25. Chloe #2
“Shit,” I whisper. “Get behind me and stay quiet.”
I press both our bodies into the wall, but we’ve already been spotted.
“Who’s there?” A sharp female voice cuts through the thick, stagnant air. I recognize it, but can’t quite place who it belongs to.
“Answer me!” she snaps out. I push Eliza out of sight into the stairwell and step into the light.
“Y-you? You’re not meant to be here!”
“Rebekah…” I start off slow. I really don’t want to have to hurt her, but I will if I have to .
“Do the Fathers know you’re here? I’ll tell them myself.” She takes a step, but then hesitates.
“They’re a bit tied up at the minute.”
She wets her lips nervously, her grip tightening on the lantern she’s holding.
“I’ll tell them in the morning then. You can wait in the study.
I’ll sit with you to make sure you’re not getting up to no good.
I have a feeling you haven’t changed at all.
” She turns her nose up and looks me up and down.
“Seems neither have you,” I scoff. “Why are you up this late anyway? Looking for more girls to snitch on?”
She lifts her head high and smiles smugly at me. “I’m a trusted member of this church, and it’s my night to patrol.”
They patrol the place now?
I suppose it makes sense. After a death and a missing girl, they probably locked the place down harder than ever. Still, it wasn’t enough to keep me out.
“I’ve been filled by God’s light, and I help to keep this place in order.”
I bark out a loud laugh that makes her recoil.
“Rebekah, the only thing you’ve been filled with is a dozen disgusting cocks. You don’t have to do this anymore. You can be your own person, not their puppet. They don’t have control over you anymore.”
She lifts the lantern higher, and looks behind me, her brow creasing. “What have you done?”
“The right thing.”
“No! You can’t ruin this! It’s God’s plan!” Anger flashes across her face, and she makes a run for it back where she came from. I sprint after her.
“Stop!”
She looks over her shoulder in a panic and ends up tripping over the long skirt of her habit .
I grab her and roll her onto her back to pin her down.
“Get off me! You wretched girl! You heathen!”
I slap my palm over her mouth.
“Enough!” I thought I’d be angry at her.
After all, if it weren’t for her telling the Fathers that I snuck out, I wouldn’t have had to face a month’s worth of punishment.
I might have been able to leave sooner. But then I wouldn’t have met Zack.
No one would have been there to save him from himself.
“Listen to me, Rebekah, everything they told us was a lie. I’ve seen the outside world, and there’s no punishment for being bad. There’s just existing. You don’t have to fuck someone to get a taste of life. It’s there for you to choose whether you want it or not. Do you want it?”
I stare into her eyes, urging her to do the right thing by all these girls here. Her face softens, a few tears spilling from the corners of her eyes.
My shoulders relax, and I remove my hand.
“I’m so glad?—”
“Help! Someone help! There’s an intruder!” She bucks her hips, trying to get me off her and claws at my face.
“No! Stop!” I grab her hands and pin them down.
“Help!” She doesn’t stop screaming. The other Sisters who have fallen for the lies might hear. Earlier, Zack and I bolted the doors to their building shut while they were still sleeping. I came here intending to only harm the men, but if the Sisters find a way out then our plans will be ruined.
“I’m so sorry for this, but in the end you’ll understand what’s right.”
Letting go of her hands, I grab her head and smack it back into the concrete.
Her eyes roll back, and I hit it again. This time her arms drop and her eyelids close.
Pressing my fingers to her neck, I check her pulse.
She’s still alive. She’ll probably have a nasty concussion when she comes to.
Let’s call that karma for being a snitch.
Up ahead is a cleaning closet. I drag her body there and take the keys from her pocket to lock her inside.
I take a moment to straighten myself out before returning to the stairs.
“You waited for me,” I say, surprised to see Eliza still there.
“I trust you.”
We head up to the entrance to the girls’ dorms, and I press my finger to my lips, urging Eliza to be quiet. I open the door as slowly as I can, so it doesn’t creak. The smell of fresh linen smacks me in the face and I’m transported back to the fearful nights I slept here, dreaming of a way out.
“Eliza?” a girl shouts and pushes past me to get to her. I watch as she hugs her friend. Eliza is stunned for a moment before she hugs her back and they kiss.
“Let me take you to the washroom. There are some painkillers hidden in the cupboard.”
“No, it’s okay. I don’t need them. They didn’t hurt me. She saved me.” Eliza points at me and her girlfriend turns with a defensive look on her face.
I don’t recognize this girl either. In fact, as I look around at the other girls now sitting up in their beds, I realize I only recognize a few of them.
It’s not unusual for them to be passed around to different places.
Especially the unruly ones. If Father Daniels hadn’t taken such a shine to me, I probably would have been shipped off as well.
I pull down my hood, and the familiar faces are surprised to see me again.
“You’re all free to leave now. The Fathers are gone.”
“Chloe?” Priya, a girl from my time here speaks up.
She puts her glasses on and climbs out of bed.
Her white night dress swishes around her ankles as she rushes over.
“I didn’t think I’d see you again. They told us you were transferred because of your disobedience.
Father Daniels left the same day. I knew it wasn’t a coincidence! What happened?”
“They covered it all up?”
“Covered what up?”
I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter. Pack what you can and get everyone out of here.”
“What did you do? Where did you go? Did they send you back here? Please, tell me something.”
“It’ll be better the less you know.”
“Better?” she snaps. “Things were awful after you left. Whatever happened to you and Father Daniels, they took out on us. Chloe, the things they did. Anyone who didn’t obey just vanished like you did.
Except they didn’t tell us pretty lies, they kept silent.
The not knowing was so much worse, but it gave them what they wanted. ”
I place my hand on her arm, but she pulls away.
“You’re angry,” I say slowly.
“Of course, I’m angry!”
“That’s good! Hold onto it. That pain is what will help you survive this, because it won’t ever disappear completely, no matter what you do.”
Her face falls with the haunting realization of her life from now on.
“I really am sorry,” I tell her as sincerely as I can. Even if she doesn’t believe me, she needs to hear the words from someone who’s been through the same. I give her a tight smile then take her hand and press Rebekah’s keys into them. “Get out of here and live.”
She stares determinedly at them. Then she removes one key and hands it back to me.
“You should head to Father Stones’ office before you leave.
When things changed, I couldn’t wait around doing nothing, so I broke in there, hoping to find a way to reach the outside.
It was a fruitless search, but I did find some letters that had been kept from us.
A few were addressed to you. Chloe, they were from your mom. ”
All the confidence I came here with leeches out of me into the cold stone beneath my feet.
Mom contacted me? All this time, I thought she was too sick to reach out to me, but the Fathers kept her from me.
“I’ll find them. Thank you, Priya. Do you have family you can return to?”
She shakes her head.
Why am I surprised? The Fathers kept this place running for decades. The easiest way to keep their atrocities from being discovered was to keep us isolated and only take girls in who didn’t have families able or willing to come for them.
They chose me because they knew my mother would die.
I turn to leave and am suddenly engulfed in a hug. Eliza squeezes me tight.
“Thank you,” her girlfriend says from over her shoulder.
“Forget I was ever here, okay? If the police get involved, tell them you know nothing. Only that you were asleep in your beds when Rebekah came in to get you out. She left you with the keys and you didn’t see her again after that.”
“You’re not coming with us?” Eliza sniffles, and her girlfriend takes her from me to comfort her.
“No, I have someone very important waiting for me.”
Leaving them behind me, I take a quick detour to Father Stones’ office.
I’m anxious to return to Zack, but what Priya told me is gnawing at my heart and I know I won’t be able to forget about it unless I see the truth for myself.
The filing cabinets stand tall next to the window in the office. I’ve seen them countless times and never considered breaking into them. I’m thankful that Priya had that bright idea.
With the key she gave me, I unlock the drawers, starting from the top and working my way down until I find what I’m here for.
Deep inside the lowest one are bundles of envelopes all addressed to the convent with different girls’ names on.
Each one has been opened already. Knowing that Father Stone, or any of the others, read them is another violation to my abused soul.
I take the ones addressed to me to the desk and use a letter opener to cut the string tying them together. My heart is in my stomach as I pull out the first letter and read it under the dim light of the candle that’s still burning away.
It’s dated only a few days after Mom dropped me off here. She says how much she missed me and that she couldn’t wait to see me again.
I remember wondering why she never wrote to me. The worry that she had died without anyone knowing kept me up most nights.
Mom’s handwriting gets progressively worse as I read through the rest. When I get to the final one I’m filled with as much guilt as she had poured onto the page.
She thought I didn’t want to see her and she blamed herself for being sick. The Fathers lied to her and told her that I was happy here without her, because I knew I’d see her again in heaven.
I truly believe that if Mom knew any of what was happening she would have fought for me. She would have gotten me out of here the instant she knew. But they manipulated everything.
The sick, twisted fucking bastards.
My hands shake with anger.
I lost everything because of them.
This room was the last place I saw Mom alive, and now it’s the final place I say goodbye.
I gather up the letters and drop them into the waste basket next to the desk. Then I pick up the candle holder and hold the flame to the paper until it catches.
“I’m sorry for what they did to us, Mom. I don’t blame you for any of it. I know you were only doing what was right. Now it’s my turn.”