by Lily Miles
Their hymns were mostly written in Latin and despite their Latin lessons, Eva didn’t have a good grasp of the language. She prides herself on being accomplished at most things, better than pious Grace, at least, but Latin was one of the skills that constantly evaded her. Because of her poor Latin, and the fact that she could hardly read the pages due to the flickering candle, Eva flounders as she sings, making their song sound flawed instead of elegant and smooth. She and Sister Isabelle fight over who’s closer to the hymnal, neither one adept at reading the antiquated tongue.
It didn't help that Catherine and Margaret weren’t there to sing their own parts. Eva did not know where Margaret was, but Sister Catherine was a different story.
Eva’s eyes snap abruptly shut at the thought of Catherine’s body pressed against the glass window upstairs, thinking she was alone, the milk-white flesh of her long legs shimmering in the silver light of the moon.
Eva had only followed Catherine up there because of the task the reverend mother had given her, to keep an eye on things around the nunnery. Eva hadn't been able to find Sister Margaret and so she’d followed Catherine instead, hoping to figure out where her dark-eyed best friend had suddenly vanished to after dinner.
What Eva had seen, however, she didn't even know how to process. All she really knew is that, for some reason, she felt no inclination to tell Mother Antonia about what she’d witnessed. And when she thought of what she’d seen, she’d felt the strangest heat swirling through her veins like the storm outside, unrelenting and powerful in its gale.
A sharp elbow digs into Eva’s rib, making her jump as Monica nods her head towards the single hymnal book all three of the girls were sharing.
Eva rubs a hand at her throat, pretending that it’s bothering her. Monica shrugs and turns her full attention back to the songbook, eyes drifting shut as she allows her voice to crescendo into a beautiful, high-pitched note that makes tears well in Grace’s eyes, both because it’s absolutely lovely and because Grace wishes she could sing like that. What Grace doesn’t know is she has her own highly attractive attributes: every sister in the convent admires her exceptionally pretty features, from her cinched waist and rounded hips, to her pillowy pink lips that beg to be kissed.
Sometimes, before they were locked inside the convent and refused the right to go outside, Sister Grace would take her hymn book outside and walk as far into the trees as she felt safe going. Then where no one could hear her, she would sing her heart out. She knows she’s not as talented as Sister Monica, but the birds seem to appreciate her songs. She doesn’t mind when they listen; it’s peoples’ criticism and judgment that makes her knees quiver.
Suddenly, the heavy door is yanked open. Sister Margaret appears there, winded and flushed and shaking.
Taken by surprise, Monica stops singing and for a second Grace continues before she realizes the lull in the song and with a pink flush, snaps her mouth shut.
“I’m sorry,” Margaret says hurriedly, her shoes squeaking across the floor and leaving a trail of what appeared to be mud streaks behind her. “I forgot that we were singing hymns tonight.”
Eva takes note of this, one of her eyebrows lifting towards her severe widow’s peak. Margaret’s habit is dry but her shoes are caked in wet mud; her face looks damp as well.
Rousing herself, and knowing that if they’re too quiet before the hour of their songs is finished, that Mother Antonia will come to admonish them, Monica resumes singing, instructing Grace to join her. The candle flickers as Margaret and Eva stare at one another. Margaret stumbles forward, taking her usual place beside slender Eva and avoiding her inquisitive eyes.
“You were outside,” Eva whispers into the young woman’s ear.
Margaret sucks in a trembling breath as Eva tries to decipher the dark-eyed nun’s multifaceted expression.
There was pain, definitely, Sister Eva could see that clear as day. Margaret’s eyes are red-rimmed and swollen and her voice sounded thick, as though she’d been crying. Catherine hadn't arrived yet, probably still upstairs in her hidden room looking out at the moon; Eva wondered if perhaps the two best friends hadn't had a disagreement … but about what, Eva wonders. They were always attached at the hip, whispering and skulking about, and Eva had always been curious what things they murmured to one another when no one was listening.
At one point Eva had told Mother Antonia it wasn’t a good idea to allow Catherine and Margaret to bunk together, because they were so close—who knew what scandalous things were going on in that room—but the mother superior had only dismissed the concerns without care.
Eva inspected Margaret’s face, realizing that there was more to her expression than just sadness.
There was definitely something gnawing at Margaret, but Eva did not know what it was. Though she looked deflated, there was a strange flush to her, an energy with which she moved, an erratic agitation that belied something more.
“I can’t do this,” Margaret suddenly says, her voice strained and breathless. “I’ve got to … I need to get out of here.”
She lifts her hands to her face and dashes back out the door of the small room, leaving the rest of the women staring after her in bewilderment. Again the hymns are cut short.
“She looked sick,” Grace offers sympathetically, “like she might vomit.”
“I hope it’s not contagious,” Monica says with a wince. She grabs Eva’s sleeve before the young woman can chase after Margaret. “Not so fast, Sister Eva. You’ve got to at least try to sing this with me. If Margaret is sick, Catherine will take care of her.”
Eva’s hands curl into fists, a desperate yearning growing within her to get to the bottom of that mysterious look on Margaret’s face. But she settles back at Monica’s side, accepting the hymnal into her outstretched hands.
Even as Sister Eva sings, all she can think about are Sister Margaret’s flushed face and maddeningly enigmatic behavior, and Sister Catherine’s shuddering body in the moonlight. Too much in one day for any budding spy.
19
Margaret
The door to the choir swings shut behind me and for a moment, I pause to see if Eva is going to chase after me.
She certainly knows something is going on, but it’s nothing I can ever share with anyone except perhaps Cat, who I haven’t been able to find since she disappeared after dinner.
My entire body shakes so violently that my knees ache and I stumble down the hall of the convent as though I'm drunk, even though in my entire life I’ve never had more than a sip of communion wine. My palms smack against the stone wall as I stagger forward towards the doors of the convent church, seeking salvation from the whirlwind of desire that boils inside my core.
An elder nun passing me in the hall stops to ask if I’m okay. With difficulty I respond, “Thanks, I’m fine,” but I feel her turning to watch me as I lurch forward towards the church, her kindly face a map of concern. I pray that she doesn't follow me. I desperately want to be alone.
Even against the rough, cold wall all I can feel against my palms is the thump of Trevor’s heart under my hand. I’d never been that close to a man, his breath on my cheek and his calloused palm covering mine and squeezing my fingers as though it would pain him to ever let go.
He’d gazed at me with those mesmerizing green eyes of his and I’d completely stopped caring about my faith and my vows. I’d stopped caring about everything but the magnificent feeling of his heart under my hand, throbbing as though it beat only for me. I’d never wanted anything so much as I’d wanted then just to rip his shirt off, so I could see his naked chest under the stars and run my hands over his entire body.
And this yearning, burning, prickling sensation that fills me … it’s all-consuming.
My entire body feels as though it’s on fire; the only thing that will douse the torrid flames is his mouth on my own. While we spoke idly about gardening, all I could think of was the way his lips might move against my own if he cradled me against him; the way I wanted to f
eel his fingers knot in my hair at the back of my head, twined in the curls.
Suddenly I wanted out of this habit, to be out of everything except for his arms.
But this is so very wrong. I can’t feel these things when I’ve made the commitment to the Church that I have. The day I took this veil was the happiest I’d ever had … until I laid eyes on Trevor, that is. Then it was as if a whole new world was opened up to me. There’s no going back now—I know that earthly plane of raw temptation exists and, sinful or not, I crave his touch and my name on his lips.
My body heaves against the church door until it gives way and I stumble out into the empty aisle. Long before, the priest had left for the evening; I am completely alone.
Outside, lightning flashes, illuminating the stained glass. Though earlier today I’d thought it was lovely, with the flickering and flaring rainbow lights, the faces and the art now seem only hauntingly twisted.
Do they scream inside like me for freedom, too? How do I silence this tempting call?
In my hurry towards the holy altar, I trip over the edge of my habit and spill roughly onto the floor, my robe coiled around my knees. I lay there in the aisle. I’d thought if I could just reach and touch the altar, perhaps I would be cleansed of my sinful thoughts and Trevor would release me from his hold.
The huge crucifix looms above me, Jesus staring down at me in disapproval. Even when I squeeze my eyes shut to block out the storm and the stained glass and the cross, I can feel his judgmental glare.
When I close my eyes, however, all I see is him. Trevor. Broad-shouldered and shirtless with his hand extended towards me. And how badly I do want to take that hand … I want to roughly grab his wrist and thrust his big, calloused hand under my pure, virginal cloak so that he feels my warm body and beating heart beneath—a body that yearns to belong to him, and him alone.
I roll onto my back, tears streaming from my eyes, even though they’re still squeezed shut as tightly as possible.
I wish our time together hadn't ended so disastrously. I wish I hadn't said what I had. I wish I could go back and take back every single cruel word. Because those hadn’t been my own thoughts, they’d been Mother Antonia’s—I’d just acted like a parrot regurgitating it all up, no matter how much it hurt Trevor. Clearly, I’d lashed out because I'm terrified of the way he makes me feel, the way he makes me question every vow I’ve ever taken.
There was no use, I had to stop pretending. Of course I hadn't gone out there simply with the intention to save his godless heart, I’d gone out there because the thought of not seeing him again made me want to die.
But even now, the intense sadness I feel over my fight with Trevor is mixed with those electric sensations he gives me; it’s almost too much for my heart and body to bear. It’s like the sadness just amplifies my desire, making this craving inside me magnified so intensely, stars burst in front of my eyes.
It’s like I'm no longer in possession of myself, like I’ve lost all sense of what is right or wrong, and all I know is that my body desperately needs something and I am finally at a loss to deny it anymore. I close my eyes, finally allowing my body to take control and do what it has wanted to do ever since I set eyes on Trevor.
As I long for Trevor’s hands to, my hands stroke over the cotton of my habit that covers my chest. My soft fingertips move slowly, taking their time to reach the crest of my breasts. They linger there at the top of the swell, flicking and pinching lightly, then more roughly, until my nipples have hardened like beads under the fabric. One of my hands stays there, rubbing in a slow circle until my nipples stand at attention and intense tingles wash over me. Waves of desire build in me as I imagine Trevor touching my breasts, with his hands and his mouth.
Meanwhile, my other hand continues to move over my habit on a southward journey that I am powerless to stop. I’m too far gone, enraptured by physical lust. Lower and lower it moves, ’til it reaches the yearning mound between my legs and dances and swirls on top of it lightly, tantalizingly; I squirm and writhe until I can’t wait another second to feel that sensation directly. Grabbing eagerly at my nun’s cloak, I yank it up over my hips.
Laying in the aisle of the church, my habit is flung up over my body, revealing my navel and white lace panties and long legs. I don’t even care that someone could look in and see me. I don’t even care that if Mother Antonia found me, she would put me in the cellar for a week without food and water.
All I care about is this feeling and finally fulfilling this irresistible, intense longing for something that I don’t understand.
Trevor flashes in front of my eyes. Him grinning, touching my hand, slowly pulling his shirt off over his head and letting it fall behind him. That handsome, tanned face setting off his flashing, white teeth. That manly, square jaw. Those broad shoulders. That sculpted chest. Those huge, powerful arms. That rock-hard abdomen.
What would he taste like? What would his eager mouth feel like as it crushed my own plump lips, his tongue searching hungrily for mine? And what would his tousled hair feel like if it brushed against my inner thigh, his breath hot as his tongue explored this forbidden place between my legs?
I bite back a moan, writhing as my hand rips my panties off one leg and my knee lifts towards the ceiling of the church. With my other hand I pull my habit up higher, gliding my fingers over my naked breasts, tweaking the nipples so roughly that the sensation both stings and makes my body twitch with pleasure.
Even though I know the sinful thing I’m doing goes against the teachings of the church, this time I don’t stop. I can’t stop. I won’t stop.
The hand in my panties cups the mound between my legs, feeling it in its entirety and lightly caressing it. It throbs against my palm, begging for more. It’s begging for Trevor, I realize.
I am not completely innocent. I know how a man and a woman couple together to create life, and now it all makes sense to me. Because all I can think about is Trevor wrenching apart my legs so that this secret place is completely bared to him, as my naked body sprawls out before him, aching for his touch.
With a moan that I can’t suppress, my fingers spread out and begin to stroke between the wet outer lips of my pussy—my eyes crack open, startled by the naughty word that floated through my head. I’d heard Catherine say it a handful of times and it’d always sounded so crude, but in this moment, it sounds delicious and enticing.
I continue to play with my pussy, still shivering at the thought of the scandalous word, stroking up and down the lips. Shocks of pleasure ripple through me, growing more and more intense with every second that passes. I find that pearl of pleasure once more, the little bud that makes me gasp and twitch like mad every time I allow my finger to swirl around it.
Faster and faster my hand moves on its own, my back arching towards the ceiling, my eyes rolling back in my head. I allow one of my fingers to slip inside my hot, wet slit, biting back a scream of ecstasy as I explore myself there. It feels so good I put two more fingers in, now getting an idea of what it would feel like if Trevor were inside me, his thickness thrusting into me, over and over.
By now I’ve lost all control of my body, and my muscles are writhing and twitching on their own, ready to explode. Then the thought of Trevor, thick and hard and pounding inside me, takes me completely over the edge. A crack of lightning surges through the church, lighting up the cross; my eyes lock on it just as my body is carried up in a wave of unimaginable ecstasy, my pussy throbbing now not with desire but with sweet release. I convulse in paroxysms of pleasure that go on for what seems like minutes, my almost inhuman shrieks of carnal pleasure ones I don’t even recognize—I can’t believe they’re coming from me.
At long last the aftershocks are over and I’m left, spent and splayed on the floor, my body a heap of trembling, hot flesh.
Eventually, when the spasms of intense pleasure have ebbed, I roll onto my side. My habit remains hitched up around my waist as my eyes drift shut, soft pants parting my lips. I have sinned and I have
loved every moment of it. I don’t know what this means for me, but I know there’s no going back.
It feels as though a door has opened for me now. I don’t think I will ever be able to forget what it felt like to step over that threshold. Yet even now, though I just had what I’m pretty certain was an orgasm, my body has begun to beg for more and more, because when I flash once again on Trevor’s handsome face, a familiar, insatiable desire swells inside of me, making a wave of goosebumps wash over my quivering flesh. What would an orgasm with Trevor inside of me be like?
Because as wonderful as that solo fantasy was, I still only desire Trevor, and I want him for real and in the flesh. And considering what happened between us, I need to see him soon. I need him to hold me, to reassure me that I haven’t ruined everything after all.
If he hasn’t forgiven me, this moment of ecstasy was as close to heaven as I will ever get.
20
Trevor
Outside my window, rain cascades down the window pane in such a thick sheet, I can only see the swirling clouds when bolts of lightning and booming thunder crack the sky. The storm rumbles through the apartment building, too. The walls creak so violently I wonder how this place remains standing at all.
Henry still moves about in the kitchen. I can hear the occasional clink of dishes and smell something simmering on the stove. He’s probably making more rum-laced milk drinks vaguely reminiscent of eggnog. It’s almost tempting to go down there and have another cup, though that would mean chatting more with the old gardener, and that’s much less appealing.
