"You're going to have to help me move the body."

Julie stood in the doorway to my room, which was a cell really, and she was as close to breathless as I'd ever seen her. She looked dashing in the moonlight, and lit up with the glow of adventure.

I knew that look.  A smile fizzed behind her expression, and even stood still she looked like she was moving very fast. It meant, 

. It meant Julie was about to leap right into that river of Something and direct its course. Make more Somethings happen.

"The... the body?" My voice shook, and I cursed it.

Julie nodded. "Much better than potatoes. Much more convincing."

I tried to swallow but my mouth was dry. I clenched my fists tight to stop my hands shaking.

"I'm ready." My face rearranged itself into an ugly scowl, which was the best I could do for brave determination to underline these words. Words which felt like a lie.




I clenched my fists tighter, and scowled deeper. Julie had whirled out of the room and my expression was wasted on her back. I scurried after her.

So! This was it then. 

. We were escaping tonight. The idea terrified me, and not just because we would be in such terrible trouble if we were caught.

Where would we go? How would we get there? What would we eat? Meals in this place were scanty and dull, but at least there 

 meals.

Surely I hadn't been here yet so very long? For these stone walls to get under my skin already?

Julie moved quickly, and her steps were silent. My own feet sounded thunderous to me, and felt like unwieldy lumps of hard clay on the ends of my legs. Ignoring my own pounding heart, I tried to copy her. To make my own feet pussycat soft and daring quick. 

Her dark hair shone in the shafts of moonlight that barred the corridor. My love was fully alive and sparkling in this moment of adventure. She had never shone more beautifully. 



No one stopped us. We didn't meet a soul.

At last, we two looked down at our accomplice. Her lined face looked peaceful in death, and I felt a prick of guilt for disturbing her slumber. Overshadowed though, by  doubt. There was something wrong. Something so boring and obvious, it amazed me Julie hadn't spotted it.



This old woman looks nothing like me! No more like me than a sack of potatoes, after all! She-



A moment only, I was caught, tar-like in the dreadful sin we were about to commit. This was a 

, would it not? The Sister would never have consented to be part of this. We were using her body for our own ends. It felt deeply wrong. I hesitated. Something Julie never did.

"Come on!" she said yet again. See! Already she gripped the corpse under the armpits.

I gave myself a shake. Loosing the doubts and cowardice like porcupine spines. Determined now that Julie would have no cause to say those words again. Unwilling that she should think me a coward or unworthy of her, I bent to the task and helped her carry the ghastly burden.

It wasn't too bad, actually. The corridors were still deserted. Luck was with us, for I am sure God wanted no part in this scheme. 

The trick was to turn off the tap of the mind, with its gushing thoughts, and concentrate on the 

. Wasn't that what Julie did? She was a person of 

. Not like me, ever caught in a swamp of thinking.

The load was light. Life, it seems, is heavy, and our shells insubstantial without it. Or perhaps not. Maybe a lifetime of fasting was what made the bony frame so bird-like. Maybe loveless decades turns one's warm blood to dust. 

This was a thought that made me move my feet with real purpose.

 I cannot stay here. I will die. All at once or a bit at a time. Like a songbird in a cage

.

Light as it was, the body was stiff and unwieldy. Like moving a big plank of wood. I understood why it took the two of us to move it. The Sister had been tall. Again I squashed my own wondering, 

how will anyone ever mistake the dead sister for me?



Huffing and puffing, we dragged it into my room. All too happy to let go of it, and keen to show myself just as decisive as Julie, I sprang to pull back the meagre blanket on my cot. Together we heaved it into the bed, as if it were a sack of potatoes after all.

It was too stiff to arrange it in a convincing sleeping position, so I simply put the blanket over it. Even with the face covered, the grey hair told all who looked in here that it was no young girl in the bed.

"Your candle," Julie said. "The one I saw you with that first night. Hurry!"

Even then, I didn't realise what she meant to do. Obedient to her whims, I fetched the candle. Patient as I'd ever seen her, she coaxed a spark with flint and lit a little flame.

While she was busy with that, I retrieved my stolen paper with my treacherous thoughts scribbled on it, and stuffed it down the front of my tunic.

Julie lit the candle, and touched it to the mattress which had so little straw. I gaped, understanding at lost. Julie gripped my arm like a rudder, and steered me out of my cell for the last time.

Her eyes and steps lively, she led the way though the corridors and peeped in the kitchen.

We already had a story prepared if we were caught here: we were hungry. We surely wouldn't have been the first to try to ease the aching emptiness of our bellies. There was no need to layer lying on top of arson, though. There was nobody there.

It didn't take long for someone to raise the alarm. In the confusion, it wasn't so hard, really, to slip out into the kitchen garden, help each other up the tree and over the wall, and leave the place behind us. Flames were spiking out of several windows, now, and guilt flared inside me to match. 



.

I glanced at Julie. Her expression was unfettered by the kind of thoughts I was having. She lived for moments like this. I stopped my tongue, and let her smile be the touchpaper for mine.

How could I ever thank her for this? For freeing me, and from more than those walls. No words could be enough.

The shouts of the Sisters were getting fainter, and yesterday's bread was filling the yawning gaps in our stomachs. Julie's hand was warm and real in mine. My blood was full of courage. I decided: the moment we stopped running, I would kiss her. Always, before, it was she who kissed me. Always she who dared, who acted, and I who followed, dazed in her wake and dazzled by the blaze of her. But now something inside me was afire, and this time it would be me.

My feet skidded to a stop. Her hand might have yanked on mine, if I hadn't used her momentum to turn her into my arms.

"Come o-"

I stopped that phrase with my mouth, and her lips answered mine. We kissed, freely, under a beautiful blanket of stars.

Thank you for reading! This is a mostly true story! Decided to share more details tomorrow. Adieu! 

If you prefer to read post one and two first: 

Thou Shalt Not Set Fire to a Nunnery

Thursday 17th April, Day 5, Story #5. This is the last in a three part series. For parts 1&2, SKIP TO THE END

"You're going to have to help me move the body."

Julie stood in the doorway to my room, which was a cell really, and she was as close to breathless as I'd ever seen her. She looked dashing in the moonlight, and lit up with the glow of adventure.



Thou Shalt Not Set Fire to a Nunnery

Thursday 17th April, Day 5, Story #5. This is the last in a three part series. For parts 1&2, SKIP TO THE END

About the Creator

L.C. Schäfer

Comments (6)

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Thou Shalt Not Get Caught

Thou Shalt Not Set Fire to a Nunnery

Thursday 17th April, Day 5, Story #5. This is the last in a three part series. For parts 1&2, SKIP TO THE END

About the Creator

L.C. Schäfer

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Keep reading

Thou Shalt Not Get Caught

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