Feather Light

Chapter 10

In my room, sleep seemed impossible. Too much was happening. I reached for my Bible, searching for comfort and the right words to still my mind and bring me peace.

Keira had said that she didn't expect me to be reading the Bible. Leigh had questioned me about it in the past too. Several years before, I had been reading quietly at the kitchen table when Leigh had bounded in, full of enthusiasm.

"Hey, big brother!" he yelled joyfully, his loud voice painful to my ears. "Tonight's the night! Pop is out of town and I am taking you into the city for some fun!"

I massaged my temples slowly. "No."

"Noah! Dude, learn to live a little. It's just a club, not a den of iniquity. Well... unless you want it to be." He widened his eyes suggestively at me.

"Still no." I returned to my reading.

Leigh walked over and flipped the cover shut on my fingers. "Is this a religious thing? Is that it? Why do you go in for that stuff? Pop, I get it. That's his generation, he's seen lots of death, yada yada, but you! You're a man of science, an Einstein!"

"Einstein believed in God," I told him coolly.

Leigh snorted. "Still."

"I believe, because it makes sense. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Each sin must be paid for. That makes sense."

"People aren't a chemistry experiment, Noah."

"People are nothing but chemistry," I countered. "On that subject, do you know how unbelievably complex human beings are? How detailed and perfect our physiology has to be just to keep our most basic respiratory and circulatory systems in balance? Do you really think we're all one giant, cosmic accident? Evolution is like a missile hitting a junkyard and flawlessly assembling a Boeing 747 by coincidence. There is a grand design. It makes sense. That's why I go in for this 'stuff.'"

I returned to my reading while Leigh rolled his eyes and walked out. We never discussed it again, but I know I made my point.

That night after meeting with Keira, my world reeled from the influx of emotion. I was a man used to thought and logic. This heady mix of attraction and emotion wasn't something I could throw rationality at. My feelings were beginning to overtake everything else inside me. I sought my Bible, looking for the cool, calm words to put the world back into perspective.

As I read, I came across a sentence that rocked me to my foundations - I had to read it twice, because the first time, the words simply refused to land on my psyche. 

...Now to the unmarriedand the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do.

Almost without exception, the passages I would read in the Bible made perfect sense. "Thou shalt not kill." Done. "Don't use the name of the Lord in vain." Of course. Other passages didn't apply so much, but they made sense for the time and place they were written. I never grazed cattle before, so I never had to worry if they were all the same kind, but if I ever did, I would revisit this command.

This new decree was direct and applicable. It ground my universe to a halt. The breath left my body and my eyes lost focus. Stay unmarried? Be single? How did that make sense? The feelings inside me that had bloomed for Keira rose up in anguish, but as much as I tried to think of a logical way around the passage, there wasn't one. The word was the word.

The words themselves seemed phrased like an accusation, as if someone already knew I was straying off the path. I was supposed to be single; the proof was right in front of me. How could I walk away from Keira? She already ran in my blood and dominated my dreams.