The Execution by Sharon Cramer

breath caught in his
chest.
    Her head was bent down, a book in her
lap as she sat boy-style, cross-legged on the tree. Her simple
dress was bunched up in her lap, allowing the warm sun onto her
bare legs, her stockings and shoes tossed carelessly into the
sand.
    Her legs were tan, as though she had
done this before, and her skin was beautifully warm against the
gray of the dead, fallen tree trunk where she perched. She sat as
still as stone, the only indication of life was the way her hair
lifted and fell in the breeze; she was that absorbed in her
reading.
    D’ata stopped dead in his tracks, his
mouth falling open. He could not take his eyes from her. The sight
of her sitting, so uninhibited, upon his favorite perch was such
agony. His primary instinct was to flee, to turn around quickly
before she saw them, and quietly escape. He was certain he’d been
betrayed by God, or trapped by Satan, whatever the difference, if
there was one. Recently, he had begun to have doubts, and such an
awful trick this was. D’ata was at extreme odds with
himself.
    She hadn’t seemed to notice them at
all. Her hair fell in such a way as to provide a drape from the sun
and anything else that might bother her.
    The gelding, perhaps surprised at the
sudden halt, perhaps as part of the divine comedy, planted its
sweaty head firmly between D’ata’s shoulder blades and shoved
hard.
    Lunging forward, D’ata lost his
footing and stumbled, awkwardly flailing about as he attempted to
regain his balance in the shifting sand. He fell instead to his
knees.
    The horse tossed his head up, the
whites of its eyes rolling as it startled from its master’s clumsy
behavior.
     
    * * *
     
    Julianne, catching movement from the
corner of her eye, looked up suddenly from her reading. Seeing
someone ridiculously flailing about with a horse, she jerked her
skirts down to cover her bare legs. Jumping up from where she sat,
she took a step back from the intruder.
    Holding a hand up and squinting into
the sun, she noticed it was the young priest, the same priest who
had so horribly embarrassed her this morning. In fact, his behavior
had caused her to be chastised by several of the senior
parishioners after the encounter, as though she had caused the
transgression herself—as though she had done something to prompt
attention from the blathering idiot! This had been her first visit
to a new church, and they’d travelled further than usual to worship
in the beautiful cathedral. She and Yvette had looked forward to it
for some time, but it had gone horribly wrong.
    For the rest of the morning, she’d
been outwardly angry with him and anyone else who dared approach
her about the event. It had made things difficult with her father.
She was the one who’d suggested they visit the other
parish.
    How dare he put her in this position!
Who in the devil’s name did he think he was, approaching her as he
had, and why, in God’s name, had a holy man done such a thing
anyway? And, that pathetic congregation, as if he were God’s holy
gift to them! They had blamed her for his ignorance!
    She’d brooded most of the day on
it—and fantasized the rest. Most irritating was the notion that, on
some level, she was pleased. There was no denying it, he was
stunning, with his dark features and striking eyes. It had
thoroughly surprised her when she’d first knelt for communion and
looked up to see the most lovely priest gazing down at her. How
unfair it was for God to call such a man to the clergy.
    It had become a serious object of
contention for her, that she hadn’t been able to shake him from her
thoughts. This only added to her consternation, and seeing him all
of a sudden on the beach only served to bring back her
anger.
    Julianne was not one to be easily
befuddled by the attractiveness of the opposite sex. She was
fiercely independent and strongly devoted to her father and younger
brothers and sister. She was also deeply grounded in her religious
convictions and knew