I spotted Luke right away, sitting in the second to the last pew on the far-left side of the sanctuary. He was wearing a button-down shirt and his hair looked nice, like he’d tried to make his dark curls behave with a bit of styling gel or something.
He looked at me and waved. I smiled and forced myself to focus on the stained-glass window near the back of the sanctuary, concentrating on the red, blue, and green glass panes so I wouldn’t lose my place in the song. When it was my turn, I sang:
“And now my heart stumbles on things I don’t know.
My weakness I feel I must finally show.”
I tried to connect with people in the audience like Dad taught me to, looking for the ones who seemed to be lost in thought, or those who might have a special need to hear the words I was singing. But my attention kept drifting back to Luke. For some reason, I felt like he needed to hear the words more than anyone else in the room.
All four of us raised our voices at once for the final lines and by then, my eyes were firmly locked on his.
“Awake my soul.
Awake my soul.
You were made to meet your maker.”
The congregation burst into applause as the four of us held hands and bowed in unison. Then we tipped our heads back, looked up at the ceiling, and whispered, “Thank you, Jesus,” in unison, like we always did. In that moment, while I was still lost in the music, all my questions slipped away and I meant it.
We took our seats and I glanced over my shoulder, trying to look casual as I searched for Luke. I couldn’t see him; there were too many people between us.
“All month, we’ve been talking about the Gospel of John,” the pastor said. “The purpose of this gospel, as stated by John himself, was to show that Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and that believers in him might have eternal life.”
John 3:16 appeared on the wall behind him in bold letters.
I listened to the sermon closer than usual, trying to hear it from Luke’s point of view. It was strange to think about hearing these words for the first time, when I almost took them for granted. They were all I’d ever known. I realized that most of the religions I’d been studying didn’t even have a bible with the book of John. The entire New Testament didn’t exist for them. None of what our pastor was saying up there was core to their whole belief system the way it was to mine.
All my life, I’d believed that Jesus was God’s son. That he walked the earth performing miracles, healing the sick, and feeding the hungry. He spoke about peace and tolerance and forgiveness. And when he was crucified, he rose from the dead to give the rest of us access to a heaven we wouldn’t have had otherwise. His life was a gift. His death was a gift to me, and people like me.
I thought back to the day I decided to be saved. I was ten years old. I didn’t even remember making the decision to do it that day; I just felt this magnetic pull and I stood, stepping away from my friends in the back pew and into the aisle. As the music played, I took what felt like a million steps until I reached the front of the room.
Our pastor was waiting there for me. When I arrived, he held my hands in his. “Do you understand that you are a sinner?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Are you ready to repent of your sins?”
“Yes.”
“Do you invite Jesus to become the Lord of your life, to rule and reign in your heart from this day forward?”
“Yes.”
I answered those questions with tears sliding down my cheeks, because I meant them deep in my soul. I believed with everything I had in me. But now I knew that, while two billion Christians believed it, too, three billion deeply religious people didn’t. To them, Jesus was a man. An important one, a prophet and a messenger, but not the son of God.
Who was right? Were we? Were they?
I knew one thing for certain: the Jesus I invited into my heart that day wouldn’t have wanted us judging one another and fighting about what we believed in.
I wondered how Luke was hearing this sermon. Was it giving him the answers he was looking for? Was it giving him peace?
Aaron stood with his guitar and took his spot on a stool in the center of the stage and started strumming in the background while our pastor wrapped up his sermon. Then he asked us to stand and sing hymn number 454, “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.”
Alyssa leaned into my shoulder. “Logan, Jack, and I are going downtown. Want to come?”
I pictured Luke in the back row, wondering if he was still there or if this whole thing had sent him bolting to the parking lot. He wanted answers, and I wasn’t sure he was finding them in the sermon, but I hoped he’d stick around and talk with Dad when it was over. Luke seemed to want certainty when he showed up at my house, and I was in no position to give it to him. But my dad could. He never seemed to have a shortage of certainty.
“I’ll meet you there. I have something I have to do right after church.” I didn’t mention Luke.
Alyssa said, “Okay, cool,” and then jumped right into the second verse without looking down at her hymnal.
We bowed our heads for the benediction, and as soon as everyone said, “Amen,” the room came to life. People stood and started gathering their things, chatting with one another as they left through the double doors. When the sanctuary was nearly empty, I walked toward Luke.
The hymnal was open on his lap, and he was flipping through the pages, reading the lyrics. I sat down next to him.
“Wow. You, like, really sing,” Luke said. “You’re good.”
“Thanks. The four of us have been together since eighth grade. We perform in different churches and festivals and stuff, and we compete against other youth choirs all over the country.”
“Singing Mumford and Sons songs?”
“Not just Mumford and Sons. Lumineers. Hardwell. Sia.” I stopped there but I could have gone on. “It’s kind of our thing. We take popular songs and sing them to Jesus instead.”
“Seriously?”
I suddenly realized how lame that sounded. “Um, yeah.”
“I just…wow. Okay.” He changed course. “Do you have a CD or something?”
I laughed. “No. But we have a killer website and a YouTube channel with over six thousand subscribers.”
We both looked up at the same time and saw Dad walking down the aisle toward us. He was wearing jeans and a dark blue sweater that made his eyes look even brighter than usual. He held out his hand to Luke. “I can’t begin to tell you how happy I am to meet you. And under much better circumstances this time.”
“I’m glad to be here.” I wasn’t sure if he meant in the church or walking the earth in general. Luke bent the edge of the hymnal back and forth and then stuffed it into the wooden rack on the pew.
Dad sat on Luke’s other side. I couldn’t tell if I was supposed to stay there or leave the two of them alone. I glanced over at my dad for guidance, but he was totally focused on Luke.
“I hope I don’t embarrass you by saying this, Luke, but I caught the expression on your face while SonRise was singing.”
Luke sat up straighter and wrapped his fingers around the edge of the pew. He fixed his gaze on the floor.
“It sounds like your soul has had a bit of an awakening,” Dad said.
Luke nodded.
“That’s a good thing, you know?”
“Is it?”
“I think it’s a wonderful thing. And it’s also kind of a scary thing.” Dad angled his body toward him. “Do you want to talk about it?”
Luke didn’t say anything for a long time. “I don’t know how to,” he finally said.
Dad looked at me and tipped his head to the back of the room, and I knew that was my cue to let them talk privately. As quietly as I could, I slid out of the pew and left the sanctuary.
When I got into the foyer, I sat on the bottom step of the staircase that led to the balcony and rested my chin in my hands. I could see the back of Dad’s and Luke’s heads through the big glass window. The rest of the ch
urch was empty and quiet.
“Hannah?” Aaron was on the stairs behind me. “You okay?”
“Yeah. I just needed a quiet place to think for a second.”
“Do you want me to leave you alone?”
“No, it’s okay.”
He sat down on the step behind me. “You sounded great today.” I felt his hand brush against my shoulder, and I sucked in a breath. I wanted to turn around and look at him, but I was afraid he’d stop touching me, so instead I carefully leaned back until I felt his knee. I reclined into it, and he took the gesture the way I meant it: as permission to keep going. He moved my hair to one side and then slid his thumb across my skin on the back of my neck. Goose bumps traveled up and down my arms.
“What are we doing here?” I asked.
“Why are you asking me? You’re the one sitting on the steps.”
I peeked over my shoulder and grinned at him. “That wasn’t what I meant.”
“I know.” He was still brushing his fingers slowly across my skin. “Is it okay?”
I tried to play it cool, even though my body felt like it might melt into the stairs. “Yeah, it’s okay.”
My eyes were half-closed, my head tilted toward him. “Can I ask you something?” I asked.
“Mm-hmm,” he said.
“When did you know you liked me?”
When he laughed, I felt his breath, like a warm puff on my skin. “Seattle.”
A month earlier, we’d all been together at the Northern Lights Christian A Cappella Choir competition in Seattle. I spent the weekend listening to Alyssa talk about how she and Aaron had been alone in the hotel elevator together, and how he looked at her during dinner, and how he told her he liked her dress, and how his hotel room was only two doors away from ours.
The only reason I spent that weekend thinking about Aaron was because Alyssa hadn’t given me any choice.
But as soon as Aaron said “Seattle,” my mind immediately jumped to the flight home.
Alyssa, Jack, and Logan were all together in one row, and Aaron and I were across the aisle from them. I’d been disappointed with my seating assignment; I was hoping to sit next to Alyssa. She knew how much I hated flying. When we hit turbulence, she always knew exactly how to calm me down.
For the first hour, everything was fine, but then things got bumpy. The seat belt sign flicked on and the pilot came over the intercom and asked everyone—including the flight attendants—to take their seats. At one point, the plane dropped hard, and I gasped as I gripped both armrests so hard, my knuckles turned white.
Aaron wrapped his hand around mine. “You okay?”
I shook my head without looking at him.
“Close your eyes,” he said, and I did.
“Breathe,” he said, and I did.
“Good. Now pretend you’re a stick floating down the river.” His voice was soft and soothing, and I’d let myself get lost in it. “Let the water take you right around the rocks.” I opened my eyes. He was using his hand to show me how the stick moved with the bends and the curves. I closed my eyes again. It was better that way. “We’re just the stick and the air pockets are the rocks. We’re just going to slide right past them, okay?”
I’d nodded.
“The plane knows exactly how to do this, okay?” As he said it, he uncurled my fingers from around the armrest. He didn’t let go of my hand right away.
Aaron squeezed my shoulders, bringing me back to reality. “So, why are you sitting on the steps?” he asked.
I gestured toward the sanctuary. “Waiting for my dad.”
Aaron peered over my shoulder. “Who’s he with? Is that a friend of yours?”
Was Luke my friend? He’d always been Emory’s boyfriend. I’d spent time with the two of them in the months before she and I stopped speaking, but that was different. I still barely knew him, but now he was my friend, too.
“Remember that guy who died in front of our house last Friday night?”
“Yeah, of course.”
“That’s him.”
Luke returned to school on Monday.
When I stepped into the cafeteria, I saw him immediately, in his usual spot, at his usual table, surrounded by all the usual people and about twenty others.
He looked better, more like himself. His face wasn’t quite as puffy anymore, but I could still see the dark circles under his eyes.
As I walked closer, I could hear the buzz of questions all around him. Everyone wanted to know why he didn’t tell anyone he was in pain that night, what it was like to ride in the ambulance, and if it was weird to think that someone else’s blood was running through his veins.
By the time I reached his side, he was trying to avoid Dean Foster’s questions about the stitches they used to fix the tear in his spleen, and if it had hurt when they took the staples out.
“Hey.” I gave him a kiss. “You good here?” I whispered.
Luke barely shook his head, but I felt it against my cheek, and that was all it took for me to step into action.
“Excuse us. I need to borrow him for just a minute. Don’t worry, fans,” I said as I led him away. “I’ll bring him right back.”
I steered him past the tables, through the crowds, and into the hall, and then found a quiet place to hide between two locker banks.
“Thanks,” he said. “That was a little overwhelming.”
I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, came up on my tiptoes, and kissed him. I waited for him to rest his hands on my hips like he always did, but he left them by his sides.
“How’s your first day back?”
“Well, I spent the last hour in the guidance counselor’s office. Where, you know, I thought I might get a little bit of guidance or maybe some counseling, but instead he informed me that my scholarship has been put on hold. Which I guess I expected….I just thought I’d hear the news from Coach, not from some guy I’ve never even met before.”
“It’s just temporary, though, right?”
“It sounded that way at first. He started off saying they wanted to wait a few weeks to see how I heal, so they know if I’ll be able to play next year or not. But then he started talking about my SAT scores and my transcript and…well, those are hardly glowing.” He stared at his shoes. “There’s no way I’ll get into Denver or any other D-one schools based on my grades alone. I’m supposed to start making a list of all the schools I might want to apply to instead, just in case Denver pulls my offer. He gave me a long speech about how I’ve been ‘resting on physical skills,’ whatever that means, and now I need to focus on my academic record and extracurricular activities for the rest of the year.”
“The rest of the year? It’s the middle of March.”
He let out a hard breath. “Yeah. That’s a problem.”
Owen Campbell walked by and slapped him on the back. “Dude, glad you’re okay.”
Luke grimaced as he squeezed my arm. “Thanks, man,” he said through clenched teeth. “Me too.”
Owen kept walking, oblivious. “See you at practice,” he said.
I waited until Owen was out of earshot. “Practice?”
“Coach said he expects me to show up, even if I can’t play. Support the team and all. But I can’t go. Not today, at least.”
“You should go. Get back to normal, you know?”
He rolled his eyes.
“What?”
“I thought you were going to cheer me up, not make me feel worse.”
I told myself not to take it personally. The last week had been full of pain and medication and surgeries and hospital beds, and his first day back at school had been full of questions and bad news.
“Fine. If you’re skipping lacrosse, I’ll skip play rehearsal. We can go to the diner, order apple pie à la mode, sit in our booth and talk.”
He looked up at the ceiling. “I just want to go home. I’m exhausted.” He pulled my hands off his shoulders.
“Are you sleeping?”
“Not much.”
&
nbsp; “Are you still staying up all night researching dead athletes?”
He shook his head, but I had a weird feeling he was lying.
He’d been acting strange all weekend. When I asked him where he’d been on Sunday, and why he lied to his parents about spending the day with me, he said he’d taken a drive to the beach to be alone and think. I had a feeling he was lying about that, too.
“Have you thought about talking to someone? Like…a therapist?”
“Why would I do that?”
“It might help. It’s totally natural to feel depressed after what you went through.”
“Depressed?” He chuckled. “What makes you think I’m depressed?”
Because he was acting exactly like Mom used to. Cold. Angry. Avoiding everyone and distancing himself from the things he cared about. The old Luke never would have driven to the beach without me.
“A lot of athletes who’ve been injured go through this. I’ve been researching it.” I reached for my phone. “I can send you links. It’s really common.”
He took my phone from my hand, closed the browser, and handed it back to me. “I’m not depressed.”
And then he kissed me. I wanted to think it was because he really wanted to, but I felt like he was just doing it to shut me up.
“Okay, you win,” he said. “Let’s go to the diner. A milk shake actually sounds really good.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Good,” I said. “We’ll treat that place like a time machine. The second we walk through that door and sit down in our booth, it’s two weeks ago. Nothing bad happened, no one got hurt, and nothing’s going to happen.”
He opened his mouth to say something, but seemed to change his mind. Then he grinned down at me. “I like the sound of that.”
It was almost midnight, but I couldn’t sleep. All I could think about was Aaron.
Earlier that day, Alyssa and I were cleaning up after practice, carrying the equipment from the stage to the music room, when he came out to help us. Alyssa was flirting with him relentlessly, but he kept looking over at me and giving me that half smile that made my whole face flush. I thought she’d noticed, but when we got in the car, she turned to me and said, “God, could you feel that sexual tension between Aaron and me?”