Evelyn lies on her side in bed, struggles to pull the thin sheets and blankets over her body to seal out the chill, but no matter how hard she tries, her feet, shoulders, or elbows are still exposed to the cold air of the dormitory she shares with three other girls. All “fallen” women, all young. All waiting in a polite queue, allegedly to be redeemed.
In the bed next to hers, Margaret shifts. Her roommate hasn’t been sleeping lately. Although the house rules forbid it, Evelyn and Margaret have become fast friends over the past few weeks.
She arrived the day after Evelyn, appeared in the doorway as Evelyn unpacked her suitcase into the tiny dresser at the foot of her bed.
“Call me Maggie,” she said, when Evelyn introduced herself. “How long have you been here, Evelyn?”
“Oh, just since last night. Did Sister Teresa do your intake?”
“Yes. These rules are mad. And I suppose this is the prison uniform, is it?” Maggie asked, holding up a drab grey shift dress.
All the “inmates,” as Sister Teresa calls them, were given the same day dresses and nightgowns. The term reflects the grim, punitively militaristic environment the nun has curated within the home. The staff keep the girls busy with cooking and cleaning, shining shoes, and scrubbing the laundry they take in from the neighbourhood to subsidize the home’s upkeep. They have scheduled outdoor time in the back garden only at predetermined hours of the day, and under strict supervision. The home is intended to be a place of anonymity. The girls aren’t allowed to talk about much with each other. No one uses their last name. No one is supposed to talk about how they got pregnant. But the one thing all the girls whisper about, obsess over, is everyone else’s due date. It’s the first thing each new girl gets asked.
Maggie is due two weeks after Evelyn, so they’re on this ride together. Evelyn takes each turn just slightly before Maggie does, twitching the wheel and leading the way for them both. The girls don’t have their own mothers or older sisters to provide guidance during their pregnancies, and the nuns certainly can’t—or won’t—offer any. The physician who comes in to see the girls never answers any of their questions. Ignoring his patient, he talks to Sister Teresa as though the pregnancy is a rather uninteresting science experiment he’s reporting on, like phases of mold growth. And so, with this dearth of information, the girls turn to one another for support, though never under the watchful gaze of Sister Teresa, or the Watchdog, as they call her. Because, after all, St. Agnes’s is a place where everything is kept hidden.
Another moan rings out from down the hall and Maggie opens her eyes. Her thin arm rests protectively over the curve of her tiny belly. She’s only just beginning to show. “Do you hear that?” she whispers.
Evelyn nods. “It woke me up. I think it’s Emma.”
“She told me last week while we were in the kitchen that she wanted to change her mind about the adoption, but…” Maggie trails off. Evelyn shakes her head. They both know that changing one’s mind isn’t an option at St. Agnes’s. “She’s been crying a lot in the mornings. I don’t think she has anyone in her dormitory, you know, like this.” Maggie offers Evelyn a weak smile.
They hold each other’s gaze for a while in silent conversation. Eventually Emma’s sobs subside, the echoes sinking into the faded wallpaper of the hallway. These walls have absorbed many years’ worth of anguished cries. Whispered pleas and prayers.
Evelyn shivers so violently that her teeth start to chatter. “It’s so cold. It feels like winter already.”
“I know. Come here.” Maggie gestures for Evelyn to join her in bed, scoots herself over as far as she possibly can on the narrow mattress. Four inches, if that.
Evelyn throws her own pathetic blanket over her friend before lowering herself onto Maggie’s bed. Maggie stifles her laughter while Evelyn tries to settle in. After a minute of struggling, they find a comfortable position and Maggie burrows her head into the crook of Evelyn’s neck.
“I asked Sister Agatha last week to see if she could scrounge up some extra blankets somewhere. She said she’d try, but the dormitories are full right now, so there isn’t much of anything to spare,” Maggie says with a sigh.
The home is staffed by three nuns who live on the premises along with Sister Teresa and Father Leclerc. They go about their business and carry out Sister Teresa’s bidding with a quiet resolve. Only Sister Mary Agatha is patient with the girls in a way the other staff aren’t. She’s diminutive in stature, plain and pale, and reminds Evelyn of a house mouse. She’s also genuinely kind, a welcome counterbalance to Sister Teresa’s snide aggression. She’s the only member of the staff who calls the girls “miss,” and she’s sweet with the babies. Evelyn thinks it’s a bit of a shame Sister Agatha decided to take the veil. She might have made a wonderful nanny.
“Hey, what’s your last name, Evelyn?” Maggie whispers now from beneath Evelyn’s chin, interrupting her thoughts.
“Taylor,” Evelyn says, and the contraband confession triggers a lurch of excitement in her chest. “What’s yours?”
“Roberts. It’s nice to meet you, Miss Taylor.”
Evelyn smiles. “It’s nice to meet you, too, Miss Roberts.”
Silence for a while as they both warm up.
“What do you want to do when you get out of here?” Maggie asks.
After is something Evelyn’s been thinking about a lot lately. She hesitates, unsure how her friend will react to her answer.
“I, um… I’ve been thinking about going to university. Maybe medical school.”
Maggie gasps, and Evelyn worries their roommates will wake up, but they don’t. “Really? That’s a big idea. What makes you want to do that?”
Evelyn chews the inside of her cheek. “It’s something I’ve thought about for a long time. The boys in our families are always told they can do or be anything they please, right? But us girls are just meant to get married or be teacher-spinsters for the rest of our lives.” She feels Maggie’s body quake with laughter. “It’s true!”
“I know it is,” her friend says. “My mother’s the same way.”
“Since I won’t be getting married anymore, I just thought… if I have the chance now, I might want more than that.”
“What kind of doctor would you want to be? There are all kinds, aren’t there?”
“M-hm. I’ve thought about maybe being a doctor that deals with bones.”
“Bones?”
“I don’t know.” Evelyn shrugs, considering how best to articulate what the possibility means to her. “I guess I’d like to be able to put broken things back together. Or maybe I could work on patients’ hearts, you know. Try to help save people like my poor Leo.”
Maggie looks up at Evelyn. “You should do it. Really you should.”
Evelyn smiles. “Maybe I will, Miss Roberts.” She pecks Maggie’s forehead with a kiss. “Maybe I just will.”
“Dr. Evelyn Taylor,” Maggie says slowly. “It has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?”