Kathryn Dahne - Curse of the Nun

Some of the anxiety she’d been pushing away for the past few weeks bubbled up to the surface as she thought about her younger self in the photo. Anna had toned down her old gothic look quite a bit since marrying Mike. She’d gotten rid of most of the piercings save for one in each ear and her nose-ring, and while her clothes still tended to be dark, she did wear more than black on black. None of that, however, meant that she wanted to look like what a proper suburban housewife probably should. She tried to picture herself in some frilly pastel sundress and failed.

“You’re serious?” Mike asked.

Anna tilted her head to the side, half-shrugging while trying not to disturb Claire.

“We’re moving to such a nice neighborhood and your position is so big I don’t want to—”

Mike cut her off with swift kiss. He pulled back and fixed her with a serious expression.

“Never,” he assured her firmly. “It’s who I married.”

He kissed her again and then paused as if considering something.

“Just maybe let’s not go back to the ‘08 look?”

Anna snorted. That was easily done.

“Deal,” she agreed.

They all headed back inside when there was a break in the rain, splitting up in separate directions in the house to finish up any last-minute tasks. Anna walked through the upstairs hallway, checklist firmly in hand as she tried to surmise what was left to be taken care of. Anna knew she might have been a little obsessive about the move, but this was a big step and she wanted this to go well. A new life, and a fresh start. That was what she wanted now more than anything, even if…

Crash!

Anna jumped at the sudden noise behind her. Had Mike dropped something? She turned around and walked into the spare room where it sounded like the noise had come from. Anna had been certain that Mike was still downstairs with Claire. Hopefully it had been nothing too fragile. She couldn’t even think of anything they had in that room, save for extra moving boxes they had set up and ended up not needing. Anna looked down to see “breakdown extra boxes” still unchecked. Maybe Mike had started in on that and had tripped on something. Anna pushed open the door and frowned.

The room was empty.

No Mike looking sheepish, just an old cardboard box, overturned on the floor with its contents spilled out around it. Anna crouched down to inspect it, none of the objects familiar to her. The cardboard was damaged and musty smelling, not one of the crisp new ones still stacked in the corner. The word STAY was harshly scrawled in large letters along one side. In front of it there was an old, leather bound bible, the gold print on the cover peeling away in places as if well worn by many fingers. On top of a stack of faded documents that appeared to be old church records, there was a large silver crucifix, remarkably untarnished and still gleaming brightly.

Anna shifted the crucifix off to the side to rifle through the records. She flicked through them, the paper brittle beneath her fingers as she carefully turned each page. Much of it looked to be donation records, items, amount, and benefactor each listed in neat, handwritten columns. Anna chuckled to herself at some of the odder donations listed. The taxidermy bat was probably her favorite.

An old black and white photograph had skidded the furthest away in the tumble. It was of a group of nuns and a priest standing grouped together outside what Anna assumed was their convent. Anna picked it up, staring down into the grayscale eyes of a young nun in the very front. She frowned at the picture, gently running her fingers over it. The nun looked so haunted, so sad. It was the same look she had seen in the photo of her younger self.

Anna found herself half-hoping that the young nun had found some sort of solace. She supposed that it was one of the reasons a person would become a nun. There was a lot to give up on that path, but she could understand wanting to find peace at any cost. At least a nunnery was a healthier choice than drugs.

Anna couldn’t figure out why Donna would have a box of old church stuff. She had never seemed the type. Still, it was obviously not one of theirs and the daylight was fading. Anna cleaned up the scattered items and headed over to the nearby open closest where they appeared to have fallen from. She didn’t spare any further thought to how the box had managed to tumble so far away on its own. Her mind back on her checklist, she headed off to find Mike.

Mike was trying to shove the pizza box into the kitchen trash when she finally located him.

“You okay up there? I heard a crash?” He asked, looking up as she entered the room.

“I found some old church stuff of your aunt’s. It had fallen off the closet shelf in the spare room.”

“Church stuff? My aunt is a lot of things, but a church girl definitely isn’t one of them,” Mike said wryly.

Anna snorted as she handed over the checklist. She definitely had to agree with Mike on that point.

“Everything’s all packed,” she informed him happily.

“Good. Now let’s hope we didn’t take any of her stuff on accident. We’ll never hear the end of it.”

Anna could only imagine the accusations that would fly if they had. She smirked and moved closer to him.

“You’re just lucky you don’t have to be the one to deal with her tomorrow,” she mock-accused, lightly poking his chest with her fingers.

Mike leaned in closer. “I am.”

Anna tilted her head back to look up at him coyly.

“You might have to find a way to make it up to me.”

He smirked in response.

“I might,” he agreed in a low voice, lips almost brushing hers.

Anna grinned mischievously at him, grabbed the trash bag out of his hand and sauntered away. Mike’s laughter followed her into the garage.

It was still raining even as the afternoon wore on into evening, the sound amplified against the roof of the garage. Anna dumped the trash bag into the large bin just as her phone started to vibrate in her pocket. Once her hands were free of their burden she pulled it out to check the ID. Her heart leaped into her throat as she saw the display read “INCOMING CALL: LEX.”

Anna bit her lip hard, unwilling tears pricking at her eyes as a thousand different memories suddenly played themselves out in her head.

She and Lex had met in high school, the perpetual outcasts bonding together against the world. He had been older than her by a couple of years and teenage Anna thought he was the coolest person ever. The fact that he had paid attention to a skinny little nobody like her had blown her mind. That had been Anna’s first taste of addiction, the thrill of being noticed, wanted. Lex had been so attentive to her, wanted to be around her all the time and was always asking what she was up to. Anna had been too naive to see the warning signs for what they were.

She viciously jabbed the decline button and shoved the phone back into her pocket. She only made it another two steps back towards the house when it buzzed again. Half reluctantly, she pulled it out to look at the screen. “VOICEMAIL: LEX” was emblazoned across a banner under the date and time.

Anna hesitated, her finger hovering over the option to listen. There were a million reasons to just ignore it. A million good reasons.

She pressed play.

A voice sounded out from the phone’s speakers, slurred and oh-so-familiar.

“Hey Anna, it’s Lex. Call me. I want to catch up, maybe see Claire. I heard you were moving up to Ridgedale of all places and I thought we could—”

Anna could feel the tears pricking at her eyes as she quickly hung up. She typed out a quick text message reading, “If you call this number again, I am calling the cops.” She reread the message twice before deleting it.