I have only two comforts to live upon; the one is the perfections of Christ; the other is the imperfections of Christians (Nathaniel Ward, puritan).

As a conscientious pastor, John regretted having given a fellow clergyman a black eye. Not entirely intentional, more a confluence of events that was larger than everybody involved. But still, hardly what he had learned in seminary.

John Mitchell was a Reformed Baptist pastor, the sort who drank a little, but not usually in front of folks from other churches, and made sure that nothing more exciting than ping-pong happened in the youth group. When asked what he did for a living, he would sometimes quote Fletch— “I’m a shepherd.” He generally had to explain the reference, and it was never as funny as he hoped. When asked what his degrees were in, he would explain that his undergrad was in philosophy, and he had an MDiv from Westminster, but that everything he did was “deeply rooted in the blues.” Some people didn’t get that either.

But he was a man diligent in his ways, and not easily discouraged. His flock was small, in a relatively large Midwestern city. He had only met Chad Lester twice before the incident. The Rev. Lester, the recipient of said eye-blackening, was the leading light and chief shaman at a mega-church across town. The two congregations, and the two men, were in the same city, but they existed in entirely different realities. Pastor Mitchell had the advantage of his reality being more or less real.

Pastor Mitchell was sitting quietly in his study after dinner, scratching his gray beard. It had been 24 hours since—as the diplomats would phrase it—the frank exchange of views had taken place. His knuckles were still throbbing gently. Cherie, his wife’s cousin, had panicked at him over the phone, and he had hurried over to her condo, unsure what the problem was. He surprised, and was in turn surprised by, Chad Lester, who was there with Cherie trying to . . . well, it was not at all clear now what he had been trying to do. But Mitchell had thought at the time he knew what Lester was trying to do. Words had been exchanged, including some bits of high volume exegesis and penetrating theological insight. Chad had stumbled on his way to the door, lurching into Mitchell, and Mitchell had taken that opportunity to unload a punch which connected with a less than perfect tenderness. But as punches go, analyzed merely in the interests of dispassionate science and apart from any ethical considerations, it had been exquisite.

Afterward, Chad had straightened up, looked at him with an expression that Mitchell had interpreted as a spiritual rebuke in excelsis, and then staggered out the front door, his hand over his eye. The look had actually been one which simply acknowledged receipt of a complete novelty, but Mitchell had a tender conscience, and under the circumstances couldn’t be expected to know that.

So here he was, a day later, playing teeter-totter in his soul, going back and forth about what he ought to do. He was a humble man, and did not mind seeking forgiveness where necessary. He had done so many times in his life, most recently for calling a young man a buffle-headed young dope during a counseling appointment. But this thing was different. Asking Chad’s forgiveness would involve talking with him, and talking to Lester was about as much fun as fishing in an outhouse. Of course, Mitchell had what a strict recording angel would have called “ample grounds” for all this, but he was still worked over by the whole thing. He did know that his feelings for Lester went somewhat beyond the legal limits of righteous indignation. But after what Lester had done to Cherie years before . . . and to all the other women Mitchell knew about . . . and then factor in the ones he didn’t know about, and the end result was a stew that Mitchell felt to be quite beyond his capacities to eat. But there was email. He could email an apology.

The phone rang, and John stared at it balefully. He glanced at the clock—it was a little before seven and he had to leave about quarter after for his daughter’s volleyball game. They were playing at some obscure Christian school—he thought it must be a Christian school with a name like Joppa—located on a street he had never heard of before. He had given himself fifteen extra minutes for getting lost and found again, but he did not really have any time to chew up on the phone. It rang again and John pursed his lips and picked it up, hoping it wasn’t Deidre Hannock. She was a solo-obsessed soprano in their makeshift choir and was always calling with criticisms of the choir director disguised as prayer requests. Mitchell’s mother had always called church choirs the war department.

“Mitchells’.”

But the voice was low, nowhere close to soprano, and kind of slurred.

“Hello, Pastor Mitchell?”

“Speaking.”

“This is Chad.” This was followed by what sounded like the thup thup thup sound of sobbing.

John Mitchell lurched forward in his chair, and without thinking, pulled open one of the drawers of his desk. What am I doing? he thought. Looking for rubber gloves? A gas mask? Grace? None in there. None around here anywhere.

“What do you want?” he said.

“I . . . I need help,” the voice said.

Instinct and long experience nudged Pastor Mitchell, poking him helpfully on the shoulder. “Have you been drinking?” he asked.

“Sort of,” Chad said. “I have never done anything like this before. I need help. I couldn’t think of anyone else to call.”

“I punched you in the eye. What makes you think I would help you?”

“You’re a pastor. It’s a brotherhood. I really need. . .” A crash cut Chad off.

“Chad? Lester?”

“Sorry. I just tripped.”

“Where are you?” John asked. He knew he was stalling.

“I am at the Hyatt. Room 306. Just a second.” A couple of moments went by with the sound of a door opening and then closing again. “Yeah, 306. You should come here. I can’t drive.”

“You’re drunk, and you want me to come over there? You don’t want my kind of help, Chad. You really don’t. I can give you all I got right now. Stop drinking, stop screwing around, repent to your congregation and resign your pastorate.”

“I don’t usually drink.” Chad was crying again, schluping all over the phone.

“And read your Bible,” John added. “Start now. I’m sure the Gideons left you one.”

“John, please.”

“Sorry, Chad. My daughter’s got a volleyball game.” He took the sobbing away from his ear and looked at the phone. With one lonely beep, Lester was gone, and the room was silent.

John Mitchell just sat in his chair, trying not to think. Scenes from dozens of bad movies played through his head. Villains dangling from balconies, cliffs, various ledges, villains calling out for help. Then there was John Mitchell, pastor, follower of Christ, busily stepping on their fingers. Hanging up on the tax collectors and prostitutes. He glanced at his watch and stood up, trying to embrace the role of dutiful father—gotta get to my daughter’s volleyball game—but it didn’t wash. Joppa was a small school, and Sandy’s coach was almost certainly going to play the B squad. Sandy was varsity. She had told him specifically that he would be wasting his time if he came, but that she’d still love to see him going above and beyond the call of duty. He had perfect liberty to go talk to Lester, and he knew it. He had made all her other games, the ones she had actually played in. He knew he should go see Lester, but deep within the recesses of his midriff, an insistent voice was loudly maintaining something along the lines of “I don’t wanna!”

John Mitchell started down the hallway to go say goodbye to Cindi, his wife, but then remembered that she was at a ladies’ fellowship. So he wheeled around, and clumped dejectedly out the front door to the driveway. Hopping in, he started his truck up, put it savagely in gear, and pulled out into the street. He would have to decide right or left at the corner, and he didn’t want to decide anything.

By the time he got to the corner, it had occurred to him that he could also make his final decision closer to the freeway, so for the time being he turned left and headed off for Joppa Christian. What kind of group would name their school after a Philistine seaport? What was with that? He decided that he needed to be on his toes, and keep an eye on the home crowd. He might learn something new about yet another little odd church group, and he settled in a little more comfortably to the idea of watching a volleyball game.

He took the freeway and found the school with no trouble at all. It was a little cinder block affair, with a larger steel gym right next to it. All the parking was on the street, so he found a spot, and walked glumly in. The teams were both warming up. Sandy saw him, waved happily, and trotted over to greet him. She kissed him on the cheek. “Thanks for coming,” she said. “Coach just told us for sure that we would not be playing. They’re playing eighth graders. If you have to do something, please go.”

John found himself chafing at her generosity, and wanted her to be a bit more clingy and needy and demanding. If his daughter was a big mess, like Lester, then he would have a parental duty to stay and to not step on her fingers. No, he didn’t want that. But he managed to say, “I might. Thanks.”

He started up into the bleachers, and then realized that he needed to use the men’s room. He glanced at the clock, and walked out into the hallway that connected the gym to the school. Nothing there. The doors to the school were open, and a wide hallway opened up to the right. He could hardly see, but close to the entrance, he could see that the first door on the left was a ladies’ room, and there were a couple doors beyond that, deeper in the gloom. He walked to the second one, opened it and stepped in, fumbling for a light. The door clicked shut behind him, and he kicked a hard metallic object at his feet. He turned around and tried the door. Locked. Groping to the left and right, all he found were janitor’s overalls, or what he judged to be something very much like janitor’s overalls. He just stood there for a moment, flummoxed.

A pipe! I smoke a pipe. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a lighter, and flicked it. He had just bought the thing yesterday, so he had plenty of fluid, while recognizing at the same time that plenty is a relative term. He looked around at his warm little broom closet, and then looked at the offending doorknob that the janitor had been warning the principal about just yesterday. “Lot of little kids in this school. We have to replace that thing.” The principal had nodded his sage agreement.

But this well-intentioned administrative desire did nothing to help John Mitchell out. He continued to look around, noting that the object he had kicked coming in was a mop bucket on wheels. He shouted a few times and then realized that it would likely do little good. So he grabbed the handle of the mop and began to tap it on the door, insistently and regularly. Anybody in the hall would have to come and check out such a noise. He would just be here a few minutes.

Half an hour later, still tapping, his mind began to drift in a typological direction. In seminary, he had very little use for that kind of stuff, and had not really paid much attention. As he put it when asked, extravagant exegesis was not his bag. But here he was and it was kind of creepy. He did not want Chad Lester to do anything but self-destruct, just like Nineveh. And he had run off just like Jonah. But what was supposed to be Tarshish in this deal? And was he going to be here three days and three . . . suddenly the door popped open, and a worried-looking woman with a kindly face peered in, her hair done up in a tight fundamentalist bun. “Are you all right?” she asked.

John Mitchell stepped out into the hallway, brushing his jacket, as if to get the closet darkness off. “I am fine, thanks so much.” They laughed together for a moment about it, she made a mental note to talk with the janitor about the doorknob again, he thanked her effusively, and they parted friends and comrades. John went into the next door, which really was the men’s room, emerged a few moments later, and walked straight out the double doors to where he had parked. The Hyatt was a couple miles south.

* * *

Chad Lester was sitting at the small hotel room table, staring at the bottles in front of him. He had no idea how to go about it, but he was still laboring manfully away. There was a small platoon of alcoholic soldiers standing there, waiting to give up their lives. “Hail, Caesar! We who are about to die salute you.” There was a bottle of bourbon, one of vodka, a six-pack of beer, and (he really didn’t know what he was doing) a bottle of tawny port. He had just walked around that section of the store, grabbing items at random. Where was Mitchell? He had downed a bottle of beer and several shots of bourbon since he had called. He felt like calling again, but did not trust himself to try to make it to the phone. And the concept of specific phone numbers was starting to slip beyond his grasp.

A knock at the door brought Lester part way out of the fog that was descending upon him. “Minute!” he yelled. He staggered past the bed without toppling over on it, and then navigated his way past the television, which was filling his room up with hotel porn. He had turned that on out of habit when he had checked in, and also out of habit ceased to be aware of it. He got to the door, fumbled with the latch, and pulled it open. John Mitchell was standing there, and Chad tried to beam in a welcoming manner. But this was the first opportunity for John to see the black and blue deposit he had made, and he took a step backwards. “Yikes!” he said.

“In, in,” Lester said, motioning helplessly with his right hand. “Where have you been, you pastoral bastard. You said you were coming.”

John bit his lip and came slowly in the door, before making his way over to the whiskey table to sit down. When he got next to the television, he jumped and looked around for the remote. When he found it, he turned the flesh tube off and stared angrily at Chad Lester, who was just standing there expressionless. “What is that for?” John asked. “Are you trying to get an appetite for dinner by watching people chew with their mouths open?” Chad Lester just blinked at him, not comprehending.

A slow moment passed while the two men made their way to their chairs, moved them around a bit, and then sat down. Chad was a little slower on the motor skills front, and so John waited patiently for him. And by “waited patiently,” we should understand it to mean “waited impatiently.” When you are waiting patiently, you don’t notice that you are waiting patiently, and John was noticing.

Chad finally eased down, did not miss the chair, and then looked across the table at John with an air of minor triumph. For his part, John knew he had to be there, but he was not yet glad about it. Apart from his detestation of Lester there was also the pastoral folly of counseling drunks. He had learned that lesson years before—like sweeping water uphill. But here he was. What was he supposed to say? Yet forty days and the Hyatt will fall down? But what he did say was, “Well, you called.” He did not add, “I’m waiting” because that would have sounded impatient. Chad was grinning at him, with his puffy cheeks and bloodshot eyes.

“I knew you’d come,” he said. “Guys like you have to come. The better-than-you boys always come. Like the ambulance.”