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‘Deels, my darling, Phyllis called whilst you were out.’
‘Why are you using that tone, Pats? What’s happened? Has someone –’
‘No – well, not yet – it’s – it’s Sr Monica Joan, my love.’
‘We have to go! I don’t care how many favours I need to call in for us both to switch several shifts; I need to see her.’
‘Already arranged, my sweetest heart. At least, I’m poised to put it into action if that’s what you want, which I thought it might be.’
‘Are you sure? We didn’t go back for Babs; bless her soul.’
‘We’re on the same continent this time. Besides, things are different now.’
Lying uncomfortably awake on the sleeper train from Edinburgh, almost wishing she had been more insistent that it would be simpler – and more useful once they reached their destination – to take the car so that they had something to concentrate on, Delia cannot quite believe this moment is here.
She has known it would come, of course.
Secretly, if she is honest, she has been thinking about it at regular intervals across the ten years since they last said a farewell of this sort to a Nonnatun Sister.
More suddenly.
And, beneath the shock, still desperately sad.
For her as much of any of the other convent’s lay occupants, as she has – with Patsy’s patient help – come to comprehend, because both she and “Sr Evie” had brain injuries.
And a consequent camaraderie.
Yet there lies the rub of her lying awake now.
Because both she and Sr Monica Joan knew – no, know, she corrects herself quickly, cursing the pre-emptive past tense – what it feels like to forget. To lose grip and grounding. To need help to bring yourself back, before you are fully aware of having been absent.
And to be treated differently, cautiously, as a result.
Even when you insist that you are perfectly capable.
Even by your colleagues and friends, who are as close as family, and who ought (if you are honest) to know better.
She and Sr Monica Joan both know what it feels like to have to offer proof.
Or, failing that possibility, to pretend.
To perform.
Pretty constantly, for fear of being judged, not merely as a professional but as a person.
And of losing everything.
Perhaps, she muses as the bunk moves, jolting with the motion of the literal train over its tracks and stalling her figurative train of thought – that elusive entity she feels she will forever fear the loss of – the somehow still striving Sister has decided it is at last time to stop?
She cannot blame her, no matter how much her heart hurts at the prospect.
She may only hope they make it in the morning.
They do, off the train and into the taxi that will take them the last of the way.
Only just, because it is as though her feet are determined to catch on every cursed cobble they can, causing her cariad to be half carrying her by the time they round the corner near Nonnatus.
She steadies herself before the external steps – and the internal stairs – thinking as she does that it is no wonder the eldest of their number is too tired to make another trip on either set.
Then, satisfied she can steel herself for the rest of this reunion, she nods to her stalwart sweetheart.
Who smiles and tightens the grip on her arm ever so slightly, whilst knocking softly and opening the door just a touch.
‘Helô Sister,’ Delia calls, cursing the crack in her voice almost as much as the cobbles.
She will not cry.
She cannot cry.
And she does not.
Until, as they enter on tiptoe, she hears the elderly nun answer eagerly, ‘Nurse Busby! Have you brought me a milky brew, child?’
Then she is gone, powerless to stop the sobs that spring at the sign their shared experience brought shared comfort too.
And the Sister smiles, beckoning her onto the bed beside her without further words.
Because they both know none are needed.