Page 25 of Saint
“It is not about what God is capable of,” I say quietly, “but what I am incapable of.”
“And what about the rest of the world?”
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
He stares at me, the frustration on his face plain. “So you get to just leave the world and everyone in it, because you don’t feelcapableof praying if you’re not given complete freedom and latitude to live your life entirely for yourself. I’m sorry, forGod,” he adds, when he sees me open my mouth. “Here’s a question for you, Brother Patrick?Whogets to do this? Who gets to just opt out of living in the world? Who gets to give up on it and retreat from it all while people still suffer? Who gets to leave everyone else to their fate while they hole up and pray?”
Shame crawls up my neck. Shame I thought I was done feeling; shame I thought I’d atoned for. The shame of being selfish, thoughtless. The shame of being Aiden Bell.
“I thought—I just think it’s better if I’m not in the larger world at all,” I try to explain. “I’m not buying a private island to fill with coke mirrors and swimsuit models. I’m not taking anything away from anyone—I’m not in the world making it a worse place.”
“Why is that the only option?” Elijah demands. “Why does you being out there mean you’ll make itworse?”
“Because that’s what Idid!” I answer, louder than I expect.
He looks at me, his lips parted like I’ve surprised him into silence.
“Because that’s what I did,” I say again, quieter this time. “I came here to learn how to be good. How to be empty of everything but faith and devotion. And when I came here, I gave all my money away—some as a donation to Mount Sergius, but most of it went to nonprofits around the country. So me leavingdidconcretely make the world a better place, because those places all have millions of dollars they wouldn’t otherwise.”
“You could have mademorebetter if you’d stayed,” Elijah says. “You could have donemoregood. Instead of being here, where nothing you do matters outside the abbey walls.”
“I should have stayed in the secular world so I could earn more money to eventually donate?” I ask, not bothering to hide my incredulity. “Is that all I’m worth? Earning money?”
“You know that’s not what I meant,” Elijah replies. “You know that’s not what this is about.”
“Do I?” I fire back, and then immediately regret it. Shame and anger are filling me like wine overfilling a cup, and I feel sour with it all. Stained. But never, even in my most masochistic fantasies, had I imaginedthis.That Elijah would see my path to survival and atonement as selfish, as silly. As shallow as an influencer’s performative yoga retreats or something.
I’d never imagined that I’d be considered less than ethical for the kind of seeking that asks nothing of anyone except an empty chair at Thanksgiving.
“Opting out of the world doesn’t help anyone but yourself,” Elijah says, and there’s a real edge to his voice now. An edge sharp enough to cut. “What is the point of all this holiness if it doesn’t reach anyone else? What is the point of becominggoodif that goodness begins and ends with you? If the only people ever touched by yourgoodnessare the people who have the time or the bandwidth to make it inside your abbey walls?”
My temper flares. “I’m not hurting anyone by being in here,” I say sharply.
“No, you’re not,” comes the cold response. “Not anymore.”
I cannot believe how deeply his words slice. Even though I’ve expected them for years. Even though I know I deserve to hear them.
We stare at each other from across the room, our breaths coming quick and hard, and I can’t speak right now; it’s like every possible response I could have has knotted itself up in my throat and snagged on the flesh there, like barbed wire.
It’s Elijah who speaks first anyway. “This,” he says, gesturing around to the cottage that has held so many of my best and worst moments, “is a waste of privilege. A waste of a life. You have blown a hole in the hearts of everyone who loved you for absolutely fucking nothing, and I hope it was worth it. I hopeGodwas worth it.”
And then he pulls open the door to the hermitage and he leaves.
I don’t follow.
16
Elijah isn’tat vespers or at dinner. I think he might be in his cell, but I’m not sure, because when I go into mine, there is silence from the other side of the wall. I walk to my window and stare out at the hill for a moment, and then at the cloisters soaking up the evening light, and back to the hill, which is lit with orange as the sun begins to set.
The bells for compline will toll soon.
I press my hand to the glass, as if I can touch the hill itself.I lift my eyes to the hills.Five years ago, I would have fought Elijah tooth and nail. I would be pounding down his door right now, demanding we either fight or fuck, the order wasn’t important.
Five years ago, I would have saidyou’re goddamn wrongand would have conceded the point only after an adrenaline-filled argument or a marathon fucking session.
But now, I’m not so sure he’s wrong.
I’m not sure he’s entirely right either though, and I suppose if there’s any gift being a monk has given me, it’s that I know how to handle that feeling now, that ambiguity. In my old life, decisions had to come fast, in minutes or seconds. Opinions even faster. It suited me, enabled my naturally impulsive thinking, and truly, it felt like there was no other way to live. Everyone else around me was making a thousand decisions a day, moving fast, thinking fast, living fast. Slowing down and taking time—to listen or ruminate or be anything other than absolutely productive in the sense of churning out choice after choice—was worse than pointless. It was weak.
