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“I was the perfect Mormon, and I was supposed to get rewarded for that! I don’t understand!” Kevin shouted, pacing along the side of the hut.
Connor nodded, standing awkwardly. Kevin felt a little bad for springing his ramblings on the district leader but he needed to talk to someone about it and that certainly couldn’t be Arnold, given as his best friend got everything he prayed for.
“Think about it!” Kevin continued. “Heavenly Father lets bad things happen all the time. Why is that? Why did I have to see someone get shot in the face several feet ahead of me? What about everything with the general?”
“A man also died,” Connor pointed out, an unreadable expression on his face. He often struggled to tell what Connor was thinking— sometimes, the leader’s behavior reminded Kevin of some of the girls in his youth group. He wasn’t sure why though, so he tried to ignore it. After all, comparing a gay man to a girl seemed a bit homophobic.
“That too!,” Kevin continued. “So who knows if there’s even a God!?”
“In high school I had a friend that didn’t believe.”
“Yeah! Maybe they figured it out.”
“Let me speak,” Connor said.
Oops, Kevin didn’t mean to interrupt. He nodded.
“I had a friend that didn’t believe. She, well,” He looked conflicted. “We were sharing secrets at a tech rehearsal, and I told her about my gay thoughts. We talked about religion and how turning it off doesn’t exactly… make you happy. Or really work. She told me something I’ll never forget.” Connor took a deep breath in, curling and uncurling his fists at his sides.
“What is it?”
“It plagues me. Are you sure you want to know?”
Kevin nodded.
“She said that a merciful God wouldn’t allow suffering. She said that if God was real, she wouldn’t worship him because childhood cancer exists.”
Kevin stared at him, his brain whirling and spinning. “Suffering in a punishment for sin,” he said dumbly.
“I know that, but what about babies? Little one year olds get cancer, what sins have they committed? Kids can’t be held accountable until eight, so how can they deserve cancer before then?”
“I—” Kevin gaped at him. Oh fuck. He’d wondered by God let bad things happen before, but childhood cancer was… senseless.
“Yeah,” Connor said. “It’s always bothered me.”
“I asked that question when I walked out,” he admitted. “But I had the hell dream and then well… the thing with the general didn’t work out.”
“Did you know Nabulungi was used to have siblings?” Connor asked.
Kevin shook his head.
“She had two sisters and a brother, they all died before they turned six. Her mom and brother got killed by General Butt Effing Naked.”
Kevin stared. “Oh my gosh.”
“Her youngest sister starved,” he added. “And her other sister… I’m not repeating what happened. How could Heavenly Father let that happen?”
A heavy silence hung between the two.
“Jesus is a dick,” Kevin said, staring unseeing into the plains in the distance.
“Do you have any idea why?” Connor asked.
Kevin paused. “I have an idea according to the Book of Mormon, but it might make it worse.” He remembered a specific part of The Book of Mormon that had always felt wrong to him. Sure some of the stories were completely nonsensical, but there was one section that seemed just plain racist to him.
“What do you mean?”
“Okay you know the Nephites and the Lamenites?”
Connor nodded.
“When the Lamenites lost, God punished them by making them, um, Black.” Gosh, it felt bad even saying that like it was true.
“WHAT?” Connor asked, shock written on his face. “That’s so freaking racist.”
“In 1978 God ‘changed his mind’ about Black people,” Kevin added, using air quotes.
“So before 1978…?”
“Yep.”
“Didn’t Jim Crow end way before that?”
He nodded, pressing his lips into a line. The more he thought about that fact, the worse it sounded.
“That’s so awful.”
“It makes the religion seem indefensible,” Kevin said.
Connor nodded, and an awkward silence fell upon them. Kevin couldn’t believe how he’d accepted that unquestioningly; he didn't think about it much in Salt Lake City but now that he lived in Uganda the whole religion felt… tainted. Bitter. Like it was a relic of a dark, evil time in American history.
“Cancer. In children,” Connor said, almost at a whisper.
“There’s no explanation for it that doesn’t end in God being awful," he said. "Supposedly His plan is ineffable so we can’t understand, but what is there to understand about killing kids?” He couldn’t imagine loosing his little sister, the concept of her being… gone, unable to grow up, was unfathomable to him.
Kevin was really starting to suspect that he’d been lied to about Heavenly Father his whole life.
“How in the fuck did you never learn about evolution?” Gotswana asked.
“My private school taught creationism,” Kevin said.
“And what the fuck is that?”
Kevin wasn’t sure how they’d got on the topic, but the Church of Arnold was discussing science topics after one of Arnold’s sermons that he made up on the spot. Evolution had come up, and not many of the elders knew what it was; Kevin, Connor, Pop Tarts, and a few others all went private schools that didn’t teach evolution.
Arnold proclaimed he’d gone to public school and knew a little about evolution, but the rest of others had their parents opt them out of learning evolution, or were simply told not to pay attention during the unit. Of course, they all knew what evolution was— Kevin knew it was the theory that humans came from monkeys. He’d never really learned it, and he supposed that if a lot of the things in the Bible and The Book of Mormon were lies, maybe creationism was too. Still, he’d had too much on his plate to really think about it.
He gave Gotswana a quick explanation of creationsism.
“That is fucking stupid,” Gotswana said. “What about dinosaurs?”
Kevin perked up, enthusiastically explaining the scripture despite his doubts. He couldn’t help it— he’d been a perfect student all his life. “Heavenly Father supposedly put dinosaur bones there to test our faith!”
“That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”
Kevin faltered before shrugging. “Some people also believe that dinosaurs and early humans lived together.”
Gotswana burst into laughter, doubling over as he wheezed. Kevin couldn’t help but giggle himself; the dinosaurs and humans living together had always seemed a little silly to him.
“Okay now that,” Gotswana said as his laughter died down, “is actually the stupidest thing I have ever heard.”
Kevin felt his face turn red. “I-I didn’t believe that!” He defended.
“But you knew people who did?”
“Well, yes.”
Gotswana laughed again. “You white boys are hilarious. And they taught you this, creationism you said, in school?”
Kevin nodded and looked around— most of them had.
“But not evolution?”
There was an awkward silence, as some shook their heads.
“I heard that evolution is where we came from monkeys,” Connor said.
“Jesus fuck you all are stupid. Mafala, Nabalungi!” He called. “Come over here and listen to what the white boys think. You, say that again,” he pointed to Connor as the two walked over.
“That evolution is where we came from monkeys?” He asked hesitantly.
Mafala and Nabulungi burst into laughter, and Kevin felt a surge of defensiveness for the district leader. What was so wrong with that statement? He’d seen the little diagrams on the monkey turning into a human and heard it all the time. Even the zoos said monkeys and humans were related!
“Arnold, you must know evolution, right?” Nabulungi, a mix of concern, horror, and something else Kevin couldn’t decipher in her voice.
Arnold looked uncomfortable and Nabulungi raised a judgmental eyebrow.
“Don’t worry Napalm, I know the chart is hot dog style,” Arnold said proudly. “There’s something else we came from, but I don’t remember it.”
“What the fuck is hot dog style? Gotswana asked immediately.
“Oh! This is hot dog,” Arnold said brightly pointed to his name tag. “And this is hamburger,” he finished, turning his name tag 90 degrees.
The villagers stared at him for a full second, before breaking into raucous laughter.
“Do they teach you that in schools?” Gotswana asked.
Kevin and a few others nodded.
“You are fucking with me. That is the most stupid American thing I have ever heard.”
“We learn it in elementary school,” he defended. “It’s cause some people can’t say vertical and horizontal.”
“I can’t believe you came in here trying to teach us when hot dog style is something you all say! That sounds like a sex position,” Gotswana said.
Kevin and Arnold’s faces turned red, and he heard Connor suppress a giggle near him.
“It sounds like something you’d make up,” Mafala added, laughing.
“Wait!” Kevin interjected. “You guys know he makes stuff up?”
Mafala looked at Kevin like he was an idiot. “Of course. It’s clearly a silly metaphor. A few people think the stories were written down before, but it’s obvious Elder Cunningham is making it up. Did you guys actually think those original stories are real?”
Kevin’s face was beet red, and he swiped at his eyes. He was sweating in the hot summer weather, or maybe he got something in his eye. It was allergies, certainly. Only allergies.
“You were going to teach us evolution,” he said, trying to change the topic. It made him feel dumb when the villagers immediately clocked things that took him witnessing a murder and getting a book shoved up his ass to even consider. He didn’t like feeling dumb; he was a top student and scored a 1490 on the SAT. He wasn’t dumb.
“Right,” Gotswana said. “All of you go to the schoolhouse, I will teach you there.”
“Do you believe Heavenly Father is good?” Kevin asked, rubbing their homemade cleaning solution on the coffee table.
After his conversation about childhood cancer with Connor, Kevin had persuaded the district leader to place him and Pop Tarts on cleaning duty together. He wanted to ask the elder about his sister, and he’d made an airtight case: Connor always had paperwork to do, and Arnold was working with the villagers on what to put in the Book of Arnold. It just made sense to stick their respective partners together. It kept everyone in pairs. There was a reason Kevin won every novice debate tournament in his freshman year class.
“I- what do you mean?” Pop Tarts asked.
“What happened with your sister is horrible,” he said, sitting on the couch to clean the side of the table (and get the other to join him).
Pop Tarts nodded.
“Can you tell me about it?” He asked.
The other elder nodded enthusiastically.
“Yes, please.”
Kevin patted the spot next to him on the couch. Pop Tarts sat down, abandoning his cleaning like Kevin had.
“My sister was an amazing dancer,” he began. “My parents and I, we were always going to different competitions. I filmed every one of her dances too, I kept having to delete things to save space.
“She did contemporary, ballet, tap, and a group jazz number. She was only seven but she could already pirouette, she was going to be on pointe the moment she turned twelve.”
“Why twelve?” Kevin asked. He didn’t know much about dance, but it seemed impressive.
It was the right question to ask too— Pop Tarts’ face lit up. “That’s the youngest people are allowed to be on pointe! She probably could have done it in a couple years but if you put kids on pointe too early it breaks their hips.”
Kevin made a face. In all the sports he’d done, that had never even been a consideration.
“Right! But my sister was that good.”
He had to push him. Kevin needed to know what happened, and he needed to know if the other elder believed in God.
“You said she was seven?” he asked.
Pop Tarts looked down and went quiet, lost in thought. He nodded.
“The year before you can be baptized.”
“Two months,” Pop Tarts said, staring at his hands. “She was supposed to give testimony in two months. We thought it was perfect timing.”
“How many months did the doctors give again?”
“Two.”
Kevin sucked in a breath. “She should have been able to get to testify,” he said.
Pop Tarts nodded. “We all thought it was Heavenly Father’s way of making it better.”
There was a pause as the other elder wiped at the corner of his eye and Kevin politely looked away.
“At least she never sinned,” he offered, turning his head back. “According to the church that is.”
Pop Tarts nodded.
“She didn’t do anything to deserve it,” he added. He was trying to lead the other into saying that Heavenly Father gave his sister cancer for no good reason. He wanted to see if the other has doubts too.
“She went painfully,” Pop Tarts said, his voice thick. “When I said goodbye she was acting normal and coloring. But the doctors didn’t realize how quickly it spread. Overnight the cancer stopped blood from getting into her leg. They had to amputate it because it b-built up blood and was killing her or something.”
He was crying. Kevin felt like he should do something, but he wasn’t sure what— he’d never been particularly good with comforting people.
“She got o- out of surgery but it was t- too late,” Pop Tarts continued despite the tears. Kevin decided he’d ignore it and give the other elder dignity. “The doctors said it happens, that c- cancer is an unpredictable illness, and patients sometime go from stable to having emergency surgeries and d- d- dying in a matter of hours.”
There was silence in the room, broken only by the sniffles of Pop Tarts.
“Do you… want a hug?” Kevin asked. That was what people did when others cried, right? He’d never had friends that cried in front of him since he was little, and back then an adult took care of it.
Suddenly, Pop Tarts was leaning into him, his arms wrapped around Kevin’s midsection and face buried in his shoulders.
Kevin awkwardly patted the crying elder on the back. He knew people always said ‘it’s okay’ to people who were crying, but it wasn’t okay. It wasn’t okay that God let that happen.
“That shouldn’t have happened,” he settled on.
Pop Tarts nodded into his shoulder and let out a quiet sob.
“It’s not right,” he added, patting the others back in what he hoped was a comforting gesture.
“I don’t understand it,” the other boy murmured, sitting up and disentangling himself from Kevin. “Why was that God’s plan?”
“I studied the texts and that’s not supposed to happen to good people. God’s plan is supposed to be ineffable, but there’s no way giving kids cancer is ever okay.”
Pop Tarts nodded.
The two had entered into a careful dance, a dance that Kevin wasn’t all to sure how to navigate. Missionaries weren’t supposed to lose their faith, much less talk about it. If a missionary talked about losing faith to someone who still believed? Well, there had been a section on that in the handbook, and they were supposed to tell the zone leader right away if anyone was ‘unfaithful.’ He wasn’t sure if he could even be reported to the zone leader on account of their excommunication, but it wasn’t something he wanted to find out about.
Kevin sure as heck wasn’t going to bring up his doubts in God if Pop Tarts wasn’t also having them. He had to figure out what the other elder was thinking, while expressing his doubts and keeping plausible deniability.
Unfortunately, Kevin had never been very good at figuring out what people were thinking.
“Childhood cancer is unfair,” he settled on.
“It is.”
It was looking like Pop Tarts was also having doubts, but Kevin couldn’t be sure.
“What did your church say about it?” He asked.
“About my sister?”
“Yeah.”
“They just gave us prayers, cards, and frozen meals,” Pop Tarts said.
“Nothing about why?”
He shook his head.
“I don’t understand how Heavenly Father could let that happen.”
“Neither do I,” Pop Tarts said softly, twisting a cleaning rag in his hands.
Surely that was an admission… right? “I’m having doubts God even exists,” he confessed, desperately hoping he hadn’t misinterpreted the whole thing.
“Me too,” Pop Tarts breathed.
They sat in silence for a moment, before Pop Tarts mentioned something about continuing to clean. They continued to spend the rest of their time cleaning in silence, Kevin contemplating what it meant if there was no God.
“I always knew I was put on this earth for a purpose,” Kevin said, bursting into Connor’s office where he was staring at some sheet of paper. “Life had meaning because God gave it purpose. But if there is no God, what is the meaning of life?”
Connor put his pen down and looked up, hair disheveled. His hair was always perfect— even though it looked good messy, it was a strange sight to behold.
“What am I even supposed to do without a purpose?” Kevin continued, pacing the small room. He always knew exactly what he was supposed to do, and the idea of having nothing, no where to go was simply unfathomable.
“Mafala told me we make our own meaning in life,” the leader said, continuing to rake his hands through his hair.
“But how?” He asked. “How do you choose what to make?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s terrifying.”
“I know.”
Kevin had heard of existential crises before, and he suspected he was about to have one.
He’d been a high achiever all his life, doing all sorts of clubs and sports, getting As, and intimately knowing the stories in the Book of Mormon. And that hard work and dedication hadn’t given him anything; he was worse off than his best friend was, who’d done nothing but watch movies and goof around. What did it matter that he’d gotten in the 98th Percentile on the SAT, really? The test was made up and he didn’t need such a high score to get into BYU, or many other universities for that matter. He was already beginning to forget the score he’d worked so hard to get, because it didn’t matter. Even college didn’t matter that much— he’d just be going to get another piece of paper, to become another cog in an uncaring, Godless machine.
More so, if he wasn’t Super-Mormon Kevin Price, who the heck was he? His faith and his destiny were all there was to him some days. He’d focused all his time and energy into becoming the perfect Ken doll for the church of Latter Day Saints, that he’d never though about who he was past that. Past the high grades and the knowledge of scripture, who was Kevin Price? Did Kevin Price even want a wife and three to five children? Did he even want to move to Orlando? It had been his dream since he was nine, but he was such a vastly different person back then. If he went to Orlando at nineteen or twenty-one or whenever he went back to the United States, would it even be the same? Was Orlando really that magical? Or had he just been nine? Was Orlando just like any other city, with concrete parking garages and meaningless desk jobs, all to prop up some meaningless system?
He didn’t like this new reality. It was so much easier when he believed in some giant man in the sky who told him what to do; without Heavenly Father, what was the reward for success?
Kevin wasn’t sure how long it had been since he’d first had his existential crisis, but it didn’t seem to be going away anytime soon.
He tried to convince himself that he should just start believing in Heavenly Father again many times, but he’d been less and less successful with each attempt. There was simply no way that there could be a God— dinosaurs were far better explained by science, evolution explained everything about life, geology and meteorology explained the rocks and the weather and the increasingly hot summers. There was nothing men had that couldn’t be explained by science besides the formation of the universe, except before God, what was there? There was nothing before the Big Bang and nothing before ‘God,’ so religion didn’t help anything there.
Then there was all the suffering in the world. Kevin always learned that Heavenly father was omniscient, omnipotent, and all loving. He certainly knew about all kinds of suffering from prayers, so he couldn’t claim that he didn’t know. If he was all powerful, why didn’t he fix the suffering in the world? And if he wasn’t, what could he fix? Doctors cured sickness and engineers built a comfortable life for everyone, but prayers went unanswered all the time. Finally if God was all-loving, then why did he let bad things happen? It just didn’t make sense. There couldn’t be God like he was told; the world was too messed up for Him to exist. He was either genuinely stupid, weak, or a dick.
And that didn’t even touch on the fact that Kevin never had real, concrete proof that God even existed. Every ‘miracle,’ every ‘blessing’ was either because of someone else or pure luck. The incident with the General proved that any ‘blessings’ were all in his head.
And without God, Kevin couldn’t bring himself to care about much of anything. He ate and helped around the hut sure, but what did it matter? It didn’t matter what he did because he was just going to die one day, and be forgotten in one, maybe two generations. If the world was 4.5 billion years old, the existence of humanity was nothing but a blip, and Kevin’s life was nothing but an even smaller blip in the timeline of humanity itself. In hundreds of thousands of years of humanity, Kevin’s life was nothing. No matter what he did, it wouldn’t matter in a thousand years.
“Kevin,” Connor said gently through the door of his and Arnold’s room. “Can I come in?”
He was lying on his back in bed, a mess of cups and dirty clothes around him. His once immaculate hair was greasy and messy; only a month ago, Kevin would have been mortified to be seen in such a state. Present Kevin however, didn’t care one bit. “Come in,” he said, making no move to get up.
Connor opened the door and delicately stepped inside, careful to avoid the clothes and whatever else on the floor. He took a seat on Arnold’s bed, which was somehow neater than Kevin’s.
“I need you to tell me what’s wrong,” the district leader said.
“There is no god and life is meaningless,” Kevin said flatly.
There was silence, and he wondered if Connor would call him a heretic.
“You may be right,” he said, much to Kevin’s surprise. “But that doesn’t mean you have to lay here until you die.”
Kevin didn’t reply.
“I’ve been talking a lot to Gotswana and Mafala,” Connor said, taking the silence as an opportunity to continue. “Neither of them believe in God, and I don’t think I do either. They told me that none of us are that special, and that’s okay.”
Well that was almost as distressing as the fact that there was no god.
“They’re not the only men living in a poor African village. I’m not the only person with gay thoughts that I don’t want. Even the people that are special like Obama or Putin will be forgotten one day. It’s like… there’s not some grand plan, and our lives don't really change the universe. It’s weird, but it’s comforting in a way. Things with Steve Blade and I ended horribly, but I’m not the only one who experienced something like that, and that embarrassment won’t live forever. Less than ten people even know what happened with that, and I’m not constantly being judged for it like I thought. We’re not the only missionaries to loose our faith, and we’re not the only group to be kicked out of the church. What we feel is important, but the world is going to keep spinning.”
“That doesn’t make me feel better,” Kevin mumbled. Not only was life meaningless, Kevin was just one person out of millions that lost their faith.
“Right, sorry. I had a point,” Connor said, running a hand through his hair.
“What was it then?”
“Right, well,” he started nervously. “The point is that we don’t have to have some grand destiny to be worth something. Mafala said that he will never leave this village and he doesn’t want to, because he’s Nabalungi’s Baba and that’s all he needs. We don’t need the world, we only need each other.”
Kevin pushed himself upright against the wall.
“They also said that God was only a placeholder for what we don’t understand. Now we have science and we know why everything happens, so we don’t need to pretend that some being made all of it. We actually know more about the world with science than we ever did with religion, so we’ve moved past the need for God.”
“How?” He asked.
“Well,” Connor explained, “the way I see it is that Heavenly Father was just a way to explain what we didn’t understand, and a way to bring comfort in bad times. All the creation stories were just ways to explain how the earth and humans came to be, but now we know how life evolved and everything, and it’s kind of impossible for two people to start the whole human race.
“People also pray to God for loved ones when they don’t know how to fix things. Most of the time it doesn’t work, but doctors can fix AIDS with almost one hundred percent success with the right medications. God was just a placeholder for doctors.”
“That makes sense,” Kevin admitted. “It’s like we’ve outgrown God almost.”
“Exactly.”
“Then why are so many people still religious, even doctors?” He asked.
“Because death is scary, I think.”
No duh. That wasn’t the most astute observation.
His face must have betrayed his thoughts, because Connor continued to explain. “There’s so much in the world that is so scary, and there’s not always happy endings. Like how there’s no happy ending for Pop Tart’s sister, or how my parents will probably kick me out if I admit I’m gay and nothing bad will happen to them. It’s really sad and it’s hard to think that bad things happen for no reason. It’s hard to think that I’ll either lose my parents or be,” Connor paused and swallowed. “Or be miserable for the rest of my life.
“It’s a lot nicer to believe that there’s some big plan that will make it all worth it. It’s nicer to think that my Grandma is watching over me and supporting me, instead of just being… gone. I don’t like that she’ll never see me be successful and I don’t like that I’ll never talk to her again, so it’s easier to pretend that I can.”
Kevin nodded. “Then why stop pretending?”
Connor cleared his throat. “I imagine for the same reason you don’t believe anymore.”
A hush fell over them. Kevin would hear the sound of the other boy rubbing his hands along the fabric on his thighs, as well as his own breathing.
“All of what you said makes sense,” he said, breaking the silence. “But what reason is there to do any of it? If there’s no plan, what’s the meaning of life?”
Connor whispered something he didn’t catch.
“Repeat that for me?” He asked.
“Love,” the other boy whispered. “I think love is the meaning.”
“Like soulmates?”
Connor shook his head. “We find love ourselves. And it’s work and it doesn’t always end up how we want, but what I had with Steve was more magical than anything else.”
“What did happen with Steve?” He couldn’t help but ask.
The other boy took a deep breath in. “We… were together. I loved him and he loved me. We were together, but we got caught.” He swallowed again. “We said we’d make it work, but I went to conversion therapy after school and Steve’s parents put him in a wilderness program.”
“Oh.”
Connor nodded, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I’d give anything to have that again,” he said.
“With Steve?”
He shook his head. “There’s… too much there. There’s someone else.”
Kevin felt something strange tug at his stomach at the idea of Connor dating. “Who?” He asked, swinging his legs over the side of the bed so he was directly across from him.
Connor took a breath in and buried his face in his hands. “Are you sure you want to know?” He asked, looking at Kevin with his piercing blue eyes.
He nodded.
“You.”
Kevin didn’t think he'd understood. “Me?” He asked.
“Y-yes, and I promise I won’t be creepy about it! If you want to forget this ever happened I will, and I’ve liked other people and totally ignored it before and I can totally do that if you want—”
Kevin cut him off, acting completely on impulse. He didn’t really know what he was saying or why he was saying it, but before he could think he blurted out “you can kiss me if you want.”
Connor’s eyes widened in shock then narrowed into something else. “You don’t have to.”
“I…” If nothing matters anyways, why not? If he felt something, maybe Kevin would understand what Connor meant about love and life. And if he didn’t, nothing would change besides him and the district leader would be awkward around each other for a while. He had nothing to lose, not really. “I don’t know if I’m gay, but I’m willing to try.”
Connor gave him another undecipherable before nodding.
“Um, come sit by me?” Kevin had never kissed anyone before, so he wasn't quite sure how to start.
Connor nodded and sat by him, before gently putting his hands on his shoulders. “Is this okay?” He asked.
Kevin nodded, doing the same.
Gently, Connor leaned in and touched his lips to Kevin’s. They were soft and he smelled like mint and strawberries, and the realization hit like a freight train.
Kevin suddenly understood what the other meant about love. Connor’s lips were gentle but they felt like fireworks touching his own; he felt the sensation of something light in his stomach and instinctively leaned in. He really didn’t know what he was doing, but Kevin grabbed Connor’s face and pressed his lips further into his own, tilting his head.
Connor gently grabbed the back of his head and brought them closer together, his fingers electric.
In that moment, Kevin’s world reconstructed itself; there may be no god, but there was Connor. He may not be special according to the universe, but he was special to Connor and Connor was special to him. Life might not have an easy, definable purpose, but it did have love. Sure, one day he’d die and people would forget his face, but he’d never forget Connor. It didn’t matter what happened when he was dead, because he had all he needed with Connor.
“I understand,” Kevin breathed, his lips ever so slightly brushing against Connor’s.
Connor pulled him back into the kiss, and for the first time since he visited Orlando, Kevin felt fulfilled. He was exactly where he needed to be, on his own paradise planet, kissing Connor McKinley in their small hut on the outskirts of Kitguli.