Chapter 5

Bill Buchanan left his office earlier than usual to pick Alex up and get her to St. Dominic’s convent by six o’clock. She was waiting for him in a plain black dress and flat shoes when he arrived. When she got in the car, she looked like she’d been crying, which he could well understand. He couldn’t blame her father for not resolving her living situation before his death. Even he was having a hard time figuring out what was best for Alex. And in the last months of Eric’s life, her father had been incapable of making any decisions, let alone one as complex as where his daughter would live. Before that, in his early sixties, it didn’t dawn on him that time was running short.

Alex was silent as Bill drove her to the convent. She sat staring out the window as depressing images wended through her head of a dark, dreary convent, ancient nuns, and then of her father in his final days.

“Are you okay, Alex?” Bill asked her, and she nodded. “I think you’ll like my wife’s cousin. She’s a character even if she’s a nun. She’s got a great sense of humor, and she’s a nice person.” Alex had trouble making the connection between humor and the mother superior of a convent. It didn’t make sense to her. She just nodded and sat stone-faced when they arrived, and didn’t move for a minute. Boarding school was beginning to seem like the less unpleasant plan.

The convent was a big, sprawling building that had been a good investment when they bought it. It was behind the church on a large lot, with trees and a garden, and a maze of small rooms on the top floor for the nuns, with large rooms downstairs where classes were held. It was Mother Mary Margaret who had introduced all their after-school and evening activities for children, young people, and their parents, which had been a great success and integrated them into the neighborhood, rather than cloistering themselves and setting the nuns apart.

Alex got out of the car slowly, almost dragging her feet, and followed Bill up the stairs. As they walked in, they were jostled by a flock of children being picked up by their parents. They were carrying clay objects, drawings, and paintings from an art class given by several of the nuns. The children were shouting and excited, and the mothers talking and laughing, and inside, a group of teenage boys were leaving the large meeting room that doubled as a gym. It was where their new Pilates classes were being held, which were a big success, but that was later in the evening, preceded by an exercise class for pregnant women. They also had an evening class for first-time parents on how to care for their newborns, which was given by two of the nuns who were nurses. And they were planning to offer art classes for older people in the community too.

Bill hadn’t been to see the convent in several years, and was stunned by how many of the locals were congregating in the halls. Mother Mary Margaret had turned it into a booming community center, and Alex was looking around with awe as children ran by her, women chatted, and teenagers came and went. It wasn’t the dark, dreary, silent place she had expected, or anything like what she’d thought. Bill inquired at a reception desk, and a woman in jeans and a tee shirt, who was actually a nun, directed them to an office at the end of a long hall, past the gym. And when they walked in, a woman in jeans and a red sweatshirt was standing on top of a ladder changing a lightbulb in a ceiling fixture. She glanced down at both of them in dismay, saw Bill in his suit and tie, and Alex in her little black dress, and looked embarrassed. She had gray hair in a ponytail, and a pretty face that always reminded Bill of his wife’s. They were first cousins and the daughters of twin sisters.

“I guess I should have worn my habit. I’m sorry, I didn’t have time to change.” She smiled down at them, finished changing the lightbulb, clambered down the ladder, folded it, and leaned it against the wall. “We lost our handyman last month, and I’ve been sitting here in the dark for three days.” She kissed Bill on the cheek and held a hand out to shake Alex’s, who stared up at her in surprise. She was a tall, robust-looking woman, and the sweatshirt said Stanford, where she had gone to college more than thirty years before. “I’m Mother Mary Margaret,” she introduced herself to Alex. “You can call me Mother MaryMeg. I’m glad you came to visit. It’s pretty crazy here every day. We give lots of classes and seminars for people in the neighborhood, mostly at night since we all work.”

She indicated two threadbare chairs for them and sat down at her desk. Alex found it hard to believe that she was a nun. She seemed more like a schoolteacher, or a principal, or someone’s mother. “We’ve never had someone come to live with us, and we’re not really set up for it,” she said to both of them honestly, “but it could work, as long as you don’t mind living in a busy place, and are willing to pitch in with us. We all take a turn in the kitchen every month. The sisters pray a lot when it’s my turn. I’m better with a hammer and a power drill than at the stove.” Bill knew she had many other skills and had majored in psychology in college, had a master’s in theology, and had been studying toward a doctorate in psychology while working as a nurse practitioner. “How do you feel about staying here, Alex?” she asked her very directly.

“I don’t know. It looks a lot different than I thought,” she said in a soft, hesitant voice.

“I’m sorry about your father. I know this is a big change for you. Bill tells me you don’t want to go to boarding school. Why not? That might be more fun with kids your age.”

“I don’t do a lot of after-school activities,” she said cautiously. “I read a lot, and I like to write. My father and I did a lot of things together. I think I’d feel trapped living at school, and be forced into a lot of things I don’t like to do. I’ve been with grown-ups, or my dad, all my life. My mom…left…when I was seven, and she died when I was nine. It’s been just me and my dad all my life.” Her eyes filled with tears as she said it, but she struggled not to cry, as the mother superior nodded.

“What do you like to write?” she asked gently, assuming short stories or poetry.

“Crime stories,” Alex said with a small smile. “My teachers think they’re weird, so I don’t write them for school anymore. My dad thought they were pretty good.”

“Maybe you’ll be a writer one day,” Mother MaryMeg said in a warm tone. “You’d have to be fairly independent here. The nuns can’t chase you around if you’re not home on time, or don’t tell us where you are. We’d have to be able to rely on you to go to school, keep up with your work, and follow our rules about the house. That’s a lot to expect of you at your age, but it won’t work otherwise. How do you feel about it?” She looked Alex in the eye and spoke to her as an adult, as though she were a young nun coming to live there, not a fourteen-year-old girl, a freshman in high school, about to turn fifteen.

“I think I could do it,” Alex said in barely more than a whisper. Bill Buchanan had made it clear to the mother superior that Alex had been provided for by her father, and would be no financial burden on them. The estate could even pay the convent an amount for her monthly room and board, which Mother MaryMeg had already said could be given in the form of a small contribution to the convent. “How much can she eat, after all?” she had said in a lighthearted spirit. This was not about money. It was about taking responsibility for her, and her willingness to cooperate with them. But looking at Alex and talking to her, the older nun was confident about it. She looked like a good girl, and seemed mature for her age. And her father had had no problems with her that Bill knew of. She was an excellent student, sensible, and well behaved, and the nuns taking her in would be a godsend for her if they would do it.

“What if we give it a try?” Mother MaryMeg suggested after a few minutes. Alex had impressed her very favorably, just as Bill had said she would. “Let’s see how it works out. Would you like to have dinner with us tonight? I could introduce you to the others.” If she came to live with them, she would have twenty-six surrogate mothers, after having none at all for the past seven years. It was going to be a big change for her, and living in community was always an adjustment for everyone, the nuns too. Some nuns lived on their own or in small groups in apartments now. Big bustling convents like St. Dominic’s were rare in the modern church. It was an atmosphere that the nuns there loved, especially with Mother Mary Margaret running it.

“I’d like that,” Alex said in response to the dinner invitation, and looked a little dazed at the prospect of moving into a convent, with a group of women she’d never met.

“Good.” The mother superior stood up and smiled at both of them. “You can leave her with us if you want, Bill. One of the nuns can show her around after dinner and drive her home. You don’t need to stick around.” It was six-thirty by then and the dinner bell had sounded ten minutes earlier.

Bill left them in the hallway and promised to call Alex the next day. Mother MaryMeg led Alex down to the basement to the dining hall. You could hear the nuns’ chatter from the stairs. It wasn’t a silent order, and they sounded like any other large group of women, laughing and talking and catching up on the day’s activities. They stood up respectfully when the superior came into the room, but went on talking and called out greetings to her. Several of them noticed Alex standing beside her, looking shy. Mother MaryMeg walked her over to a table of younger nuns who were chatting animatedly and stood up again when the superior approached, and several of them smiled warmly at Alex and said hello. They slid over on the bench where they were seated and made room for her when told she was staying for dinner, and Alex sat down cautiously with them. She was next to Sister Regina, who beamed at her and handed her a platter of roast chicken a few minutes later. “We have pizza on Tuesdays,” she whispered. “Sister Sofia is Italian. She makes great pasta too. I’m a terrible cook,” she admitted and the others at the table agreed, as Alex smiled at them. It was overwhelming meeting so many of them all at once. A few of the nuns around the room were still in their habits from work, most of them nurses from the Catholic hospital nearby, but the others were wearing street clothes, in most cases jeans, which Alex found reassuring.

They were modern and informal, and were a variety of ages, but many of them looked young to Alex, and nothing like what she’d expected. As she helped herself to chicken, spinach, and French fries, all of the nuns at her table asked her questions about school. A number of them had heard about her visit and wondered if she would come to live with them. They told her about all the activities they engaged in, what their daytime jobs were, and the classes they taught at night. Sister Regina said she was the instructor in the new Pilates class, and two of the others taught the art classes for young children in the neighborhood. They made it sound like fun to live and work there.

“Do you have a boyfriend?” one of them asked her, and she thought it was a trick question as she shook her head. She hadn’t been out with any boys yet. There were one or two boys she liked at school, but the subject of dating had never come up, and her father had wanted her to put that off as long as possible, and she still agreed. “I had two at your age,” the nun who had asked admitted, and the others teased her about it, and she said one of them had since become a priest. He still sent her Christmas cards, and was a missionary in Africa.

All the nuns in the group made her feel welcome, and Mother MaryMeg had Sister Regina show her what could be her room if she came to stay with them. It was tiny, and barely big enough for the bed, desk, and dresser that were in it, which were fairly battered and had been donated to the convent. There was nothing charming about the room, and she wondered where she would put all her things, but at least she could put her typewriter on the desk.

“We might be able to squeeze a small bookcase in here for your schoolbooks,” Sister Regina said thoughtfully. Alex didn’t say it, but she wanted to bring some of her father’s books with her too, especially the ones they had loved reading together. It was going to be a tight fit in the small room. “We don’t spend much time in our rooms,” she explained, as they walked downstairs and ran into the mother superior in the hall.

“Would you drive Alex home for me?” Mother MaryMeg asked Sister Regina, who went to get the car keys. Then the nun in the sweatshirt turned to Alex and she could see that Alex was on overload from all she’d seen. Her whole life had changed in the blink of an eye, and where to live, and with whom, was a big decision for a girl her age. “What do you think, Alex?”

“I’d like to come and live here,” she said politely. “Everyone was really nice to me at dinner.” There were tears in her eyes again as she said it. She missed her father, and she didn’t want to leave their home and Elena, but if she had to, at least the nuns seemed friendly and kind and appealed to her more than boarding school. And she might have time to write here, in the tiny room, more so than in a dormitory she’d share with other kids at a residential school. That colored some of her decision, and how welcoming they’d been to her during the visit.

“Why don’t you move in this weekend? There will be plenty of us around to help you. Just let us know when, and I’ll work out the details with Bill,” Mother MaryMeg said warmly, as Sister Regina appeared with the car keys to one of their four station wagons that were in constant use. Alex followed her outside, got into the front seat, and put on her seatbelt, and Sister Regina chatted easily on the drive back to Alex’s home.

“I’m excited that you’re coming to live with us,” the young nun said, smiling at her, when they reached the house Alex had shared with her father. Alex said they were going to rent it out, and keep it so she could live there one day. “I’m sure you’ll miss it, but we’ll take good care of you in the meantime,” she promised, and Alex nodded and thanked her. Sister Regina watched her walk inside after she opened the door with her key, and she saw Elena greet her and peer out at the car that had brought her home, and then the front door closed and Sister Regina drove back to the convent, while Alex sat on her bed and looked around her familiar room.

There was space for almost none of her things in the small cell she’d been assigned, but she was going to take as many boxes of books as she could anyway. She could store them under the bed and stack them in the corners. Her books were all important to her, and were so much a part of her life with her father, and had meant so much to him, that she couldn’t let them all go into storage. She combed his bookshelves for hours that night, pulling out the ones she wanted to take with her. She decided to take her favorite Nancy Drews since they had been her first mystery books, and were symbolic of her early life with him. And taking his favorites was like taking him with her. She was up long after midnight making stacks of their most beloved books, some of them first editions he had treasured. She treated them all with reverence, and the following night packed them all in boxes Elena had gotten her.

She wasn’t sad about leaving her school, since she had just started recently and had no close friends there yet. It was the house that would be hard to leave. She had lived there all her life, and her father had been in it for twenty years before that. It was like leaving the womb, to go out in an unfamiliar world, full of strangers, and a way of life in the convent that was totally new to her. She had no idea how it would work out, or what would happen to her if it didn’t. With her grades, she could have gotten into any boarding school, but they all seemed cold and too big to her. In an odd way, the convent seemed friendlier, and she was used to living with adults.

Bill had promised to drive her over on Sunday with all her things. And their house would be put up for rent the following week after all their belongings were cleared out. Elena had been told to give her father’s clothes away, and the moving men would pack the rest and keep it in storage at the moving company until the day Alex would be old enough to go through it, and maybe move back into their home again. But that day was a long way off, after college. Eight years away, after high school and university, or when she turned twenty-one. She had a long road to travel until then. And the next chapter of her life would begin on Sunday at St. Dominic’s. She had no idea what it would be like living there, or how long she’d stay. Maybe a few months or a year or two, and after that the fates would decide what would happen to her.

Alex was waiting in the living room with Elena when Bill came to pick her up on Sunday morning. She had six suitcases of clothes, twelve boxes of books, her typewriter, and the lamp from her bedroom with blue lambs on it that she’d had since she was a little girl. Her father had always told her that the lambs were blue because they thought she’d be a boy, but as it turned out, they’d gotten lucky when she turned out to be a girl. She had fallen asleep looking at that lamp every night, so she took it with her. And she had her father’s favorite crime books with her, the Nancy Drews she had loved most, some other mystery books that had inspired her, and the binders with her stories in them. And she had packed a sweater of her father’s that still smelled like him, and her pillow from her bed. Everything else would be stored.

Elena started crying long before Bill arrived, and she had promised to visit Alex at the convent whenever she could. She had to look for a new job, after more than fifteen years with the Winslows, and she was dreading finding a new employer, and heartbroken that Alex couldn’t stay in the house with her. Alex clung to her and sobbed before she left, and Elena pressed a little religious medal into her hand for good luck. It was agony walking out of the house for the last time, and just watching her do it, Bill had tears in his eyes when he started the car, an SUV crammed full of Alex’s belongings. It was the saddest thing he’d ever seen. She sat in the front seat, crying and holding her childhood lamp, and neither of them spoke on the way to St. Dominic’s. There was nothing left to say except how terrible he felt that she had lost her father and her home, and the housekeeper she loved. Pattie and her children had come to say goodbye to her the night before, and they had all cried too. It was a tough situation, but out of everyone’s control, and Pattie said she hoped that Alex would be well cared for at the convent. She had talked to her husband about letting Alex stay with them, but they had no room, were already jammed to the rafters with their own four children, and didn’t want the responsibility of another child.

Bill had filled out the paperwork on Friday authorizing Alex’s transfer to the parochial school near St. Dominic’s, and her transcript would be sent there. And he and Mother MaryMeg had agreed that a small amount would be deposited to the convent’s account every month to pay for her room and board, which the archdiocese had approved.

When they reached the convent, the nuns were coming out of the church next door. Many of them had worn their habits to attend mass, but the younger ones hadn’t, and rarely wore them anymore. Mother MaryMeg spotted them when they drove up, and she asked the nuns to help them unload the car and take Alex’s things upstairs. She had given considerable thought to Alex living with them, and had assigned three of the nuns to supervise her, although everyone would help if necessary. Sister Regina had volunteered immediately and had bonded with Alex over dinner and when she showed her the room. She looked barely older than Alex on Sunday morning with her blond hair in a braid, in white pants and a pink tee shirt. She was unnervingly pretty for a nun, which had concerned Mother MaryMeg from the first, but her vocation appeared sound. She had also assigned Sister Thomas, who was the nun with children of her own. She had groaned and laughed when the mother superior discussed it with her. “Not again! That’s why I came here, to get away from teenagers forever.” But she was good humored about it, and willing to give it a try. And Sister Xavier Francis was in her early thirties and a teacher, had a great knack with kids, and could help with her homework if need be, particularly Latin and math. All three of them were waiting for her on Sunday, and several of the others carried her heavy bags and boxes up the stairs to the third-floor room. No one could move an inch once they set her suitcases down, and her boxes of books were piled high on the bed. Alex set down her lamp and typewriter on the desk, and Sister Xavier looked at the old Smith Corona with awe.

“What a beautiful machine!”

“I use it to write mystery stories,” Alex said cautiously, not sure how they’d feel about that. “Crime stories, actually.” And the young nun’s eyes lit up at the words.

“I love crime stories!”

“That’s what’s in the boxes.” Alex grinned. “They’re my father’s favorite books.”

“Who are your favorites?” She reeled off a list of her own, including Dashiell Hammett, Agatha Christie, Eric Ambler, Frederick Forsyth, Robin Cook, and a long list of books that Alex and her father had read, and some Alex hadn’t.

“I’ve read a lot of them.” Alex smiled. “I used to love Agatha Christie when I was younger.” She had recently read The Silence of the Lambs and loved it. “My father didn’t like women writers. He said women can’t write crime, only a man. I’ve read a lot of male writers.”

“I’m not sure I agree. But I like mysteries that are softer and less violent. I like Dorothy Sayers. And I like themed mysteries too, especially about dogs.” Alex smiled at what Sister Xavier said, and recognized them as “cozies.” She didn’t want to be disrespectful and say she’d outgrown them and had graduated to hard-boiled mysteries and crime thrillers, which were more violent and much tougher, and often written by men, as her father said.

Alex had put some of the boxes of books under the narrow bed by then, and stacked others in the corners, and Sister Regina was helping her unpack her clothes. They barely managed to squeeze them into the closet. And Alex set up three photographs of her father on the desk and one of her mother with her when she was two.

“Your mother was really beautiful,” Sister Regina said, looking at her picture. “And your father was very handsome too.” Alex stared at the photographs for a minute and nodded. She still couldn’t believe that he was gone. The last tragic months with him were already fading from memory, they had been so unlike him. What remained were the warm images of the years before, the adventures they shared, the baseball games they went to, the books they’d both enjoyed, the long nights talking about what they’d read and what they did and didn’t like about it, the fact that he was always there, and tucked her into bed every night. The memories of her mother were dim and had been for years. But those of her father stood out more sharply than ever.

The nuns came by and helped her put everything away, and Sister Thomas came to check on them with a motherly air. She hadn’t admitted it, but there was something comforting and familiar about being responsible for a child again, even one Alex’s age.

“Everything going smoothly here?” she asked with a smile. She had kitchen duty that day, so had been busy making lunch. But she came upstairs to see how Alex was settling in, and she saw that she looked sad as she glanced around the room. It was a big change from home, even if everyone was friendly here. It wasn’t the house she grew up in, and the father she adored was gone. Alex had said goodbye to Bill before he left, and thanked him for everything he’d done, and he had promised to stay in touch, and told her to call him if she had any problems. He encouraged Mother MaryMeg to do the same, but she was sure that everything would be fine, and had told him Alex seemed like a sweet kid.

“I know this can’t be easy for you, Alex, but we’re glad that you’re here,” Sister Thomas said kindly. “God works things out strangely sometimes, better than you expect. I hope you’ll be happy with us. It’s different than what you’ve been used to, but we have fun here too. There’s something very warm and friendly about living with a lot of nice people, and sharing your life with them.” Alex was curious about her and nodded as she listened.

“Do you miss your children?” she asked her cautiously, wondering why she had become a nun after being married and having kids. Mother MaryMeg had told her about Sister Thomas’s six children, and Alex was stunned.

“I miss them like crazy,” Sister Thomas said honestly. “But I’d miss them if I were home. They’re all grown up, and live all over the place. They come to visit me, and I’d be a lot sadder home alone. This gives my life meaning, and I’m useful. I always wanted to be a nun before I got married.” She had gotten pregnant at eighteen and had to get married, which she didn’t tell Alex. “And now I can. I’ve had the best of both worlds.”

“I don’t want to be a nun when I grow up,” Alex said quietly with a firm look in her eye, and Sister Thomas understood.

“No one expects you to. We just want to give you a home, and help you get to the next stage of your life. You’ll be out of high school before you know it, and off to college. And then you’ll have a job, and get married and have kids one day, and then you can come back and visit us.” She made it sound very simple and nonthreatening to Alex.

“It’s nice of the nuns to have me here,” she said gratefully. “I didn’t want to go away to school. And I want to be a writer one day.”

“Then I’m sure you will, if you work hard at it. Is that your typewriter?” she asked with interest, and approached to look at it with admiration. “Where did you ever find it?” It was in perfect condition, and a vintage piece.

“My dad gave it to me to write my stories.”

“I’d like to read them sometime,” the nun said gently, suddenly pleased that Mother MaryMeg had assigned her to help care for Alex. She reminded her of her own children not so long ago. It seemed warm and touching now to have her there, even though she had resisted it at first, but Alex seemed like a sensible, well-brought-up girl. She had good manners, and appeared to be considerate and intelligent, although inevitably at fourteen, there would be some bumps and battles ahead in the next few years. But Sister Thomas had lived through it before and knew she could again, and this time she would have twenty-five partners to help her, not just one who thought the kids were her job and never his. She had loved her husband, but her marriage had not been easy. “Lunch is in a few minutes,” she reminded Alex before she went back to the kitchen, and Sister Regina came to get her when it was time.

“Do you want to help me buy groceries today?” she asked as they walked downstairs, both of them in jeans and tee shirts, like two kids. “I’m on shopping duty. We buy out the supermarket once a week. They give us a discount.”

“Sure, that would be fun,” Alex said as she followed her into the dining hall in the basement and sat down next to her. Sister Xavier Francis was at the other end of the table, and Sister Thomas was sitting with the mother superior as she often did, but waved when she saw Alex come in, and Alex waved back. Overnight, she had twenty-six new friends, or adopted aunts and godmothers. It was totally different from anything she could ever have imagined, and she and Sister Regina chatted all through lunch, about movies and books and the Pilates class Sister Regina taught. She invited Alex to try it and she said she would. They wanted to add a yoga class too.

They went grocery shopping together afterward, and Alex helped her with an art class for mothers and children after that, and she peeked in at the babies in the parenting class, with young panicked-looking couples. The hours flew by, and after dinner, she went up to her room and lay down on her bed and thought about the day. She wanted to do some writing, but she was too tired, and still feeling overwhelmed by all she’d seen and done that day. It was all so new to her, and so were the nuns. She was starting her new school the next day.

She was surprised when no one came to tell her when to go to bed or turn off the light. They treated her like an adult, as her father had, and they seemed to assume she could regulate herself. She liked that. They respected her, and expected her to live up to it. She got undressed, brushed her teeth, said good night to the photo of her father, and turned off her lamp with the little blue lambs. The bed was hard, but the pillow she’d brought with her was familiar, and she slept with her father’s sweater next to her, so she could feel him near her, and smell his cologne. It was a brave new world, but not a bad one, just very different.

And as she fell asleep, she had an idea for a story that she wanted to write the next day. It would be the first one she had written in months, since her father started failing dramatically, and the fact that she had an idea for a new story seemed like a good sign. As odd as it was to be here, she was home, and she drifted off, feeling peaceful and safe.