Sweetest Sin

Chapter Three- Preaching to the Choir

After my confessional with Father Romano, I emerged feeling anything but cleansed. The best way to put it was that I had fell dirtier than when I went in. My mind went a million miles a minute as I thought about all the perverted ways I could have snuck my way into his side of the booth and shown him how good it felt to sin. But with too many eyes on me and the fact I wanted him to beg for it had stopped me. There was also the stinging sensation left behind by Mother Rhoussar’s flick of a ruler upon the dorsal aspect of my hand. I even had a small welt begin to form that placed a blemish on my otherwise flawless complexion.

I returned to the large room shared by the “purgatory” girls, and now found the room to be bustling with them. They all silenced and look to her as if she was the devil himself who had entered. I ignored the gazes and whispers as I was used to this, even expecting it by now. If it wasn’t the girls doing double takes in my direction, than it was the men surrounding me.

As I made my way to my bed that had been disheveled from the perfect nature it was left in, I also noticed how my things had been strewn around the room. Items of a rather personal nature had been forced out in the open with other items having been broken or ripped in the process of removing them. I had yet to learn if this had been on purpose as I took a moment to gather my things before hearing my name called from behind me. I ignored it at first in thinking it was one of the girls in the vicinity of my slumber, until I heard it again and turned to see it came from Tessa. She had motioned me out into the hall as she almost seemed afraid to enter the room.

I made my way towards her before feeling her pull me even further from the room. “I’ve been looking for you since you got in trouble...I hope I didn’t get you in trouble. I even told Father D’Aceria that I didn’t see what you had-”

“It’s alright, I just had to go to the confessional with the handsome priest.”

“You saw him?”

“I told my “sins” to him.” I chuckled. “If he only knew the ones I wanted to do to him…” I commented as I saw Tessa’s cheeks flush an immediate bright crimson. It was obvious that she had excelled in the idealistic version of a daughter my parents had wanted. She dripped with virtue and innocence, but somehow found herself attracted to the mysterious sins I had committed in my past schools. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that many were misunderstandings and not my fault. The only one that had been was when I was caught with Mary Jane a few months prior to arriving here. But it didn’t matter in regards to my reputation as people will believe what they want-even if they are going on so little or making it up themselves.

She pulled me further throughout the school and out of the boarding building and into one across the stoney path. Even the way she walked was perfectly aligned with the stones set at her feet. Tessa followed each one incredibly close, careful to not step upon the grass in fear of being scolded.

I, on the other hand couldn’t have cared less as I saw their version of punishment, and if it got me more time with Gabriele, then I was all for it.

She pushed her weight against the double doors that opened up to another building that I instantly recognized to belong to a sort of lunchroom. Long tables stretched from one side of the room to the other, and sat duplicated at least five times. The rest of the layout was conducted of areas for sister nuns to walk through to be sure we were keeping by our manners or prayers, as I saw her hit a ruler against a young girl who tried to fling a pea at another schoolmate. The sudden clap of the ruler startled everyone around her, including me as silence then filled the room. It only returned when the young girl ran out of the lunchroom with her head in her hands and tears pouring down her face.

“This is our dining hall…” Tessa spoke as she allowed me to continue my analysis of this location as I gave a smile before looking back to her.

“These usually look the same.” I said sarcastically as she gave a nervous laugh as if she lost cool points for introducing it to me.

“Right…” She eventually responded. “I know that most of this stuff is going to look gross,” She began as she took a tray from a stack and I took the one beneath hers as we held them in front of us to prepare for our dinner. “But the mashed potatoes are incredible! The broccoli is almost always hard and the pudding is tapioca which makes me almost sick to even look at, but everything else is pretty good…” She commented as she didn’t sell me on any of the items she described.

My diet usually consisted of m*******a and coke, the drink, not the nose candy. But the poor excuse for a meal that laid before me had made me crave a hit even more as I thought of cuddling with my teddy bear, Mary Jane, a bit later after sneaking out. I had noted on the journey to the chow hall that there was a staircase access to the roof that was right outside the purgatory hall. It would be easy to access once everyone to to sleep, so I planned my escape later in the evening to have a smoke.

As I sat down at a table beside Tessa, I found Father D’Aceria to ring a type of bell to gain everyone’s attention. It wasn’t as loud as a gong, but was surprisingly large in size for such a gentle ding. My gaze focused upon the bell as I heard words come from his lips but found myself at a daze as I saw Gabriele standing off center to him. He seemed to be watching me as well but I couldn’t tell as he was a lengthy distance away and he could have been spacing out too for all I know. I decided to think it was at me I let out a yawn, knowing they were contagious, and found him to do the same a minute later. I smirked as we were told to bow our heads and pray at the dinner table.

I have sat through many prayers in my life. They usually consisted of ones given on holidays or at church, when every single member of my family would pretend to close their eyes when they were really looking down. My mother’s gaze usually focused on her nails as she picked at them in a nervous tick and my father’s had been on the reflection of his shoes, to this day, I don’t know why this had been so fascinating to him. But the prayer Father D’Aceria had been one was that was spoken by everyone in the hall, causing for feeling as if I was being serenaded by a choir of boring lyrics.

"Bless us, O Lord, and these, Thy gifts, which we are about to receive from Thy bounty. Through Christ, our Lord. Amen." These words were spoken in an excruciatingly slow manner before everyone then set their pointer fingers and middle fingers in unison on various points of their bodies; having begun at the forehead, and ended with their hands in their laps. It was only then that food was allowed to be consumed, as I had already snuck a bite of the mashed potatoes that were given a rave review by Tessa. To be fair, of all the food items, this one had been the most edible, as everything else tasted as if it came from powder.

Polite conversation ensued between Tessa and I throughout dinner as we got to learn more about each other. It was only a matter of moments before I learned that her family life had been the same as mine, only she had an older sister who her family idolized instead of her. She was actually a nun somewhere in Italy. You could tell by the jealousy on her face that she wanted their approval, and in a way, it broke my heart as she was a sweet girl and seeing her sad was disheartening.

When dinner came to an end, we were told our curfew for the “new students” which had consisted of me and another female who was too shy to even acknowledge herself that nun had to threaten her with a whipping of the ruler to force her to stand. I felt so bad for her until the thought was lost as I finally came to the point in my day when I could sneak away from this crazy place and go somewhere alone.

This would be harder to do than I thought, however, as I had noticed that many of the girls continued to converse even into the early hours of the morning. I tried to be subtle and whisper “Shh” throughout the night, but only found scoffs instead of silence to be returned. When silence did finally fall to me, daybreak was beginning to make its way over the horizon as I made my way to those set of stairs-making it outside in record time. There was a small ladder I could climb to gain access to the roof and I had done so before taking a seat near the center of the building.

Within moments of sitting there, I heard someone clear their throat and I immediately expected to turn and see Mother Rhoussar. However, I saw a male figure instead who was the perfect clean cut American boy for the 1960s; complete with the award winning smile.

“Don’t worry I won’t tell, if you won’t.” He commented as he lifted a bud from behind his ear and took a seat next to me. “I haven’t seen you around here…”

“I’m new.” I spoke, uninterested.

“I’ve noticed.”

“It’s creepy that you are on the roof of a girls’ boarding school.”

“Not when you consider that my boarding school is on the other side of that wall..” He pointed behind him as I saw that the fence that held this compound together had actually been split between the two campuses. I looked to the boy, taking in his appearance in full. He was rather handsome, I could admit that, with steely blue eyes that could take any girl’s breath away. However, my focus was on Gabriele. As this guy seemed to try too hard, and I wanted to be chased but not tackled and I also wanted to work for it just a bit...and Gabriele was making me do that, even if he didn’t know it. And tomorrow was a new day to try and obtain his attention or affection, I would be keen on either.