In This Small Spot (34 page)

My biggest regret in making that decision
while you were gone is that I will not be here to welcome you home.
However, it will allow you the opportunity to make your own
decisions without unnecessary distractions.

Please know how fervently I pray for you,
and that I will see you one day soon.

Lauren

Mickey had read it over and over, and then,
placed it in her Bible with Alice’s letter.

Moving about the abbey, Mickey had quickly
realized how noisy and conspicuous she was, with her crutches and
awkward gait. She’d made a habit of trying to get to the Chapel
early, and, as she sat now, a bell sounded above her and soon the
Chapel was filled with the quiet shuffling of feet and the creaking
of wood as the nuns filed in for Vespers. Once the organ sounded
and the voices rose, the music of the Office enfolded her,
transported her, as it had since the first day she had wandered in
in her fishing waders, to a place where her pain was “not gone, but
lessened,” she would have said. Closing her eyes, she tried to
absorb and memorize every scent – incense, flowers, the lemon wax
Sister Fiona preferred for polishing the walnut choir stalls. But
when she opened her eyes, it was a harsh jolt to see Sister
Anselma’s empty choir stall.

When she arrived at the vestment room for
the first time, her heart was pounding, “and not from the exertion
of walking.” There was still a very faint smell of smoke, but
visually, it looked almost as if nothing had happened. “I’m not
sure what I expected,” she would say to Jamie much later. “I knew
it would be repaired, but…”, “But it felt like nothing had
happened, like they moved on without you,” he guessed. New timbers
criss-crossed the vaulted space high above, supporting the new
roof; the stone walls had been scrubbed clean and new windows had
been installed. She was standing at the top of the stairs when the
others saw her. Awkwardly, she descended the wooden steps and made
her way toward them.

“Welcome back,” Sister Caroline said
solemnly, giving Mickey a hug. As the most senior nun there, with
the longest tenure working under Sister Anselma’s guidance, she had
taken charge of the vestment room and the work they were doing.
Sister Paula, Sister Madeline and the others also came over to
greet her.

“Where would you like me to work?” Mickey
asked.

“Would you mind helping at this embroidery
station?” Sister Catherine asked. “We’re trying to get caught up on
the work that was lost in the fire. We don’t know when or if we’ll
resume any restoration work for the museum.”

Mickey suspected Mother Theodora had already
explained Mickey’s physical limitations to Sister Catherine as this
embroidery station was one where she could remain seated. To her
surprise, there was a small basket with an arrangement of pine
greens and dried baby’s breath sitting on a table next to her
embroidery frame. Shrugging, she studied the pattern marked on the
silk, and threaded a needle.

In the corner, untouched, was Sister
Anselma’s loom. The half-finished vestment on it was pockmarked
with burns and water stains. It sat there, almost a presence in the
room, catching Mickey’s eye at unexpected moments when she glanced
up or spoke to someone in passing. It was a couple of weeks before
Mickey could bring herself to approach it, arriving early one day
so that she was the only one in the vestment room. As she neared
the loom, she could see the tonal pattern that Sister Anselma had
been weaving into the cobalt-blue silk. She swallowed the lump in
her throat as she stared at the only visible reminder of the fire –
well, almost the only,
she thought as she turned and clomped
back to her work station.

╬ ╬ ╬

Mickey lay naked on her stomach, covered only
by a sheet, as Sister Mary David came in and secured the curtain
around the bed. She pulled aside the sheet and carefully removed
the gauze still covering the few open, bleeding areas on Mickey’s
back, tugging gently to loosen it where it was stuck. The first
time Mickey had come to the infirmary for this treatment, she’d
been able to feel the trembling of Sister Mary David’s hands.

“Sister, what is it?” Mickey had asked,
struggling to sit, wrapping the sheet around herself. “Is this too
difficult, too disturbing? We could ask Mother –”

“No, Sister Michele, it’s not that!” Sister
Mary David insisted. She looked as if she were ready to cry. “It’s
just… every time I remember that day in the hospital, and
everything you’ve endured, I’m so ashamed. I cannot begin to fathom
how much pain you were in, but the fortitude you showed… and I was
too weak and cowardly to watch and help. I’m so afraid of hurting
you.”

To Sister Mary David’s alarm, Mickey laughed
– an angry, bitter laugh. “You can’t hurt me, not compared to –”
She pressed her fingers to her eyes, and said more gently, “Believe
me, I understand. I hated getting burn cases when I was practicing.
As for my so-called bravery, I absolutely dreaded those sessions.
The medications couldn’t touch the pain. It was often more than I
could take. I just prayed for release, and on the good days, I
passed out.” She laid a reassuring hand on Sister Mary David’s arm.
“I promise I will tell you if I need you to do anything
differently, okay?”

Thus reassured, Sister Mary David had
quickly became more comfortable doing Mickey’s burn care, cleaning
the dried blood and applying an emollient to keep the scarred skin
supple and soft. Sister Mary David finished this step now, saying,
“All done. I’ll be back in a moment.”

Mickey quickly dressed in t-shirt and
sweatpants for their exercise session. This, too, had been
difficult at first, as Sister Mary David gave only tentative
resistance to work Mickey’s legs. “Harder,” Mickey had urged until
Sister Mary David learned how to judge Mickey’s strength and how
much to push.

“Come on, you wimp,” Sister Mary David said
now. “You can do better than that.”

Mickey’s face was scrunched and red with her
effort. “It’s a shame,” she panted, “that you’re not as timid about
this as you were about looking at my butt.”

Sister Mary David was so shocked and
surprised that she dropped Mickey’s leg. In a few seconds, both of
them were laughing so hard they had tears running down their faces.
Neither of them was aware that, on the other side of the curtain,
Mother Theodora had come into the infirmary to see how the exercise
sessions were going. She held a finger to her lips when Sister
Helen saw her and smiled as she listened to this exchange, and then
realized that the sounds had changed. Mickey was crying. Mother
could hear Sister Mary David murmuring to her. Silently, Mother
Theodora left the infirmary.

╬ ╬ ╬

Mickey sat at her work station, hemostats in
hand as she worked a needle in and out of the cloth. As she worked,
she could smell the faint scent of the dried roses sitting at her
work station. The mysterious floral arrangements had continued to
appear every few days in her cell or the vestment room. No one
seemed to know who was bringing them. The juniors had just
performed their Christmas concert for the community. Unconsciously,
Mickey began humming the
Coventry Carol
. She was so absorbed
in the detailed stitches she was making that she didn’t see Sister
Paula and Sister Stephanie exchange smiles as they heard her.

“It’s nice to see you laugh and smile
again,” Sister Helen said one afternoon. She was cleaning the
infirmary windows as Mickey was finishing her exercise session with
Sister Mary David, telling a story about how she broke her arm when
she was a child, climbing onto the garage roof to retrieve Jamie’s
Frisbee.

Mickey glanced up at her in surprise. “Have
I been that bad?”

“Yes,” Sister Mary David interjected. “You
have. But I don’t think many could have come through everything you
have without being a little bitter. It is nice to see you melting –
like Sister Anselma did during your retreat,” she added with a
cryptic smile.

“Good God,” Mickey said to herself, “does
the whole damned community know?”

Christmas was three days away when Mickey
got one of her best presents in the mail. Danielle Wilson sent a
Christmas card with her senior picture in it. She was graduating a
year late because of all the time she’d spent in the hospital, but
her cancer was completely gone, something her doctors couldn’t
explain, “but I can,” Danielle wrote. She had already been accepted
at the University of Maryland as a pre-med student. Mickey shared
the news with the entire community.

As if in answer to a Christmas prayer, the
abbey was covered in about eight inches of snow on December 24th.
Although it was beautiful, Mickey stood looking out the cloister
windows, realizing it would be nearly impossible for her to walk
through it for more than a few feet. Over the past few weeks, it
had become clear that her part of the abbey had become very small,
limited mainly to the enclosure garden. Sometimes at night, she
dreamed about running through the orchard, but when she woke, she
knew the only way she would ever get back out to the orchard or the
farm would be in her wheelchair.

On her way to the vestment room that
morning, Mickey saw the juniors outside shoveling and sweeping the
walks of the enclosure to create clear paths. A thought occurred to
her, and before she could talk herself out of it, she went outside,
dropped her crutches and eased herself backward into the snow.
Waving her arms and legs, she made a snow angel. The juniors all
looked at each other for a moment, clearly not sure what to think.
Then Abigail dropped into the snow also. In a few seconds, the
enclosure was peppered with supine figures waving arms and legs,
making snow angels and giggling like kids. Faces appeared in
windows, laughing and pointing. Sister Josephine came rushing
outside, an expression of consternation on her face. The juniors
all sat up, waiting to be reprimanded.

Looking around, she spied Mickey. “I knew it
was you!” she scolded.

“I’ve wanted to do this since I was a
postulant,” Mickey grinned. “Here, help me up.”

Sister Josephine reached for her hand and
yelped as Mickey pulled her down into the cold, dry snow. “C’mon,
you know you want to!” Mickey laughed, falling back into the snow
again.

All the juniors watched Sister Josephine a
little apprehensively and were shocked when she fell backward into
the snow and made her own snow angel. Laughing again, several of
them moved to fresh snow to make more angels.

“How appropriate.”

Everyone stopped and sat up. Mother Theodora
was standing there, looking very dignified with her hands tucked
inside her sleeves.

“The last bit of decorating for Christmas, I
presume?” she asked, looking around, her eyebrows raised.

“Wouldn’t you like to make one of your own,
Mother?” Mickey asked, looking at her mischievously as if daring
her.

Mother Theodora’s eyes twinkled. “I believe
I will.”

And to everyone’s surprise, she walked out
to an undisturbed patch of snow and, lowering herself to the ground
a little more carefully than the youngsters, made a snow angel.
When she sat up, Mickey and the juniors cheered and clapped.

“Now,” Mother said, “if some of you will be
kind enough to help an old lady to her feet, I’m going to change
into a dry habit.”

They all got to their feet and brushed each
other’s backsides off. The juniors resumed their shoveling, still
laughing and chattering.

Mother Theodora slipped an arm through
Mickey’s as Mickey got her crutches back in position. Walking
together toward the cloister, Mother said, “Thank you, Mickey.”

“For what?” Mickey asked. “Getting you all
wet and snowy?”

Mother Theodora smiled. “For reminding us
that religious life, all life, is meant to be lived joyfully. This
is why we needed you back among us for a while.” She stopped and
looked at Mickey as they entered the corridor. “I pray this is a
very blessed Christmas for you,” she said seriously. Then she
kissed Mickey on the cheek and left her.

Mickey kept playing Mother’s words through
her head. She wasn’t sure exactly when or how, but she had decided.
As strongly as she had felt pulled to the monastery to re-establish
a deeper spiritual life and learn to how to live with things she
had no control over, she now felt she was being pulled back to the
outside world. This would be her last Christmas as a nun at St.
Bridget’s. She had a feeling Mother Theodora knew it as well.

Chapter 43

“You understand that I will not be able to
return to take care of repairs or other issues,” Mickey said to
Carol Barnes, the realtor who would be acting as property manager
for the rental of Mickey’s house in Baltimore. “I’ve put together a
list of the purchase dates of all appliances and mechanical systems
in the house. Some are still under warranty. And here is a list of
all the tradesmen who have worked here and know the systems.”

Carol blinked. “I wish all my clients were
this organized,” she smiled, flipping through the notebook Mickey
handed her. “And you’re going where, again?”

Mickey’s acceptance into St. Bridget’s had
been finalized two months ago. There were so many loose ends to tie
up: the house, her leave of absence from the practice and the
university, finances. She’d forwarded five thousand dollars to St.
Bridget’s to cover her rent during her postulant and novice years.
“No one is turned away if they don’t have the money,” Sister
Bernice had written, “but it helps tremendously to offset our
expenses.” Mickey was also keeping active checking and savings
accounts to cover any expenses related to the house. She’d
considered selling it, but, “I just can’t. Not yet.”

“I’ll be on temporary assignment in central
New York,” she said to Carol. “Here’s the address. I’ve given your
name and telephone number to the housing office at Hopkins. You
should have no trouble limiting renters to medical residents or
doctors coming for fellowship training. My furniture will all be in
storage by next week.”