**Scene: “An Unopened Chapter”**
Faith balanced a sturdy canvas tote in one arm, the waxed paper from a half-eaten scone still tucked beneath the strap. Honey had scribbled a note on top of the book order invoice: *“He looks tired. Maybe tuck in some sunshine while you're there?”*
She knocked lightly on the door of the church office, almost hoping no one would answer. But Ben opened it almost immediately, sleeves rolled to the elbows, glasses perched low on his nose.
“Faith,” he said, clearly surprised but not unfriendly. “I didn’t know you were on delivery duty now.”
She smiled, trying not to fidget. “It was either me or Huck, and he said his vibe was more Dickensian than pastoral.”
Ben chuckled and stepped aside, motioning her in.
She set the books gently on the desk and was about to make her exit when something caught her eye—a framed photo of two boys, maybe ten and twelve, with matching crooked grins. Beside it, a child’s watercolor of an angel and the words *“Hope lives here.”*
Ben followed her gaze. His shoulders softened.
“My sister passed away,” he said. “Suddenly. I’ve been caring for her boys while their dad gets his feet back under him.”
Faith looked up slowly. “That’s why you weren’t at service last week.”
He nodded. “Yeah. I didn’t tell anyone. I guess I didn’t want to make a sermon out of my grief.”
There was a pause. The kind that doesn’t ache, but *listens*.
Then Faith said, barely above a whisper, “You probably could have. And I think... I would have stayed to hear it.”
He looked at her then—really looked.
“You’re welcome to stay anytime, Faith. In the music. In the mess. In all of it.”
---
Ben moved to pour a second mug of coffee, gesturing for Faith to sit if she wanted to stay. She hesitated, then lowered herself onto the chair opposite his desk, journal still cradled in her hand like a shield she hadn’t decided to lower yet.
The steam between them curled like a bridge.
> “What was she like?” Faith asked quietly, nodding toward the boys' photo.
Ben smiled, though it looked like it had to pass through a veil of grief first.
> “Fierce. Thoughtful. Could make a room laugh or cry with the same story. Her name was Claribel.”
Faith traced the rim of her mug. “I’m sorry I didn’t know. I didn’t really… let myself know much of anyone after—” She stopped.
He didn’t push. Just waited.
> “After Noah,” she finished. “I thought I could worship God and still keep walls around the people.”
Ben nodded slowly.
> “Makes sense. People burn us in sacred places, and suddenly it’s easier to treat everyone like strangers with kind faces.”
Faith blinked, not expecting understanding to sound so casual. So true.
> “But you stayed,” she said, watching him. “After what happened. After how fractured everything felt here. Why?”
Ben leaned back slightly, fingers laced around his mug like it steadied more than the coffee inside.
> “Because I believe in church as a *place of becoming*, not of arriving,” he said. “And I think people are craving that again. Not perfection. Not showmanship. Just honesty. Healing. Community that tells the truth and sings anyway.”
He let the words land.
> “I want this place to be safe again,” he continued. “For the ones who stayed too quiet for too long. For the ones who left because it stopped sounding like grace. And for the ones—like you—who have something sacred still simmering beneath the surface.”
Faith looked down. Then up. Eyes glistening, but not from sorrow.
> “I used to think that if I sang again, it would mean I’d forgiven too easily. That I’d forgotten.”
Ben shook his head.
> “Maybe it means you *remembered*—who you are, who He is, and what the music means when it’s not wrapped in pain.”
She exhaled, then opened her journal. Flipped to the page with the lyrics from *So Close.*
> “I don’t know if I’m ready to stand on a stage again.”
He smiled gently.
> “Start by standing in the room. That’s more than enough.”
---
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