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  He takes the piece of paper but doesn't look at it. He doesn't look at me. "I . . . I don't know what I'm supposed to say."

  You do, I realize. You just won't say it.

  "Think about it?" I ask.

  He nods, and I stand up. "I really appreciate this, Max. I know this wasn't what you expected." I take a step back. "I, um, guess I'll call you. Or you call me."

  He nods, then folds the paper in half and half again, and tucks it into his back pocket. I wonder if he will even look at it. If he'll tear it up in little pieces and rake it into the dirt. If he'll send it through the wash in his jeans so that he cannot read the words anymore.

  I start walking down to the curb, where I've left my car, but I am stopped by Max's voice. "Zoe," he calls out. "I still pray for you, you know."

  I face him. "I don't need your prayers, Max," I say. "Just your consent."

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  Faith (4:01)

  MAX

  Sometimes God just plain pisses me off.

  I am the first to tell you that I'm not always the brightest crayon in the box, and that I would never assume I could know what the Lord has up His sleeve, but there are situations where it's really hard to figure out what He's thinking at all.

  Like when you hear about a bunch of kids being killed in a school shooting.

  Or when there's a hurricane that wipes out an entire community.

  Or when Alison Gerhart, a sweet twenty-something who went to Bob Jones University and who had the prettiest soprano in the church choir and who never smoked a day in her life was diagnosed with lung cancer and dead in a month.

  Or when Ed Emmerly, a deacon at Eternal Glory, lost his job just when his son needed a pricey spinal surgery.

  Since Zoe's unexpected visit, I've been praying over what's the right thing to do here, but it's not a matter of black or white. We're in agreement about one thing: to us, those are not just frozen cells in that clinic; they're potential children. Maybe we both believe this for very different reasons--mine religious and hers personal--but either way, we don't want to see those embryos flushed down a drain. I've been putting off the inevitable by agreeing to keep them frozen, suspended in limbo. Zoe wants to give them the chance at life every baby deserves.

  Even Pastor Clive would side with her on that.

  But he'd probably go ballistic if I told him that this future baby was going to spend its life with two lesbian mothers.

  On the one hand, I have God reminding me that I can't destroy a potential life. But what kind of life is it to subject an innocent child to a gay household? I mean, I've read the literature that Pastor Clive's given me, and it's clear to me (and to the scientists who are quoted) that being gay is not biological but environmental. You know how gays reproduce, don't you? Since they can't very well do it the biblical way, they recruit. It's why the Eternal Glory Church fights so hard against allowing gay teachers in schools--those poor kids don't have a snowball's chance in Hell at not being corrupted.

  "Afternoon, Max," I hear, and I look up to see Pastor Clive coming in from the parking lot, carrying a bakery box. He doesn't smoke or drink, but he has a real weakness for cannoli. "Care to share a piece of gustatory paradise from Federal Hill?"

  "No thanks." The sun, behind his head, gives him a halo. "Pastor Clive, have you got a minute?"

  "Sure. Come on inside," he says.

  I follow him past the church secretary, who offers me a Hershey's Kiss from a bowl on her desk, and into his office. Pastor Clive cuts the strings tied around the bakery box with a hunting knife he keeps on a loop of his belt and lifts one of the pastries. "Still can't be tempted?" he asks, and, when I shake my head, he licks the cream from one end. "This," he says, his mouth full, "is how I know there's a God."

  "But God didn't make those cannoli. Big Mike did, down at Scialo Brothers."

  "And God made Big Mike. It's all a matter of perspective." Pastor Clive wipes his mouth with a napkin. "What's weighing you down today, Max?"

  "My ex-wife just told me that she's married to a woman and she wants to use our embryos to have a baby." I want to rinse my mouth out. Shame tastes bitter.

  Pastor Clive slowly puts down his cannoli. "I see," he says.

  "I've been praying. I know the baby deserves to live. But not . . . not like that." I look down at the ground. "I may not be able to keep Zoe from going to Hell on Judgment Day, but I'm not going to let my kid be dragged down with her."

  "Your kid," Pastor Clive repeats. "Max, don't you see? You said it yourself--this is your baby. This may be Jesus's way of telling you it's time for you to take responsibility for those embryos, lest they wind up in your ex-wife's control."

  "Pastor Clive," I say, panicking. "I'm not cut out to be a father. Look at me. I'm a work in progress."

  "We're all works in progress. But being responsible for that baby's life doesn't necessarily mean what you think. What would you wish most for that child?"

  "To grow up with a mom and a dad who love him, I guess. And who can give him everything he needs . . ."

  "And who are good Christians," Pastor Clive adds.

  "Well, yeah." I look up at him. "A couple like Reid and Liddy."

  Pastor Clive comes around the desk and sits on the edge of it. "Who have been trying for years to be blessed with a child of their own. You've been praying for your brother and sister-in-law, haven't you?"

  "Of course I have--"

  "You've been asking God to bless them with a baby." I nod. "Well, Max. When God closes a door, it's only because He's opened a window."

  Only once in my life have I had the same kind of parting-of-the-clouds-so-the-sun-shines-through moment as I have right now--and that was when I was in the hospital and Pastor Clive helped me clear away the smoke and bullshit to see Jesus, close enough for me to touch if I reached out. But now I see that the reason Zoe came to me today was because God has a plan for me. If I am not capable of raising this baby on my own, at least I know he'll be cared for by my own flesh and blood.

  This baby is my family, and that's where he belongs.

  "There's something I need to talk to you two about," I say at dinner that night, as Reid passes me a platter of scalloped potatoes. "I want to give you something."

  Reid shakes his head. "Max, I've told you. You don't owe us anything."

  "I do. I owe you my life, if you want to get technical about it, but that's not what I'm talking about," I say.

  I turn to Liddy. Weeks after the miscarriage, she still looks like a ghost. Just the other day I found her sitting in her parked car in the garage, staring out the windshield at a row of shelves that held power tools and paint. I asked her where she was going, and she jumped a foot, she was so surprised to see me. I have no idea, she said, and she looked down at herself as if she was wondering how she got there in the first place.

  "You can't have a baby," I state.

  Liddy's eyes fill with tears, and Reid is quick to interrupt. "We can, and we will, have a baby. We've just been expecting it to happen on our timeline instead of God's. Isn't that right, honey?"

  "And I've got a baby I can't have," I continue. "When Zoe and I got divorced, there were still three frozen embryos left at the clinic. Zoe wants to use them. But I think . . . I think they should go to you two."

  "What?" Liddy breathes.

  "I'm not father material. I can barely take care of myself, much less someone else. But you guys--you deserve to have a family. I can't imagine a better life for a kid than living here with you." I hesitate. "In fact, I've experienced it."

  Reid shakes his head. "No. Five years from now, you'll be back on your feet. Maybe even married--"

  "You wouldn't be taking my kid away from me," I say. "I'd still be Uncle Max. I'd still get to take him out surfing. Teach him how to drive. All that stuff."

  "Max, this is crazy--"

  "No it's not. You're already