by Lily Miles
My stomach rumbles at the thought of dinner: food. Surely our fast would be broken soon?
As was usual at this time, I’d heard the cooks in the kitchen, their pots banging. Now the scent of dinner was wafting through the halls of the convent. Right now I’d get on my knees and beg for just a spoonful of oatmeal.
“Are you rejecting me?” Eva asks in her dry, incessantly irked tone. “Would you really rebuff your own sister this way?”
“Of course not!” I answer with a gasp, one hand flying to the rosary around my neck and giving it an apologetic squeeze. “I'm just wondering what prompted this. You usually stay so …” What was the right word here? Aloof? Snooty? Condescending? “Independent.”
Yes. That sounded like a compliment. Hopefully.
Eva’s face gives nothing away. I don’t think she’s even blinked since she took her spot in front of me. She reminds me of a lizard sunbathing on a desert patio. Those creatures just stare ever onward, their expression never changing, no matter what happens around them.
“I just don’t want to be alone,” she shrugs. Her eyes avert mine for the quickest of seconds, the action happening so fast that, had I blinked I would’ve missed it in its entirety. My heart warms slightly for her.
Loneliness. I know it well.
It’s one of the costs of following the dream of joining the convent and pledging yourself to your faith forever. Your vow is one of chastity and isolation. You can only go so long at it alone; eventually, you must depend on your sisters for company.
“Okay,” I answer, making the mistake of patting her arm.
Eva recoils from me like I’ve just spit in her face, her mouth contorting into that same snarl once more. I keep my face pleasant, even though I want to roll my eyes. I’d noticed she always does this when touched before she can prepare herself for it, so it doesn’t hurt my feelings. Living between these high, stone walls, you get used to not being touched. I’d forget what a hug even feels like if Catherine weren’t so adamant on embracing me whenever the mood strikes her.
It occurs to me then that Eva could use a friend like Cat, even if neither of them would ever admit such a thing. Maybe, one day, they’ll finally see the good in one another. I know there’s good in Eva, no matter how much she tries to pretend she looks down on all of us and wants to squash us under her heel like the bugs she thinks we are.
After I collect my things from the room I share with Cat, I walk with Eva down towards the main hall of the church. We move along in silence, our figures casting shadows against the cobbled gray floor as we pass under the electric lights. I can only imagine the battle that had to happen to convince Mother Antonia to allow such technology under the roof of the nunnery. If it were up to her, we’d still be washing our clothes in basins and cooking our meals on a simple hearth, all by candlelight. While I know certain simplicities can be nice on occasion, too much would make life here at the convent unbearable.
Eva’s long legs march like a toy soldier’s, her arms unmoving at her side. I watch her from the corner of my eye, her gaze focused straight ahead in grim determination. Like Mother Superior, she doesn’t often smile. In fact, Eva reminds me a lot of Mother Antonia Humilitas, but just on the surface. Underneath all that, I believe Eva still has a beating heart and life in her veins, unlike our reverend mother, who is cold and dead through and through.
“What?” the brunette nun grunts when she catches me staring at her. Her long fingers brush her high, gaunt cheekbones. “Do I have something on my face?”
“No,” I answer, almost proud to have been the one to catch the vigilant nun off guard for once, instead of the other way around. A sigh escapes Eva’s tight lips. “Then stop staring, Sister Margaret.”
I do as she asks, focusing my eyes ahead. We pass by tall arches and marvelous stained glass windows that peer out onto the blue sky. Below the convent, rolling green fields and hills lead out to the surrounding forests. I try to remember what it felt like to walk on city streets, talk on telephones, watch tv and play games on my laptop before I came to the convent. But now I can hardly remember what a keyboard feels like under my fingers or the soft comfort of my denim jeans, let alone a ponytail curling against the back of my neck without being squashed by a veil. That all feels like such a distant, foreign world now. If I ever did want to leave this nunnery, I’d be so behind. I know how fast the modern world revolves, and it would’ve kept on spinning without me.
But, then again, it’s not like I'm going anywhere. I'm safe here in my cloistered shell, and safety is all one could ask for, isn’t it?
Once we reach the main chamber of the church, Sister Eva slows to a stop. Sometimes our priest is here, but today he’s tucked away in one of his back offices working on his sermons. Or perhaps Sister Grace has begged him to show her his private library again. He has the most sacred of works back there, and Grace adores just gazing at them. She knows she mustn’t touch any of the ancient, sacred texts, but just being near them leaves her glowing for days.
We settle side by side in a pew near one of the faceted windows.
Unsure if Eva is ready for me to look at her, I stare instead out the glass. The colors seem to swirl together as the sun shifts outside, the splendid rainbow of shades making me dizzy. It’s so beautiful I almost want to cry. This is why I'm here, I remind myself silently. To marvel at the Lord’s wonder and to dedicate myself to him. I can’t be led away from this path I’ve chosen.
“Your face when I showed up … you looked like something was bothering you,” Eva remarks abruptly.
I turn back towards her, head tilting. I can only imagine what my face looked like, all flushed cheeks and dilated pupils.
Eva isn’t looking at me, still focused ahead on the priest’s pulpit. I stare down at my clasped hands instead. My fingernails are digging into the back of my other palm, red crescents starting to form. I can’t tell her—I can’t tell anyone.
I try to get Trevor out of my mind but he remains, his eyes glowing against the backs of my eyelids.
Again that heat begins to swell inside of me, as it does every time my mind wanders towards Trevor. The broadness of his shoulders, the green pools of his eyes … what is it about him that makes my blood seem to simmer? Heat warms my crotch again and I’m aware of an inner craving, an emptiness that cries out to be filled, now. I shift back and forth, biting my lip.
I can’t feel this now. Not here in the church. It’s wrong.
I close my eyes, willing away the overwhelming sensation, but that seems to only make it swell inside of me. It builds further, making me gasp and clench my knees hard together.
Eva cocks her head, eyes narrowing on me. I hate the way she stares at me as though she can see right through my cloak and veil. I can hardly breathe, the boiling of my veins making my temperature rise and sweat form on my brow.
Desperate to get away from her prying eyes, I jump out of the pew and dash back towards the doors of the church. My feet click the entire way, the sound bouncing from wall to wall as Jesus looks on from the stained glass and from his spot on a crucifix above the pulpit. I run faster and faster, willing the heat of the exertion to replace the heat inside my core, but it all seems to slither and twist together until everything is spinning wildly around me.
As soon as I'm outside the church, I gulp in greedy mouthfuls of air, but find no relief until I grab my veil in both hands and tear it back off my forehead. My long, dark hair springs forth, slick from sweat, and I collapse on the sidewalk outside the convent in a damp, trembling heap. My hands press against my lower stomach, trying to figure out the source of those bewildering feelings, hoping they aren’t rooted in the naughtiness I suspect.
Perhaps I should go see the doctor, just to make sure. Maybe there’s something wrong with me … this type of burning in my veins, it can’t possibly be normal, can it?
Suddenly, I'm aware of eyes on me from somewhere around the convent grounds. I can feel someone watching me, their eyes taking in my hair uncovered
by the veil. Expecting to see Eva smirking from the shadows behind me, instead my gaze collides roughly with that of the very gardener I’d been trying to avoid.
Trevor stares at me from over the handle of his shovel, which has plunged partially into the earth under his feet. But though he says nothing, his face is not a frozen mask like Eva’s. Quite the contrary. There’s something in his eyes, something hungry, something tempting, something dangerous.
The heat that I feel, he can sense it. Because he can feel it, too. I can see it in every line of his focused face, as he gazes at me fixedly.
Muttering a prayer, I grab my veil and rush back inside, comforted only when I hear the slam of the heavy door behind me.
What is happening to me? And why is it Trevor who causes these confusing—and thrilling—sensations?
8
Trevor
In the half second it takes me to throw my shovel down on the green bed of grass beneath me, Margaret is already gone.
She was there for only a moment, like a mirage or a mystical illusion, just long enough to make me certain that angels do walk this world.
Her hair was not at all what I expected it to be. Though I could tell by her complexion and brows that her locks would be dark, I’d been expecting glossy, smooth hair that frames her pretty face. But her hair was a wild, cascading mane that went way down her back. I found I liked her hair better untamed than I ever would have if it was as smooth as I imagined.
Under that veil and that wild hair there is a wild heart, I’m sure of it. I can tell.
Abandoning my task, whatever it might have been—I sure as hell can’t remember now— I bend over and dig through my bag. My fingers brush that weathered, old notebook I always have with me. Tugging it free from the bottom of my bag, I collapse down on the soft ground and lay it on my lap.
After looking carefully up and down the grounds to make sure no one was watching me, I stretch my legs in front of me and thumb open the book. If somebody sees me I could get scolded for not doing my duties.
Though the list of things I could bring with me when I joined the convent staff was extremely limited, I’d managed to keep this one special item hidden. I’d had this notebook for a year and a half, having picked it up back home when I started getting my act together. I’d had art therapy to help me through crises growing up, and been singled out more than once as a budding artist with professional potential. Unfortunately, I hadn’t fulfilled that promise—at least yet—but I still enjoyed drawing whenever I could. On each of the pages, I’ve drawn various people in my life, or strangers in a restaurant or on a bus, or scenes, even objects like cars that I love. I draw whatever I feel like, and I find it helps calm me and keep me out of trouble.
On the most recent page is the face of a beautiful woman. Plump, delicately curved lips are set in a pale face sketched by my pencil: Margaret’s face. Over the last few days, I’d spent hours hunched over this page working on getting it right, but it wasn’t as good as I’d like it to be yet. Her eyes weren’t quite the right almond shape and the bridge of her nose was just a little too strong, but I would get it there, and then I would show her.
I’ve drawn many things over the last year and a half, but nothing quite as lovely as she.
I flick my pencil carefully over the page, just beginning to mark the wispy, wild curls so that when I'm alone in my room later, I’ll be able to remember just the way they danced across her forehead and down her back. But with a chuckle I realize I'm not going to forget that sight anytime soon. I can still see her perfectly in my mind’s eye, her expression marked with shock as our gazes locked. She’d blushed and run away the moment she realized she’d been caught without her veil by male eyes, but what a sight she was to behold.
I’d never experienced anything as surprisingly gorgeous as the sight of her without her veil. There’s no other woman like her on this planet, I’m sure of it now. It’s totally unfair that I won’t be able to hold her hand in my own or taste her lips. Or other parts.
She’s so tantalizingly close, yet so far, unattainable behind the strict barriers of religion and equally impenetrable walls of a convent fortress that keeps her locked away. I still don’t understand any of it.
I’d thumbed through the small bookcase we had in the living room of the male dormitory to see if I could find any literature about the nuns and their oaths, but the books had been boring and there isn’t much there, anyway. Most titles had been about the architecture of the convent, while others had been on notable people who’ve passed through the halls. Then there was the odd Tom Clancy or John Grisham thriller.
In the living room, the handful of groundskeepers never talked much among ourselves. Nobody was outright unfriendly, it was just like we all mostly wanted to be left alone. I suppose we all have reasons for coming out here, and they’re as unwilling to share theirs as I am mine. Because some things are better left unsaid. Though I do wonder if I'm the only one whose eyes wander towards the nuns sometimes. Not just any nun, however. Only my nun. My Margaret.
“You, boy,” a voice calls.
I snap the notebook shut and tilt my face upwards to see the mother superior of the convent trundling towards me. Her eyes are cast down at the earth around us so as to avoid stepping on any errant rocks or sharp twigs, and so I have just enough time to shove my notebook back into hiding.
“Are you really taking your break so early?” she asks with a frown.
“My hands were starting to ache so I thought I’d give them a quick rest, Mother,” I answer with a taut smile.
I’d made sure my bag was safely secured and she wouldn’t be able to spy into it. I'm glad I did so, because she takes her time scraping her eyes across my backpack, as though looking for contraband. I don’t have anything illicit in there except for the drawing of Sister Margaret, but I don’t think that would go over well with the mother superior. Aside from the occasional lusty thought towards that beautiful nun, I have followed every rule as closely as possible. I don’t want to get into any more trouble.
I really do want to make the best life that I can. Sure, before I may have been somewhat of a lowlife, but I want to prove that people can change; I want to one day be worthy of someone as beautiful inside and out as Margaret, though I doubt I’ll ever meet someone who matches her perfection.
Before I can wonder if the mother superior had come all the way out over the grass just to scold me for sitting still for a moment, she huffs and looks back at me with those narrowed, cold eyes that match the shade of the stone walls rising behind her. The hair on the back of my neck goes up, the same way it always does when she gives me a look like this.
I don’t like the woman, and I certainly don’t trust her. She has the eyes of a rabid dog and the expression of a hunting wolf. I’ve seen many faces like that in my troublemaking days. It’s never good.
I'm struck with the sudden urge to grab Margaret, hurl her over my shoulder, and take both of us as far and as fast from this place as I can run, but I know that’s ridiculous. For one thing, Margaret would never allow such a thing, and besides, where would I go? Would I just return to the streets so I could get jailed again?
Mother Antonia gazes levelly at me for a moment, her eyes boring into mine before she finally begins to speak in that growling tenor of hers. Her voice is deep for a woman, the kind that gets its edge from constant yelling.
“Since you’re going to be more involved with the nuns here, I wanted to make sure that you completely understand your task here at the convent, Trevor,” she declares frostily.
She stares down at me, her black habit flapping around her black socks and masculine black shoes, as her hands are planted firmly on her big hips. Though far shorter than I, in this position above me Mother Antonia reminds me of an ominous, looming building, the kind that would never fall no matter what storm or earthquake or tidal wave should ever barrage its walls. I can’t help but shudder.
When it comes to “being more involved with the nuns,” I have
no idea what she’s talking about. Hopefully she hasn’t caught me eyeing Margaret, because I think that’d be bad for everyone. Really bad.
I clear my throat awkwardly and tug at my collar, but Mother Antonia grimly purses her lips. She stops talking and gazes at me expectantly.
“I think I understand what I'm doing here, for the most part,” I manage to respond. “To be honest, the instructions have been a little lacking, but I’ve been able to figure things out. I know where the seeds are now so I won’t be wandering into your office again anytime soon. And I know that my duties, in particular, are the daisies and roses and not giving any nuns leaves to make tea.”
Hoping to ease the intense tension between the reverend mother and myself, I crack a wry smile at my joke, but she remains impassive. The mother superior’s eyebrow arches up so high it’s almost at her gray hairline, though of course I can’t see that under the veil. She blinks her eyes a few times as though I hadn't made any sense whatsoever, and then ruffles up like an irritated pigeon.
“What? Young man, no. I'm not talking about seeds or daisies or even tea. I'm talking about the virtue of the sisters here. Just as it is your responsibility to guard the grounds, it is your duty to guard their morals. If you see or experience anything of less than holy standards, you must report it immediately to me. Are we clear?”
Her words soak slowly into my skin, leaving me feeling repulsed.
Oh, we’re clear, alright.
She’s asking me to be a snitch, to come running to cling to her skirts if I see anything scandalous like Margaret’s sudden removal of her veil. She may have worded it as guarding the girls’ morals, but I can see right through Mother Antonia’s carefully chosen words. The mother would surely love to know about Margaret’s reckless behavior, but like hell I'm going to say anything: giving Mother Antonia news of the nuns would be like feeding a helpless bunny to the predatory wolf this vile woman is.