XLIV

JUDGE NOT, THAT YE BE NOT JUDGED

(MATTHEW 7:1)

SEVENIA SALLIE (GIRL PROPHETESS)

“Can you keep a secret?” My Uncle Six asked me before we even sat down across from each other in my dad’s study.

“Sure,” I replied with a frown.

Then my uncle groaned and pushed the palms of his hands over his eyes and bowed his head. His elbows propped on his knees. I noticed the dark circles that had been under his eyes when we had met here two days previous had only deepened. Instead of revealing his secret, he became still and quiet.

“Did you read any of Pastor Samson’s book?” I asked quietly.

“Yes,” he replied, his head popping up so quickly I gave a little start. “I read the whole thing. As a matter of fact, I was up all night after you gave it to me. That’s why I was dead to the world when we were supposed to study yesterday. Sorry.”

“No worries,” I said with a shrug. “What did you think?”

He pursed his lips, looked at the ceiling, and circled his hands around each other. “Intriguing, enlightening, frustrating and confusing. Anyhow, reading that book is the reason I feel compelled to confide something to you.”

He stilled and stared at me as if expecting a response. I couldn’t think of anything to say other than, “Okay.”

“The chapter, ‘Father of lies,’ based off of Matthew 8:44,” he said. “I couldn’t get it out of my head. It seems like my whole adult life is based in secrets and lies. Part of it has been made known because of the way my wife died. But the biggest part is still hidden. It probably would have remained hidden since Charlotte’s killer was killed. He was shanked in jail last week so there will be no trial.”

“I see,” I replied, numbly. “So what you’re saying is even though your secret seems to remain safely hidden, you still feel compelled to share it?”

He nodded. Then he put his elbows back on his knees, became still, bowed his head, and stared at the floor. I resisted the urge to bob my leg or tap my foot.

“I’m bisexual,” he suddenly blurted as his head popped up.

This time I visibly startled. At the same time there was a thump that came from behind the wall. Then, albeit muffled, I heard my dad yowl in pain.

“Daddy?” I asked as I leapt from my chair and ran to his room. He was sitting on his bed, wincing, and rubbing the top of his head. “Are you okay? What happened?”

“Oh, nothing, Sweet Pea. I just bumped my head when I was in the closet.”

You weren’t the only one in the closet, I thought as my brain reeled from Uncle Six’s revelation. “You’re okay then?”

“I’m fine,” he replied as I had already turned and dashed back to my uncle.

“Sorry,” I said a little breathless as I sat back down.

“What happened?”

“You just told me you were…”

“No, I mean with Seven.”

“Oh, he just bumped his head. Did you want to elaborate on what you just told me?”

His eyes looked frightened. “It felt weird telling you that. Do you feel weird hearing it?”

It’s strange how quick a lie can come to the lips of even someone who’s diligently seeking God. I see why we are instructed with things like pray without ceasing (1 Thessalonians 5:17), and to bring every thought to the obedience of Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5 ). I opened my mouth to say no, but instead replied. “It was a surprising admission, but it makes me feel closer to you.”

“It does?” he inquired with a frown

“Yes, it makes me feel loved that you trust me enough to reveal a secret like that.”

“Wow,” he said with a little smile, the tension in his face relaxing. “But you should already know I love you.”

“Oh, I know you do,” I replied with a shrug. “But there are degrees to love, and variations. For instance, obviously I love my dad. But the way I love my boyfriend Branch is different.”

There was another thump from behind the wall, but softer than the first and no yowl. What was Daddy doing?

“So there’s also another element to where I’m going with this,” he said nervously. “It has to do with your Aunt Charlotte. God rest her soul.”

He looked at me with both intensity and with caution, but seemed to freeze up. I urged him on. “Okay, what about Aunt Charlotte?”

“Your Aunt Charlotte,” he said slowly and deliberately. “Was born a boy. She was transsexual.”

There was not only another thump from behind the wall, but a big crash. I ran into my father’s room again and he was crawling out of the closet. That’s when I noticed something like a window in his closet. I looked closer. It was a two way mirror! As I took a couple steps toward it, I saw Uncle Six sitting very still and staring at the floor.

“Daddy!” I scolded with a low voice and clenched teeth. But he looked so stunned and sheepish, my anger quickly dissipated.

“Sorry,” he whispered.

“We’ll talk about this later,” I said as I shut his closet door. “Stay out of there.”

He nodded as I quickly made my way back to Uncle Six. My brain whirled, not only with questions about what my uncle had just revealed about my aunt. But also the sudden parent child role reversal I just experienced with my father.

Uncle Six rubbed his hands vigorously on his thighs, and there was a frightened look was on his face again. I told him his brother was finished messing about in his closet. Then I gave him a reassuring smile, even as my heart pounded with the stunning information about my aunt. It was simply unbelievable.

My Aunt Charley was one of the most beautiful, feminine women I had ever known. I had accidently  seen her topless once. Her breasts appeared natural and well-proportioned with her tall slender frame. Her pale skin seemed soft, silky, and supple. There was nothing resembling a male at all. Except maybe her slightly husky voice.

“I guess I should start at the beginning,” Uncle Six said uneasily, and then forced a little laugh.

“That’s always a good place,” I replied with a nervous giggle.

“When we were in our early twenties, Brock was a bouncer at a, um, gentlemen’s club.”

“You mean strip bar,” I said more sternly than I intended. I found nothing gentlemanly about men watching young women dance naked.

“Yeah, anyway, I started hanging out with a coworker of Brock’s. Jesse Parker was his name. We really hit it off and became fast friends. At that point in my life, I was bicurious, but never really thought I’d act on it. Do you know what bicurious is?”

He really seemed uncomfortable, so I tried tapping into a bit of my dad’s style of humor. “I might have been born at night Uncle Six, but it wasn’t last night. So you were curious about learning a second language?”

I said this with a straight face, and his uncomfortable demeanor spiked, before my laughter put him at ease. “I know what you mean. Please continue.”

“Okay, well, like I said, we really hit it off. He was a great looking guy. One night he confided he was gay. One thing led to another, yadda, yadda, yadda, we had a great time and I ended up with a secret boyfriend.”

“So,” I said slowly. “It ended up you were more than curious?”

“I was. Yet I could never get completely comfortable being in a romantic relationship with a guy. So after a couple of months of fooling around with Jesse, we amicably ended things. Ironically, when we called the intimate part of our relationship quits, that’s when he told me he knew the perfect person for me.”

He reached into a book bag by the side of his chair and pulled out a yearbook. “So, when Jesse first told me he was gay, he said the only other lover he had was this guy he went to high school with.”

Uncle six thumbed through some pages and stopped when he came to the page he was looking for. The boy he showed me bore a strong resemblance to his deceased wife. The name underneath said Charles Davidson. I looked from the photo to my uncle. “Is that Aunt Charley’s bro…”

I stopped talking. My eyes went back to the photo and studied it for several seconds. “That’s Aunt Charley?”

He nodded. “So Jesse had told me they were a closeted couple for, like, two or three years, but not much else. Other than showing me these pictures.”

My uncle showed me two more pictures in the yearbook. Charley Davidson in a track uniform. And Charley Davidson with a girl at prom. Although he was far from macho, Charles Davidson was clearly a young man.

 “After he showed me the yearbook pictures, Jesse said he wanted to buy me dinner and he would explain further. So we go to this restaurant on the order of Hooters.”

“Wow, so this Jesse was a gay guy that worked at a strip bar, and liked to eat at Hooters. He was full of contradictions.”

“Aren’t we all?”

“Amen.”

“So the waitresses at this place all had the same uniforms,” he continued. “Green plaid miniskirts, green bikini tops, and white blouses that didn’t fully cover the bikini tops. White knee high socks and black Mary Jane shoes. Promise me you’ll never work there.”

“Trust me, I won’t,” I giggled.

“So we go there and he asked the hostess for Charlotte’s section. That’s when I met your Aunt for the first time. I don’t know about love at first site, but when Jesse introduced us, it was magical. So he asked me what I thought of her. I said she was not only smoking hot, but blazing hot. I asked how he knew her. He said that she was his old boyfriend. Then he reminded me of the yearbook pictures he had just showed me. I about fell out of the booth.

“He proceeded to tell me that she started transitioning with hormones when he turned eighteen, and the reason they broke up was because he was no longer comfortable with how spectacularly female she became. He was attracted to masculine, and although she didn’t plan on completing the transition with surgery, she was obviously too feminine for his tastes.”

“So, Aunt Charley,” I said and then cleared my throat. “Still had, um, some boy parts?”

My uncle nodded.

“Until the day she died?”

He nodded again. “As a matter of fact, you could say it caused her death.”

“How?”

“I’ll get to that,” he assured me, right when his phone rang with a song. I kid you not. It was ‘Man I Feel Like a Woman,’ by Shania Twain. “It’s my lawyer. I have to take this. It should only take a minute.”

“Okay,” I replied as chipperly as I could muster, even though my mind spun like I was riding the Tilt-a-Whirl. So I prayed.