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The fact that Jason prayed for God’s help in learning to love me is the straw that breaks the camel’s back. When I prayed, it was that Jason would show more affection for me. It was to receive more of his love, not to change him. I wanted him to love me like the pastor loved his wife, like the parishioners love their spouses. I wanted to know, without waking up every morning and questioning it, that Jason loved me.
“The wedding is off.” The words stop Jason in his tracks. He’s offended that I spoke over him, but even more, he’s mad that I would end the marriage.
“You don’t get to make that call, Chastity. You cannot tear apart what God has put together.” His voice raises, drawing the attention of the pastor at the front door.
I step out of the pew and look at my feet, laughing as I display my subservience to him. “You know, for a long time, I thought you were my Prince Charming, but it turns out that you were just another frog. You’re the right man, Jason, but I’m the wrong woman. Have a nice life.”
I turn my back on him and walk away. Jason calls my name and scrambles to get out of the pew. He yells at me that I have things at his house, that we’re getting married in a few days, but I don’t turn around. “Keep it,” I yell back, “keep it all.”
What am I really losing? A few pots and pans? Some clothes that I took to his place in preparation for living together? Other seemingly useless items that I can’t even think of?
I’ve gained so much more. Clarity, the potential for happiness, maybe even something better. I pull my phone out of my back pocket and text Rooster my address. Maybe he’ll show up like he said he would. Maybe he’ll do crazy things for me like he said men do for the women they love. Or maybe he was all talk.
I guess we’ll find out soon enough.
ROOSTER
She isn’t home when I arrive. I sit on her front porch with a bouquet of wildflowers and think about how my life led me here.
I wanted to go back to college and earn a degree that would allow me to do what I really wanted, but I needed money first. I remember thinking about leaving the state and trying to work somewhere else. Maybe I could get a teaching job in another district or another continent. I had options.
Instead, I showed up at Stallions in a pair of tight-fitting briefs. I needed to work out more, there was no doubt about that, but I had something they wanted. I was packing nine inches behind those briefs, which was more than enough to get me the job.
Instead of doing the honorable thing and going back to teaching, I became a male dancer. I met gorgeous women and I was fawned over every night. I made three times as much as I did teaching, sometimes even more. The world was my oyster.
Until Chastity walked through the door. She stole my breath away and then my heart. She was kind and sweet, honest and open. She didn’t tell me about being engaged, but it didn’t matter. Some people fall in love slowly, developing a relationship first. But some people see their soulmate and know immediately that that person fills the missing parts of them. That’s how it was for me with Chastity. I looked at her and just knew that she would fill all of my cracks.
She pulls up in the driveway a few moments later. Even wearing a t-shirt and shorts, she looks beautiful. Her dark locks are pulled into a clip and a few loose tendrils hang around her face. “You came,” she says with a confused little smile.
I stand up and dust myself off, holding the flowers wrapped in cellophane out to her. “I told you I would.”
Chastity takes a few tentative steps forward. She looks at the flowers and takes them from my hand when I offer them to her. “These are beautiful.”
“Not half as beautiful as you.” I close the gap between us and reach forward to push the stray hairs out of her face.
She looks up at me with those blue eyes that pierce my soul. She has captured me with just her gaze. “I’m not perfect, Rooster. Some would call me broken.”
I wonder what happened when she went to talk to Jason. Did he call her broken? Did he tell her that she wasn’t perfect? That might be true in some sense of the word, but who cares? Why does it matter? “I don’t need perfect or whole, Chastity, I just need you.”
As I say the words, I know that they’re true. I’ve dated a dozen women over the years, but even my longest relationship didn’t make me feel the way that Chastity does. People say that when you know, you know. And I know that if I lost my job today, if I didn’t have a roof over my head anymore, if all of my possessions were to disappear, as long as I still had Chastity, I would be fine.
“I wear dresses sometimes,” she warns. “Shorts, tank tops, a host of clothes that my ex said were too provocative.”
I could punch him in the chest for making her feel ashamed. I wrap my arms around Chastity’s waist and pull her into me, crushing the flowers between us. “Wear whatever you want. Do whatever you want.Bewhoever you want. I like you, Chastity, and there’s nothing about you that I want to change.”
She lets the flowers fall to the ground as she reaches up to wrap her arms around my neck. “You’re something else, Rooster.”
“As long as that something is yours,” I tell her.
Slowly, I lean down to press my lips to hers. I am met with the flavor of strawberry chapstick; the taste of Chastity. She is sweet and delicious, soft and supple. I could kiss her forever. And I hope I get the opportunity to do so.
* * *
