So this is the way things were for the next week, until Rachel headed back to Loyola. We did it just about anyplace we could, and I imagined the entire house must have reeked of semen.
In our post-coital clean up, Rachel opened up more and I got it; I could see where Rachel was coming from. She didn't want to take anything seriously, and wanted to be free of anything that mattered. She told me, in terms that could only come from someone who was a college sophomore, that she wanted to "deconstruct" things that tried to take themselves seriously by mocking them, mocking through the mysterious, intimate act of sex.
She told me this, and I must have looked at her quizzically. "You can think of it as a game. Treat it like a game. Like when we were kids, but now we can do things we couldn't do as kids." I remembered just then that I had in fact seen Rachel totally naked before when we were very young and wondering about the differences between the sexes.
"And treating the things that are most not like games and turning them into games."
"To show how stupid they are, basically?"
"To show that they don't matter. And what are the biggest things?"
"I guess the Church?"
"Right. The Church. It controls you life, you know."
When Dad was ready to drive her up to Salt Lake to catch her flight back to LA, she came back from the car to give me a little hug. She looked at me like she was giving some sisterly advice. It must have been touching for Mom and Dad as they watched from the distance. Less so if they had heard what she said.
"You know, there's also Mom." I didn't know what she meant, and glanced for a second toward Mom. "She's is the line between you and the Church."
Mom was the agent for the Church in the home. She was always involved in Church activities and callings -- she had been the Relief Society President, the Young Women's President. She kept Dad on task with the Church; as I mentioned earlier, I pretty much felt he kept active in the Church only because of his job, and I guess because of his commitment to Mom. So there was, after all, a logical link from the Church to Mom and then to us.
"So," she paused, "We need to fuck in order to fuck the Church. But we also need to fuck Mom."
I don't know how I reacted, it was instinctual, and she quickly added, "I mean figuratively. We don't really fuck the Church. We don't really fuck Mom."
She walk away and shouted from the car, "Anyway, we'll continue all this when I get back for the summer."
So, for the next five months of anticipation I masturbated pretty much non-stop. But it couldn't overcome the urge I had to get back with Rachel. We didn't communicate at all, and I worried that things would change and our carnal relationship would be at its end. I couldn't find a girl to take her place. Girls were not only guarding their chastity, but they were also protective of the boys who were preparing for their missions. Heaven forbid that they have the double sin of losing their virginity and in doing so keep a boy from going on a mission. And what girl would match Rachel in terms of her sexual abandon.
Late May Rachel returned home. I had received my mission calling two weeks earlier. I was going to preach the Gospel in Korea, in the Seoul Korea Mission. I would be getting my temple endowments in early June and going into the Mission Training Center, just a mile down the hill from our house, the week after that to get a start on the language.
Going along this path, I had to steel myself against Rachel's head-on assault on my religious values. Taking the usual course for repentance was simply out of the question. I would have to go to my Bishop and confess in detail. That we had masturbated in front of each other. On two different occasions. That we then had sexual relations. And yes, I had penetrated her. And yes, oral-genital contact as well. (But not anal, if that mattered.) That we actually had engaged in sexual intercourse multiple times. Like, maybe, twenty or thirty times.
He would then have me go to before a Church court where all of this would be laid bare in front of the Stake Presidency and its quorum. I would certainly be disfellowshipped -- no, that is what would happen if I went "too far" one time with a girlfriend or fiancé -- doing it repeatedly and with my sister would certainly mean being excommunicated. There would be a long road of repentance before joining the Church again. I would never go on a mission, and would not be allowed to go to BYU. At this late date it would be hard to apply anywhere else. And I couldn't continue to live at home because everyone would know exactly what had happened. The proceedings are supposed to be private, but of course people can't keep their mouths shut.
So I was simply going to live with this. Living a lie before Heavenly Father, and down the road before my missionary companions and even my future wife. I already had compartmentalized my sister-fucking time from my non-sister-fucking time. I prayed to Heavenly Father as if it was simply not happening. Much as I did my day-to-day activities in front of my parents as if it was not happening. The difference, of course, being that Heavenly Father knew, and he could withdraw his spirit and guidance from me.
I couldn't see staying on my mission for the full two years. I would have to find an excuse to return early. If missionaries started to have medical or mental issues that made it difficult for them to continue, they could get an early release and still be considered a returned missionary. I would do something like start to hear voices, or feel that I was a prophet, something that would make me seem to be sincere but unstable. Return home, head to BYU.
