032:

He followed her to her condo, and watched as Jake tiredly reentered his own place a few doors down. Melia unzipped the heavy jacket that had kept her warm while on their walk. The baby began to wail in earnest, looking around in annoyance, knowing that a stranger was in the house. Melia got the hot water on and the chocolate packets out with mugs.

She sat down to nurse. Little fists scratched and kneaded impatiently. Robert fixed the hot drinks and brought them in, setting hers on the coffee table and sitting on it close, facing her. "You don't drink." He stated softly, not wanting to disturb Hannah, who turned, still nursing, to glare at him.

"I drink hot chocolate." She said.

"Mormons in general don't drink."

Her brows rose. "Is this a quiz?"

He shrugged. "I've never hung out with a Mormon. And... I usually drink."

Melia eyed him quizzically. "Oh. What religion are you?"

He eyed her curiously. "Atheist."

"Oh. I've heard that before. But in the end everybody who said they were atheist was actually non-denominational."

"No, I prefer a true non-traditional approach. I deny the existence of God."

"To deny means you have to acknowledge Him on some level." She adjusted her baby, pulled her top up a little to cover for modesty's sake, and then looked up at him again.

"You would debate me on this? You'll lose."

"You over estimate your convictions." She laughed mirthlessly. "I have no problem defending my faith on any level."

"I'm not asking you to defend your faith; I'm simply stating that there is no God."

Melia shook her head. "So, to you, existence is pointless?"

"A mere accident." He finished his mug and set it down, resting his hands on his knees.

"Then why did you get married?"

"For love."

Melia shook her head and scrunched up her lips in disdain. "A man made creation. You let other men, base and immoral, dictate your behavior while on this earth? What for? A true atheist can have no such convictions. You won't be able to tell me where your love erupted from. It wasn't in your genetics, or your moral conscious... for you couldn't have one. Again another man is dictating these things, if you truly believe there is no higher power."

"Why would God take Karen?"

There was anguish in this statement, and she realized it wasn't that he didn't believe in God it was that his conception of God was skewed. "To God death is simply the transfer of spirit from one existence to another. There is no pain, no punishment, no deliberate need to make you sad."

"God doesn't inflict pain?" He scoffed. "I am in pain, a great deal of it. If you say love is from God, and only from God, my moral choices or whatever, then God also inflicts pain."

"Pain is a condition of our mortal existence. Jesus Christ suffered pain." She smiled gently at him.

"So, you're saying I won't be in pain when I'm not alive? Yeah, because I won't be able to feel anything."

"All pain is relative to what dimension you are currently residing in. Earth life is a temporary probationary time period that exists only for our benefit in understanding flesh and all its attendant vices and conditions. Pain is one of the things we get to experience. I think there will be forms of pain in our lives forever. I would die a thousand deaths of pain forever to lose Hannah. God himself has lost some of his children, I'm sure he will feel a form of pain forever because of it. He wouldn't be God if he didn't feel that pain. So, what makes you think that God can prevent you from feeling pain?"

"You're saying he can't prevent himself from feeling pain."

"Pain is a choice. If we didn't love, it wouldn't bother us. But we do love, we choose to love, and God doesn't take that away from us just because it might cause us pain. He lets us have it at our own request. Pain is a consequence of our choice to love."

Robert raked his fingers through his hair staring at the floor. "You're winning." He said.

Melia shrugged. "This isn't even me at my best. I'm half asleep sitting here all warm and nursing and ..."

"You make sense."

"Which makes you confused, not an atheist."

"We should continue this conversation."

"You should come to Matthew and Tom's baptism this Sunday."

"I'll be with Karen." He said.

"If you change your mind, you can come with me and Hannah."

"I might need to get out." He said and gave her that under the lashes look.

"Yes, you might." She agreed. "It's at our home in Montana. About an hour and a half away by private plane. You wouldn't have to be gone very long. Baptisms take like a half an hour."

"Expensive four hours then."

"For whom?" She cocked her head to one side and gave him a meaningful eye. "Or you could just go to church this weekend somewhere by yourself."

"Highly doubtful. I'm not that guy, the one who finds God just because his wife is dying. Karen wouldn't want that."

Melia shrugged and looked down at Hannah's sleeping face. "Well, you've been invited."

"So, does this make us friends?" He cocked his head at her, twitching the goatee and mustache. The dark eyes were so mesmerizing.

Melia swallowed. "I think it qualifies."

"Will you come see my wife with me?" he asked.

"You think that's what she wants? To see me..." She didn't add, but the thought went through her head.... Another woman....

"A young and talented actress who has recently gone through a terrible loss herself." He stated, standing up abruptly as was his way. He straddled the table for a brief moment and then made his way to the front door.

He twirled his finger in the air and indicated the whole room. "Like what you've done with the place. Very homey." And then he closed the door behind him and Melia was left yawning and feeling slightly mystified by the appearance of this man in her life, hoping that perhaps Heavenly Father had sent him to help her get through her loss, by helping someone else with theirs.

********