As I stood there in front of him, I knew that this was the moment my whole life had been about. Nothing I had ever done or said or thought or felt would matter at all. Nothing I had achieved would exist after this moment. I wanted so badly to walk away, to change the future that awaited us both, but I no longer had a choice in the matter. That choice had been taken from me the day I met this man, or perhaps even before.
He looked at me in that way he has. He expected me to be there. He knew what I was doing. But then he'd known all along. That was one of the things that hurt the most. I had done everything I could to hide my fear, my pain, my disgust at what I knew I would do, but he knew. The others didn't. I think they sensed it, but they never understood. They never liked me, but they tolerated me because he liked me. What am I saying? They hated me. They feared me. They didn't know why, but they could tell there was something dark within me that would rear its ugly head one day. That day was now.
I was living in a moment of hell. A moment that had started at dinner, when the gentle bickering which had been going on between us turned to something more. I think he was tired. He knew what was coming and that it was going to happen soon. Mary tried to soothe him, but he was too much on edge. Even as he walked in to dinner you could see that his mind was somewhere else. His nerves were at breaking point. He looked more tired than I've ever seen him. Beneath it all there was a hint of anger - of a temper barely restrained. In truth, it's the first time I'd ever seen my gentle friend really angry. There had been flashes before, but now it was something else.
As we sat around the table the others pored over his every breath, gazing at him as if he was some kind of star. I couldn't face him. I couldn't look at him. I knew it would be tonight - It was I who had set the time with the authorities. The others just didn't understand. They thought this was just another dinner, another gathering of friends to drink and chat about meaningless ideas. We had ideals once. To show the world a better way to live; peace, not violence; love not hate. Now it was all about Rome. About guns. About war. About all the things he stood against.
He started to hand around the food, telling them how to remember him. They just got confused. That was when he got really angry - when he thought this could all be for nothing. He shouted and screamed and hit the table. Then he told them - us. One of us would deny him, and one of us would betray him. I didn't believe he would tell them like that. Somehow I'd thought it could be a secret; one that they'd never know. But now it was too late. They all ran in a panic until he told them that Peter would be the one to deny him. I've never seen Peter so pale. He just stood there shaking his head and promising that he would never do that. Then Jesus said again that one of us would betray him. I couldn't stand it any longer. Something inside me snapped. I stood up and shouted back at him.
They all stepped away from me like I had some disease. The way they looked at me - it was like... You don't ever want to know what it was like. I don't remember much else. We argued. I ripped the room apart. I hit him. I HIT HIM! Then we both just stood there staring at each other. I just wanted to reach him somehow and tell him it would be alright, but I couldn't.
I blamed him.
It's irrational but I blamed him for the way I felt. For what I had lived with. For what was to come. I screamed and screamed at him. I told him I hated him. And for that brief instant I did. Hell - I hated him, I hated all of them, and God knows, I hated myself. That hurt him. He told me to go. He WANTED me to go. He knew everything that was to come, and he wanted me to go.
Perhaps he just wanted it over with, but I couldn't let it end like that. I had to tell him - show him - that I still loved him. That I wasn't doing this out of hate, however it might look. My words came out jumbled and angry, but... There was suddenly a huge weight on my shoulders, crushing me. It felt like I had the concerns of every living thing on my back - I wasn't strong enough to bear it so I fell at his feet. I couldn't look at him. I just knelt there clutching his leg like it was the only thing in the Universe. We both just sat there sobbing as the others looked on. They STILL didn't get it.
At least they'd finally realised that something was happening. Something big. Something they didn't understand. They were all crying too. Hugging themselves. This man they'd idolised and adored was suddenly changing before their eyes - shattering, falling apart. And they just sat there.
I felt Jesus move. He lowered his hands towards my shoulder, the way he always had. I couldn't let him do it. I wasn't his trusted friend any more. I wasn't his right hand man, or any of the other things I'd ever been. I was the traitor who was going to destroy him.
His touch could always heal anything. I didn't want to be healed. I didn't want to be blessed or forgiven. I didn't deserve to be forgiven. I ducked away from him and walked away knowing that nothing could ever be the same again. The more we shouted and screamed, the closer we became. We were the only two who really knew what was going on. It was like we had a secret agreement of the worst kind. Now I walked away to fulfil my part of the bargain I had never made with him.
He had found me, broken, afraid, angry, alone. Along the way he had healed me, made me whole again, given me everything my life had lacked. And now we had come full circle. Now I was once again broken, afraid, angry and alone. I think that was what really upset him about this whole thing. That he had spent so long earning my trust, giving me a life, only to see it taken away.
I don't remember the walk to the guard house. When I got there a crowd of them were waiting. They looked at my tear-stained face with disgust, then followed where I led.
I don't know how I found him. I'd never been to the garden - it was vast with glades and secret corners but that night it was like the path was lit with torches. No one else could see anything, but the way was so clear, so bright. I couldn't take a wrong turn if I'd tried. Then we turned a corner and they were there.
I had kept a secret hope that the others would be true to their promises to look after him, but they were all asleep. The emotion -and wine- had been too much for them and they'd all passed out. Only Jesus stood there, alone, in the middle of the garden. Some force carried me forward until I stood before him. He looked so calm, so accepting. I think he'd somehow managed to accept what was coming. The haunted, frightened angry look was gone. He had tear stains on his face too.
You know, until then I hadn't considered what the signal to the guards should be. Should I strike him? Spit on him? Somehow distance myself from him?
This man stood against violence, against hatred. He spoke of love and gentleness. He had accepted me when everyone else in the world had rejected me. I loved him - he was my best friend, my teacher, my mentor - he was like a brother to me. So I leaned over and kissed him. In that one, tiny gesture my universe collapsed around me; everything I'd ever know shattered into a million pieces.
As I pulled back I caught a glimpse in his eyes. They were so deep. In them I saw everything. Everything that had been, and everything that would be. I saw his future, and mine. I saw how brightly he would shine, how he would be a light for millions - all of them calling his name with that look in their eyes that I have in mine. And I saw my place in history - it was so black, so dark, so cold. I tore my eyes away. I couldn't look at him. I stared down at the ground and wished it could open and swallow me. Swallow us both. Take us somewhere away from all this. Somewhere we could just sit back and have those intellectual debates we had once enjoyed. But it couldn't be. Nothing could ever be the same. I'd done it. Now I was a traitor.
He spoke to me then. "Judas. Must you betray me..."
For a moment, I was confused - he knew this would happen. He knew better than I did.
Then he added "with a kiss."
It was a private joke between us. I couldn't believe he could say it now. I lifted my gaze and he looked at me with so much love, and compassion and understanding that I fell apart. He reached out to me and this time I accepted his embrace - I fell into it and wanted to keep falling. We just clung to each other. I buried my head in his shoulder and he clung to me like I was the only thing that existed.
Then reality returned and the guards draged us apart. They threw me into a wall and I sat dazed and empty until they'd gone and I found myself alone.
I went to the high priest's house. It was the only place they could have gone, a belief confirmed by the hoards outside. The guards recognised me and let me in.
I stood there next to him as they interrogated him. He was so calm. Even the priests were shaken by the way he just accepted of the situation. Then in front of them all Annas thanked me for turning him in. It was done. My place in history was sealed. Now the whole world knew what I'd done.
Moments later he was taken away. He was surrounded by guards, but in that way he has he somehow moved them until he was next to me. He looked at me and reached out to me. I turned away. I didn't deserve his gaze, his thought, anything. Still he laid his hand on my shoulder for the briefest moment before he was dragged away from me for the last time. I treasure that touch - I can still feel it now.
I was near him though - I didn't leave the prison for hours. I watched as they beat him and flogged him. They tried everything they could to break him, but just when it looked like they'd destroyed him, he would get that peaceful look and they'd know they were back at the beginning. He was waiting to die. Everything else was just a nuisance.
But I was the one who put him here, so I had no choice but to watch. To be his witness. And it hurt. God it hurt so much to watch, to be so helpless. But now I couldn't look away. If my crime was treachery, my punishment was watching the result. I know he saw me there. A few times he reached out to me, stretching for the bars in the door so far away. I wished he could reach, but it was not to be. Even then, there, battered and bloody,His eyes held such wisdom. They burned so brightly in those moments. For all the power and the glory that his disciples had shouted about on the entry to Jerusalem, this was where it really appeared; this was the real glory - that light in his eyes as he sat in a prison, awaiting execution.
Finally I could take it no longer. I ran to the priest's house and burst in. I rambled. I begged. I pleaded. If I could have taken his place, I would. Anything to save him what was to come. But that was not my fate. I had endured my trial, now it was his turn. My part was done.
The priests threw me out into the street and it was there I accepted that my journey was over. There was nothing left for me anywhere. I had no friends; his followers wouldn't accept me now. I had done what I was put on this Earth for. I had seen my future; now nothing I ever did would matter, or be noticed, or be remembered. I was the one who had betrayed Jesus.
It was with crystal clarity that I bought a rope and climbed a tree near his prison. Even now I can't bear to be away from him. I just want to feel his touch on my shoulder one more time. I just want to know that he still loves me after all I've done. I just need to know that someone still loves me. I spent so long searching for love - any kind of love -- and now the only love I've ever known has been taken away by my own hand.
I refuse to believe that I didn't have a choice. I could have walked away. I could have stayed there at dinner and not gone to show the guards the way. Sure, they would have found me and disposed of me, but wouldn't that have been better?
But then they would have found someone else and it would have been wrong.
Jesus was a man who preached love. Whose life was testament to peace and compassion. His betrayer had to be someone who loved him and who he loved if what is to come will mean anything. It had to be someone close to him and someone who would die for him - willingly. For all their words, where are the disciples now? Peter denied him, as predicted, and the others ran and hid, or sat around looking dazed. None of them visited the prison. None of them pleaded with his guards for mercy. None of them even stayed around to see what happened.
Yes. I could have stayed there at dinner. But even then I knew that I couldn't deny my friend the future that is ordained for him. I don't know why he'll be remembered. I don't know how he will change the future, but I know he has a part in it. As do I.
I don't know where I'm going now. I imagine it will be somewhere dark and cold. Somewhere alone. Like the places I've spent most of my life. But I have to die too, just as he does. There has to be someone there for him in what lies ahead, and I can't do that if I'm here. They won't let me near him any more. So I have to find another way. I'll be there, at his side, with my hand on his shoulder every step of the way. I've found that same, calm place inside myself that he showed me - that he showed us all. And now I'm ready.
But one last question: If I could go back to that time before we met, and instead of letting him put his hand on my shoulder, just walk away so none of this would ever have happened, would I do it?
That's why I'm telling you this. Because tomorrow no one will remember anything about me except for that kiss. The one and only kiss I ever gave in my sad, pathetic life. But if just one person knows the truth, even for just an instant, if one person knows why I did what I did, knows that HE LOVED ME and that I LOVED HIM, then it's worth it, and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Because to have known him, to have been near him, to have loved, even for just those few months - that's worth an eternity of damnation.
Goodbye my friend.
My time has come.