Back in the Habit

by Alice Loweecey

  “But it’s different now, right?”

  “In what possible way do you think a centuries-old institution would be different after a mere fourteen months?” Her hand crushed the pop can into a silvery green hourglass.

  “I mean, you know, the nuns. The merger happened while you were getting out, so you probably wouldn’t know half the nuns. That’s good, right?”

  “I’d know even fewer than that. I hadn’t been back to the Motherhouse for five years before I left. They had me teaching in the boonies. That doesn’t mean—”

  “See? Piece of cake. Look at the schedule I worked up.” He moved the mouse, and the spreadsheet returned to the screen.

  She dragged her hands over her face. “It is not a piece of cake.”

  “I’ll call Sister Fabian tomorrow and ask her to send you a habit—you didn’t keep those, right?”

  “Of course not.”

  “You’ll need a room of your own.” He started typing. “If she has to, she can make someone double up.”

  “No one gives Sister Fabian orders. Listen—”

  “Don’t believe her poker face. She’s panicking like my mother the night before Thanksgiving.”

  “Frank.”

  “I can drive you to Pittsburgh—it’ll be smarter than you renting a car and trying to park it somewhere. We can keep in touch by cell.”

  “Frank.”

  “You go to Mass every Sunday, right? How does two o’clock sound? I’ll clear it with Sister Fabian tomorrow; that’ll give her plenty of time. Now, here’s what I think your cover should be—”

  “Frank!” She clenched her hands in her lap so she wouldn’t try to fling the office chair through the window. “Use Plan B.”

  He stopped simultaneously typing and talking. “There isn’t one. This plan is flawless.”

  “Wrong. It has one big flaw. Me.”

  “You have a conflict?”

  A thin, strained laugh escaped her. “I’ll have to cancel my Sunday through Wednesday lineup of dates.”

  His mouth dropped open a tick, and she laughed for real.

  “I wish. Whatever gave you the idea that me going back into the convent would be easy, let alone a good idea?”

  “I—but—of course it’s easy. You couldn’t be more perfect for this.”

  “Wrong again.” She gripped her hands tighter. “I cut all ties when I left, and not only because of multiple nasty fights. I did it because bad things happened, and they’re—difficult—to remember. The thought of returning never crossed my mind for an instant.”

  His expression drooped, changing the pattern of freckles on his face. “Think about it now, okay? Say yes so we can get on the Pittsburgh Diocese’s approved vendor list. Think of what it’ll mean for the business.”

  “The business won’t benefit by me freaking out in the laundry room down in the cellars.”

  “Then don’t go into the cellars. Oh, wait. You might have to, because that’s where the Novice killed herself. But you’re strong, Giulia. Look how you testified in court in front of TV cameras to get Don Falke in jail. A few days in one big building won’t break you.”

  Her lip curled. “Fabian could eat Urnu the Snake for breakfast.”

  She might not want to remember all the details of when Sandra Falke and her brother Don—also known as Urnu the Snake—tried to murder her three months earlier. But she definitely should not remember the ten years of Fabian-spewed crap she’d been inundated with.

  She slammed the crumpled pop can into the trash. “For breakfast.”

  “I don’t doubt it. Seriously, Giulia, you’re not still under that harridan’s thumb. She doesn’t have one crumb of power over you.”

  Her mouth quirked. “That’s exactly what I’ve been telling myself.”

  “And that’s why we make a kick-ass—sorry—team.” He hit the Print button. “Take home the cover story I wrote for you and her summary of the incident. I’ll have her send a habit to your apartment.”

  “When did I agree to this?”

  “Just now, when my flawless reasoning won you over.”

  “No, it didn’t.” He looks like an eager little boy. Does he know it’s almost impossible to resist him when he gets that expression? “I realize getting the Diocese to funnel some of its wealth our way sounds good, but—”

  “It doesn’t just sound good, it is good. Clients around here don’t come much bigger.” He grinned wider. “When I started Driscoll Investigations, my fellow cops told me that the cheaper rents in Cottonwood wouldn’t make up for all the Pittsburgh business I’d be losing. Hah.”

  “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Maybe I’ll get run over by a bus on Saturday.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” He crossed into the other room and brought back the printouts from the communal printer by Sidney’s desk. “What’s the address of your new apartment?”

  “No. Have two habits delivered here tomorrow.” When Frank’s eyebrows furrowed, she said, “I don’t want her to know where I live. And don’t look at me like that. Sensible people don’t allow toxic ones access to their lives.”

  “Point taken. I’ll meet you here at one. What’s your dress size?”

  “So much for a woman’s mystique. Twelve.” She glanced at her jeans and wool sweater. “You know, the habit’s optional in most Communities now.”

  “Camouflage. You’ll be one more anonymous nun in black, especially to the ones from the three other cities. You’d stand out in street clothes, even bland street clothes.”

  “Are you implying my wardrobe isn’t stylish?”

  “Well, I mean, compared to, you know …”

  “Heh. I don’t disagree. Okay, fine. The habit it is.” How fast this discussion progressed from “No way” to a dress fitting. “Frank, if I end up in psychotherapy because of this, you’re paying the bill.”

  “I’ll get a rider on the insurance.” He folded the printouts and handed them to her. “And stop putting yourself down. You’ll be fine. Strength, intelligence, and charm are the hallmarks of Driscoll Investigations. I’m charm, you’re everything else.”

  “That’s not a compliment.” She tried to scowl.

  “You bet it is. A beauty-queen bimbo would never have suited me.”

  The scowl worked this time. “No improvement. Time for me to leave anyway. The bus comes in ten minutes.”

  He returned it. “You’re not waiting on a downtown corner alone at night. I’m driving you.” He shut down the computer. “Just because you took self-defense training doesn’t mean I want to give you an opportunity to use it.”

  _____

  Frank pulled his Camry into the minuscule parking lot of Giulia’s new apartment building. The wind blew leaves and stray fast-food wrappers across the asphalt. The few people on the street hurried past, raincoats flapping behind them.

  Frank unhooked his seat belt. “Are you going to invite me in?”

  “A lady needs boundaries, Mr. Driscoll. Besides, I haven’t dusted and vacuumed this week yet.”

  “I’m guessing I could eat off your floors. All right, since your door is barred to me tonight, let’s have dinner tomorrow. A last fling before taking the veil.”

  “Temporarily.”

  “I should hope so. I have no desire to look for a new partner. Well?”

  “I’d love to.”

  “Giulia,” Frank said through laughter, “you need to practice playing hard to get. Make the man wonder if he’s worth your time. Make him chase you harder.”

  So much for reading Cosmo religiously. She sat straighter in the passenger seat. “It sounds lovely, Mr. Driscoll, but I’ll have to check my calendar.”

  “Better. Now tell me you’ll text me, because that’s more impersonal than a phone call.”

  “And
rude in this case.” He opened his mouth, but she forestalled him. “All right, I get it.” She flipped her hair back with one hand. “I’ll text you—sometime.”

  More laughter filled the car. “Did you learn that coquettish gesture from Sidney?”

  “Mingmei. It flopped, didn’t it?”

  “Uh, well,” he cleared his throat. “It needs a little practice.”

  “I’ll reread several Cosmos tonight.” She opened her door, and Frank started to open his. “That’s all right. I can see myself inside.”

  “My mother taught me manners. Do you really read Cosmo?”

  “I have a lot to catch up on. And your brothers taught you how to sneak in a kiss or three.”

  “I—”

  “Uh-huh. Thanks for the ride. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Safe behind her own apartment door, Giulia plopped a year’s worth of Cosmo magazines on the coffee table. “I will learn to do this right if it kills me.”

  Her conscience whispered that she was avoiding the real issue: her, back in habit, walking through the Motherhouse door on Sunday afternoon. A mere thirty-six hours from now.

  “I am not thinking about that tonight. I will let it sink in and dissect it in the sunshine tomorrow.”

  She flipped pages in the top magazine till she found that month’s how-to: “The ‘Good Girl’s’ Guide to Flirting.” With a yellow highlighter in one hand, she settled in for an hour of study.

  Three

  “I’m waiting with my camera ready,” Frank said from the other side of the office’s bathroom door Saturday afternoon.

  “Frank, I will call down on you every curse my grandmother taught me if you take my picture in this outfit.”

  “Curse away. It’s worth coming into work on a Saturday to see you in that outfit.”

  The long, narrow office bathroom wasn’t meant to double as a dressing room. Giulia zipped the black A-line dress and adjusted the wrist-length sleeves. The detachable white collar tucked in just as she remembered, a Velcro circle securing it at the back. The two-foot-long veil hung on the back of the door as though it hid a severed head. A narrow ray of sunlight touched it, and the black polyester swallowed like a living shadow.

  She grimaced. “All right, that’s morbid. Just put the thing on. You haven’t forgotten how.”

  “Giulia, who are you talking to?”

  “The habit, Frank.” She listened a moment. “Don’t laugh. This is your fault.”

  “I’m not—” he cleared his throat—“laughing. How long does it take to put on two pieces of clothing?”

  “Hold your horses.” She jammed the veil on her head, hands automatically tucking her brown curls under the narrow white outer band. “I shouldn’t remember that trick so easily.”

  She stood before the mirror over the sink, eyes closed while she adjusted the inner plastic headpiece at the top. A deep breath, and she opened her eyes.

  “Oh, crap.” Sister Mary Regina Coelis stared back at her—a ghost laid to rest nearly a year and a half earlier.

  Frank’s voice came from right against the other side of the bathroom door. “Giulia? What’s wrong?”

  “Everything. Move. I’m coming out.” She turned away from the apparition in the mirror and opened the door.

  Frank’s phone clicked. “Dia naofa.”

  Giulia tugged the veil farther down over her ears. “An outfit guaranteed to flatter no figure. It makes fat women look like tents and skinny ones like scarecrows. Thus its purpose: an instant turnoff to any man with a pulse.”

  She rifled through the tissue paper in the delivery box. “Did Fabian remember to send a crucifix?”

  Frank snapped another photo. “There’s an envelope taped under the lid.”

  Giulia ripped open the flap on its narrow end. A three-inch-high replica of the San Damiano crucifix fell into her hand. A plain gold wedding band was tangled in the stainless-steel chain.

  “Fancy crucifix.” Frank’s voice tickled her earlobe.

  “It’s the one that spoke to Saint Francis.” Giulia took refuge in ordinary, ignorant Frank. “Seriously, Francis, didn’t you ever have to learn about your patron saint?”

  He waved it away. “For confirmation, but who remembers that? Put it on so I can get the whole effect.”

  She worked the chain free of the wedding band and eased it over the veil. As it settled under the collar, the crucifix resting over her camouflaged cleavage, footsteps slapped down the hall.

  The door opened so fast it bounced off the printer table.

  “Am I too late? Traffic on Saturday is nutso. Oh—oh wow, Giulia, you look just like Maria from The Sound of Music!”

  Sidney’s sneakers squeaked on the linoleum as she circled Giulia. “It’s like you’re an old-maid librarian or something. All your hair is gone, too.” She stuck her nose up to Giulia’s chest. “Ew. What a creepy crucifix. The ones in Olivier’s parents’ house are plain silver or wood. This one’s too realistic for me, even with the miniature saints and angels all over it.”

  Frank was biting his cheek and looked suspiciously innocent. Giulia turned her back on him and stopped Sidney’s great white shark impersonation.

  “Sidney, what happened to you?”

  Her tanned face now looked like a grade-schooler’s idea of splotchy polka dots.

  Sidney threw her hands in the air. “It’s all Olivier’s fault. We had our first real argument last night. He said my stir-fried tofu tasted like little soy sponges, and I said he was going to die of a heart attack before he turned forty. He actually eats rare steak.” She shuddered. “Then he said I wasn’t seeing both sides of the argument because I never ate ‘real’ food. He said if I ate a Twinkie and admitted it was Heaven with cream filling, he’d eat my tofu-veggie loaf for dinner.”

  “And the hives?”

  Sidney stomped her foot. “I ate the whole thing while he watched—it was disgusting! All that over-processed flour and trans fats and sugar. About five minutes after I swallowed the last bite, I started to itch all over. And my nose stuffed up so bad, I had to irrigate it three times. While I did that, he found an allergy website. We narrowed it down to the yellow dye, of course. Chemicals are evil!”

  “You didn’t end up in the hospital?”

  “No, my throat didn’t close up or anything, so as allergies go it’s not that bad, but I am so furious! I’m never sick, not even with a cold, and Olivier’s messed up my whole immune system because he had to be stubborn.”

  Giulia wasn’t sure how she was keeping a straight face. Sidney looked like a tall, brown version of the famous “mad bluebird” photograph. “You are going to milk this for all it’s worth, right?”

  Sidney stopped rubbing her arms. “Huh?”

  Frank leveraged himself off Giulia’s desk. “You took his dare and beat him at it. Olivier will be a walking guilt machine till those hives fade.”

  Giulia practically saw the light bulb illuminate the top of Sidney’s head.

  “I never thought of it like that. He already left two messages on my phone, but I ignored them.”

  “The next time he calls, answer and let him do all the talking. A little groveling will be good for his soul.”

  Frank tsked. “Women. You’re all manipulators.”

  “Yet you still chase us.”

  He pushed through the tissue paper on Giulia’s desk and held up the wedding band. “Even though all you’re after is one of these.”

  Sidney’s mouth mirrored the O of the ring. “What’s that for?” she glanced at Frank, then away again.

  “It’s part of my undercover outfit. All nuns who take final vows wear one. You’ve heard nuns referred to as Brides of Christ. Final vows are like wedding vows in a sense, so we get a wedding ring.”

  “I never knew that.”
<
br />   “Since I’m pretending to be my old self, I need to wear it again.”

  “Ooh, put it on, please! I want a picture.”

  “So do I.” Frank held up his phone. “Smile for the cell phones, please.”

  The fastest way to get out of this is to play along. Giulia slipped the ring over the proper finger. A little loose, but better than having to spray her finger with cooking spray to remove it when all this was over.

  With a big, fake grin on her face, she held up her left hand and waited for the clicks.

  Four

  Frank snaked through the bistro tables that crowded the floor of the Laff It Up comedy club, a Corona in each hand. Every table was full and the bar was standing-room only. On the walls, the framed photos of famous comedians seemed to rattle with the decibel level.

  He handed one of the beers to Giulia as he sat down. “They’re out of limes. Sorry.”

  “This is fine.” Giulia took a drink. Thin, but cold. At least it’s thirty degrees warmer in here than outside.

  The waiter must have been three steps behind Frank, because he set their enchiladas in front of them while the bottle was still at her lips. Her stomach growled, but she was sure no one else heard it.

  Frank swallowed a mouthful of beer. “Forgot to tell you. Blake emailed me with another commission.”

  Blake, Frank’s former schoolmate and the vice president of the AtlanticEdge tech company, had fulfilled Frank’s prediction. When Driscoll Investigations saved Blake’s life—and high-society marriage—from a crazed stalker, Frank knew that a grateful Blake would talk up Driscoll Investigations to the right people at AtlanticEdge.

  “It’s better than delivering subpoenas to pay the bills, right?” Giulia cut another forkful of tortillas, meat, and gooey cheese. “I should learn to cook Mexican.”

  “God, yes. Subpoenas, I mean. No more forced encounters with losers who have more guns than brains. If Blake keeps up this pace, I might have to refuse one of his offers.” He looked to the ceiling. “Saint Joseph, patron of hard-working men, I was only joking. I love all this work.”