The Humper Game Pt. 05 Ch. 06

Sam asked about the sermon, and Ellen summarized it, with Kelly adding some points. I said, "I'd really better not talk too much more about it unless someone else takes over driving. But I was already hit hard just with his first text. You know I like to think I'm pretty hot stuff, in certain areas. I need to sit down and think about what I glory in—take personal pride in. But then, that from 2 Corinthians—'the time is now'—that got me even more."

I shut up, but Ellen spoke up. "Sam, you know how Phil gets when he's emotional about something. He'd told me about putting his arm around you and holding you, when you were crying because of that sermon, and he was working very hard not to cry. I couldn't hold him, it was too uncomfortable for both of us with my arm between him and the back of the pew. I really wish someone like Ellen—um, the other Ellen, the tall one—had been there. I held his hand, but he really needed more."

They disconnected a bit later, and I managed to navigate the city traffic successfully. I was relaxing somewhat by then. We dropped Kelly off, all getting out so we could exchange hugs with her. She said, "You're running tomorrow, aren't you?" and we assured her that that was our plan. We remembered to make sure that she got her share of the weekend's leftovers.

As we drove the very short distance home from Kelly's—with Ellen now beside me—I told Ellen, "It's a very good thing that I'm happy being committed to you, to keeping it exclusive. Kelly is really nice and sweet, she's really attractive to me. And she really is convinced that she needs to wait for marriage to have sex. But I think that if I made a serious pass at her—the right way—it would be the way it was with her boyfriend, all over again. She would be saying no, because she really would know it's wrong, but everything except her mouth and mind would be saying yes."

"What's different is that you're not like her boyfriend. If she said no, you would feel bound to respect that—even without bringing me into it. Or if you got aroused enough that you didn't manage to stop, afterward you would feel you had to stand by her if there was trouble. I said 'feel' there twice, but I mean 'think and feel.' Phil, I don't deserve you. When I couldn't make up my mind, you had every right to demand that I either go to bed with you or relinquish all claims on you, and you didn't. You waited patiently for me. And you would have, even if you didn't have Jenny and Sam and a few others to help you."

Unsurprisingly, Sam's drawings for the ring showed beautiful taste and thought, not to mention skill. I said, "I want to see it bigger, too, but you do realize that these drawings are larger than life? I need to see them life-sized, too." When I had time to fiddle with them, later, I could see that the ring would be everything we could want.

When we had gotten our luggage—and our share of the leftovers!—upstairs and put away, Ellen said, "There was something this morning you were going to tell me later. I said something about the impression you had made in Sunday School, and you said Sam had said something the other time you were there."

"Right, I forgot. You saw that Uncle John didn't let me keep quiet and listen today, but he called on me and pushed me a lot more the first time. And I didn't see what I could do but give the meaning and application the text demanded, and none of it was really different from the position that church takes on those matters. I was totally mystified about why people were so surprised. Impressed. Sam told me that first off they didn't expect a nineteen year old kid to be so knowledgeable—which is ridiculous, but probably true anyway—and especially any nineteen year old kid who came as a friend of Sam's. She said that it would really help her, since she needed to go and apologize to a bunch of those folks and ask them to forgive her, for things she'd done when she was younger.

"She said that the people in that class were—as a whole—part of the core of the congregation, and very influential with the rest of those, so getting them to see that she had changed was important to her. I suspect it helped Uncle John and Aunt Sally, too, when Sam made the rounds after church trying to talk to all those she had wronged, and if she's right, my performance in Sunday School may have gotten some people to listen to her who wouldn't have otherwise. Credibility.

"And of course they had now had three months to tell each other, and other solid members, about both my supposed spiritual insight and Sam's change of heart. And the change of heart really is real, you know."

"Don't fish for compliments, dearest. Only women are supposed to do that. I know a good deal about your spiritual insight, and there's nothing 'supposed' about it."

We just snacked for supper, some fruit that probably needed to be eaten after a week and more, and some nuts. We got ready for bed very early. For one thing, we were somehow much more tired than was reasonable considering what a good time we'd been having and our rather normal bedtimes and alarm times. But also, well, that didn't make sense either. We surely hadn't been deprived as far as sex went. We'd tried to be even a little quieter than usual, but not much, and really, there were more people around to disturb at home. But we both wanted a longer and more involved session of making love than usual. Maybe part of it was the suggestion that the kind of person we wanted to officiate at our wedding might require us to be celibate for weeks or months.

Before we finally went to sleep, I asked Ellen whether she was bothered by what we'd been told about all that. She said, "Of course it bothers me to think of no sex for a couple of months, or maybe more! On the other hand, I understand why a pastor might require it, even of nonbelievers. Besides questions of morality, they should want to make sure these people aren't getting married just because they've fallen into having sex. And I did survive it, remember. It was my own choice, and it hurt me a lot, but I did. Admittedly, we were also holding off on expressions of affection and on sharing a bed all that time.

"Going to church with you for a few weeks wouldn't be a hardship, if the preaching is as good as this morning and if I like the music. And I actually welcome the idea of counseling, if it's well done. It may turn up areas we need to talk about and haven't thought of, and I also want to observe it being done, for professional reasons." Ellen had pretty much decided that her goal for her education in psychology was to go into counseling.

"But right now I want to sleep," she went on. "You can decide in the morning whether you want more sex. You know it's your call, even now, but I hope I satisfied you enough for one night."

So I kissed her goodnight, without much passion, and told her I loved her. We fell asleep holding each other. All right, I was sleepy too.

Revision: 6/27/2019