From Behind His Glasses

By Lee Franklin

“Oh what a tangled web we weave?” Have you ever had a moment that was unlike any other moment in your life? The moment that had the power to determine who you were from that second until eternity... MELODY certainly did. In this first book of the Mini eSeries "Echos of the Past." We meet Melody she’s a beautiful church native with the same desire as most…she simply wants to be loved and apparently at any cost! This tale of love, trust and deception is a page turning addiction that forces us to remember that just because you’re brought up in church, doesn’t mean that your every act and/or deed will be considered Saintly but perhaps even downright Scandalous! Melody falls prey to her own tumultuous game and the end result manifests in her secret of bearing the weight of life altering condemnation. “This can never be exposed!” and she attempts to lock away one bad decision after the next …but have the keys been found?
Melodies' journey towards love, wholeness...and forgiveness for her self and others takes us on a ride of past reflections… (Even in our own lives.) Hold on as she begins this pilgrimage to find herself, forgiveness of her past mistakes and maybe even love.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: May 31, 2014
• ISBN: 9781483530024

Lee Franklin

Lee Franklin is an ordained minister in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and a board certified chaplain (Association for Professional Chaplains). She currently serves as a hospice chaplain in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. A frequent contributor to Daily Bible Studies, she is also the author of A Pastor s Practical Guide to Funerals (Abingdon Press, 2013). She writes for publications, including Circuit Rider for United Methodist clergy, and PlainViews, a chaplaincy journal. Lee also leads workshops for laity and clergy on pastoral care, grief, death, and dying.

Book preview

I lay there naked in a half dark room with my legs quivering. I could barely breathe due to the stench of weed and cigarette smoke. At that moment, every bit of my church up-bringing had been filtered out. I was literally drowning in the guilt of it all as he unapologetically finished relieving himself. Upon his completion, without as much as a millisecond of interruption, he rolled over to return her call without uttering one single word in my direction. Not even the infamous, How was it? I had secured my way into some really dreadful situations, but this had to be the worst. It went against everything I knew. What was I thinking when I agreed to do this? I knew better. I’m sure my brother was rolling over in his grave. I had never even once thought about how despicable I would feel. Nor did I lend my thoughts to contemplate how she would feel, at least not until now. I looked down at the floor to grab my panties, and I caught a glimpse of the liquid pieces of him discharged on my thigh. It was at that moment that I realized that he had removed the condom. He was a frat boy—the popular one on campus. Everybody wanted him and all that was extremely exciting until this present moment. I couldn’t wrap my mind around the thought of how many of the everybodies he had before me, and how much of that number was without a condom. I sat there thinking of the different possibilities until my insides began to swell with rage as I scanned the room in search of the abandoned contraceptive. I could hear him explaining to her why he couldn’t answer her call. I could hear him whispering lies in the same tone that he had earlier whispered them to me. I couldn’t be mad or at least not at him. The lingering fact remained that he belonged to someone else.

Then there was the sobering truth that he had confirmed it verbally all along, often stating that this moment, right here, was really all it was about. There was something in me that willed for more in spite of what I heard him say. I guess somewhere in the back of my ridiculous head, I thought I could change his mind. By simply being the best he’d ever had, if there was such a thing. But if it was, then maybe then, he’d consider me. Then again, maybe not. It was bad enough that he swore his loyalty to her right down to the moment he began to undress me. Adding further insult to my ego, he wouldn’t take off his glasses. That’s right; he wore those hideous sunglasses the entire time he indulged himself in me. It was definitely sobering. What sobered me most was the moment when he passionately spoke her name in my ear and without explanation, continued as if he had done nothing wrong. What was even crazier than that was the fact that I let him. Yet, it was so obvious that his head was filled with nothing but her. I couldn’t understand why he even had sex with other women if all he could think about was her. It bothered me to no end that even after my best attempt to please him physically and mentally, in hopes to sever their sexual ties, his thoughts of her obliterated my every move, even in her absence. There was no way I could win. I wanted so badly for him to live in that moment with me—just me, only me. I had imagined him gazing intensely into my eyes as we jointly reached the brink of our infatuation together. Nonetheless, this wasn’t happening. Was he drunk? Was I not good enough for sex without a barricade? Was he that guilty that he had to further detach himself by leering at me from behind his glasses? Or maybe his eyes would have released his true motives. I had been told the eyes are the windows to what’s within, so there must have been a storm raging in my soul at that very moment because I could no longer fight back the tears as they gushed from my eyes. Or maybe it was God’s way of reprimanding me for my actions. I knew He wasn’t pleased. With all I knew about God, I had made a conscious decision to deny His teachings and ways for a moment of what was supposed to be pleasure. I felt as if I had placed all my faith and longsuffering right on the floor next to my Victoria’s Secret’s panties. I was paralyzed with grief.

Before long, he had placed her on speakerphone in the other room and I became nauseated at the sound of her voice. I tried to step back into my under garments but was compelled to release them by my attempt to suppress the violence brewing on the inside of me. I held on to the nightstand, but the force of the projectile vomit commanded me to my knees. I kneeled there bare bodied with my panties around my ankles and my right hand submerged in vomit, all the while gasping to catch my breath. Not only was the floor covered in large portions of my lunch from that day but so were the pieces of clothing I had removed. Thoughts of worthlessness kept invading my mind. This was my all-time lowest. Luckily, there was an old towel draped over the stand, so I struggled to grab it. Once it fell, I began to wipe some of the lunch splatter off the side of his bed. I managed to collect myself enough to lift the weight of my body up on the nightstand and scrambled back onto the side of the bed. I could still hear him pleading his case in the other room. Disgusted at the whole situation, I leaned over and picked up my partially covered sweater and jeans to assess the damage I had done.

Ugh, how in hell can I wear this? I mumbled to myself as I dropped the saturated items of clothing back to the floor with the rest of the mess.

Now I clearly understood why all of my college friends always took what they called a whore bag. The smell was awful; it was so bad that no sooner than I was able to get my panties up, I was thrown back on my knees into a vicious cycle of gagging. Before long, I was hurling again. This time it