The Saint Agnes Passion
By Jacqueline Jillinghoff
Chapter
6
The car slowed down as
it passed. The driver, a bald guy with gray stubble on his face, leaned across
the passenger seat and called through the window.
“Need a ride, hon?”
Kristen ignored him,
facing down the street as if looking for her bus. Baldie
drove on. It was the third offer she’d had since she’d been sitting here. The
guys were creepy, but in a weird way she liked the attention. It meant she
looked good, and she wanted to look good — for Patty.
Of course, at her age,
and with her body, it didn’t take much. She was dressed simply, in a loose-knit
gray sweater, red sneakers and socks, and black cargo pants. She had showered,
and she smelled like roses.
Patty had told her to
wait at the bus stop a half-mile from school. They would meet here and go to
lunch, then to a museum or a movie. Kristen had a fantasy about necking in the
theater, and Patty feeling up her tits like a horny boy. To make it easy for
her, she wasn’t wearing a bra, or a shirt. Her bare skin shone through the gray
mesh of her sweater, and anyone who bothered to look could see the copper brads
of her nips. The guys in the cars bothered, and right now, Kristen wished her
hair were as long as Suzie’s. She crossed her arms. Maybe it was a mistake to
leave the house so exposed, but now that she’d seen men’s reactions, she was
dying to see Patty’s.
That is, if Patty ever
showed up. She said she’d here at a quarter to two, after Good Friday prayers,
and it was almost two-thirty. Kristen was hungry. The metal bench was starting
to hurt her butt. She’d let three buses go by, and she worried the next guy who
tried to pick her up wouldn’t take no for an answer. She looked expectantly at
the shops across the pike, sure that at any second her beloved redhead would
come bobbing around the corner, brimming with explanations and apologies.
But after ten more
minutes, she’d had enough. Patty had said not to come to the convent, but if
Kristen was going to be stood up, she was owed an explanation. Maybe something
was wrong. Maybe Patty was sick. In that case, Kristen would take care of her.
And if her conscience was bothering her again, a look at Kristen in her
see-through sweater would bring her around.
Kristen got up from
the bench and crossed the pike when the light changed. Bobbi, the woman who
owned the second-hand jewelry store on the corner, waved to her through the
window. The girls from Saint Agnes spent a lot of their after-school hours in
there, trying on antique silver pins and lapis pendants. Kristen was surprised
Bobbi recognized her out of uniform. She had a sudden inspiration — she and
Patty would go in this very afternoon and buy matching rings. Jade, if Bobbi
had them, to remind her of Patty’s eyes. She pointed down the street toward the
school, as if explaining why she couldn’t come in just then, and she walked on.
Off the crowded pike,
with its banks, real estate offices and shops, the road descended into a valley
of gingerbread homes and wrought iron fences. The sidewalk stopped at the first
cross street, and Kristen continued on the shoulder, past the old orphanage
where, now, they took care of kids from the city who’d been abused or whose
parents were in jail. Stone cottages built a century ago hid behind a barricade
of trees that were just beginning to bud. Farther along, across the roadway,
stood a white-grid block incongruously called the Cloister, where retired nuns
were warehoused with other old Catholics, and where, every December, the girls
from Saint Agnes, in their plaid winter uniforms and red Santa hats, would
wander the antiseptic corridors, singing carols and handing out
construction-paper Christmas cards drawn by kids at an elementary school. The
girls were assured their visit made the old people happy.
The white box receded
at the edge of Kristen’s vision, and as the road curved, Saint Agnes Academy
turned slowly into view, a gray fortress on a green hill. The girls called it
The Castle. It was built of smooth gray stone, with three doors in the center,
each recessed in a lancet arch. A projecting gable overspread the entrance, and
Saint Agnes herself, patroness of virgins, martyred at twelve, guarded her
charges’ virtue from her niche below the peak. To the right, at the corner of
the school, a chess-piece turret rose a full story
above the surrounding roof. Everywhere the walls were studded with battlements,
so in case of attack, she guessed, the girls of Saint Agnes could rain arrows
on the raping Vandals below.
Kristen climbed the
asphalt drive past the arches and around the tower. Behind the school was the
sisters’ residence, a squat cross, made of the same gray stone as the Castle, that sat in the middle of the parking lot. The nuns
walked fifty feet to work every day. She mounted the steps and rang the bell.
Stillness.
Sunshine. Birds. She rang
again, and after a small eternity she heard the sucking sound of an inner door.
A lock clicked, then another. The oak door opened a crack, and Kristen found
herself examined by the hard gray eyes of Sister Saint Augustine.
“Yes?”
“Sister Patrice asked
me to meet her here.”
“Sister Patrice is
indisposed,” the nun said. “Can it wait?”
“Well … we … uh …”
“Yes?”
“We were going to talk
about my vocation.”
“You want to be a
nun?”
“I think so.”
“Never think. Either
you know or you don’t.”
“I’m only fourteen.”
“A baby,” Sister Saint
Augustine said. “Very well. Come inside. I’ll see if
Sister’s well enough to receive you.”
She stepped back, and
the heavy door opened wide, as if on its own. Kristen
went in. The nun heaved the door shut and brushed past her, leading her into a
dim foyer. The walls were covered halfway up with oak, recessed in rectangular
panels and topped with a protruding rail. The ceiling, too, was oak, deeply
coffered and toothed at the edges. The rugs were spotless, but they looked old
— thick and dull blue, with an indecipherable pattern of thorns and yellow
flowers that twined around a faded brown cross. A staircase with a wood-spindle
banister went up the left wall. To the right, an archway, braced with fluted
oak pillars, opened onto a sitting room.
“Wait in there,”
Sister said. “Sister is upstairs.”
But Auggie didn’t go upstairs. She went back behind the
staircase and disappeared, limping slightly. She always limped. The sole of her
right shoe was thick, to compensate for her short leg.
The sitting room was a
transept of the cross, with windows on three sides. Kristen sat in a ruffled
loveseat opposite the entrance. A crucifix hung on one side of the archway, and
a picture of the Virgin on other. Magazines were fanned out on the coffee table
in front of her, like in a doctor’s office, except these magazines were
religious. The covers were smooth, as if they had never been opened.
Impatient and
uncomfortable, Kristen picked one up. She flipped to an article about making
the gospel relevant to the millennial generation, and she was about to discover
the secret when Auggie limped into the room again,
carrying a tray.
“I was making some
tea,” Auggie said. “Perhaps you’d like to have some.”
She put the tray down
on the table. Besides the tea service, there was a plate piled high with lumpy
oatmeal cookies.
“Are you hungry?”
“Yes,
Sister.”
“Don’t be shy, then.
Help yourself.”
“Thank you, Sister.”
Kristen bit gratefully
into a cookie as Auggie poured her a cup of tea.
Without asking, she added two spoonfuls of sugar. Then she poured herself a
cup, unsweetened, and sat down.
“How’s the cookie?”
“Mmm,”
was all Kristen could say with her mouth full.
It was chewy and dense
with raisins and walnuts. Obviously homemade, and wonderful.
She followed it with a sip of the tea, and, liking the sweet taste of
peppermint, took a big hot swallow. It felt good going down. The sugar seemed
to course through her arms. She was hungrier than she knew.
“You needn’t sound so
surprised,” Auggie said. “I can be nice, on occasion.
I know I come off as stern, but it’s necessary if we’re going to turn out truly
Christian women in today’s world. What makes you think you might like to join
our order?”
“Did you tell Sister
Patrice I was here?”
“I will. Answer my
question.”
“I don’t know,”
Kristen said. “I love God.”
“Do you love God, or
do you love Sister Patrice? — Don’t be embarrassed. You wouldn’t be the first
girl who thought she had a vocation because she had a crush on a nun. I’ve seen
it many times. They used to have crushes on me, back in the day. Would you
believe it?”
Auggie
was sharper around the edges than Patty, but she wasn’t a bad looking woman.
Not pretty, but handsome. Her face was square, with soft lines around a thin
mouth. Her iron-black hair, in stiff bristles, was tipped with gray, but her
square shoulders bracketed a bosom that was still high and pointed — the
advantage of not having kids. B cups, Kristen guessed.
“Yes, Sister,” she
said. “I believe it.”
“Well, you get an A
for today’s class. More tea?” Sister hadn’t touched
hers.
“May I please have
another cookie?”
“Since you have such
lovely manners, you may have as many as you like.” She stirred another spoonful
of sugar into Kristen’s cup, and Kristen saw the students had been unfair. She
regretted not liking this woman.
“I can see why you all
love Sister Patrice,” Sister went on, laying the spoon on Kristen’s saucer with
a clink. “She’s young. She’s warm-hearted. She has that charming brogue, and
those extraordinary breasts. — Oh, don’t look so shocked. We’re nuns, but we’re
women, and we live in close quarters. We notice each another’s bodies. Surely,
you’ve admired Sister’s breasts. You can admit it. It’s no sin.”
“Yes,
Sister.”
“I thought so. It’s
only natural. You know, there’s a misconception about life in the convent.
Everyone thinks it’s a hotbed of lesbianism. Do you think you might be a
lesbian?”
“Patty asked me the
same thing.”
Oh, did she say Patty?
“You mean Sister
Patrice asked you.”
Oh, she had.
“Yes,
Sister.”
“So you do love her,” Auggie said. “I was wondering why you would come to discuss
your vocation dressed in such a revealing manner.”
Suddenly
self-conscious, Kristen pinched her sweater in the center of her chest and
shook it out, plucking it away from her stiff nipples. But it was too late. Auggie had noticed them. And as Patty said in class, about
adultery in the heart, a thought, once thought —
“Can’ be un-thought,”
Kristen said out loud.
“What was that?”
“Nothing,
S’st’.” She couldn’t help but
giggle.
“Did I say something
funny?”
“Uh
uh.” She clamped her mouth
shut, suppressing another laugh, but despite her best effort, a sputtering
cackle broke through.
“It is funny, isn’t
it?” Sister said.
“What?”
“Everything,
darling. Life.”
Kristen glanced down.
The sweater had settled back on her chest, and her nipples were poking through
the weave again.
“Ni’s,”
she said.
“Hmm?”
“I see my nip-ples.”
“Yes, I see them,
too.”
But Kristen didn’t
bother to tug at her sweater a second time. Her arms felt heavy, and she didn’t
feel like moving. She was indisposed.
Funny word,
“indisposed.” Take it apart. In. Dis. Po. Dis Po In. Dis In. Like all the way in.
Whoa! What was wrong
with her? She shook her head. Blinked. Down on her
lap, her fingers curled limply around her half-eaten cookie. A crescent moon
far away, at the bottom of a wavy pool. She contemplated it for a while, until
Sister took it from her and placed it back on the plate.
“You won’t need that,”
she said. She licked a finger and wiped a crumb from the corner of Kristen’s
mouth.
“How are you feeling,
dear?”
“Fum,”
Kristen said.
“Did you say fine? Or funny?”
“Fum,”
she repeated, as if the meaning were obvious. And she laughed again, but it
didn’t sound like her laughing. It sounded like it was coming from outside.
“That’s the tea,”
Sister said. “It’s making you very relaxed.”
Something
crawled around down there. Under her sweater. A mouse. Oh. It was Sister’s hand. Kristen told her to stop.
Or maybe she didn’t. Watching the lump move made her dizzy. She rested her head
on the back of the seat. That didn’t help. The ceiling was tilting and swooping
around. So she raised her heavy head. Her sweater was gone. Her titties were
bright white lightbulbs. Her sweater was way over there. The lightbulbs went
out. Something black was on her chest. Her titties tickled. They felt wet.
Something was stretching and moving them around.
“Auggie,”
she said.
Auggie
was nice. She gave her tea and cookies.
The
Virgin Mary was over there. Her blue gown billowed and rippled. It made her
queasy to watch. She looked down again. She was all undressed. Except red socks. The mouse was in her lap. No eyes. No
tail. But it had fat lips that sucked on three bony fingers.
“Cunt,”
she said.
“That’s
a very bad word,” a voice said.
“Su’
says cunt.”
“Does
she?”
“Fuck and cunt.”
“She’s
bad, isn’t she?”
“She’s
bad.”
She heard more
laughing. The mouse was far down there. The black thing was between her legs. A
fat tongue licked the mouse’s nose. Red socks. Wet tickle.
Right there. She watched herself feel herself
come.
“Huh!”
“Does that feel good?”
“Huh-uh.”
The
door. Light in the windows.
“No, dear, you mustn’t
go out with no clothes on.”
Where did the light
go? Just carpet. Blue and yellow.
Brown thorns. She licked it, laughing and thinking, cunt.
Wet tickle again. On her asshole
this time.
“My darling,” a sad
voice said.
A
hand on her cheek. Soft. She was
looking up. What light though yonder…? White, around a
shadow-face. And a halo of orange fire.
“I’m
all done,” she said, pointlessly, and gave up the ghost.