Small Gems – Lead Us Not by Kate McMurray
”Tis one thing to be tempted…another thing to fall.” – William Shakespeare – Measure for Measure (Act II, Scene I)
Lead Us Not is a scary-tale. No, not in a things-that-go-bump-in-the-night kind of way, but in a life-seems-to-change-overnight kind of way. You meet the man of your dreams, fall in love, move to New York City to pursue your hopes of becoming actors, and the next thing you know, eight years after you met, a single bit of innuendo from a near total stranger has you questioning every last thing you know to be true about the man you love and know better than anyone else in the world.
That’s the way temptation begins—with doubts—because even with reassurances and promises, those doubts can continue to fester in the darkest recesses of your mind, causing you to question every action, every reaction, every word, every excuse when the one you love is late or begins behaving differently or working longer hours. And the longer those questions and doubts hang out there, unspoken and unanswered, the wider the rift and the deeper the silence becomes until suddenly you find yourself looking. You see someone else in a different light, and you listen to their offers and their propositions…and you consider…but only for a moment.
And then you either succumb or resist. You are either condemned or delivered. The choice is yours alone but the consequences, bad or good, will be shared. The pain will be doubled if you choose poorly.
See? Scary.
Kate McMurray has written a story so subtle that it fairly blindsided me with its cunning. It made me question, “what if?” What if I was lead into temptation and I followed willingly, and then I’d fallen before I even realized I’d been pushed?
That’s exactly what reading this story was like—falling and loving every word of it.
Download this FREE story HERE.
