Short Story: Shrove Tuesday.

Short Story: Shrove Tuesday.

Sister Scholastica walked slowly from the church along the cloister and paused by the wall. The sun was warm; birds were singing from the mulberry tree in the cloister garth. Shrove Tuesday. Pancakes. Sister Benedict mentioned them after mass. Sister Scholastica remembered her mother making pancakes in the lucid days between her bouts of insanity. They reached to the full span of the dark pan she used. Speak to me, Mother, she used to say when her mother’s madness gripped her tight, but she never did or rarely if the mood took her, Sister Scholastica mused, brushing her hand along the cloister wall with the rough bricks. She sniffed the air. Flowers. The sunlight caught her face; warmed her. She hid her hands beneath her black habit; moved away from the wall; walked along cloister towards the refectory. Her stomach rumbled softly. Hunger. Lent soon. Less to eat. She recalled her mother’s eyes when the madness held; the darkness; the anger and fear. Her father took her for the last visit to the asylum, the summer ending, the clouds dark that day. She never spoke; just stared out at the fields beyond, as if an answer lay there she could not reach. The refectory door was open. Sisters gathered by the breadboard. Softer mumblings; stomachs rumbling. Sister Scholastica cut her slice of bread; walked to her table; waited for the abbess to knock on wood. Her father had been too strict; too hurtful, especially after mother’s madness showed, and after, when she’d gone and the large house seemed empty. The abbess knocked; the sisters chanted the grace; then sat on the long benches that lined the tables. The nun reading began her drawn out book on some dull saint from a dusty book from the library, her voice dry as paper, and her eyes following the page lazily. The crucified hung from the wall above the abbess’s chair; his arms strained with the sins of the world; his eyes pleading to the ceiling, which was stained, and dark. She ate the dinner; watched her sisters; wondered who would be the first to go or die amongst such few. Sister Dominic had died a week ago; found huddled in her bed; stiff as the stick she used to hobble round with clickedy click, clickedy click. Pancakes arrived. Hers was thin; rolled and touched with sugar and lemon. She cut and ate slow. Allowing the taste to simmer on her tongue as it had as a child. Francis had wanted only sex; he never really loved her; just led her on for months on end. The last copulation a dark affair, unwanted and haunting. The pancake almost dissolved on her tongue; the lemon touched and tingled. The pancake had gone. The plate empty. She sat; listened as the reading nun droned on. She placed her hands beneath her habit; felt her breast beneath the cloth; the softness still there. The sunlight touched through the high windows; sprinkled onto the tables and floor; the Crucified hung in his lonely silence, his arms out stretched to embrace the world of dark and bright. Never saw Mother again; never knew her embrace once the madness came. Father, forgive me for I know not what I’ve done, but still the beatings came; the locked room for hours and hours; the only light, the small chink through the drawn curtains. The abbess knocked; the sisters rose; the grace chanted; the sound of prayers spoken; the touch of hand on hand beneath the black habit as the refectory emptied and was left to its silence once again. Sister Scholastica paused by the wall. Sniffed the flowers; breathed in the air; felt the sunlight kiss her brow as Francis did, but far more warmly, more constant, more loving, she mused, lifting her face to the sun letting the memories drift off like the birds in the distant trees over the cloister walls.