Tara Quinn - The Night We Met

I couldn’t understand my reaction so, really, had no explanation for it.

“When’d you quit the convent?” Arnold asked after the beer had been served.

“I didn’t.” My eyes shied away from any contact with Nate as I replied—and my entire body suffused with guilty heat. For a second there, I’d wanted to deny my association with the church. With my calling.

Like Peter? Who later redeemed himself?

Or Judas—who never did?

“No kidding!” Nate’s deep voice was distinctive, his words clear in the room’s din. “You’re a nun?”

He’d been a minute or two behind, parking the car, when Arnold had mentioned it earlier.

“Not yet,” I assured him as though there was still time to stop the course of my life if need be—and at the same time shrinking inside, preparing to be struck down for my heresy.

“I’ve been living at St. Catherine’s dormitory for the past couple of years, but in two weeks I move into the convent itself and start my formal training,” I added to appease any anger I might have instilled in God, directing my comment to Nate without actually looking at him. “It takes three years to get through the novitiate.”

“You live with the nuns?” That voice came again, touching me deep inside.

“I live in a dormitory on the grounds, yes.”

“Dressed like that?”

“Not around the convent, no.” I didn’t describe the plain brown dress I usually wore. Not understanding why his presence was like a magnet to me, I wasn’t going to engage in conversation with him at all if I could help it. I tried to focus on Arnold and the other guys as they relived, with exaggerated detail I was sure, antics from their day, each trying to top the other with tales of daring attempts or perilous danger survived.

But frankly, I found their accounts boring. I kept thinking about paying my bill and excusing myself. Our waitress passed, laden with drinks and I told myself I’d flag her down next time.

“Do you spend your days with the nuns?”

I shook my head, alternating between wishing I’d bothered with makeup or a hairstyle and feeling glad that I hadn’t. Men liked blond bobs, not the straight brown wash-and-wear stuff that was cut just above my shoulders.

There was safety in mousy.

And in another six months when, God willing, I became a novice and received the Holy Habit, minus the wimple I’d be honored with when I took my final vows, my hair would be cut as short as my father’s.

“What kind of order is St. Catherine’s?”

Why wasn’t he joining in the boasting with his friends?

“Teaching. Other than those who run the household, the sisters hold teaching positions, either at the private college I attend or at Eastside Catholic High School right next to it.”

I didn’t see how he could possibly be interested in this. And wasn’t even sure he’d be able to hear me above the crowd.

“So that’s what you want to do? Teach?”

“I want to serve God. Since the Second Vatican Council there’s been a surge of energy directed toward education. And I love kids. So, yes, I do hope to spend my life teaching.” Instinctively I turned to face him as I spoke. And couldn’t look away. He had the bluest eyes I’d ever seen. And possibly the warmest.

“How old are you? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“Nineteen.”

He leaned a bit closer, not disrespectfully, I somehow knew, but simply to ease conversation.

“Do you have any idea how lucky you are to know your calling in life at such a young age?”

The question reminded me of my reason for being in the pub at all—potentially the last time I’d enter such an establishment. “Yes,” I told him, remembering the conclusions I’d drawn only a half hour before. And the resulting peace that had settled over me.

A peace I couldn’t feel quite as intensely anymore…

“So what happens next week? Do you quit school?”

“No. I only have a few more classes to take before I get my degree and I can attend those during my postulant period. That’s what I begin in two weeks.”

“How’s that different from what you’re doing now?”

I could hear Arnold on my other side, delineating in great detail a downhill run he’d made that day.

“I’ll be moving into the Mother House—the main house where the nuns live. Other than classes, I’ll be pretty much restricted to living there. My day will start at 5:00 a.m. and end at 10:00 p.m. I’ll have a uniform, mostly black, with a veil but no wimple, and my only possessions, besides my rosary and hygienic necessities, will be a sewing kit. Except for grace, meals will be taken in silence, and most general conversation will be limited to designated free time during the day. In another six months, when I become a novice, I’ll read only religious books, and will have no access to radio, television or newspapers so that I can focus completely on prayer, meditation and spirituality.”

He’d asked. But I think I answered as much for me as for him. Hearing myself say the words out loud made them real. Official. I was prepared. And unafraid.

“And you’re doing this because you want to?”

There was no derision or criticism in his tone—just honest curiosity that spoke to my heart. “I can’t imagine doing anything else,” I told him with a certainty born earlier that evening.

“What does your family think of it all?”

“I’m the youngest of five and my folks have been shaking their heads at me for as long as I can remember.” I smiled. “Mostly they approve. They’ve already got sixteen grandchildren. And they’re devout Catholics. They’re proud that one of their offspring is dedicating her life to God’s service.”

“But you don’t feel they’re pressuring you to go through with it?”

“Not at all.” That I knew for sure because we’d talked about it. Several times. “They want me to have a decent, productive life doing something that makes me happy.”

“You’re very lucky.”

I almost didn’t hear him. I considered letting that be the end of the strange conversation that had sprung up from nothing. But as I thought about what he’d said, I knew I couldn’t just get up and leave.

“You don’t think your parents want the same thing for you?” I couldn’t believe I was asking such a personal question of a total stranger.

“Probably.”

The response left a lot unsaid, but I wasn’t forward enough to press further.

“What do you do?” I asked instead, with a genuine desire to know. Nate Grady, as a member of the human race, intrigued me.

“I manage a ski resort in Boulder, Colorado.”

“What about in the summer?”

“We have camp activities for kids, hiking for adults.”

“So how did you meet Arnold?”

“My kid brother and Arnold were part of a ski team training for the junior Olympics several years ago and stayed in touch. After high school, Keith enlisted, said it was the only way he’d ever get a degree. I offered to help him pay for college, but he wouldn’t let me. His unit was deployed to Vietnam almost as soon as he got out of boot camp and two years ago, we got word that he’d been killed. A couple of weeks later, his remains were sent home for burial.” He paused, and when he resumed speaking, his voice was slow and measured. “Arnold and I have this sort of unspoken agreement to fill some of the gaps left by Keith’s loss, so we go skiing together a few times every year.”

The words could have hung like lead between the strangers we were, but they didn’t. Nate’s openness disarmed me. I had a feeling he wouldn’t have been so forthcoming with other people—and that he was hiding a lot more pain than he was showing. “I’m so sorry.”

“Me, too,” he said. He lowered his head, hands resting on the table on either side of his soda water. Neither of us had touched our drinks since he’d first spoken to me.