Yes
*Thursday. 2:58 p.m. I’ve been standing outside for six minutes because I can’t decide if walking through that door is an act of faith, or an act of something else entirely.*
St Callum’s Church stood empty under the sharp autumn light. The sun cut across the tower and threw a long, precise shadow onto the road. Sophie stood on the opposite pavement, coat collar turned up high, eyes fixed on the oak doors.
Inside the pocket of her coat her hand clenched around a set of keys. The knuckles pressed white against the dark wool.
She glanced at her watch: 3:01. She exhaled a thin plume of breath into the cold air and crossed the street.
Her palm met the rough surface of the wood. She pushed. The heavy door swung inward.
The nave stretched away, long and hollow. Daniel stood in the centre aisle turning the pages of a folder. The creak of the door echoed.
He looked up. He closed the folder hard and set it face-down on the nearest pew with a dry, definite click.
His eyes held steady. The rigid line of his shoulders, held tight beneath the black clerical shirt, lowered by a single, visible degree.
Sophie stopped. The toe of her boot was exactly two metres from the toe of his shoe.
“You came,” he said, voice level.
“I said I would.”
“You said you’d think about it.”
Sophie did not blink. “I thought about it for thirty seconds.”
A muscle jumped in Daniel’s jaw. The left corner of his mouth lifted a millimetre, forming a faint crease that was not quite a smile. It was a small surrender.
Sophie’s pupils widened as she caught the expression. She blinked once.
“I thought we could use the archive room,” Daniel said. “More comfortable for conversation.”
He turned and walked toward the dark corridor on the left. Sophie followed.
The archive room was narrow and close. Four walls pressed in by old bookshelves. A small high window threw a single dusty beam of yellow light across a wooden table and two chairs set almost side by side.
Daniel entered first. Sophie came after. The space was so tight she had to brush against him to reach the chair.
The heavy wool of her coat dragged hard across the rough black fabric of his cassock. The soft rasp of cloth on cloth was clear in the silence.
Daniel’s throat moved visibly against the stiff white collar. He stared down at the place where her coat had just scraped across his chest.
They sat. Under the small table their knees were only centimetres apart.
Daniel laced his fingers tightly on the tabletop. “So. What did you want to talk about?”
Sophie looked straight at him and did not look away. “How long have you been a priest?”
“Eight years. Why?”
“Was it a calling? Or was it a decision?”
Daniel pressed his thumb hard against the knuckle of his own index finger.
“Both. At the same time. Which made it harder to say no to.”
Sophie’s fingertip tapped once, sharply, on the wood of the table.
“And if the calling and the decision ever pointed in different directions?”
Daniel pushed his chair back abruptly. The legs scraped loudly across the floor. He turned his back on her and faced the dusty shelves.
His silhouette blocked the light from the window. He reached up and drew down a brown leather-bound volume.
He dropped the book lightly onto the table. It slid a short distance toward Sophie’s side.
Her hand came out to stop it. Instead of taking the book, her index and middle fingers deliberately settled over the edge of Daniel’s thumb. The pressure was light, but intentional.
Her pale fingertips rested on the rough joint of his finger. Two full seconds of absolute stillness.
Daniel closed his eyes. The tendons in his neck stood out. He jerked his hand away from the table as if burned.
Sophie withdrew her own hand slowly. Her gaze dropped to the open page. Her breathing had grown deeper and heavier in her chest.
Daniel’s voice was rough. He spoke of translations, of different versions saying different things. He stood close now, reaching past her for another volume on the shelf.
His little finger brushed the dust that lay across the back of Sophie’s hand where she still held the first book. Only a single point of contact. Sophie’s breath stopped.
She turned her head suddenly to replace the volume. In the confined angle the movement swept her face past his. The tip of her nose almost touched his chin.
Daniel’s eyes opened wide. Sophie’s lips were parted only centimetres from his. His nostrils flared once.
He stepped back hard. The heel of his shoe struck the wooden floor with a sharp report. He turned his face toward the door.
Sophie remained motionless. The book in her hand fell onto the table with a soft thud.
“I should show you back to the nave,” Daniel said, back still turned, voice forced out on a breath.
“Of course.”
In the wide centre aisle of the nave the distance between them had returned to two metres. They stopped.
Sophie adjusted the collar of her coat with calm fingers. “Same time next Thursday?”
Daniel looked straight up at the crucifix above the altar.
“Yes.”
Sophie turned. The measured click of her boots on the stone carried her toward the main doors.
Daniel stood unmoving. His gaze lowered slowly from the altar to the little finger that had just touched her.
Outside, Sophie pushed the door open. Late sunlight struck her face full force. She raised a hand to shield her eyes.
At the foot of the steps Cara stood holding a paper bag of groceries.
Cara’s eyes travelled over Sophie’s expressionless face, then narrowed as they settled on the shoulder of her coat.
A long grey-white streak of dust marked the dark wool—dust from the narrow shelves of the archive room.
Sophie came down the steps without any sign of surprise.
“Since when do you go to church on Thursdays?” Cara asked, voice flat.
Sophie brushed past her shoulder. “Since I came home.”
Cara turned halfway and watched her go. Her eyes darkened as they moved from Sophie’s retreating back to the closed oak doors of the church.
*He stepped back. That’s what I should be thinking about. But what I can’t stop thinking about is the two seconds before he did.*