The Tale of Armando, Part 3

(continued from the previous two posts)

Armando was a very active new member of the church.  He came every Sunday and to every activity where the missionaries were likely to be at.  Though I wanted to think of this as a good thing, he tried to talk to me or be near me or at least stare at me every time.  I found it horribly uncomfortable but made the best of it and did everything I could to avoid having a solo conversation with him.

Was I being cruel and unfriendly to a new member of the church?  My district leader thought so.  He thought Armando was a nice kid who needed the extra support of the sister missionaries to feel comfortable during this transition period.  But I remembered vividly that uncomfortable hour locked in Reina's room.  I dealt with it mostly by avoiding Armando as much as I could and trying to seem like I wasn't avoiding him.  In some ways I felt like I was still the 15 year old girl who fled to the bathroom during stake dances every time a certain boy tried to ask me to dance.  ("No, it's not that I don't want to dance with you, it's just that I have to go to the bathroom again!")

Things came to a head soon.  Holly was transferred just before Christmas and the mission president assigned me to be a senior companion.  Perhaps with Holly gone, Armando thought it was time to make his move.  Or maybe Christmas just seemed like the perfect time to give a gift to the missionary who had first talked to him.

So he gave me a little wrapped present after Sacrament Meeting.  It was an engagement ring.

My reaction to receiving an engagement ring from a boy I had never even dated, while I was still a missionary even, could only be described as disbelief.  Armando had taken off as soon as he had given me the present so he wasn't around to actually propose, and I thought I must be mistaken.  Maybe he had just given me a ring because he thought I would like one?  However, my new companion Lorena was shocked as well.  "An engagement ring???" she exclaimed in horror.  She insisted that I needed to give it right back to him.  And here is the part I regret the most out of all the business.  I was too mortified to directly confront Armando about it.  So we tracked down my zone leader and gave him the ring.  I asked Elder Zirker to take the ring right back to Armando and explain that I couldn't accept it.  He was mildly annoyed (he probably had a lot of things he had to take care of and didn't want to bother with my petty little gift refusal).  In fact he tried to get me to keep the ring, saying I would hurt Armando's feelings if I didn't accept it.  In Zirker's opinion, since Armando didn't actually propose, it was just a regular old gift, and Armando didn't mean anything special by it.  I was frustrated that he saw it that way, but fortunately my new companion was no shrinking violet (just like Holly) and she waded into the fray, insisting that it was in fact an engagement ring and that Zirker needed to return it.  Zirker gave in and took the ring, and I sighed in relief that at least I wouldn't have to break Armando's heart in person.  Although what on earth could he really expect?  That I would be a mind reader, know he was proposing to me, and wholeheartedly accept, even though I was a missionary?  Even though I had expressed absolutely NO romantic interest in him?

Not long after this, we had our personal interviews with the mission president.  I told my mission president about the ring and asked for a transfer out of the area.  My mission president granted my request and the next time when missionaries were shuffled around to new companions and new areas, I was sent to a different area of Queens, far enough away to take me completely out of Armando's reach.  I was relieved and quite heartlessly forgot all about him.

For awhile.  But Armando was not done with me yet.

(To be continued for the last time . . . .)