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“Not great memories?” she asks, and I nod silently as she squeezes my arm again.
“I know how that can be. I thought coming home after four years would be something special… and it was, I mean. You were there. But what I mean is, the house… Even my Dad. Everything was so…”
“Different,” I murmur bitterly, gripping the wheel tighter and half wishing I could have done this without Faith. So she didn’t have to see the effect this place has on me.
“Oh, Noah. Do we have to? Can’t we keep going, or even turn back? I hate to see you so down on a place,” she says, pleading with me to turn back or drive on if it’s going to be so hard.
A helicopter flying low overhead silences us both as I take the last main turn off to the convent.
“I think we’ve gone just about as far as we can, for now, Faith,” I tell her.
“No matter what happens, we’ll be okay. I haven’t broken any laws and it’s only on a promise that I’m doing this, got it?” I remind her again, grateful when she gives a nod and holds my gaze in the mirror while clutching my hand.
There’s a lot of new buildings, and the streets seem narrower for some reason, but there’s enough of the old neighborhood to bring back decades in a split second.
All the fear, unknown, and anger of a kid who just wanted to be accepted, not even understood.
Just accepted for who he was.
My heart seems to stop for a second and I freeze up, the convent’s not where it should be until I realize I’m two blocks over. Nearest where the old school used to be.
“Almost there,” I tell Faith again, grinding my jaw and looking at the gas gauge, wondering how all this is really gonna pan out.
Turning up, unannounced, and not leaving on the best of terms so long ago.
I hadn’t thought this through with myself in mind, and now I have Faith along with me.
My responsibility too.
That helicopter zooms over us, lower than a bird as I notice Faith following its path with her gaze.
I see the old street, then the old building, a space right out front of the gates.
Here goes nothing.
“Well, here we are,” I announce, trying to sound cheerful but noting Faith’s knowing look as she leans over to peck my cheek.
“Whatever happened, we’re moving past it after today, right?” she asks, reminding me again.
I nod my head gravely and slide out of the truck, almost forgetting the damned case again.
The gate’s unlocked but still as heavy as ever, a huge double wrought iron number from the last century, weighs a ton and even my best right arm has a time making enough room for Faith and I to squeeze through it.
The grounds are still pleasant, with short grass, white roses, and lots of benches and wide-open spaces.
Faith takes my free hand as we wind our way up a half-acre of path to the front doors.
Huge, inlaid wooden things made to look like arches. A heavy cross on each of them. A tiny electric bell next to the one on my side.
Faded plastic, brittle under my finger and not one I hear making a sound once I press it.
“Nobody home?” Faith ventures after almost a full two minutes of waiting.
I feel her shiver next to me, I sniff. Knowing we’re not unnoticed by being here.
“They’ll answer,” I tell her.
And they do.
The huge oak door creaks back before I see a tiny old woman in her nun’s habit, her eyes downcast, her bony finger pointing the way in.
Not the welcome party I was expecting, and a rush of nervous energy ripples across my belly as I hear the door close loudly behind us.
“We’ve been waiting for you, Mr. Templeton,” the old woman says, her voice creaking louder than the door.
She beckons us both to follow her.
A large, wide set of black and white marble stairs lead up to an even wider corridor.
Nothing’s changed in here, the smell, mixed with church incense stings my nostrils and my memory as we obey her command to follow; leading us both to the Mother Superior’s office.
She ushers us in with a jut of her sharp chin, the newest superior swinging around in her chair, smiling a greeting as she eyes me up and down.
“Well! Mr. Templeton, how you have grown into a fine, young man,” she gushes, levering herself up from her chair with her desk and coming over to us both.
She’s tiny, but nobody’s fool. I remember her from thirty years ago as if it was yesterday.
“Sister Montieth,” I murmur, feeling her smooth, gnarled hand in mine as it tightens.
“Mother Superior Montieth,” she barks, dropping my hand and giving Faith a dismissive glance as she eyes my briefcase.
“You’ve finally come!” she says loudly, falling back into her soft chair as if getting up was too much for her, both her hands raised with her eyes to the heavens.
