Man on a Mission

Man on a Mission

“The bishop showed me the picture this morning,” Bob said gravely.

“What picture?” answered his friend Tim.

“The one you took, either you or Fred or Liam, but I think it was you.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Tim, but the color rose bright in his face and his ears became very red.

“That’s what I wanted to say to the bishop too, but you got too much of my face for that. I couldn’t pretend it wasn’t me, “ said Bob. “Look, I saw you fooling around with the camera, but why did you do this to me?”

“All right. I did take the picture. I didn’t mean to get your face in it, but you turned your head just then. What I wanted was a picture of Jeanne Marie, not of you anyway.”

“But Tim, you didn’t get her face in it at all! I’d like to have a picture of her face, ” said Bob. “I’d like to remember what she looked like.”

“The part in the picture is the part I wanted to remember,” Tim said. “She had been looking toward you, and then sort of tripped or something. You looked over and she looked away, just as I snapped the picture. Right after that Brother Fred came up, and I didn’t want him to see me.”

“You have no idea how much trouble this has gotten me into though, ” said Bob, shaking his head.

“I have some idea, and I’m really sorry. I didn’t know Dad would pick up the pictures from the photoshop. He wanted to show them to the men’s group at church tonight. He’s so proud of us, or he was. Now he figures I was up to something too.”

“So I’m not the only one who got yelled at?”

“Well, by the bishop, yes,” said Tim.

“What do you think will happen? Your dad’s on the missionary board. What did he say?”

“He said it was a disgrace to think that after working hard all summer on our missions we’d ruin it all with a little fling like that.”

“Ruin it all?” said Bob. “Doesn’t he know how hard we worked?”

“He says it looks like we didn’t take the Lord’s work seriously enough.”

“Oh no, he’s wrong there!” Bob protested. “I took it very seriously. I worked hard on my mission, and I’ll be going home to get married and raise six or eight children. I have lots of responsibilities ahead of me. We all do. I just wanted one little chance for –well, freedom—like other guys have.”

“I know, Tim, I know. All we can hope for is that the bishop knows it too. Maybe he’ll remember how he felt when he was young.”