tashigi

We eventually pried ourselves out of bed, performing a much-needed changing of the sheets and then trooping into the bathroom together, taking care of the necessaries and enjoying a soft, playful shower. It was a little bit crowded, with all three of us in there at once, but I loved every moment of it, and we only came out again once we ran out of hot water and Mom and I had started to shiver from the cold. We dried each other off, snuggling and warming up, then climbed into bed, Mom insisting I take the middle.

The second error is taking silence for an answer. When you pray to God and get only silence, that is neither a yes nor a no. It is simply the absence of a response. Whether or not God has heard your prayers is impossible to know, so however you interpret the silence, it is due to your own feelings. If you do something wrong and God doesn’t punish you, does that mean your actions are condoned or forgiven? How could you possibly know if God doesn’t explicitly tell you? God hasn’t deemed you unworthy; you deemed yourself unworthy. Do not try to find meaning in silence. All you hear is your own conscience.”

Still, she made me nuts. When the class would be working on an in-class assignment, she would float around the room, answering questions and offering advice. She always paused at my desk, squeezed my shoulder or rubbing it a little and ask if I needed help. I thought she kept touching me longer than she did with the other kids, massaging my shoulder or sliding her hand down to the middle of my hunched over back. I would break out in a sweat whenever she touched me, and my cock, which was in the teenage stage of always being semi hard, would become rigid and strain against the fabric of my underwear and pants.