One Saturday afternoon, there was a knock at my back door.
"Marie...! I mean, SISTER Marie!"
I stood aside and motioned for her to come into the kitchen. Marie had been a neighbor of mine prior to my divorce. I'd moved away and she ran into me at a book store a few weeks back. I'd missed her company and invited her to "stop by anytime" for coffee and talk. She'd done just that, coming by almost every Friday and Saturday morning.
"Please, come in Sister! I've just put on a pot of coffee."
"Oh, Mr. Dietz, you can call me Marie. You've known me long enough."
Sister Marie stood just inside my kitchen, so I motioned her over to the table, holding her chair for her as she sat down.
"Would you like some cake with your coffee? Or would you prefer tea today? I have some nice herbal stuff I just bought-"
"Coffee, please," she interrupted, "with cream and sugar, if you would. I'm in a devilishly decadent mood today."
I prepared it and I sat across from her. Over the weeks we'd been meeting, we would talk about being neighbors and her growing up in the neighborhood. As Marie, she'd babysat my daughter before my wife and I divorced and I'd always admired her. She wasn't beautiful in any "model" sense, but she was always what I considered pretty, with long, dark hair that hung past her shoulders, thick lashes that were naturally dark, a button nose, and a wide, sensuous mouth. Marie had a nice figure and, now that I think about it, reminded me of Jenna Ortega.
Marie had always been small, both in stature and figure-wise, though she didn't seem to care. I'd admired her secretly when she would come over to use our pool, usually with two or three friends or siblings in tow.
Her parents had been strict Catholics and were exceedingly pleased when another of their children had decided to devote themselves to the Church -- her two older brothers becoming priests and an older sister becoming a nun. With nine children, they could afford to 'give half of them up to their Savior.'
But I was quite surprised when I'd heard through friends that Marie announced her intention to enter a convent after spending the final two years in an all-girl Catholic High School. She hadn't seemed the type to want to do that as she'd been very rebellious since 6th grade and had flirted with the Goth scene through most of her high school years. She'd also spent a majority of her free time at our house, devouring my book collection and talking to me about what she'd read.
So, when we ran into each other at the local book store, it was quite a surprise to both of us. I made the invitation and we began to get together at either a coffee shop or my house for a chat. Lately, she seemed to be more comfortable talking to me again, almost to where we were back when she was younger. Today, though, she looked a little apprehensive and troubled.
"Mr Dietz," she began.
"Please, call me Max," I told her.
"M-, Max," she said, hesitating, "you know that I'm thinking of becoming a nun, right?"
"Thinking of? I thought you already were one!"
"No, I'm just an initiate. They give you some time to do some self-examination before making a commitment. I have to make up my mind soon and I've got a bit of a problem. You were always the person I could talk to about things, no matter how embarrassing or 'out-there' they might have seemed. You were never judgmental, never talked down to me and you always took me seriously, even when I thought I was right and tried justifying my mistakes."
I nodded. "You always deserved that, Marie. Heck, girl, you even skipped a grade in elementary school! I've always found you to be intelligent once you were able to put all the pieces together."
"Thanks, I think!" she said, laughing. She sipped her coffee again and I shook my head. The plain cream blouse did nothing for her figure. She'd looked really hot as a Goth and now, with a lack of makeup and the frumpy clothing she wore, she looked more like a frightened little girl than the confident woman I'd come to know.
"So," I said, "what's your problem?"
"It's kinda... well... I'm at a crossroads." She sipped her coffee again and then seemed to change gears with a non-sequitur. "How does one know if one is in love?"
I was taken aback for a moment and considered her words.
"Are you in love?"
"I'm... not sure."
"Are you questioning whether or not you should become a bride of Christ?" I asked, feeling just a bit hypocritical as I'm not all that religious.
"No, I'm not questioning that."
"Hmmmm."
I thought a bit more and she fidgeted a bit, so I poured her some more coffee and put the cream and sugar in front of her. Marie often had a difficult time saying what she meant and sometimes I thought she enjoyed the question-and-answer game as well, so I plowed on.
"So, you want to become a nun?"
Marie sipped at her coffee and then, putting it down, she stared down at the table and her face crinkled up into thoughtfulness.
"I don't know. I thought I wanted to be one until recently. Then things changed and I began to have doubts."
"Doubts about your love for Christ?"
Again, I felt like such a hypocrite asking questions like that because, I didn't really believe in Christianity. I was what I called a "psychological deist", meaning I believed in a creator as the energy of the universe and didn't anthropomorphize that deity. I felt a spirituality in the earth and the universe, but I never went for all the wiccan-pagan-tree-hugger nonsense or that banal blathering of those that thought the alignment of planets 'affected' us in some way.
She laughed at my comment. "I don't think most women become nuns because of a love for Christ," she said. "Maybe in your day, they did, but not now."
"Ouch," I groaned. That was a hit. Yes, I was 42 and she'd just turned 20.
"I didn't mean it that way, Max!" she laughed. Then her face became serious again. "I just don't seem to know what I want. All the other girls seem to be so focused. I can't seem to develop the same singularity of purpose that they have."
"Why is that?"
"Because I think I'm in love."
I sat there stunned, looking at her for a few moments.
"You think you're in love?" I parroted.
"Yes."
"With a guy or with one of the girls in the convent?" I asked before slapping my head. "Oh God, it's a priest, isn't it!"
Marie leaned back and laughed, her breasts pressing against her shirt. She stretched and kept them pressed there, so that I could see that she wasn't wearing a bra, but had a camisole or some other type of undergarment beneath it. And they were bigger than I thought.
"No, it's not a priest and no, it's not one of the other girls. Nor is it a nun. It's a lay person."
"I see. Well, what's the problem then?"
"It's a guy that isn't even in the church," she said. "But I do like him and he's recently become available."
"Hmmm. You know, Marie," I began, pondering, "I don't think I've ever known you to express any indication that you were interested in guys. I've never seen you with a date, never saw you hanging out with any one guy, even during your Goth phase. You always had a pack of them around you, but you never let any of them get too close."
She laughed. "Oh, that phase! Yeah. All of them wanted me in one way or another, but none of them were really interested in me... or interested me."
