Exodus 20, p.1
Exodus 20, page 1
A NineStar Press Publication
www.ninestarpress.com
Exodus 20:3
ISBN: 978-1-64890-454-7
© 2022 Freydís Moon
Cover Art © 2022 Jaycee DeLorenzo
Edited by Elizabetta McKay
Published in February, 2022 by NineStar Press, New Mexico, USA.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact NineStar Press at Contact@ninestarpress.com.
CONTENT WARNING:
This book contains sexually explicit content, which may only be suitable for mature readers. Mention of transphobia and drug use, depictions of dubious consent and sexualization of religion.
Exodus 20:3
Freydís Moon
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Acknowledgements
About the Author
thou shalt have no other gods before me
Chapter One
“YOU HAVE THE address. Go.”
Diego López gnawed his lip as he leaned against the rusted tailgate on his father’s busted Chevy.
He cradled his phone against his ear and tried to focus on his mother’s voice, exhausted and cold, rasping through the speaker. The gas station was quiet—nearly abandoned—but his attention darted to an oasis floating above the highway and a napkin tumbling across the empty lot. He pitched his shoulder upward to steady his phone and smacked a pack of Lucky Strikes against the heel of his palm.
“I can find a way to pay you back,” he said and pulled a cigarette free with his teeth. “I don’t need another handout, and I definitely don’t need to play carpenter at some bullshit church to—”
“Cállate,” his mother snapped. “You listen to me, mijo. You get in that truck, you drive to that church, and you make this right. No one put you behind the wheel of that car—my car—and no one put the… the drugs in your wallet, and no one—”
“I know.” He sucked smoke into his lungs and switched his phone from one ear to the other.
“This isn’t about the money. This is about honor—familia. You go, understand? Go, work, get paid, come home. Do your community service and fix your life. This man, this Ariel, he’s giving you a chance. Take it before he changes his mind and hires someone else.”
“Yeah, because every able-bodied worker in town is trippin’ over themselves to go rebuild a church in the middle of the desert, Mamá. Sure.”
“You made your choice. Go.”
He angled his mouth toward the sky. She wasn’t talking about his fourteen-hour stint in jail or the cash-bail she’d worked double shifts at the diner to pay for. She was talking about the sickle-shaped scars beneath his shirt, the choice he’d made three years ago—eighteen and able to say, Yes, do it. Same vague guilt trip, same acquiescence. You’re like a coyote, she’d said to him once. Halfway to a wolf but still something else. He thought about that as she breathed on the other end of the line and imagined her sitting in the recliner in his childhood home, rolling a slender joint, watching fútbol while a pork shoulder braised in the crockpot. Sometimes she tripped over his name, her tongue unused to making the sound, but when she’d met him at the door after he’d been released from El Paso Detention Center, she’d said Diego with her full voice. Cracked every syllable like a bone.
“Yeah, okay.” He sighed. “Do you want me to call?”
She huffed. “Eres mi sangre.”
He shook his head and finished his cigarette, then crushed it beneath his boot. “Sé.”
“Tomorrow, then. You’ll tell me about the church?”
“Sure, yeah. Tomorrow.”
“Drive safe,” she said.
Diego ended the call without saying goodbye. He stood with his thumbs tucked through his belt loops. Endured the heat. Watched the road. Pictured himself elsewhere, across the state, settling in Austin. He’d bartend to make ends meet. He’d never touch narcotics again. He’d rent a studio apartment, and fill it with houseplants, and learn how to cook. He’d send money to his abuela, and he’d visit her more, and he’d grow the fuck up. Becoming another disappointment on the López family tree wasn’t an option anymore.
It never had been, but stealing the car, crashing the car, getting caught… Yeah, that changed everything.
Early summer rippled through the dry air. He scanned his phone again, reading and rereading the address his mother had sent him—coordinates, actually—before he hoisted into the driver’s seat and turned the key in the ignition. According to Google, Catedral de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe was located in Luna County, New Mexico. He pulled his lip between his teeth again. Seven grand to help rebuild a decrepit church in the middle of the desert? Camming paid more. He’d found that out after getting hit with top-surgery bills. But now that his mother knew about the Vicodin, he certainly didn’t need her to know about the porn too. He manifested the future he’d imagined—bartending in Austin, visiting his grandmother, making pozole in his apartment—and drove toward a city called Sunshine.
“SERIOUSLY,” DIEGO WHISPERED. He idled at the end of a dirt road, surrounded by cacti and hardy flora, staring miserably at a patch of graffiti painted across the front of the church. DIOS MUERTO covered the left door, and the word WALL, crossed out in matte red, filled the right. One window was missing, stained glass still hugging the frame. The roof slouched, but the steeple skewered the sky, crowned with a white cross.
He glanced at his reflection in the rearview mirror. Freckled brown face, piercing seated in the cushion where his lips bowed, eyes three shades darker than his skin. He was sculpted like his homeland, cheekbones high and chin round, eyebrows tapered and black. And he carried stubborn remnants of his childhood—long-necked and slender, wide-hipped and fine-mouthed—same as his tía. A bruise lingered on his jaw, planted there by a light-skinned cop, and gold glinted around his neck. Before he could squash the feeling, panic squirmed in his stomach.
Out in the middle of nowhere in his dad’s beat-to-shit truck, hoping whoever needed a renovation assistant didn’t clock him, and really, seriously, betting he wouldn’t make it out alive if whoever hired him was—
Knuckles rapped the passenger window.
Diego startled, whipping toward the sound. An asshole, he thought, and then, oh.
A man peered at Diego over the edge of his sunglasses, eyebrows lifted curiously, mouth set and stoic. He was hard to gauge. Young, maybe. Or quite older. There was no way to tell. When he spoke, his voice was smooth and honeyed on the other side of the glass. “Are you lost?”
“I’m Diego—Diego López.” He swallowed hard. “Are you Ariel Azevedo?”
“I am. You’re here to work, right?”
Diego nodded tightly.
“Good.” Ariel jutted his chin toward the church. “Come inside; I’ll show you around.”
Ariel Azevedo turned on his heels and made for the church. His collared shirt clung to broad shoulders, and Diego didn’t realize his height until he pushed through the double doors, leaving them unsteady on their rusty hinges. He fiddled with his keys. Huh. He’s not what I expected.
With his duffel slung over his shoulder, Diego raked his fingers through his short, black hair, dusted his palm over the shorn sides, and followed the path Ariel had taken. Silence fell over the desert, disrupted by distant cars and a barely-there breeze. A lone scorpion skittered beneath the warped panels at the base of the building. It was rugged—the atmosphere, the land, the job—and haunted, somehow. A place left to fester.
Diego stepped between the cracked doors and eased them shut behind him. Splintered pews cluttered the space, some of them toppled over, one split down the center. A rectangular fan whirled atop a cardboard box next to the pulpit, churning hot air.
“There’s plumbing. The shower’s stocked and clean, but no hot water,” Ariel said. He flipped through an instruction manual and pointed with his pinky finger to an array of disconnected pieces on the floor. “Unfortunately, no air conditioning either, but I’ll finish this before tonight, so you’ll at least have a fan in your room. One bathroom, two adjoining bedrooms. Galley kitchen with a fridge and two-top stove. Generator is in the basement.”
Diego gave a slow, thoughtful nod. He glanced from the vaulted ceiling to the dusty stained glass, assessing an image of the Blessed Mother rendered in gold and white. Candelabras clung to the walls, covered in dirt and grime, and a bowl meant for holy water sat bone-dry at the beginning of the aisle.
Ariel continued tinkering. He pushed cropped brown hair away from his brow. Dark, neatly kept stubble peppered his ruddy face, and his features were strangely sharp, as if he’d been cut from marble. Diego lowered his gaze to the floor.
“There’s not much here, I know, but it’s enough. Have you eaten?” Ariel asked.
He thought to lie, to say, Yes, earlier, but he shook his head. “Not yet.”
“Your room is down the hall. There’re fresh sheets, towels in the linen closet, curtains if you want them. Get settled, and we’ll make dinner once I m done with this.”
The floor creaked under Diego’s heavy boots. He tried to step carefully, avoiding areas that looked unstable, and paused in front of Ariel, paying mind to the scattered bolts and screws on the ground. “What am I here to do?” Work, yes. He understood that. But where could they possibly start in a place like this? It was an abandoned thing, incomplete and begging for demolition. He gripped the strap on his duffel, tipping his chin upward to meet Ariel’s eyes as he stood.
Ariel furrowed his brow. He reached out and dragged his index finger beneath the gold chain around Diego’s neck. When his thumb met the oval Saint Christopher charm, he pressed his thumb to the gilded surface. “Whatever I say.” His voice was tender and coaxing, like someone speaking through bars, cooing at a caged animal.
Diego’s breath caught. He stepped backward, eyeing Ariel skeptically, before he turned and walked toward the doorway in the far corner of the main room. His heart floundered. Heat pooled low, low in his stomach, and he thought, Fuck. Who the hell is he?
“Are you a man of God, Diego?” Ariel’s voice carried, beating toward the steeple like wings.
Diego stopped. He drummed his fingers on the chipped doorframe. “Ask God,” he said, tossing the words over his shoulder, and disappeared into the hall.
Chapter Two
EVEN POST-SUNSET, Luna County burned. The night passed in sweltering increments inside the stuffy church. Diego slept with the sheets draped over his waist, bare-chested on a full-size mattress. The small repurposed bedroom had probably been utilized for storage in its last life. Now, it held a nightstand and a dresser, a tiny closet with shelves and a garment pole, and a skinny window facing the desert.
He’d dozed in fits, waking at the sound of footsteps after midnight, jolting upright as an odd hush whistled through the gaps in the glass. Prayer—spoken by the wind or a nomad—drifted into the room on a breezy whisper. Diego couldn’t help but listen.
And the word was made flesh.
He snatched at sleep, lulled by heat and darkness, but hardly managed more than a few hours before dawn poured through the window. He blinked at the ceiling, searching for cracks in the slanted roof. A spider had strung a web in the corner. Dust clung to the sturdy beams. He reached for his abuelo’s Saint Christopher, given to him when he’d been young and entirely different, and remembered Ariel thumbing at the etched icon. Like most unfamiliar places, Catedral de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe had turned him restless. He felt childlike. Embarrassingly homesick. Still, he slipped out of the stiff bed, pawed at his eyes, and got dressed.
Across the hall, the sink ran. The toilet flushed. Diego waited for footsteps to come and go before he cracked open the door and walked into the cramped bathroom. He cleaned his teeth. Splashed his face. Raked texturizer through his hair. Stared at his reflection until his eyes wandered, settling on Ariel’s toiletries—simple red comb, facial moisturizer, damp toothbrush. He touched the wet bristles and jerked his hand away, hyperaware of the awkward excitement thrumming in his veins. Such an intimate little tool, jammed into Ariel’s mouth day after day. His voice rang in Diego’s skull. Whatever I want. Confidence and curiosity. Abrasive, crisp syllables. Diego had never met someone like Ariel Azevedo; the immediacy of it pulled like a thread through his center.
Diego wasn’t sure if he had a reason to be afraid, but he was.
“Are you awake?” Ariel’s voice sounded on the other side of the door, followed by a light knock.
“Yeah—yes, sorry. I’ll be right out.”
“Meet me in the nave.”
Nave? Diego pursed his lips. “Okay.”
He checked his reflection, the tank loose on his narrow frame, blue jeans snug on his hips. He tightened the laces on his boots and searched the mirror again, shrugging on a thin flannel, concealing the tail-end of his scars. Maybe the fear was residual, prompted by instances every person like him tended to face in new situations. The what if, the potential threat, the worrisome undercurrent of being self-built. Lastly, he put on deodorant.
Noises echoed. Tools clattered, and heavy objects were pushed or pulled. He traced the outline of his phone in his pocket and walked into the main room—nave, whatever—to find Ariel, dressed in frayed denim and a white T-shirt, hauling items out of the building.
Ariel paused, midway in lifting a pew, and tilted his head. “Good morning.”
“Mornin’,” Diego mumbled. He pushed his fingers through his hair, a nervous habit. “What’s on the agenda?”
“I need the nave cleared before we replace the floor. I assume you don’t have a problem lifting? Your mother insisted you were strong.”
“I’m strong enough,” he said and nodded at a caved-in pew. “And the broken furniture? Are we breaking it down or fixing it?”
“I’d like to fix as much as we can.” Ariel shrugged toward the open double doors. “Did you eat?”
“Not yet.”
“Help me get this outside, and then we’ll put some coffee on. There’s toast too.”
Diego curled his hands under the bench and lifted, easing forward while Ariel waddled backward. Outside, pews, chairs, and fixtures sat in the dirt lot, shielded from the sun by repurposed bedsheets. Once they lowered the bench to the ground, Diego righted himself and cracked his back, scanning golden desert and hot stone. Last night, he’d shared the kitchen with Ariel, paying mind to each shallow cabinet Ariel opened. “Coffee, here,” he’d said and pointed to Peruvian grounds, filters, sugar, and honey. “Pasta, ramen, frijoles, canned stuff. You’re welcome to any of it. There’re fresh vegetables in the fridge too. Juice, milk, soda—the works.” Diego hadn’t mustered the courage to ask for a beer.
“Hopefully, we can start on the foundation today,” Ariel said. He set his hands on his hips, squinting at the displaced furniture. “Elena said you’ve done construction. Have you ever worked with laminate?”
“I’ve helped my dad with a few jobs. Nothing major, just framing and tiling. Some kitchen redesigns. Laminate’s easy though. Shouldn’t be a problem.”
Ariel hummed thoughtfully. “And what made you decide to drive all the way out here for work?”
“My mother decided for me.” Diego ignored how Ariel flicked his gaze from the horizon, shying under the careful once-over Ariel granted. He cleared his throat and swatted dust off his hands. “Coffee?”
Ariel nodded. “Eat too. You’ll need your strength.”
At that, Diego stayed quiet. Onyx rosary beads curved around the back of Ariel’s neck, and red slid over his shoes as he walked through a patch of sunlight colored by a stained window. His age was still a mystery. His purpose too—what he wanted from this church, why he hadn’t hired a larger crew. Diego had seen people like him in crowded malls, on busy streets, quiet and well kept, striking and unique, usually moving with purpose. Here and there and gone. Men like him, the secretive kind, usually made Diego wonder who he was meant to become. But this one, this Ariel Azevedo, tripped Diego’s fight-or-flight.
“Grab the bread. There’s apricot jam next to the egg carton,” Ariel said.
Diego slid four slices into the toaster. “So,” he tested, propping his hip against the counter. “What made you want to renovate this…” He shifted his gaze around the small kitchen, situated at the end of the hall adjacent Ariel’s bedroom. Shithole, he wanted to say. “Place.”
“Church,” Ariel corrected. The coffee pot hummed and spat. He crossed his arms over his chest, watching Diego down the arc of his nose. “People need something to believe in, don’t they? Señora de Guadalupe is the perfect opportunity to restore faith, inspire change, ease the disbelievers into believing in something holy again. In something higher and mightier than us.”
“Restore faith, huh? In what? God? Heaven?” He slathered butter onto his toast, followed by orange-colored jam. “That’ll chase poverty away? Extend visas? Tear down the wall? Because according to your front door, that’s what people want.”
Ariel took the sticky knife from Diego’s hand. “Faith isn’t a catchall, Diego,” he said smoothly, as though he’d said Diego a thousand times. “But it’s a comfort. Challenging, unruly, peaceful. Church gives us a place to worship, and worship gives us a chance to mend our wounds.” Ariel dragged the dull knife between his lips, sucking away apricot jam. “You’re wounded, aren’t you?”
