Betrayed

Rob and I couldn't stop laughing as we ran across the car park of my Father's church, just getting revenge for years of humiliation gave me a feeling of elation. Rob drove me back to my unit and I invited him in. "I wish that I could have seen the look on his face when he realised what was happening. My only concern is for my Mum, she will be the one that he will take his revenge on because she's there, then he'll take it out on Andrew, he'll blame him for encouraging me to rebel against him, but then he's a big boy and can handle it. He'll save his most virulent anger for me, when and if our paths should cross. I'm not looking forward to going to work tomorrow, the up-side will be to hand in my resignation. Then I'm going to have to find another job quickly because I now have rent to pay.

I hadn't asked him if he wanted anything to eat, I just assumed that he would. I was buttering bread ready to make sandwiches. "Look I can't stay, I have to get home to my girlfriend or she'll think all the wrong things, I did tell her what I was doing this morning."

"Oh, I'm sorry, I thought, you know, I owe you for your help and this was my way of repaying you." It was a feeble attempt at salvaging my embarrassment but it was the best that I could do.

"Sorry, I should have told you that I'm spoken for."

"That's alright, I'll crawl into my hole and die."

"No you won't, the new you is much stronger than that." He pecked me on the cheek and left.

After he'd gone I finished making the sandwiches because I had realised that I hadn't had breakfast and suddenly I was hungry.

I had made myself a cup of coffee and just sat down to eat my lunch when there was a knock on my door. I opened it to be confronted by a battered Mum. "Oh Ruth, what am I going to do? Your Father was so. . . I've never seen him so angry. He shouted a lot of nasty things at me and his language, it was filthy the things that he called me. He hit me, several times and very hard. I don't know what to do."

"Sit down Mum, can I get you something to eat, a cup of coffee maybe? When you've calmed down, we can talk this thing through. We need each other right now."

"Thank you for this, I have nowhere to go to and no-one to help me. I can't use the church, I can't go back there, and the thought of having to show my face there again is just too horrible to contemplate. I don't know how your Father is going to explain that video, and, quite frankly I don't care."

"But that's the problem Mum, you do care. You may not think so right now but it's in your nature to care. I bet that when I suggest that you go to the police you'll tell me that you can't do that to your father. Mum you have to stand up to him, you'll be surprised how good it feels to eventually get up the courage to do it for the first time and after that it gets easier."

"But he's a good man." Her tone, and the fact that she touched the bruise on her cheek, told me that even she doubted that statement but felt that she had to defend him. "He's a good Christian."

"Mum, he's not even a good Christian. If you were to look at what it means to be a good Christian you will realise that the supposed core of the Christian doctrine is all about love, unconditional love, and part of that is to respect people's differences and not to impose your values on others. Father imposed his values on you for all of your married life, oh he told you often enough that his values were the only true values, and I have no doubt that he believed that, but not everyone agrees with him. You saw that video up there on the big screen, is that the behaviour of a man who should be followed, is that the behaviour of an awesome man of God. His actions in that video are reprehensible and I don't know what the outcome will be, but whatever that is he deserves it."

"But this will destroy him, destroy his work, his church."

"Mum, he has destroyed himself, and if the church supports him it is worthy of destruction."

"But he's your father."

"Mum, he stopped being my father when he failed to realise that the rules, his rules, that he imposed on me were destroying me as a person. Now that I've found the real me I'm not going back to what I was. I am a strong person now, can't you see that?"

"Yes, and I'm proud of what you have become, but Darling, don't let your anger blind you to the good qualities that you've found in yourself, rise above your anger and be the person you are meant to be."

I was just about to answer, there was a slight pause while I tried to think of my answer, when the phone rang. It was Andrew. "Ruth," That was as far as he got before I hung up. The phone rang again. "Ruth, please don't hang up. Is your Mum there?"

"Yes she is." My tone was meant to convey the message that I didn't want to talk to him. It didn't work.

"That's a relief. Your father has been on the phone, he's in a real mess. I can't get any sense out of him, he's babbling about being ruined by me and sobbing that he can't find your Mum and doesn't know what to do. I was tempted to tell him to pray."

"Did he happen to tell you what happened in church this morning?"

"No, what happened? Wait, don't tell me, the whole church didn't happen to see a certain porn video did it?"

"Yes."

"Oh my God, no wonder he's in a state."

"You're lucky that you weren't there."

"What do you mean? You don't think that I had anything to do with the video do you?"

"Andrew, I know what I saw."

"Do you? Look I'd like to come and see you, I need to clear the air about something."

"My Mum's here, remember?"

"I don't care, in fact it will be better if she was there. I'll be there in ten minutes and I'll explain everything." Before I could tell not to bother he'd hung up.

"Who was that?"

"Andrew Hudson, he's coming over to discuss that video that was shown at church this morning. Before he gets here I need to tell you that I was responsible for it being shown."

"I thought you might have had something to do with it, and I applaud you for it." I couldn't believe my ears, she was supporting my destruction of her husband's reputation. "He had it coming to him after what he said to you in church two weeks ago, oh he actually admitted to me that he directed that message at you. We had an argument about it and I told him the he would have to earn my respect all over again. To say that he wasn't happy would be an understatement. He has blamed Andrew Hudson and he really must be upset to call him looking for your address in search of me."

"This is a new person sitting here, Mum, I never thought that you had it in you to stand up to him like that."

"Ruth, if you thought that what he did made you angry, it had nothing on my anger."

"But that night, you supported him."

"No I didn't, I was just trying to calm you down and explain my position. I didn't like my position any more than you did, but I had to think about how I'd approach the problem. I didn't have your resources, if I had I'd probably done something similar. He needed to be taught that you can't just ride roughshod over people's feelings like that."

"What are we going to do?"

"Would it be possible for me to stay here until everything settles down and we can talk some sense into your father?"

"You can stay as long as you like. What will he do about the church, I don't think that he'd want to be there now that this has happened, and he's been doing it for so long he doesn't have anything else to fall back on."

"He can always make a career out of porn, I hear it pays well."

"Mum!"

"I know, I shouldn't have said that and I'm sorry, I just had this moment of stupidity."

"What are we going to do about the fact that he has assaulted you? You just can't let him get away with that, he needs help."

There was a knock on the door and I let Andrew in. He kept his distance from me and made no attempt to show any kind of affection. "What was it that you wanted to say about that video, and don't try to convince me that it wasn't you I saw standing there playing with your cock?"

"It wasn't me and I can prove it."

"This had better be good."

"Okay, think back to the man that you claim is me."

"Y-e-s." I wasn't sure where this was going but I let him continue.

"Can you recall everything about his cock? Do you have a mental picture of it?"

"Yes."

"Was it circumcised or not?"

"Not I think, yes, I'm sure that it wasn't"

"Now remember back to the last time that we made love."

"Yes." I had a smile on my face because it had been a very pleasant moment.

"My cock, you got up close and personal with it as I recall, is it circumcised?"

"Yes, yes it is!" He had a smile on his face as if a weight had been lifted from his mind.

"Would you like another look to confirm this?" He asked. I was shocked to see that Mum wasn't at all shocked by this conversation.

"No, I don't think that will be necessary. But who was that I saw, he's the spitting image of you?"

"That is my cousin. The gene pool runs deep on the male side of the family and I have several cousins that could pass for my brother and this particular reprobate is one of them."

"But that was Celia in it too, wasn't it?"

"Yes, unfortunately. She doesn't do that sort of thing anymore. That video was made several years ago when she needed money and my cousin talked her into making some porn videos. How your father came to be in it I didn't know but I've spoken to her about it and she remembers it, she said that he wasn't very good."

"He was on one of those evangelical conferences and there were rumours at the time that some of the pastors had a little extra-curricular fun. This fun has returned to jump up and bite him." Mum said. "I heard about it and he confessed and swore me to secrecy."

"Well it's out in the open now. How do you think that he'll handle it?"

"Probably plead guilty as charged and explain that it was a moment of human frailty that saw him involved in it. He'll probably claim that the video was shot without his knowledge or permission." Mum said. "But then he'll be lying, you see when he came back from that conference he told me all about it, how he'd been seduced by a beautiful woman and had sex with her. He said that he was with a group from the conference at a restaurant and Celia was a waitress there. One of the local pastors knew her and introduced her to the others and when they had finished their meal your father had accompanied her back to an apartment where all of this took place. He was worried at first that she would blackmail him by threatening to tell the church about it, but the pastor that had introduced them told him that it was all taken care of. He was told later of the video and that it was destined for the overseas market and would not be released locally, and that was why I was so shocked when I saw it."

"That was of course before the Internet porn websites that make such videos freely available to download. He must have known of its existence because he got paid for his participation and he will have to rely on me not revealing the payments that he's received over the following two years from this video." Andrew told us. "I noticed these payments when I was going through his old tax returns for him. At first he told me some tale about it being royalties from a book that he'd had published until I pointed out to him that the money was coming from a video production company and not a publisher or literary agent. He told me all about it."

"I don't know what to think any more." I said to them. "Here was this man that I thought was the embodiment of an ultra conservative Christian pastor, and you've just revealed that he has had a human side to him all along. If he'd shown that to me earlier none of my revenge would have happened, and I would have thought him a better person for it."

"Yes but he didn't show that to you, he acted just like many people who become 'born again', they take a position that is diametrically opposed to what they did before they changed. Only in his case his lapse occurred while he was a pastor and that made his new position even more conservative. When you're heavily associated with a church like his you see it all the time, but in most cases the novelty wears off and the people return to something like their previous character. In his case, because of his position he had to maintain the rage so to speak, and he made it really hard on you." She told me. "For that I'm sorry, sorry that I didn't have the guts to stand up to him. But you've turned out very well and we have Andrew to thank for that."

My opinion of Andrew was swinging back to where it was on Thursday before I'd seen the fucking video. I was back to thinking that he was a good guy after all. "I disagree," Andrew said, "You laid the foundations for Ruth to become a very capable young lady, all that I've done is to put icing on the cake, to pretty it up, you deserve the credit."

"Look it's getting late and we haven't eaten, what do you say we order in a pizza?" I interrupted before this got too soppy.

"Sounds good to me," Mum said, "I don't know when the last time I had a pizza was."

Pizza ordered and a bottle of wine produced, we sat and waited. Mum took her first sip of wine. "This is nice, I don't know why churches forbid us to drink wine, Jesus drank wine."

"The ban on wine has nothing to do with scripture, it is more to do with the Calvinistic attitudes that we have inherited from our ancestors and stemmed from the early King James Bible." I explained.

The pizza arrived and we sat at the kitchen table and ate it. Mum licked her fingers and looked at us. "Should we put him out of his misery or make him suffer a little while longer?"

"I think that we should let him know that you're safe and taking a time out from him for a day or so. I hope that he'll progress through the blame stage and come to terms with why all of this has happened. If he presses the issue we should tell him that you've sought refuge at a Women's Shelter, he'll have visions of you being at the mercy of the hairy legged feminists that seem to run these places, and of you not being the same person when you return."

"You haven't quite let go of your anger yet, have you?" Mum asked.

"Not quite, but I'm getting there."

"You will, it was never in your nature to stay angry for long, that's one of the things that I love about you." Andrew said, bringing a swift glance from Mum.

"When you say 'love' do you mean love?" She asked.

"Yes, I love her, and when she told me to get out of her room, and her life, I was devastated, believe me, I thought that my world had come to an end. I can't compete against Mills and Boon's heroes."

"You do a pretty good job." I reached for his hand. Another, this time slightly longer, glance from Mum.

We talked until the bottle of wine was empty and the question of whether Andrew was to stay the night was reached. "If Andrew stays, is he going to sleep on the sofa and you and I share your bed, or do I get the sofa?" Mum asked.

"I could always. . . ."

"Don't worry, I'll take the sofa." She said. Andrew smiled at me and thanked Mum. "I realise that people today have no compunction about making love before marriage and I'm in favour of it." She caught my shocked look. "Don't be so shocked, the marriage laws that the church adheres to have less to do with cementing a loving relationship between two people before they take the plunge, as they are to preserve some archaic property laws based on a marriage contract drawn up between both sets of parents. This involved dowries and a proof of virginity as evidence that the bride was not in breach of that contract, and a steady market in sacs of blood to fool the husband. Love has nothing to do with it, don't get me wrong, I'm no advocate of wholesale fornication to test the sexual prowess of the other party. To me, making love is an integral part of the joining of the physical and spiritual relationship between two people." Andrew stayed.

We left Mum at my apartment to go to work. On arrival we were confronted by a mob of the voracious media, all vying to get the scoop. "Miss Williams, can you tell me, did you have anything to do with the video shown in your father's church yesterday?"

"Was I on it?"

"No."

"Then why do you think that I had anything to do with it?"

"What I meant was, were you responsible for the video being shown to the whole church?"

"I was not responsible for the content of the video and neither was I responsible for it being shown."

"So you deny any involvement in it being shown?"

"No." She was getting exasperated at my evasions, but then she hadn't yet asked the one question that I couldn't deny.

"Were you involved in it being shown?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"You'll have to ask my father that. Now if you'll excuse me we have work to do." Andrew ran interference for me as we pushed through to the staff entrance.

"You handled that extremely well." Andrew said as we entered his office. "If that had happened a month ago, you would have turned around and run, screaming, for the car park. You told them what they wanted to know but told them nothing, they were after a scandal and, while they have a whiff of one, you've not given them one."

"I was scared, if you hadn't been there I would have run."

"I don't think that you would have, you might not have handled it as well as you did, but you would have tried to respond because that's who you are." All the time he told me this he had his hands on my shoulders and as he finished he kissed me, softly, gently and lovingly. He knew exactly what I needed to hear to calm me. I kissed him with a little more force just to let him know that I was grateful for his love and support.

Celia was angry on the phone. "Where the fuck did your little friend dredge up that video from?"

"A friend gave it to her, apparently it is on one of those free porn sites under the title of 'Old Dude Fucks MILF While Husband Watches'. He had made the same mistake that she had, that it was me playing to role of the husband instead of Cousin Tim. You weren't to know when you enticed Pastor Williams into your studio that it would eventually find its way to his daughter at a time when she was less than happy with her father. She ran it for the church to get back at him for years of humiliation. It worked by the way."

"So what happens now between you and her?"

"Everything's fine between us."

"You're kidding, how did you manage that?"

"Just pointed out that it wasn't me playing your husband."

"So what will happen to her father?"

"We don't know yet, we're playing it by ear."

It was Wednesday when we agreed to meet with Father in a neutral location, Andrew's Lawyer provided his conference room for the occasion. Father began aggressively. "Whatever did I do to you that would make you do that to me?"

"I can understand your anger with me because of the video, but in my defence, I was still angry with you for the humiliation that I suffered at your hands in church. Now we can sit here and yell and scream at each other and achieve nothing other than making each other even angrier, or we can calm down and talk this thing through like rational adults, which is it to be." This stopped him in his tracks. He had come to this meeting thinking that he would be able to browbeat me into submission and I'd shown him in a gentle and non-aggressive way that I would not let that happen.

He looked at me for a moment or two before he realised that he would have to change his approach. "I'm sorry, but I've been under a lot of strain over the past few days. Everything that I've ever worked for has come crashing down around my ears and I don't know what to do."

"I have been thinking about this, and have discussed it with Mum and Andrew. It will require you to confess to making a huge mistake many years ago, to which you have repented to Mum and God, and from which you have moved on into a better place. You have devoted your life to the service of God and the church, and want to continue with that work."