Heretics Anonymous

by Katie Henry

I didn’t lose my faith or anything. I never had it in the first place.

just because a person says something is true doesn’t mean it is, and anyone who tells you otherwise is probably trying to keep you from doing something fun.

“What about her? She’s wearing pants without a belt.” “Her trousers don’t have belt loops,” Father Peter says. “Yours do, so you need a belt.

Ya know, Gramercy had the same rule and its just as stupid reading it in this book now as it was 10 years ago in high school

“At some point, you’ll have to learn to follow the rules, whether or not you like them.” “Why?” I ask, and I’m instantly embarrassed at how childish I sound. “Because, trust me,” he says, looking at me with what might be pity or might be understanding, “your life will be so much harder if you don’t.”

“What a dick,” I say, in what was supposed to be a mutter but turned out a lot louder. There are suddenly forty eyes on me, and none are wider than Lucy’s. “I—what?” Sister Helen says, leaning on her desk for support. “He’s a dick,” I repeat, and this time I do mutter it. “God. For doing that.”

Wow he really needs to learn to just shut up

Everyone else is watching me like I’m a train wreck of a reality show, too entertaining to be disturbing.

“I mean Heretics Anonymous should go public. The rest of the school should know about us, even if they don’t know exactly who we are.”

Youve been in this group for 20 minutes, you dont get to decide this

The last time I was responsible for something, it was a beta fish, and it died after I overfed it. Hopefully, this will be more successful.

I have to tell someone about this. If I don’t, I’ll explode and do something really stupid. Like kiss Lucy. Or commit arson.

Ummm boi you may have some problems you need to work through

“I’m surprised by your indicknation over the penis speech bubble.” She gives me a dark look. “You’re making the rest of us feel like we’re being shafted.”

Father Peter sighs the kind of sigh that only comes from decades of hearing fifteen-year-olds giggle at the word “vagina.”

wearing a smile that could only be caused by Jesus or LSD.

Paul plops himself down on the edge of the stage in a way I think was supposed to seem casual. “So, guys. Sex.” He looks at us like we should be shocked and awed he’s said the word out loud.

Omfg the flashbacks

He sits back, looking disgustingly pleased with himself. You’ve got them now, I can almost hear him thinking. You acknowledged sex is fun! They went in expecting something stuffy and boring, but you’re different!

I have never been more embarrassed for anyone in my life.

He’s not”—and Paul smirks a little here—“some kind of cosmic killjoy.” New life plan: form a band called Cosmic Killjoy.

“Exactly right. It’s clean.” Paul holds the sticky side up for all of us to see. “This is what you are like, when you choose chastity. Pure, unblemished, untouched . . .” . . . and good at holding packages together? Did this dude compare our virgin souls to masking tape?

I know we’re in an auditorium full of people and taking orders from a man who thinks premarital sex is akin to murder,

I wonder what the Catholic Church does to people who get turned on at chastity assemblies. They probably castrate them.

“This,” he says, showing the tape off, “is what you are when you choose to live an unchaste life. And for the girls, there’s an extra level of danger. Biologically, women develop strong, hard-to-break attachments to those they sleep with. Though we all give away pieces of our God-given soul through unchaste actions, ladies, you give away pieces of your heart, too.”

I want him to die

“true love waits” and “chastity is not a burden, it’s a crown of triumph”

Fuck him

“Everything gets set up for you,” I say, “everything gets perfectly arranged for you, and you still act like a jerk, because you’re mad at other people half a world away, and that’s not Mom’s fault and it’s not Sophia’s and it’s not mine, so back off.”

As much as i think michael needs to shut up, his dad is a narcassistic bag of dicks so....

“Sorry,” she whispers. “But it’s almost nine. Can you drive me home?” “Uh” is all I can say, because not only did I wake up five seconds ago, but Lucy’s right hand is about five inches away from my leftover dream boner. This would probably freak her out, if she knew, because it’s really freaking me out, and I’m attached to it. “No one else is up yet,” Lucy says. “I AM UP,” Leftover Dream Boner says.

So I stare at her helplessly and wonder when death will come.

“Shut the fuck up,” I tell Leftover Dream Boner.

I suggest that the theology textbook could stop describing atheism as “one of the most serious problems of our time” and not suggest that agnostics suffer from “a sluggish moral conscience.”

Thatll go over well

“So,” he continues as I stare past him, through him, to the kitchen where there is food and no one is talking about sex. “If you ever need anything, to be safe—for both of you to be safe—I want you to come to me, okay?” I was wrong. Lucy was right. There is a God, and he hates me. There is a Hell, and I am currently in it.

There are worse things than your dad wanting you to practice safe sex

I slide to a stop across from the main chapel entrance, where the big bulletin board is, protected by glass, the border decked out in blue and green, same as the stupid plaid on their stupid ties. The music in the chapel gets louder and louder, reaching a crescendo as I wrap my hand up in the sleeves of my shirt and my hoodie and punch through the glass. It goes down without a fight, clinking and shattering as it falls onto the floor near my shoes. The music gets even louder, and I clear away the last bits of glass from the bulletin board

Good idea. Now you wont have to worry about losing lucy when you move because youre going to lose her now

I don’t know if I got them all. I don’t know if it matters. My hands won’t stop shaking.

Fingerprintsssssss

At worst, I’m going to get shipped to a re-education camp deep in the Vatican City catacombs, and Lucy will still hate me.

At worst youre going to be arrested for vandalism and expelled from school and killed by your parents

“I think I’m missing the mention of a crime.”

Vandalism??????????

I don’t understand how the St. Clare’s library can ban so many books for being “inappropriate” when they have a whole row of Bibles. Harry Potter might be a wizard, but I’m sure he never hacked a woman to pieces.

“Straight white boy destroys everything, world stops to listen?” She pops a piece of cinnamon roll in her mouth. “That’s the history of the Western world.”