by the second, exuding its threatening intent. Its proximity has the power to drain everything from me but pain and despair. Unending unhappiness. I clutch at my head, trying to stop it from getting inside. But the darkness is terrifying and the darkness is complete. I know all I will feel is darkness forever.

“HELP!” My throat tears open.

Hands grip my arms. I brace myself to feel the claws once again slicing through my flesh. My shirt sticks to my back with drying blood. I’m writhing, attempting to break free from its grasp. Flailing. But the hands grip harder.

“HELP!”

I will die here in this church, struggling against the grip of the demon who followed me inside.

“HELP!”

“Felix.”

My feet lose purchase on the slick floor. I would fall, were the arms not around me.

“Please!”

“Felix, it’s me. Open your eyes—it’s Milo.”

I’m still thrashing. Panicking. Trying to distance myself from the restraining hold. But my eyes flick open and the world once more comes back into focus.

“It’s okay. It’s okay, you’re alright,” Milo is saying, his voice distant as if he isn’t whispering the words in my ear. As if we aren’t standing in the back of the church, the rows of overhead lights glowing yellow. The rain beating quietly against the windows. The candles burning in their glass vases. I might have thought the whole thing was a hallucination were it not for the destruction plainly visible at the other end of the aisle—the leaning altar, the ceramic shards, the figure of Jesus torn from the cross. Though the storm has calmed, the frayed cables sway almost coyly from the ceiling. I absorb all of these details, my breath coming in shuddering gasps that shake my whole body. I still haven’t found my feet. Instead, I hang by Milo’s support, and he holds me tightly in a way I can’t remember ever being held.

“It’s okay, Felix,” he says. “I’m right here.”

And then I collapse into sobs, flooded with an anguish that I can’t release quickly enough. The tears are large, hot orbs squeezing from my eyes like flames. My chest hurts, my throat hurts. And I’m clinging to him like I might never let go.

“Dores is dead,” I say, the words congealing on my tongue between sobs. “Dores is dead and I can’t—grieve—with my parents because they hate me.”

Milo lowers us down so that we’re both kneeling on the floor of the church. His hand moves to my back, massaging my crumpled shoulders.

“I don’t want to be gay. I don’t want to be like this. I don’t want to be ostracized. I don’t want to be alone.”

The words don’t feel like enough, and yet they’re all I have. So I give them to Milo because he asked me for them. Because despite everything, I’m still hopeful. Because of the way he holds me. I think sometimes we long to give ourselves to someone, because there’s a chance they’ll carry us when we’ve given up.

“I think I have Lacrimosus too,” I admit, “like Dores did. And I don’t want to end up doing the same thing to myself.”

Milo told me he would stay. He said he wanted to be with me despite how fucked up I might be inside.

I think he meant it.

As the storm continues outside, dawn mere minutes away, he sits with me on the floor of Saint Anthony’s and never lets me go.