Waiting to Believe (25 page)

Grudgingly, winter gave way to spring. Kacey was surprised one sunny Sunday to find a thin envelope waiting for her among the stacks of mail. The handwriting was small, shaky, but immediately recognizable. Her mother rarely wrote, and when she did, it was often to complain about something. There had been a card with a short note at Christmas. Joseph had broken his left arm playing hockey. Gerald was sassy and pleading for his own car now that he was a senior. Annie wouldn't be coming home for Christmas but had sent a fruit basket. Bridget and Maureen were staying on campus but would be home for Christmas Eve Mass. Kenneth was not mentioned.

“What is it now?” Kacey wondered as she slit open the envelope.

Dear Kacey.

I thought of you this morning when I looked out the kitchen window and saw my first robin of the season. Sitting in the apple tree by the back porch. Actually, I heard it first and then spotted it. Just as perky as could be. Did I beat you?

Love, Mom

Kacey's lips quivered, but she smiled. Each spring, they'd all vie to see who would spot the first robin. Whoever had the first sighting marked it on the calendar, and that date was transferred over onto the next year's calendar. Kacey was the winner most years, with Annie often complaining she had seen one but had forgotten to mark it down.

Kacey had continued her search each spring at Blessed Sacrament, even though there was no one to share it with her. But on March 19, 1967, her mother had seen the first robin and wanted to tell Kacey. Kacey strode to the library windows and scanned the oaks with tear-filled eyes.

In time, the robins returned to the trees of the convent, to the phone lines, and to the rich, black soil of the gardens. Kacey heard their cheery song even in the darkness just before dawn, rousing her from sleep to lie contemplating the life unfolding before her.

She was now just four months away from her first teaching assignment: the culmination of her college work. The launching of a profession she would follow for the rest of her life. But the prospect brought a sense of foreboding.

Though many of her daily chores had been removed as she moved up the ranks of her postulancy and novitiate, the one task that remained was ironing. She was increasingly troubled by what she read on her hands and knees beneath the ironing board. In the early sixties, the issue was race. And though it had not been a new issue for American society, what tugged at Kacey was the fact that students had become less tolerant of it and institutions had perpetuated it.

And then there was Vietnam. The heartfelt rage of students over the war stirred her. The news of the marches and the demonstrations, the unity of thousands of peaceful warriors left her feeling impotent, inconsequential. By 1967, many saw the two issues, civil rights and the war, as connected. Both involved deprivation of rights, of dignity.

Ten thousand marched against the Vietnam War in San Francisco on a cloudy April day. Ten thousand. Was Greg there? Bridget? Within the walls of her silent community, such news could not be comprehended.
She
could not comprehend it. Nor could she comprehend her own place in this new world swirling around her.

45

“I'm open! I'm open!” Sweat slipped from beneath Kacey's coif, dampening the edges and tickling her neck. She waved her arms in the air, her flowing sleeves swirling around her bare arms. Sister Mary Anthony wheeled and fired the ball at Kacey. Sister Mary Michael leaped high, trying to block the pass, but Kacey leaped higher, snagging the ball and pulling it to her chest. She dribbled down the makeshift court, did a quick feint to the left, then pivoted, lifted herself off the asphalt, and shot. Two points.

A cheer went up from the seven sisters sitting in lawn chairs at the edge of the driveway. Three of them were from the retirement wing of the convent, old and withered, afghans tucked around their legs, though the early June sun beat down on them.

The most progressive of the older nuns, they were willing to accept their juniors playing basketball—running, whooping, pinning their habits up midcalf to keep them clean.

For Kacey, these games were life giving. But now she bent over, placing her hands on her knees, regaining her breath. “Hey, Mary Quentin!” she called to the sideline. “Come in, give me a break.” But the young sister shook her head. “Come on,” Kacey insisted. “I've gotta rest!”

Mary Quentin again shook her head. “No,” she called out as she rose from her lawn chair. “Not today.” She folded her chair, laid it on the ground, and walked toward the back door.

“Heads up!” Mary Angelica yelled just as the ball was fired at Kacey from close range. She reached out and pulled it in, beginning a slow lope to the opposite end of the court. Mary Michael sped up from behind, batting at the ball. Kacey was distracted, and Michael stole the ball. Kacey stopped in her tracks, raising her arms above her head. “That's it! I'm too worn out. Let's call it a game!”

A small groan went up from the other players, but no one argued. And no one was sure which side had won. The joy was in the play.

Kacey bounced the ball, returning it to the shed where the equipment was stored, with Lisa behind her, carrying another ball. “That was kind of abrupt. Are you okay?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah. I just got sidetracked. I don't know what's going on with Quentin. She wouldn't come in. She doesn't seem like herself lately.”

They replaced the balls on the shelf. “I've noticed, too,” Lisa agreed. “I can't even get her to play Clue, her favorite.”

“I don't like it,” Kacey observed, but time for talking had ended as they left the shed and approached the back porch.

Big day! The reforms of Vatican II reached down to the convents around the world, bringing change no one could have predicted. After centuries of floor-length habits and head-binding coifs and scapulars, individual communities now had the right to vote on whether to wear a modified habit or continue wearing the traditional garb.

Blessed Sacrament sisters voted for the modified habit, though the older sisters held back. Kacey was thrilled to be measured for a navy-blue skirt, midcalf.

She remembered the day that Angelo Giuseppe Cardinal Roncalli, Patriarch of Venice, was chosen as leader of the world's Roman Catholics. Not many days later, she had watched her father hang a photo of the new pontiff above the dining room buffet. As he placed the nail, her father voiced his quiet hopes for reform within the church. Criticism was increasingly widespread, even among the faithful. To many, the Catholic Church no longer seemed relevant. Kenneth understood the criticism. He shared it. But he also believed his beloved church was capable of renewal. Kacey knew that miles away, her father shared her delight in the changes brought about by Pope John XXIII, even though it meant such different things for each of them.

The day was already hot when she returned from showering. She smiled at the new outfit hanging on the closet door. What a relief it would be to slip into it. Pulling on pantyhose for the first time since high school, she noticed how white her legs were. They hadn't seen sunshine for five years. Nor had they been shaved . . .
Unsightly!

There was no change in the men's white T-shirt. It would now go beneath the new long-sleeved white blouse. No bras for the sisters. Kacey buttoned the blouse and stepped into the skirt. Next, the piece she didn't understand: a navy vest that reminded her of the pinnies schoolgirls had worn in gym class basketball games. Shoes were the same: clodhoppers.

Finally, she fastened the new short veil atop her head, pulling wisps of her strawberry blonde hair forward, for all the world to see. Her neck was exposed.
How delicious!

The smell of rhubarb pies wafted through the screen door. Sister Mary de Sales was lifting one out of the huge, old oven, sliding it onto a cooling rack on the counter. She looked up and gave Kacey a wide smile. Reaching for a plate of cinnamon-topped piecrust scraps, she held it out to Kacey, knowing it was a favorite.

Kacey took the biggest piece on the plate, making a kissing motion with her lips. She leaned against the counter and nibbled slowly on the flaky crust, before taking two smaller pieces and slipping them into the pocket of her skirt. “Mmm,” she allowed herself to murmur.

Then with a wave, she moved through the kitchen and was on her way to the library. No words had passed between them, still they spoke.

“No fair! You've got to keep both feet on the floor!” Lisa yelled as Kacey slapped a red king on a red queen in the middle of the table, slipping it under the card in Lisa's hand. It was the end of a lively game of double solitaire. Kacey usually won and did again.

“That's your family's rule, not mine!” Kacey countered, “Anything goes at our house!”

“Well, I don't think that's the way Hoyle intended the game to be played.” Lisa scooped up the two decks of cards and began to separate them, but Kacey stopped her.

“I can't play anymore. I want to write home.”

“Write home? What's up?”

Kacey was irritated. “Do I need a reason?”

“Of course not! I'm sorry. It's just that you don't write very often.”

Kacey backed off. “True. But I want to tell them I've heard from Annie. I wrote to tell her about getting our teaching assignments. You know, her being a teacher and all.”

“She's still in Boston?”

“Yep, doing pretty well, but she says it's hard. Really hard in an inner-city school.”

A silence fell between them, both lost in their own thoughts. Then Kacey asked. “I'm kinda scared about teaching. Are you?”

The question took Lisa by surprise. “A little,” she admitted.

Again they sat without speaking, Lisa once more shuffling the cards. Kacey watched her friend's hands. “It might be the end of the road for you and me,” she said softly.

Lisa's hands stilled. “I know,” she said. “I've thought of that. It wouldn't surprise me if they sent us miles apart on purpose.”

“Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of. We've been pretty lucky for five years. Only gotten called on the carpet a few times.”

Lisa grinned. “Well, we could always pray to St. Ursula to keep us together!”

Kacey wrinkled her nose. “Who's she?”

“The patron saint of teachers! And that's gonna be us before we know it!”

They both smiled at the thought. Teachers. Yes, before they knew it, they were going to be teachers.

46

“Mary Laurence . . .” Kacey awakened, frozen in fear. It was near midnight. Someone was kneeling by her bed, shaking her shoulders.

“Mary Laurence.” A familiar voice. “Shh. Don't wake the others. Come, please.”

Kacey sat up. “Quentin? What in the world?” Mary Quentin raised her index finger to her lips, then tugged on Kacey's arm. The others in the room slept on as Quentin led Kacey from the room and down the hall to the bathroom.

Once inside, Kacey flipped on the light and hissed, “You could be getting us in a lot of trouble! What's going on?”