by Joan Crate
“I dropped a cup,” Rose Marie announced.
“Figures,” snapped Sister Joan. Her exasperated footfalls pounded down the hall.
“Figures,” Rose Marie repeated, drawing her lips in as Sister Joan did. She had seen Taki imitate the sisters so many times she was almost as good at it as her friend.
Sister Bernadette and Sister Cilla looked over at her, eyebrows raised.
“Oops.” She clamped her hand to her mouth, but a giggle erupted through her fingers.
Sister Bernadette snorted, and all three, once again, broke into laughter.
By the time they were able to stop, they were weak-kneed. Propping themselves against the cupboards, they finished the dishes, not daring to look at one another. Rose Marie drained the dish tray in the sink just as Sister Bernadette turned on the tap, and water sprayed them both. Oh my, that started them off again!
“Sister Cilla, where did you learn to juggle?” she was finally able to ask. Her stomach ached, and she felt limp as an old sheet, but happy—as she hadn’t felt since Taki left. “I’ve seen you toss rolls of socks in the air for the first-year girls, but never cups. I didn’t know you could juggle cups!”
“Dear, oh law,” Sister Cilla panted, untying her apron. “My big brother and his friend learned to juggle in high school, from a library book, believe it or not. They practised all the time. Someone gave Sean, my brother, a unicycle, and his friend chopped down an old bike and made his own. They juggled and rode unicycles at the same time. His friend taught himself to walk tightrope too.” She paused. “Bernard.” The name stuck on her tongue as if she didn’t want to let it go. “Six foot four. Wavy hair. I was fond of him, and he of me.” She gazed out the window at the long shafts of light on the horizon. “Or so I thought.” The mood in the kitchen had changed, and blue drew like curtains between the three of them. Rose Marie hung her dishtowel on the hook and slipped out the door and down the hall to the sewing room.
Reaching into the fabric cupboard, she pulled out the bag of cotton pads she had sewn the previous week. She crept upstairs and deposited a handful in her bedroom closet. The rest of the bag she took up the next flight of stairs to the dorm. They would be in her wardrobe when she needed them in the fall.
She was turning to go back downstairs when she saw it pulling from a dark corner of the room. Oh, a blunt shadow head and thick, short arms! Not the shadow sister. Slowly, she backed away until her back hit the cold metal of a bedframe. Squeezing her eyes shut, she crossed herself. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. When she opened her eyes, the shape was gone. She dashed out the dormitory and down both flights of stairs, back to the safety of the kitchen.
“Since you’re back, you can help me roll oats for tomorrow’s breakfast,” Sister Bernadette said, turning to her. “Rose Marie,” she exclaimed, holding out a rolling pin. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
21
Happy Birthday to You
MOTHER GRACE FOUND Sister Margaret on the back porch instructing Rose Marie on how to shuck corn.
“Not like that,” Sister Margaret objected, her chins jiggling. “Grab it by the top. Pull two or three leaves at once or you won’t get all that silk stuff. No, pull harder! Heavens to Murgatroyd, if my lumbago weren’t so bad, I’d do it myself!”
“I’ve been looking for you, Sister Margaret.” Putting a hand on the woman’s shoulder to distract her from Rose Marie’s half-hearted efforts, Mother Grace wished her a happy birthday. “Rose Marie, did you know it is Sister Margaret’s seventy-fifth birthday today?”
Sister Margaret’s scowl deepened as Rose Marie mumbled an unenthusiastic “Happy birthday, Sister.”
“I’d like to speak to you before we eat,” Mother Grace said, and Sister Margaret turned, giving her such a baleful look, she had to wonder if the woman didn’t know exactly what she was about to say.
“Now, if you’re not busy, Sister. In the dining room.”
As they passed through the kitchen, Sister Margaret looked longingly at the cake Sister Bernadette was icing, and Mother Grace contemplated whether a chunk of it might sweeten Margaret’s mood. But lunch was almost ready, and she shouldn’t jump to conclusions. Sister Margaret might very well be relieved to hear what she had to tell her.
Once they had sat down, each of them grunting softly at the effort, she got right to the point. “Sister Margaret, due to your venerable age, I’m going to lessen your workload. Sister Cilla will take over as senior dormitory supervisor. Of course, you’ll still have your duties in the dorm, but you can leave a lot of the running around to Sister Cilla.”
Outrage bubbled across Sister Margaret’s face, and despite herself, Mother Grace felt herself blanch. Sister Cilla, of all people, stepped into the room with a handful of cutlery.
“I guess I’m too old to be useful,” Sister Margaret bawled. Sister Cilla had the good sense to freeze in her tracks. “I’m not the oldest one here, you know. Sister Lucy is. And I’m sure not sick. Just a little lumbago is all. No appreciation. All my hard work, and now I’m not good for anything!” Sister Margaret’s bottom lip quivered. She looked over to Sister Cilla, who was slinking back to the kitchen. “I guess someone less experienced can run things better than me. I guess I’m just too feeble—”
“Nobody thinks you’re feeble,” Mother Grace cut in. Now Sisters Joan and Bernadette were coming into the dining room. Vieilli, and Rose Marie right behind them. She raised her voice to include them all. “We more senior women need to allow the younger, more energetic ones to contribute, Sister Margaret. It’s time to take things easy before we wear ourselves out.” She attempted a lighthearted chuckle as she struggled to her feet. “Now let’s eat, everyone. This is a celebration.”
All during supper, Sister Margaret was pouch-eyed and silent, saying nothing, not even to Sister Joan, except “Pass the butter.”
After the meal, Sister Bernadette brought in the birthday cake with a large 75 inscribed in blue icing. Everyone clapped, and Mother Grace led them in “Happy Birthday to You” while Sister Margaret glowered.
Sister Bernadette handed a large corner piece of cake to Sister Margaret. As soon as it was in front of her, Sister Margaret grabbed a fork in her meaty fist and plunged it in, metal tines screeching against the porcelain plate.
22
Dead Chickens
ROSE MARIE HAD learned how to make the most of summer. Sure, Taki was gone, but Papa visited her Sundays, and sometimes she was able to sneak off during the day and walk to the marsh to see the young ducks diving in the reeds or trying out their wings. She could sleep in once in a while, and the sisters were more relaxed than during the school year. But this summer wasn’t the same as usual. The sisters were different, less fixed somehow. Or was it her? She wasn’t entirely sure anymore what was really happening and what she imagined. Sometimes her dreams seemed completely real. And those awful ghosts. The shadow sister touching herself. That new thick shape. A man.
When she was little and saw the spirits of trapped and snared animals fly out of their bodies, Papa said she had power. Mama said she could see the world in all directions—forwards and backwards. Now, she just wanted to see it the same way everyone else did.
She was sitting at the breakfast table staring at her doughy waffle and pondering all these things when Mother Grace leaned towards her. “There’s still a lot to do before the school year starts, Rose Marie.”
More chores, no doubt. She nodded dully.
“What it means, chérie, is that we’ll have to cancel at least two of our catechism classes.”
“Pardon?”
“Preparations have fallen behind. Surely you don’t mind having time off from your studies?”
“But, Mother Grace, you’ve never cancelled catechism before. Ever.”
Mother Grace patted her wrist. “I’m afraid I need you to help Sister Lucy,” she whispered, looking over at the old woman at the table behind them.
Rose Marie turned to see
Sister Lucy tilted in her seat, her face as blank as her apron.
“Rose Marie will take you up to your room, Sister Lucy,” Mother Grace shouted. “You need to rest.”
Rose Marie took her arm, and they climbed to the second floor, Sister Lucy moving at an alarmingly slow pace.
“Are you okay, Sister?”
Abruptly, Sister Lucy stuck a crooked index finger in her face and shook it. “You are one shameful girl, Sister Mary of Bethany. It’s disgraceful, the way you prance around here. I have eyes, you know. I can see what’s going on with you, with you and, and that so-called—” She waved at the floor below.
For no reason at all, Rose Marie was stung with guilt. Who was this Sister Mary? She opened her mouth, but she was stopped by Sister Lucy’s expression of outrage. She couldn’t think of a thing to say.
* * *
After Mass on Sunday, Rose Marie spotted Papa going to Mother Grace’s office rather than the visiting room.
She waited for him in the hall. “What is it, Papa?” she asked him as soon as he emerged.
Facing her, he cupped her shoulders in his hands. “I have to go back up north.”
“No, Papa. Just one more Sunday.”
“I can’t wait any longer. Joseph has to start school. Day school.” A pleased expression glanced over his face. “He will come home on a bus every day.”
“Fine!” She sounded just like Sister Joan. “You’re leaving me after only—what?—six or seven visits? So you can see him every single day, all year round. That’s just fine.”
Sister Lucy limped in and sat on the other side of the visiting room. As if they needed a guard. As if this were a prison, a goddamned prison—and it was. It most definitely was!
Rose Marie stamped her feet, trying to stop the heat darting up her calves.
“Sit down, my girl.”
“I’m not your girl!”
Sister Lucy squinted at her. How could the old bat hear only when she didn’t want her to?
“You don’t even love me,” she flung at Papa. She was about to run, but he caught her arm.
“I talked to that Mother Grace again,” he said. “She won’t let you come with me.” His hand gripped her arm more tightly as she tried to shake him off. “Stay still, Sinopaki. That Mother Grace got another letter from Indian Affairs. Kiikaa! I seen it myself. Just now, she shoved it in front—”
Papa started to cough, and she broke free. Down the hall to the kitchen she ran, Papa coughing and waving his arm at her. She banged through the back screen door into the blinding afternoon.
Papa had Joseph. Why would he want her? No one cared. She raced past the garden, past the shed, down the path to the barn, where no one would look. She hated them, hated the school and all the nuns! She hated Papa and Joseph.
The stink of chickens. Oh, at her feet, a flock of headless birds! Pulpy-necked, their feathers slick with blood, they staggered around her. A scream hatched in her throat. Headless chickens lurched and stumbled, smearing her with their blood and feathers and stink. Just as the scream flew through her mouth, the birds faded, disappearing in their own deaths.
She ran faster, past the wire-mesh fence and into the barnyard. No one but Brother Abe was supposed to go near the barn. The chickens wouldn’t lay if they got scared, he always said. She didn’t care, not even if it was true that any little noise made them start pecking one another. She didn’t care if they all moved in for the kill at the first sight of blood. She didn’t care, she didn’t care, she didn’t care!
As she raced around the barn, she could hear the chickens start up, the pound of her feet driving them into a loud squawk. In her mind, she saw Papa and Joseph having supper together in Aunt Katie’s kitchen. The squawking and flapping in the barn grew frantic, her breath coming hard. She would run them all away—the birds, the sisters, Papa, Joseph, and Aunt Katie—beat them into the ground with her beating feet.
She ran until her eyes blurred and her breath caught on fence wire. Gasping, choking, she stumbled through a chaos of flaps, pecks, and blue; through straw, dirt, and chickenshit. She fell against a fence post.
Up, way up, at the very top of the barn, a flicker of movement caught her eye. There, near the overhang of the roof, at that small door, was a thick man’s shape. Then a hand outstretched, pushing.
The black shape plummeted against the blue sky, the flaring afternoon sun. You bitch!
Oh God, she was flying, falling, cursing! She smacked the earth with a bone-crushing thud. Pain ripped out her breath and drove through her head, her chest, her splintered ribs.
Forgive me. A guttural voice bubbled in her throat, words grinding in her jaws like broken teeth. A man’s voice: For I have sinned. In te, Domine, speravi, non confundar in aeternum. A priest’s language. A cold wave of fear surged from her belly. Forgive me, oh my God. She/he was dying.
Her body was a bag of sand and splinters. Everything else had seeped away. She opened her eyes, unsure of where or who she was, what had happened.
In the barnyard, yes. Hurting, retching, she crawled. Like tape pulled from a window, the priest’s broken body separated from hers. She crumpled against the garden shed and sucked in barbed air. She’d stay here until death had folded itself back—years, lives away—from that terrible time.
* * *
“I don’t know where Sister Cilla got to,” Sister Bernadette huffed as Rose Marie dried the supper dishes. “You’ll have to put them away tonight, dear.”
“Sister Bernadette, I was just wondering,” she began. She bit her lip to stop her voice from trembling.
“Yes?”
“Who is Sister Mary of Bethany?”
Sister Bernadette’s hands shot out of the dishwater, one falling to her breast. “Where did you hear that name?”
“Sister Lucy called me that.”
“Well, she shouldn’t have!” Sister Bernadette slipped her hands back in the water, her brow furrowed.
“Is she the sister who died?” It was just a guess, but she had to know.
“A terrible tragedy.” Sister Bernadette sighed. “How did you hear about it?”
“Mother Grace.” She crossed her fingers behind her back. At least she wouldn’t have to invent anything to confess to Father William that week.
Sister nodded. “We never found out why exactly, what claimed her. Father Alphonses brought old Doc McDougall from Hilltop—that was the year before he retired—but there were no visible signs. And not a month after that other death.” Her voice fell to a whisper. “No one wanted a fuss made. Dr. McDougall put it down as a heart attack, young as Sister Mary was.” She rubbed a forearm over her brow and sighed. “It may very well have been a heart attack, for all any of us knows.”
“Sister Mary of Bethany slept in my room, right?”
“Yes. Why? You haven’t seen—”
“No,” she said quickly. The lies were slipping from her mouth as easily as prayers.
“It’s just that there were some silly stories afterwards, that’s all.”
“But did she—Sister Mary of Bethany—stay in the dormitory sometimes?” She had seen her there countless times.
“Yes.” Sister Bernadette grabbed a clump of steel wool and started scouring a pot. “Sister Mary was not always dutiful, and she was required to do penance in the dormitory one summer once the students left. She was, well . . . she liked to flirt. You know, with the volunteer painters from the community, farmers bringing food, anyone. Harmless enough, but not suitable for a servant of God. I shouldn’t be telling you any of this, but Mother Grace said that if she wasn’t acting as a sister should, then she couldn’t sleep on the sisters’ floor.”
“The other death, Sister—”
“I’m not saying another word!” She rinsed the pot under a torrent of water and banged it into the dish rack.
“Was it a man, a pr—”
“Enough, Rose Marie!” Sister Bernadette scuttled over to the stove.
“Please, Sister.” Oh, she had a million ques
tions, but Sister Bernadette’s unyielding back told her their conversation was over.
23
You Make Your Bed
THE BUSES WERE scheduled to come back to St. Mark’s on Monday, the fourth of September. Classes were to start the following day.
Right after breakfast, Rose Marie helped Sister Cilla carry the ladder from the tool shed up to the dormitory. They set it under the first window, and Sister Cilla, climbing to the top, instructed Rose Marie to sit on the second rung from the bottom. “For stability, dear.”
Rose Marie was anxious for Taki to arrive. Already bored with helping Sister Cilla, she slouched, resting her chin in her hands.
“Dear, oh law,” Sister Cilla panted from above as the ladder quivered. “This one’s stuck.”
Rose Marie got up and turned sluggishly around, kneeling on the bottom rung and placing a hand on either side of the ladder. She found herself staring up Sister Cilla’s long stockinged legs, oh, and white drawers! Quickly, her face burning, she looked down at the floor she had spent most of the previous day washing and waxing. This summer she was seeing all sorts of stuff she wasn’t supposed to see and didn’t even want to! She closed her eyes, braced her feet, and held tightly to the ladder rattling under Sister Cilla’s tugs and jerks.
As Sister Cilla descended, they both heard the popping slide of wheels coming to a stop on gravel and the huff of a bus door opening. They ran to the one low window in the dormitory, shuttered and locked during the school year “to keep busybodies in their beds,” Sister Margaret claimed. Sister Cilla kept it open all summer just as she did the high windows. Now she and Rose Marie stared down at the first group of girls spilling into the schoolyard.
“There’s Rachel Useful,” Sister Cilla pointed out. “Dear, oh law, look at those little first-years. One, two, three; looks like four from that bus alone. And there’s Judith Shot One Side looking more . . . mature than ever.”
“Yeah.” Rose Marie, surveying the outline of Judith’s large, high breasts and long legs, had to agree. “She looks like a grown-up.”
