In This Small Spot (30 page)

Mickey briefly fantasized about turning back
to her plate with a “No”, but Abigail looked so miserable, standing
there, humiliated, with everyone watching… Mickey stood up. “I
forgive you,” she heard herself say, reaching her arms out to
embrace Abigail.

“Thank you,” Abigail whispered. Mickey could
feel her trembling uncontrollably.

As Sister Anselma had predicted, Mickey felt
herself unexpectedly swept away in one of those moments of grace –
“more like a tsunami,” Mickey would have said, as all the anger,
bordering on hatred, she had been harboring toward Wendy and
Abigail dissolved in that moment, leaving her feeling exposed and
vulnerable. To her intense embarrassment, as she held Abigail in
her arms, she was on the verge of weeping in front of everyone. “I
was not prepared for the power of those three words,” she told
Mother Theodora afterward. “Few are,” Mother responded.

Later, as she took her dishes to the kitchen
pass-through, Mickey passed Sister Anselma who stopped her by
laying a hand on her arm. In her eyes, Mickey could see that she
knew exactly what had happened. Suddenly feeling like she could cry
again, Mickey blinked hard and looked away. “Don’t be so cocky,”
she muttered, “I still may punch her.”

Chapter 37

The Saturday of the wedding dawned clear and
warm – a perfect May day. Sister Teresa had beautifully decorated
the Chapel with understated arrangements of flowers from the nuns’
garden. Mother Theodora had declared the day a holiday, with no
obligations other than the wedding Mass.

Mickey got up at the normal time, and went
to help Sister Regina. The cows still had to be milked, holiday or
not.
Besides, it’ll give me something to do while I wait,
she thought anxiously as she walked through the dewy grass to the
barn. Today, she would see Alice’s family for the first time since
the Christmas after her death. She had written to Edna and Charles
several times, but she wasn’t sure how awkward it would feel to see
them again – in a monastery, in a habit….

She was on hand to greet them all when they
arrived. As expected, there were lots of shocked faces and
good-natured teasing about the change in Mickey’s appearance since
they had seen her last. There were several new grandchildren to
introduce. It felt like a family reunion. Most of the nuns were
delighted to have an opportunity to interact with the babies and
children, holding them and keeping them entertained. It was much as
Mickey remembered – the Worthington clan truly seemed to enjoy
being together. “Are they always like this?” Mother Theodora asked
with a smile as she watched them. “Yes,” Mickey grinned. “They
became my family when Alice and I were together.”

“And it was a good thing,” she sighed,
looking over at Natalie, who, along with Mickey, was the only other
guest on Jamie’s side, sitting stiffly in a chair in the corner of
the common room where everyone had been given permission to gather.
Mickey went to sit beside her.

“Mom, have you said hello to Edna and
Charles? They always ask about you.”

“We spoke,” Natalie answered. “They said
they were happy to welcome my other child into their family also.”
She glanced at Mickey out of the corner of her eye. “I… I suppose I
ought to apologize for not being more accepting of you… before,”
she said as if the words were being dragged out of her.

Mickey stared at her, feeling a poison
rising in her like bile. “Don’t you dare,” she breathed. “Don’t you
dare apologize to me now… after you ignored Alice for twelve
years.” Natalie looked around, afraid that someone might overhear.
“Not once did you acknowledge her when she was alive,” Mickey
continued, unable to stop now she was started, “and now, because
Jamie is getting married, the good son, doing what I couldn’t with
this Church-sanctioned ritual, you’re suddenly feeling magnanimous
enough to apologize?”

She stalked away, oblivious to who might
have heard. She got as far as the enclosure garden before she was
aware of footsteps behind her. It was Jennifer, already changed
into her simple long, white dress.

Filled with shame, Mickey sat on Sister
Linus’ bench under the cherry tree, covering her eyes with her
hand. Jennifer followed silently. “Jen, I am so sorry,” Mickey said
softly. “Of all the days for me to have a meltdown…”

“I’ve been expecting it,” Jennifer said,
slipping her arm through Mickey’s.

Mickey looked up at her. “What do you
mean?”

“Mickey, I know you love Jamie and me, and
that you’re happy for us, but you’d have to be a saint not to feel
at least a little angry and hurt and jealous about all this fuss
when you and Alice loved each other so much with no real – I don’t
know what word to use… validation, I guess, of your
relationship.”

“We didn’t need that,” Mickey protested.

Jennifer looked at her tenderly. “It’s a lot
easier to not need it when it’s a choice to have it or not. I know
you could have been married now, but it wasn’t an option then.”

They sat silently for a bit. “Do you
realize,” Jennifer continued, looking out at the garden, “that you
and Alice are the model Jamie and I hold up for what we want our
marriage to be like? Not my parents, or yours,” she said pointedly,
and Mickey couldn’t help but smile, “or any of my other brothers or
sisters. The two people in our lives who could never be married
gave us the best example of how to build a life together as
completely equal partners. You’re why I’m not being walked down the
aisle by Dad – I’m not a piece of property being transferred from
one man to another. You’re why I don’t need an engagement ring or a
huge wedding or gifts. All I need is Jamie and the things we
learned from you and Alice.”

Mickey’s throat was tight as she hugged
Jennifer and said, “My brother had better treat you like the
treasure you are.”

Jennifer kissed her on the cheek and said
with absolute faith, “He will.”

The wedding was simple and beautiful. Sister
Margaret had chosen works by Bach and Handel for the Mass, and she
had rehearsed a small, chosen choir to sing harmony as the
community sang the melody. The doors of the grille had been opened
so that the wedding guests could come to the altar for
Communion.

After the Mass, in lieu of receiving gifts –
“you’ve already given us so much” – Jamie and Jennifer gave the
abbey a set of the twelve Stations of the Cross. Jennifer had found
them in a church in France that was being remodeled, and Jamie had
restored and then bronzed them so that they could be placed around
the enclosure as places of meditation.

An extra table had been set up in the
refectory so that everyone could eat together. Edna and Charles had
arranged to have the meal catered so that no one had to cook or
clean up. Sister Cecilia kept looking anxiously at her kitchen
every time one of the servers came through.

Late in the afternoon, when everyone was
finally gone, the abbey settled once more into its quiet routine.
Jamie and Jennifer, who were scheduled to leave for England the
next day on their honeymoon, were hosting as many people as Jamie’s
little house would accommodate, and the others were staying at inns
in Millvale. “How romantic,” Jennifer’s family had teased at
hearing that they would be spending their wedding night in a house
full of relatives, but “it’s romantic enough for us,” Jamie and
Jennifer insisted.

Mickey restlessly waited until nearly
midnight before she went to the orchard. It was a night very like
the last May night she’d come out here – a warm breeze was blowing,
stirring Mickey’s soul with a yearning, an emptiness so deep she
felt she would never be whole.

Mickey hadn’t been out there long when she
heard, “I knew you’d be here.” Sister Anselma sat beside her on the
hill where they’d talked before.

“And I knew you would come.” Mickey looked
at her in the moonlight, feeling reckless and breathless at how
near she was.

“It was a beautiful ceremony.”

Mickey smiled. “Yes, it was. It was the only
wedding I can truly say I enjoyed.”

“You know, it occurred to me, Jamie is your
twin, and you said Jennifer looks almost exactly like Alice – if
they have children, they’ll be as close as you and Alice could have
come to having children of your own.”

“I know. Alice and I thought about it. We
even asked Jamie once if he’d be a sperm donor – artificially,” she
added quickly, “I not that open-minded.”

Sister Anselma laughed, something she did
more frequently now, Mickey realized as she listened.

“But when we really thought it through, my
schedule was so erratic, and Alice worked with children all day –
it just didn’t seem fair to have her come home to be a single
parent most of the time.”

She looked at Sister Anselma. “Does it
bother you to talk about Alice so much?”

Sister Anselma smiled and shook her head. “I
feel like she’s a part of our history together.”

Giving in to her feeling of recklessness,
Mickey reached over and took Sister Anselma’s hand. Their fingers
intertwined, then pulled apart, only to rejoin in a sensuous dance.
For a long time, there was only this forbidden contact, setting
every nerve ending in Mickey’s body on fire. “Do we have a history
together?” she asked softly. “What about a future?”

Sister Anselma looked at her, and whispered,
“Do you want a future with me?”

Mickey didn’t answer directly. “Most of the
time I’m okay as we are, but sometimes…” Gently she pulled Sister
Anselma to her, haltingly, slowly. Their lips touched in a kiss,
feather-light, exquisitely soft. Abruptly, they both pulled
away.

“We can’t,” Mickey groaned.

“I know,” Sister Anselma murmured. “And this
is not the right time to be making decisions about anything – with
the wedding, and all the emotions it stirred up.”

“You’re right,” Mickey agreed. “I’m
sorry.”

“I know I should be,” Sister Anselma said,
“but I’m not.”

╬ ╬ ╬

Life settled back into a more normal rhythm
over the next few weeks. Most of the weaned calves were sold, and
Mr. Henderson took a few cows at a time to neighboring farms to
“visit the boys.” The abbey always gave the farmers a few calves in
payment for the bulls’ services. The hay was growing tall. The
enclosure was bursting with color as dogwood, crabapple and cherry
trees all bloomed at once. The bronze Stations of the Cross were
positioned around the periphery of the enclosure and small flower
beds were planted at each one: hydrangeas, roses, azaleas and
lilies. The plants were chosen so that there would be something
flowering almost continuously through October. Life seemed idyllic.
I should have known better,
Mickey thought later when she
looked back.

The restoration of the largest tapestry was
coming along. The smaller tapestries, ironically, were proving to
be harder to work on as nearly the entire bottom third of each had
to be carefully pulled out after the design was painstakingly
drawn. Then new threads had to be worked in without looking like
new threads. They were using a tea dye to age the newer
threads.

Jamie and Jennifer were splitting their time
between his house outside Millvale and her apartment in New York.
They came out to St. Bridget’s when they got back from England to
visit and allow Jennifer an opportunity to check on the tapestries.
“I think we’ll have the largest one done by Christmas,” Sister
Anselma told her as she brought Jennifer over to where Mickey was
carefully working in new threads in one section depicting a hunter
on a horse. Mickey felt a tingle run through her body as Sister
Anselma’s shoulder grazed hers.

“Excuse me,” Mickey murmured, forcing
herself to move away.

Ever since the wedding, Mickey had felt
acutely aware of Sister Anselma’s every movement. She had no idea
if Sister Anselma was feeling the same way or not, but Mickey was
also feeling the strain of constant physical desires. It wasn’t
just sexual – “although that part is pretty damn strong,” she would
have said – it was the longing to hold her, touch her, kiss her.
She couldn’t believe how much she missed just being touched.

Mickey coped with her excess energy by
continuing to help Sister Regina with as many farm tasks as she
could. She worked her required hours in the vestment room, but she
spent her Recreation time weeding the vegetables, cleaning the
barn, helping with maintenance on St. Jude – anything physical to
take her mind off Sister Anselma. She’d had to reassure Sister
Regina that this really was how she wanted to use Recreation. And
she prayed. When it didn’t seem to help, she prayed harder as
Mother Theodora had suggested. But she had a guilty feeling that
maybe the reason prayer wasn’t helping was because part of her
didn’t really want these feelings to go away. “I like being in love
again,” she finally admitted, but only to herself – having someone
to dream about as she drifted off to sleep at night, someone to
think about while she did all this extra work in an effort not to
think, only to realize that she was humming and smiling as she
labored.

And yet, “Being true to your vows is much
more than just living them superficially,” Sister Josephine had
told the novices more times than Mickey could count. “It requires a
whole-hearted commitment to the spirit of your vows, to the call
that brought you here in the first place.”

“Where is that call?” Mickey asked Mickey.
“Have you forgotten it?”

“No, I haven’t,” she replied. “It’s still
there. It’s just…”

“Just what?”

There was no answer to that.

“Off to the farm again?”

Mickey snapped to at the sound of Father
Andrew’s voice. He was coming from the direction of the orchard,
carrying a small sack.

Mickey nodded. “Getting ready for the first
hay cutting. We need to make sure the trailer is ready to go.” She
nodded toward the sack. “Hunting?”