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“Shall I make coffee? For the adults?”

We always provide coffee to the adults, and she knows this, but before I can reply, the front doors open and Marie enters, flushed and lovely in a deep green dress. My breath catches. She belongs on a throne, I think. Draped in a velvet gown, with the rarest gems on her fingers and a line of would-be suitors stretching out the door.

I watch her walk, my eyes memorizing things they should not: her delicate collarbone, the sway of her hips. I think of the way those hips felt, pressed to mine. It’s something I recalled more than once when I was in bed last night, and I know this evening I’ll be picturing them again.

“It’s inappropriate, is it not?” asks Irene, jolting me from my thoughts. She nods at Marie. “Wearing a dress like that, when we’re at war. Especially when she should be striving to fit in more than she does.”

I don’t even try to hide my irritation. Half the women in this town are jealous of Marie, and I believe that jealousy is causing more issues for the Durands than their mother’s background.

“God chooses to grace us with beauty even in the most desperate of times,” I reply. “Roses will still bloom in the spring and sapphires will still sparkle as bright. Why should she be any different?”

Irene’s eyes widen and that’s when I realize the error of my ways. I just compared Marie’s beauty to the flowers of spring and rare jewels. The words of a lovesick man, not a humble priest.

Which should come as no surprise. Increasingly my thoughts are not of God at all.

* * *

For the next week, Marie avoids me, or perhaps I’m avoiding her...ashamed of my behavior and ashamed of the things I imagine each night: her naked beneath me, gasping my name as my lips slide over her breasts, as my fingers steal between her thighs. I imagine entering her, pushing into her tight, wet heat. I pinch the bridge of my nose even now, trying to force the thoughts away.

It’s for the best that there are no more quiet moments with her, no more smiles exchanged. That I no longer stand near enough to smell that rose-scented soap she uses. I tell myself that it will all blow over, that eventually these fevered thoughts of her will exhaust themselves and I’ll be able to commit, once more, to my purpose here.

I just wish those thoughts would exhaust themselves a little faster. I hate not speaking to her. I worry about her in the same way I always did, but when her brow furrows, I can no longer ask what’s wrong. I can no longer check up on her, make sure she’s getting home safely.

On Wednesday, though, I can no longer hold my tongue. The day has been bitterly cold, and by the time she’s preparing to leave the church, the snow is falling faster. What if it gets bad just as she sets out? People have died ten feet from their homes in a blizzard. It will look bad, the two of us alone, but I’m too anxious about her to care.

I catch her as she’s pulling on her coat. “It’s too cold to walk,” I say abruptly. “Just wait. I’ll give you a ride home.”

Her lips tremble and then she forces a smile, pulling her gloves from a pocket.

“Thank you, but I already have a ride,” she says.

“Your brother?” The question comes out on its own and sounds every bit as possessive as it feels.

“No, actually,” she replies, averting her gaze as she pulls on the first glove. “Gerard.”

Gerard. His name is like a punch to the face. If I were a better man, the man I aspire to be, pretend to be, I’d be happy someone is looking after her. Instead jealousy tears through my chest.

She opens the door and my hand goes to her arm, as if to physically stop her from meeting him. “Are you sure you...” My words trail off. My jaw clenches. I have no right to question her decisions. As far as she’s concerned, I’ve probably been the worst choice she’s ever made.

She waits for me to complete the thought and when I don’t, she gently tugs her arm from my grasp. “You don’t need to worry about me, Edouard.”

I watch as she runs down the steps to the waiting car, feeling sick to my stomach.

I tell Irene, who has remained behind as always, that I’m not feeling well and return to my room. I’m failing my job, I’m failing the parishioners, I’m failing Marie and myself. I promised God I’d give her up if He returned her home safely, and I didn’t. Perhaps this is my punishment for failing.

I drop to my knees, just as I’ve been trained. I pray for resolution, for relief, for a sign. Normally I feel clearer after I pray. Normally the silence afterward feels full, as if it holds answers. But tonight when I rise, the silence mocks me. The room seems emptier than it did when I arrived, and there’s only one person I’d want here to fill it.

I know, when I wake, that there will be no signs. How could I ever even see one when Marie is all I’m capable of noticing? The sight of her standing in front of a blackboard tortures me as much as the sight of her walking away. The questions torture me too: Is Gerard courting her? Is he waiting at the farm for her to return even now?

I should blame myself for this predicament, but a part of me—a part I can barely stand to acknowledge—blames God instead.

* * *

I wait for her to come to confession on Saturday. She’s always among the first to arrive, and I’m hungry for that moment when she’ll be mere inches away from me in the confessional, hungry for her soft voice to wash over me in the darkness.

But the hours pass, and she never comes. Instead I listen as Madame Fournier details her petty squabbles, as Madame Beauvoir gives me a small list of her mild failings without ever alluding to her large ones.

I’m sometimes amused by these confessions and sometimes disturbed, but today I can barely focus on them. Is Marie absent because she’s avoiding me, or is it that she’s off with Gerard? I hate both answers.