* * *
—
The day after she called Carson, she got the results of the DNA test. It was conclusive, which they knew it would be. Michaela was her daughter. It was comforting to know. She’d had the test before she went to New York. She sent a text to Hattie, and emailed the results to Michaela, and signed it “Love, Mom.”
* * *
—
Melissa’s and Michaela’s lives had improved exponentially as a result of Hattie finding Michaela. The one whose life had been negatively impacted was Hattie, Sister Mary Joseph. The unraveling of her religious life had begun when she went to Saint Blaise’s, saw the prison where Melissa had been, and her faith in the religious life began to spiral down faster when she met with Fiona Eckles. What she had seen and done there had driven her out of the Church, and Hattie was beginning to think it would have the same effect on her. She could no longer respect a church that had sold babies for profit, no matter how well intended their motives. It had only been a fluke, or a miracle, that she had found Michaela. The others weren’t as lucky, and they would never find their mothers. And the mothers who wanted to would never see their children again. It seemed a cruel turn of fate for all concerned. And women like Fiona had been injured too. Hattie couldn’t seem to recover from it.
Mother Elizabeth had seen what it was doing to her, and so far hadn’t been able to help her. She had offered to send her on a retreat, or for therapy, and Hattie had refused both.
“What would that change?”
“Even those of us in religious orders are human, Sister Mary Joe,” she reminded her. “We make mistakes. They made a big one when they destroyed the records. They thought they were protecting everyone involved.”
“They were protecting the Church, not the people in it. And so many people got hurt as a result. My sister was almost one of them.”
“You did a wonderful thing for her, and for your niece, but you can’t lose your vocation because of it. That’s too high a price for you to pay.”
“And what if my vocation was motivated by the wrong things from the beginning? Maybe that’s what’s coming to the surface.”
“There’s nothing wrong with your vocation, my child.” But there was so much she didn’t know that Hattie didn’t believe her. “You’ve been here for eighteen years. If there was a flaw in your vocation, you’d have discovered it a long time ago.” But Hattie knew that Fiona Eckles had been even older when she asked to be released from her vows. She couldn’t forgive herself for her part in what she had done. Hattie had other things on her conscience.
“I’d like to go back to Africa one day,” she said wistfully. “I was happy there, and serving a useful purpose.”
“I can sign you up for service there again, but you need to find your footing first. When you feel your vocation is secure, I’ll see what I can do to recommend that.”
“I’d like that,” Hattie said, her eyes brightening. For the first time in months, she felt hopeful. Going to Saint Blaise’s had been a dark experience which shook her faith in everything she believed in. It was a cover-up, like others the Church had committed to protect their own. Hattie didn’t want to be part of an institution that did that, no matter who was to blame. She saw the Church as an evil force now, which was what Fiona had said to her too. But what would she do if she left? Where would she go? After eighteen years, she had no other life now. She could go to her sister in the Berkshires for a while, but then what? No matter where she looked, she saw no meaningful future for herself. The only thing she wanted to do was return to Africa, but that didn’t seem likely either. And it was a form of running away too.
She drove up to see Melissa the week before Thanksgiving, and they spent the day together. There was snow on the ground, and they went for a long walk in the orchards. Melissa could sense that her sister was troubled and her spirits were down, and asked her about it. Hattie hadn’t seemed all right to her since she’d come back from Ireland, despite the victory it had been for her.
“It shook my faith,” she confessed to Melissa, “in everything I believe and have dedicated my life to. It was so dishonest, and hurt so many people.” The cover-up of the rogue priests was a scandal the Church was still reverberating from too. And what if there were other things? “I told Mother Elizabeth I’d love to go back to Africa. She said she could recommend me, but I have to get my feet on firm ground first. I keep thinking of Fiona Eckles leaving the Church because of what happened at Saint Blaise’s.”
“You wouldn’t give up your vows, would you?” Melissa looked startled. She hadn’t realized how deeply shaken her sister was.
“I don’t know,” Hattie answered. “I’ve thought about it. I’m not sure my vocation was ever for the right reasons.”
“Of course it was,” Melissa tried to reassure her. “And I don’t want you to go back to Africa. I just got you back a few months ago, I don’t want to lose you.”
“You never will.” Hattie smiled at her. “This isn’t about us. It’s about what I believe in, and why I’m there. It’s complicated.”
“Life is complicated. People are complicated. And churches are even more so.”
“If I’m not sure of my vocation, I don’t belong there,” Hattie said firmly.
Melissa was worried about her when she left. Things were going so well for her now, and she could see that her sister was suffering. It was almost as though Saint Blaise’s was cursed, and everyone who went there paid a terrible price. It was exactly what Melissa had said about it when she was there. It was hell on Earth. Her own faith had been restored when Hattie had found Michaela, and now it seemed as though Hattie was losing hers. She had never heard her question her vocation before. She was going through a very dark time, her own private hell, just as Fiona Eckles had described. Hattie wrote the ex-nun a long letter when she got back to the convent that night, asking her advice. But she could already guess what it would be.
* * *
—
Norm spent a quiet Sunday with Melissa, the day after her sister’s visit. They watched a movie on TV and went to bed early that night. She was making coffee in the morning when he brought the paper in, and the front page on The Boston Globe was a photograph of one of the most important movie producers in Hollywood. He was in his sixties, and the headline was that a major actress was bringing criminal charges against him for sexual assault. It was a shocking story and Norm read it as she handed him a mug of coffee. When he finished, he passed the paper to her.
“Wow, that’s a shocker,” Norm said. He was one of the most respected producers in the business. The actress, who had two Oscars to her credit and a Golden Globe, claimed that he had raped her five years before, slapped her around afterward, broken her nose, and then sodomized her. She hadn’t reported him because she didn’t want to lose the starring role in the movie that won her her second Oscar. She had produced photographs, which the producer insisted had been falsified. The victim claimed that he had lured her to his office, and she had been coerced into having sex with him once before, when he promised her another starring role, but only if she let him sodomize her. She said she had finally spoken up because she claimed he had recently tried to coerce her again. He denied all of it, and Melissa finished reading the story and looked at Norm.