Black Apple (24 page)

“Y-yes, Mother Grace,” she stammered, no longer the self-assured young woman who had, minutes before, walked into the office.

“You’re all right?”

She nodded uncertainly.

“Now listen. Tomorrow, once you are on your own”—Mother Grace’s voice wavered—“on that Greyhound bus, you must sit near the front where you can see the driver and he can see you.” She looked directly at Rose Marie, studying the pillowcase she had cut, bleached, hemmed, ironed, and tied behind her ears. “A white headdress.
Mais oui
, the sign of commitment I’ve been waiting to see. Now,
chérie
, there isn’t much time, so pay attention. There are often ‘undesirables’ at the back of the bus. If you must share your seat, sit next to a woman, preferably an older woman.”

“But why do I have to leave St. Mark’s? Do you want me to go?” Her lip was bleeding, the taste like an old penny.

“Non.”
Mother Grace pulled a hanky from her sleeve and dabbed her nose. “I’m afraid there’s no getting around it. Now, there’s something else I must tell you.”

“Mother Grace?” She hated the childish whine of her voice, the tears burning her eyes.

Promptly Mother Grace closed her mouth and struggled to her feet. As she made her way around the desk, Rose Marie rose too. For the first time in her life, Mother Grace wrapped her wiry arms around her. How thin and bent the old woman felt, so much smaller than she really was.

“Dieu, aidez-moi,”
Mother Grace whispered, squeezing. “You must be careful while you’re away, child. Be good. Don’t let any man”—she swallowed—“get close to you.”

“I don’t want to leave,” Rose Marie sobbed like a first-year girl. It took all her will to withdraw her arms from Mother Grace’s brittle waist, her familiar scent of soap and age.

  *  *  *  

Sister Lucy, looking bewildered, wobbled out of the confessional, and Rose Marie stepped in. It was good practice, she knew, to take confession before any trip, any change, any danger. Just in case.
Come Light of the World and enlighten the darkness of my mind
, she prayed as she knelt. She had no idea what might be lurking past the prairie, over the rolling foothills and in the crevices of the mountains hovering at the edge of the western horizon so very far beyond St. Mark’s Residential School for Girls, her home for twelve years.

“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned,” she muttered. “This is my first confession since school ended. I’m sorry about that, Father William, but right now I am fearful of what lies ahead. It’s me, Rose Marie, and Mother Grace has told me that I must leave St. Mark’s for three months.” She tried to steady her voice. “I’m having trouble trusting in God Almighty.”

“As you know, my child, the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest,” Father William said. “Even to the parish of Black Apple.”

“Yes, Father,” she began, but he was moving. Through the screen, she could see him turn his back to her until she could spot every nub running down the back of his black cassock.

On the other side of Father William stood a boy, his hands on a small priest’s bed in a small priest’s bedroom. The boy’s back was also turned to her, striped and bloody, just as hers must have looked when Sister Joan beat her with the electrical cord, so many years before.

“This may hurt,” Father William murmured to the boy as he poured liquid onto a cloth. “I’m afraid, son, it’s necessary to avoid infection.” The boy jerked as Father William applied the cloth. “There, there,” he said, his voice as tender to the boy as it had been to her on the day she had revealed the truth about Sister Mary of Bethany and Father Damien.

Lower down the boy’s back, Father William dabbed with the cloth. The boy was subdued now, moving just slightly at the sting of the liquid, sniffing faintly.

“Loosen your pants. Now, now, settle down,” Father William crooned as his fingers slid under the waistband. “I’ll take care of you.” His hand reached farther down, and his other hand dropped the cloth and tugged. “Let’s get you out of those.”

Everything had gone dark. She could see only Father William’s black cassock moving, and rising from it, the smell of something left too long in a warm, airless room, something off. The boy was crying, and Father William stretched his neck, his face lifted to the ceiling, eyes closed, skin glistening. “Let my weakness be penetrated with your strength this very day,” he grunted.

Rose Marie scrambled to her feet and fled the confessional.

“Child, where are you going?” Father William’s voice trailed after her. “Make an act of contrition
. I absolve you of your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son—
”

Dear God.

  *  *  *  

She slept terribly that night, her dreams strung with rope and electrical cords, jammed with yelling, thumping, sobs, and the gurgles of strangulation.

In the room she was sharing with Sister Simon for the summer, she rose in the darkness to scribble a prayer that was running around in her mind, then dressed as soon as Sister Simon flailed awake in her bed by the window.

At Matins she couldn’t sit still in the pew, and at breakfast she was able to eat only a bite of toast. No one spoke, and though she had the feeling the sisters were stealing glances at her, she wasn’t able to catch any of them at it.

For the past month—ever since she had been visited by Papa, or Papa’s spirit, or Papa had sent her a healing dream, whatever it was—she had been calm. Not only was she loved, but with the shadow sister and priest gone, she felt a degree of control over her life. And if she knew some things the sisters hadn’t told her about, like animal spirits, seeing backwards, and dreams . . . well, she wasn’t worried. She had learned from Mother Grace that revealed truths that surpass reason were mysteries to be accepted on faith. Over the years, she had accepted them all.

But now Mother Grace had spoiled everything. She was sending her away for doing nothing wrong! The small amount of control she had felt once the shadow people left was nothing but an illusion, a lie. Anything could befall her. At any time. No matter what she did.

As soon as breakfast was finished, Mother Grace steered her to the office to give her money she had “secured from the sisters’ personal fund,” and more warnings about buses and strangers, but Rose Marie was only half listening.

“Write to that priest on Papa’s Reserve, please, Mother Grace,” she interjected. “He has to tell Papa not to come here and visit. He can visit me in Black Apple instead.”

From the frown on Mother Grace’s face, Rose Marie knew she wasn’t about to tell the priest to deliver her message to Papa, at least the part about coming to Black Apple. Oh, Mother Grace had never liked Papa, had always tried to keep him from her. Anger bubbled through her, and she turned away. If only she knew the name of the Reserve and the priest, she could write him herself. But Mother Grace wasn’t about to tell her.

“Rose Marie?”

“What?” she snapped, feeling the power of her anger surge and then drain away. She was helpless again, had always been, would always be helpless at St. Mark’s.

“Don’t worry, Father Patrick will take care of you.”

That’s what I’m afraid of
, she thought.

Upstairs, she packed her spare school dress, a worn sweater, a slip, three pairs of underwear, a bundle of cotton pads, one pair of stockings, two nightdresses, and a pair of shoes, then rummaged through the desk for paper and books. At twenty-five minutes to ten, she folded Sister Bernadette’s raincoat under her arm, picked up her borrowed suitcase, and was about to lug it downstairs, when Sister Cilla stepped into her room.

“I need to say something to you about men,” Sister blurted, her face flushing.

Rose Marie was caught off guard. “Oh.”

“Once you’re in Black Apple, you might meet a man who is interested in you, or who pretends to be. He might be a handsome, charming young man you think is sincere, but more than likely he only wants”—Sister Cilla cleared her throat—“to take advantage.” She turned even brighter. “Most men are like that. Not all, but most. Do you know what I mean, Rose Marie?”

She could only stare.

“Listen, you can’t trust any man who wants to court you. Don’t let him get too familiar. By that I mean . . . well, don’t let him interfere with you. Dear, oh law.” She paused. “No kissing. No hands under clothing. You don’t want to be ruined, and you certainly don’t want a baby.”

“Oh my, no!” She felt the suitcase slide from her grip and topple over on the floor. She hardly noticed Sister Cilla duck out the room. Instead, she tried to recall the prayer she had scribbled sometime between last night and this morning.
Hail, Holy Mother of Heaven and Earth
.

Then she picked up the suitcase and started down the stairs.

Waiting for her at the bottom was Sister Lucy, supported by Sister Cilla, her cheeks still pink.

“Why, Sister Lucy,” she said, scarcely believing the old woman was standing before her in the main entrance, so feeble had she become in the past year. “Sister Lucy, you look pretty good,” she said loud enough for Sister to hear.

“Our dear daughter,” the old woman cooed, touching Rose Marie’s face.

“Sister Lucy wanted to come,” Sister Cilla explained. “Dear, oh law, I couldn’t say no.” Sister Cilla turned to the sound of Mother Grace making her way down the hall. “I couldn’t say no to her, Mother Grace.”

Slow and heavy footfalls on the stairs, lighter ones close behind. “Sister Margaret. Sister Joan.”

Sister Simon came up quickly behind Mother Grace, and Sister Bernadette scampered from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron.

“Rose Marie, you must keep in touch,” Mother Grace said. “Write to us once a week, at least. There are stamped envelopes in the side pocket of your suitcase.”

“Yes,” all the sisters chorused.

Sister Bernadette helped her into a black raincoat, and Sister Simon motioned to the gumboots by the door. Just as Mother Grace had predicted, both coat and boots were too large; she was lost in them.

It was Sister Bernadette who moved first, rushing up and throwing her short arms around her. Rose Marie felt the cool cotton of Sister’s summer habit on her chin and smelled bleach and onions. Then all the sisters gathered round, pressing hard bones and jiggling flesh, their damp cheeks and warm hands against her. She had never experienced such a display of affection in all her years at St. Mark’s. She couldn’t stop her chest from heaving, a wail trickling from her lips.

One moment, it seemed the universe was ordained and orderly.

Then, it shattered.

  *  *  *  

In the car, Sister Cilla’s white knuckles locked on the steering wheel as she accelerated down the gravel road from the school. Behind them, a plume of dust billowed.
Smoke
, Rose Marie thought. Her past burning away.

At the highway, Sister Cilla turned right in front of a transport truck and slowed to a snail’s pace. Down the hill they rolled, the truck braking behind them, its air horn blasting.

“We’re here,” Sister Cilla announced a few minutes later as the car lurched to a stop outside a dingy gas station and adjoining café slumped against the highway. Far behind them, St. Mark’s stood, a thumbprint on the vast horizon.

Once Sister Cilla had helped Sister Lucy out of the car, she turned to Rose Marie. “I have something for you.” Her hands fumbled at the nape of her long neck. From under her collar, she pulled a silver chain with a small silver cross. “My brother gave this to me when I took my vows. I want you to have it, Rose Marie. For luck. Here, let me fasten it for you.”

The bus pulled in then, and as Rose Marie climbed up the Greyhound steps behind an elderly Indian couple, she turned to wave good-bye to the sisters. They had grabbed hold of each other a few feet from the bus doors, and Sister Cilla seemed to wrap Sister Lucy like a wire around a windblown bale of hay. At the end of her sharp nose, a drop formed, then another, each spilling onto Sister Lucy’s wimple.

Mutt and Jeff
, she thought. She had seen the cartoon in the newspapers she used to wash windows and bundle up potato peels, and it had always made her chuckle. But not today. Today the contradiction of short and tall, thin and plump, young and old wasn’t funny. Sisters Cilla and Lucy were staying, while she was being shipped away. Lifting her hand for one last wave, she caught something from the corner of her eye. There, under the awning of the café, someone was watching the sisters. Still as a fence post, the narrow shape stood in the shadows, only the hands moving, working something. A straw hat, she guessed.

“C’mon,” the bus driver called, and she climbed the remaining steps. He pulled a lever and the doors wheezed shut behind her. Immediately she was assaulted by the smell of orange peel, cigarettes, and that unnameable acrid odour she had sometimes detected on Mother Grace’s breath in the morning.

Three rows behind the driver was an empty seat, and she remembered Mother Grace’s words about sitting near the front. As she neared the seat, the woman by the window plunked her purse down. Just as she started to say, “Excuse me, but is this seat free?” the woman glared at her and jerked her frizzy blond head to the back of the bus.

Rose Marie gazed down the aisle. A long bench seat made up the last row, just like on the school buses, and, on each side of the seat, a man leaned against the window, sleeping. The elderly couple who had just boarded the bus was sitting in the row just in front. Across from them were two young men. In front of the men, Rose Marie spotted another empty seat.

“Sit down,” the bus driver yelled, and feeling the burn of the frizzy blond woman’s eyes on her, feeling other eyes staring through Sister Bernadette’s baggy black raincoat, she rustled to the back of the Greyhound. As she drew closer, she saw that everyone sitting there was dark-skinned. Indians, like her.

Taking a seat, she sensed one head still turned towards her. It wasn’t the frizzy-haired woman, as she expected, but a man on the end seat of a middle row, a white man with a stubbled chin and red hair as dull as a dead fox caught in one of Papa’s traps. He grinned at her with crooked teeth. She turned to the window and took a deep breath.