The Divine Economy of Salvation

by Priscila Uppal

  “Don’t look at yourself,” I tell her as I kick the door open with my heel. “Look ahead.”

  The place works. Upon reaching the first floor, I call out for help and Sisters come running in the dark, some with flashlights, some with candles, and some without any aid, using their voices against mine to feel out where we are. The Sisters are like trained police squads or firemen. All working in unison in a disaster, following the unwritten rules that they know to be the correct way of proceeding. Kim almost fell twice on our way up the stairs, and I want someone with a flashlight to take over for me. I am afraid I will burn her accidentally, trying to save her from falling. At the top of the stairs, the flame from the candle singed a strand of my hair. Kim coughed and plugged her nose momentarily before her labour pains started up again.

  On the way to Sister Ursula’s office, Sister Irene can be heard screaming.

  “Baaahhh!” she roars. “Baaahhh!”

  I am about to rush up and help her, but Sister Ursula stops me. By this time all the Sisters on the first floor are gathered around and, with little direction, divvy up the duties to be performed. Sister Rosalind goes to find Sister Bernadette, who has a cellphone, to call the hospital, our phone lines being affected by the storm. Sister Josie leaves to inform Father B. that the baby is coming, and Sister Frances runs up to the other floor to get any of the Sisters with medical training to help out. I think I shouldn’t be here, even if Kim has asked for me, because I have no medical training, except for a St. John’s Ambulance course that all the Sisters took together a couple of years ago. I breathed into a plastic doll. We did not learn how to deliver babies. So when I hear Sister Irene screaming, that is where I think I should be, assuming each Sister ought to use the tools they have to take care of each other. Sister Irene is my care. My presence might calm her down.

  “Don’t abandon the living for the dead,” Sister Ursula says curtly. “Go to Sister Irene,” she orders Sister Mary, another older Sister who spends most of her time in her room and handles the prayer meetings on Thursday nights with Father B. Sister Mary obeys.

  Sister Ursula, with the help of Sister Katherine and Sister Sarah, manages to get Kim to her office and placed on the examining table. She keeps looking to make sure I am there. I tell Kim I will stay with her as long as she needs. I try to appear calm, but under the beams of light, everyone can see she is bleeding badly. Sister Ursula scrubs her hands and puts on plastic gloves. Sister Katherine gets some water and bandages and towels to place underneath Kim, while Sister Sarah wipes the sweat off her forehead and places a pillow underneath her neck. I place the candle holder outside the door like an offering.

  “It hurts too much,” Kim pleads. “Oh God. It hurts!”

  It takes the three Sisters to convince her to open her legs.

  Kim screams with all her strength, her lips contorted into a rectangular shape, all her teeth pushing the skin to the outermost edges. She grips the padded cushions of the table and the white paper rustles underneath her, her legs in the stirrups meant for internal exams.

  “Try to push,” counsels Sister Ursula, pulling her white lab coat over her pink pyjamas. “Now try to breathe evenly.”

  Four Sisters stand guard like bedposts, each holding a flashlight, and many other Sisters come and go from the room, snatching anything that can be used for light: candles, bedside lamps that work on batteries, key chains that glow, lighters. With the women around her, Kim’s legs spread while Sister Ursula bends in between, the room resembles a vigil. The uttered phrases are low and precise, incantations.

  Breathe.

  Too much blood.

  Contractions four minutes apart.

  Ambulance on its way.

  Too late.

  “I don’t want to die!” screams Kim, groping for my hand and then crushing it inside her own.

  “You’re not going to die,” says Sister Ursula confidently. “You’re having a baby. Now concentrate. Concentrate. Get me my forceps.” The last command she directs to Sister Sarah, who searches for them on the shelves over Sister Ursula’s desk. Two damp handprints are visible on the sides of her sweat suit. She was performing yoga exercises when the commotion started.

  “I won’t let you die,” I tell Kim, who, with my words, squeezes my hand even harder. Her hair is drenched in sweat. Sister Katherine combs it off her face with her fingers, then tries to massage her temples. Kim convulses with pain. A faint trickle of blood runs down her lips. She bites the side of her mouth, following Sister Ursula’s demands for concentrated effort.

  “Push.”

  “Yes!”

  “Push.”

  “Yes!”

  Kim yells her words. Each Yes gaining in force, until she is on her own, pushing with all her might, throwing all her energy into the stirrups to set the baby free. The white paper beneath her is red from her waist down, the stain spreading. Sister Ursula attempts to hide it from her and mostly succeeds. Since I do not know anything about childbirth except from the few pamphlets I took home from the hospital the day Kim and I went for her checkup, I am unsure whether to panic. I was not present during Christine’s sons’ births, so I don’t know how it was for her, whether the loss of blood is normal. However, Sister Sarah, returning with the forceps, who I know worked as a volunteer in a hospital when she was a teenager and helped deliver a couple of babies, gives me concern. She is calculating the loss of blood and spreading towels across and underneath Kim’s legs. She is worried enough to leave the room twice to check on the ambulance.

  Kim holds on. In the strange multicoloured glow of all the little lights, her face takes on a greenish-yellow hue. She is straining, bearing down upon her body, forcing it to comply. For the first time since she entered our doors, I can see the will to live written on her face, pulsing in every muscle of her body. She wants to live. She wants to push the baby out. And I am scared like I’ve never been scared before. I thought I’d become accustomed to fright, but this is different. This is not a known fear. This fear could end in many ways. If my hand weren’t in hers, I’d be gripping my locket for strength. I’d be begging my mother to save us.

  “Baaahhh!”

  I turn my head rapidly, nearly yanking Kim with me, who holds onto me as if we were handcuffed. Sister Irene is nowhere in sight. The noise has come from Kim. Her face turns white and her neck goes limp. I begin to shake her.

  “Sister Ursula! She’s fainted.”

  “Get her a face cloth. And get me the liquid Demerol from the drug cabinet. And a syringe. Quickly.” She says all this while between Kim’s legs. Sister Frances hands me a face cloth, dousing it with cold water from the tap, a sympathetic nod exchanged between us. Sister Katherine produces the medication from the cabinet and hands it to Sister Sarah to load the syringe. Sister Ursula removes her green mask for a moment, standing upright.

  “I’m going to have to extract the baby myself. The ambulance will be here to take them to hospital once this is over. She’s going to have the baby here.”

  Although it is a tense situation, the announcement makes many of the Sisters waiting outside the door pleased. Several turn to each other silently and nod. Some hold hands outside the door. One or two actually go down on their knees and start to pray. Once immersed in a crisis, it is difficult to offer it up to anyone else’s hands. The women here trust each other more than they trust people on the outside, regardless of the new technologies such people might bring to our aid. It is meant to happen here, this miracle or this tragedy. They will see it out.

  The water seems to help. Although not fully conscious, Kim does regain her ability to hold her head erect. She glances around the room, stunned, her mouth open and droopy.

  “I don’t get it. I don’t feel any more pain.”

  “That’s good, Kim. Just push. Right?”

  Sister Ursula nods, sinks back down to gauge the progress of the child and the damage to Kim.

  “It’s coming feet first,” Sister Katherine whispers to me, shaking her head. “N
ot a single thing is going right.”

  I am about to ask her a question about this but she puts her finger to her lips, jutting her chin in the direction of Kim, who is staring up at me with such deep affection in her eyes that an outsider might think I am her mother.

  “Am I dreaming?” Kim asks me, taking my hand and placing it on her cheek. “Am I giving birth?”

  “Yes,” I reply. “Yes, my dear, you are.”

  “Premature?”

  Sister Ursula is the best doctor this convent has ever seen. That’s what Mother Superior says, and many of the other Sisters are of like mind. I put my trust in her. Feet first or head first, this child is going to live. Both children are going to live, I correct myself. Both children are going to live. Please.

  A couple of Sisters outside the door are humming. Or at least they seem to be humming, their voices melded together in unison, all intent on the same wish. I have the urge to pray as well, as I caress the hand in mine. Kim’s eyes have grown heavy-lidded. She struggles to keep awake. Sister Ursula and Sister Josie hand each other instruments and talk in short, blunt phrases. Their voices drain away from the one inside my head.

  A Psalm. A Psalm I sang at St. X. School for Girls, Bella in the front row, her voice echoing. The priest absent. Girls like me practising to please Sister Aline. Saying the words without knowledge of their meaning or impact. Saying them for the sake of saying. Girls wanting to hear their own voices rising into the air, the desire to create something beautiful, something holy.

  The scalpel rising.

  Kim falling asleep. A cut on her side, just under the rib cage. Sirens wailing. Sisters running back and forth, making room. A stretcher rolling. Sister Katherine telling them there is no time.

  Remember not the Sins of my Youth, nor my Transgression:

  According to Thy Mercy remember

  Thou me for Thy Goodness’ sake,

  O Lord.

  I remember the prayer and it is not to God that I recite it, but to the unborn child struggling to get out. It is from this child that I require remembrance and forgiveness. It is to this child I confess as if it were my own, as Sister Ursula draws it from the body, cutting out a space for it to emerge. Premature and small enough to hold in her two open palms. The blood of its life upon her hands, a tiny purple face. The sex hidden from my view.

  Who has come for you? little one.

  The men approach to secure Kim on the stretcher. Sister Bernadette has already gathered my jacket from my room. The power is still out, but the Sisters line the hallway with their candles and flashlights, illuminating the way for the men to follow, the cord cut and the baby wrapped in cloth in the back of the ambulance, hooked up to oxygen. The men have high-powered flashlights, but the women stand with their weaker ones, insistent on participating in the procession.

  Death is backwards, Sister Irene. You were right. Death is backwards. Another ambulance is also here, come for the pale outline of the woman I have just invoked. Her spirit lingering on. An intravenous tube tucked into the skin of her arm. The snow pounding down, dragging the boughs of trees to the harsh ground. The doors to her ambulance close as do ours. Goodbye, Sister Irene. Goodbye.

  Sister Ursula removing her mask and hugging Sister Josie, waving at me still holding Kim’s hand as we go. Two male paramedics bandaging Kim. The child breathing, artificially for now, but breathing. I have faith. I have hope.

  The baby’s purple chest rises. The closed eyes open for a moment, the white as pure as lilies.

  Before you were born, you were already a rumour.

  Speak.

  Breathe.

  Dear Child, Tell me.

  The renovations have begun for the Day Care Centre. Kim cannot be convinced to return to school, but we try. When she comes to see us, that is. She visits less often as the many months wear by, reminds us how much work it is to care for a child on your own: the feedings, the diaper changes, the sicknesses, the constant supervision. She says that with the Day Care Centre in the basement of the church, she might be able to find full-time work. Yet she’s elusive. I sense this is not entirely out of choice, but out of shame. She is thankful for what we’ve done for her, but now she desires her freedom. I can sympathize. And the child has grown well, despite the respiratory disease. Social Services makes sure the medicine is paid for. I figure in about a year or two, if Kim doesn’t bring her child here for care, we will not see her again.

  The Centre has solved my problem about what to do with the basement during the weekdays. We have arranged it so that there is a room for teaching with desks and a bulletin board, paint and pencils, and a blackboard. Glass walls divide the schoolroom, while the rest of the space is for playing. The toys, which have been donated by our parishioners as well as by a toy company Sister Bernadette has corresponded with, can be brought in and out on carts and in bins, easy to clean and removable for wedding and wake receptions on the weekends. The addict meetings, workshops, and prayer groups are now held in the back offices of the church. Two partitions have been removed, and the rooms can hold up to thirty-five adult people, fifty children. I am pleased. The large donation from the employer of Mr. Y., the lawyer who had phoned the convent asking about me, provided the down payment on our loans. Although there was no return address or name listed on the enormous cheque itself, I know who it must be from. I sent a card to him. And I think I can still recognize the large sprawl as his signature. He must have simply wanted to make sure it was from me. I know he will keep my secret. I tell Father B. a little lie about it. I tell him this is what the cheque was specifically donated for: a daycare. What does it matter if it works in the end? Father B. had needed to do a bit of convincing to the Bishop, but the Bishop relented. It means the church can qualify now for various grants. The application forms are on Mother Superior’s desk. Sister Bernadette is going to teach full-time there until word gets out and more children arrive and we need more Sisters to join in.

  What I’ve discovered is not that I have been released from my burdens. Far from it. I’ve found more. But before, my burden was a hungry and scared child. I held on to it, gave it milk, watched it grow out of my arms, out of control, until it was far too dependent to make its way on its own. And as Sister Ursula told Kim about her weight, that she wasn’t in danger because of the amount of weight she had gained, but the way it was being distributed, I’ve also found a better way to distribute my weight. Among my Sisters. I used to think that we were meant to walk in black because we were the mourners of the world. I had been assuming God was a man, a parent. He must be a child. And I shouldn’t have been stuck on the present paying the debts of the past. I should have been asking whether the present can pay the debts of the future. It’s a practical matter. There is no answer, only action. As for the transgressions of my youth, no one may have found me out yet. But like anything else, like a silver candle holder buried deep in the soil of a rock garden, I too can be dug up. I can be found. So can this. Forgiveness is not absolution as I’d once supposed. It’s a carrying, owning one’s sins. It will be found. It must be found. Then there will be confessions, and I will listen. You see, I live here. My name is Angela. You may remember me.

  ∼ ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ∼

  For the U.S. publication of this book, I’d like to extend my sincere gratitude and thanks to Hilary McMahon of Westwood Creative Artists for her hard work and great enthusiasm and to Antonia Fusco at Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill for her empathetic reading of my nun and her keen eye.

  Published by

  ALGONQUIN BOOKS OF CHAPEL HILL

  Post Office Box 2225

  Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27515-2225

  a division of

  WORKMAN PUBLISHING

  225 Varick Street

  New York, New York 10014

  © 2002 by Priscila Uppal.

  All rights reserved.

  Lines from P. K. Page’s “Autumn” are from Hologram, Brick Books, 1994. Lines from Paul-Marie Lapointe’s “Poem for Winter” are from The P
oetry of French Canada in Translation (John Glassco, ed.), Oxford University Press, 1970.

  This is a work of fiction. While, as in all fiction, the literary perceptions and insights are based on experience, all names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. No reference to any real person is intended or should be inferred.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available for a previous edition of this work.

  E-book ISBN 978-1-61620-234-7