This one-shot ambushed me when I should have been thinking of the next chapter of A Time of Trial. I was thinking about the Christmas Special and the friendship between Evangelina and Julienne and it got mixed up with last week's episode with Cynthia... and this is what emerged. I'm not altogether pleased with it, perhaps might have been better to chop it in half! Feedback, as always, is treasured.

Knowing The Difference

'Sister!' Sister Evangelina exploded into Sister Julienne's new office without worrying about such social or monastic niceties as knocking. 'D'you know what those bl-blooming girls have done now?'

The Sister-in-Charge was her usual unruffled self as she indicated the chair on the other side of the desk. 'Why don't you sit down and tell me about it?'

Sister Evangelina obeyed, dropping her considerable bulk onto the upright wooden chair, her backside hitting it with a thump that was both lacking in grace and all too audible. Many women - even nuns - would look askance at this, but Julienne never had. It was only one of the reasons that Evangelina loved her.

Now she leaned forward, knees akimbo with her hands braced against the firm expanse of blue-clad thighs. 'Remember that young couple at Christmas? The fella what had shell shock?'

Julienne nodded.

'Those bl-blimmin' girls only went be'ind our backs, they did.' Evangelina's voice was rising at the thought. 'They allowed 'im to be there durin' the delivery, didn't they? I 'eard all about it today, how amazin' it was an' 'ow much it's helped. Did you ever? A man in a delivery room!' She was breathless from accumulated shock and fury, never to mention the speed with which she'd pedalled home. After all, she was almost sixty-five.

Sister Julienne's expression turned thoughtful. 'Perhaps they were right—'

'Right?!' Evangelina echoed. 'They only went straight over our heads, no respect, no obedience. Them girls, they get worse every year—'

'Sister.'

Julienne's voice quietened Evangelina as it had done in all the years since a serene second year novice had taken a raw and ravaged Evangelina under her wing. The other young nuns had all twitched out of Evangelina's way; she was too big, too uncouth, her humour too ribald and her laughter too loud for their middle class sensibilities. Julienne's gentle ways and non-judgemental manner had acted as a balm throughout the hellish days of the novitiate, and Evangelina's gratitude was as profound as it was inarticulate.

Now the younger woman—Julienne was nearly four years Evangelina's junior in age, although her senior in religion—leaned forward, her eyes twinkling. 'Do you remember St Thomas's?'

Puzzled, Evangelina nodded. What had their long-ago training days to do with anything?

'Do you remember what we thought of the matrons and Sister Tutor?'

Evangelina's quirked in an unwilling smile. 'We thought they was all old 'as-beens, didn't we,' she recalled. 'Or I did. You were too nice, you just murmured at me about charity and holy obedience.'

'I was supposed to set an example,' Julienne reminded her wryly. 'But… I agreed with every word you said. They were old and set in their ways. Reluctant to accept new ideas, unwilling to even consider change.' Her tone turned from light to regretful. 'Sister, I fear we are becoming them.'

Evangelina grinned. 'We're long past that. We're older now than they were then.'

'There you go.' Julienne's eyes were sparkling. 'We're fossils.'

Evangelina harrumphed. 'Speak for yourself. I'm no fossil 'til I'm six feet under, an' not then if the Good Lord has anythin' to do with it.'

They exchanged smiles; smiles born of years of sisterhood and fellowship and work.

'What did Alan Bridges actually say?' Julienne prompted.

'That Yvonne's labour started just as everyone was told to go 'ome,' Evangelina recalled. 'You and me, we went to Nonnatus, the old one.' Her face clouded; it still hurt to remember the hail of bricks that sounded the death of the building that had sheltered them for so long. 'That young chap of Nurse Lee's told us to scarper an' we were that worried we never gave the Bridges another thought. That's where them girls got their chance,' she added, tapping the polished wood of Julienne's desk for emphasis before continuing.

'They hustled Yvonne home and got 'er all set 'fore the waters went. When the littl'un came, it were Nurse Lee who did the deliverin', and Nurse Franklin who cut the cord an' handed the baby over.' Evangelina paused, some of the tension leaving her shoulders as she considered the next part of the story. ''Appen they was right,' she admitted gruffly. 'Alan, he said that when Trixie handed the scrap over, still covered in blood and vernix, she told 'im, "This blood is beautiful".'

Julienne was blinking the tears away. 'Giving him clean blood on his hands, to wash away the memory of that other blood. Oh, Trixie.'

Evangelina grunted, unwilling to own that she too was moved.

Sister Julienne leaned against the high back of her chair. 'We can't afford to be stick-in-the-muds,' she began gravely. 'We may have a wealth of age and experience on our side, but these girls have knowledge, new knowledge that may save those we endeavour to serve. We must be humble and accept their knowledge as a gift—and,' she added with a twinkle, 'be grateful that they have the determination and enthusiasm to put it into practice, even in the face of opposition from stubborn old has-beens like ourselves.'

'Old dogs an' new tricks, eh?'

'No, because we can and will learn. We're already doing so. Look at you and Cynthia last week. She was overwhelmed by your approval.' A pause. 'You should give it more often, Sister.'

It was a clear reproof, for all its gentleness, and Evangelina found herself fiddling with the hem of her sleeve as if she were one of the girls. 'I know,' she acknowledged. 'I gotta be nicer to 'em. Kinder. Life'll knock the nonsense outta them soon enough, the East End'll knock the nonsense outta them. They don't need us—me—to do it for 'em.'

Julienne pushed back from her desk. 'Come on, it's nearly four. The girls will be home from their afternoon calls, and hungry.'

'A little hunger never hurt anyone,' Evangelina said, only half-seriously. The pain of hunger had been all too familiar to her in the years before she entered; ironically, while her fellow novices had complained and wailed at the food they were given—the food they must have expected—to the young Evangelina even the simplicity of convent food had been a luxury.

Sister Julienne knew this and her eyes were understanding as she said, 'Even so, it's a dreadful day and they'll be cold and wet and tired when they come in. No, they deserve their tea. Come on, you can help me set it up. Mrs B left cake—'

'If it's still there,' Evangelina inserted gloomily.

Julienne laughed. 'It is.' She leaned closer. 'She made Eve's pudding—with custard—and she didn't want Monica Joan to get to it. The custard's in the refrigerator but the cake…' She turned on her heel and opened one of her own cupboards, producing a plate bearing the soft yellow sponge on its bed of cooked apples.

Evangelina grinned at her superior's transparent delight. 'Mrs B knows your weakness.'

'There are worse vices,' Julienne answered tranquilly as Evangelina followed her out of her office, up the three steps, and along the polished and panelled corridor that lead to the kitchen.

When they arrived they found they'd been anticipated; Chummy was struggling with sandwiches, Jenny and Cynthia were pouring tea, Sister Monica Joan was hovering while Trixie tried to keep her away from the custard, and Shelagh looked up from unbuckling Timothy's callipers with a wide beam as they entered.

'Cake!' she exclaimed, bounding to her feet with an ease that Evangelina found herself envying in her most secret heart of hearts. 'We wondered why there was custard and no cake.'

'I wouldn't have put it quite that way,' Trixie put in, giving Sister Monica Joan a mock glare as she pushed the elderly nun into a seat. 'I think we all know exactly why we couldn't find the cake.'

'And I see it is the pudding of Eve, a feast of temptation indeed,' Monica Joan remarked, her eyes sparkling as Julienne gently placed it in the centre of the table.

'It's a temptation we'd all like to not resist, Sister,' Trixie told her tartly as she sat down.

Sister Monica Joan pouted as Cynthia came to hand her a cup of tea, and the old nun's petulance faded when she touched the saucer. 'Porcelain! The finest porcelain! How did we chance across such richness, Nurse?'

'We found that cup and saucer at the back of the kitchen cupboards when we were packing from the old house, Sister,' Julienne explained. 'There were several, but they were chipped and cracked and we had to throw them out. However, we thought we'd keep this one, the only perfect set, for you.'

Evangelina watched as Sister Monica Joan's wrinkles bracketed a bright smile as her fingers—still slender and elegant despite the years—caressed the cup with a delicacy Evangelina herself entirely lacked. A pang of guilt assailed her; the tea set to which the cup had belonged was a gift from a relatively well-off patient many years before, and she knew that the cracks and chips on the discarded items were due to her own carelessness. She could handle a mother and child with exquisite lightness; anything else, and she had the grace of an elephant.

The same was true of her dealings with people. When had she seen Monica Joan's face light like that in response to a word or deed from Evangelina herself? She continued to watch—with an avidity that was not entirely free from envy— as Sister Julienne ushered everyone to their seat with a series of touches and smiles and the odd word here and there. Evangelina would have yelled, ruffled Timothy's hair (never to speak of his precarious ten year old boy-pride), thumped down the plates, annoyed Monica Joan by giving her the wrong fork—and people would still have been milling around trying to do several things at once. As it was, within moments their little family was sitting in peace at the long and generously laden table, bright faces turned towards Sister Julienne as her quiet voice lead them in the customary Grace: 'Bless us, O Lord, and these gifts which of thy bounty we are about to receive through Christ our Lord.'

As Evangelina joined with the others in responding 'Amen' she found herself thinking that Nonnatus was indeed singularly fortunate. They had the gift of talented, eager nurses, an expert cook, a handyman who was truly deserving of the name, a generous doctor, and the blessing of a superior who had the humility to admit when she was wrong and the courage to forge ahead into unknown.

Somewhere in France an American serviceman had once asked, 'Do you know the Serenity Prayer, Sister?'

Evangelina had not, but he'd recited it and the words had lingered as an appropriate motto for those who dedicated their lives to the poorest of the poor: God grant the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change those I can, and wisdom to know the difference. Familiarity had diluted the simple words in the long years since, but now they struck her anew as she met Cynthia's shy smile across the table and answered a question from Jenny with more gentleness and less tartness than was her wont. She could not change the harsh realities of the East End, could not hold back time, could not change the young girls that came to them year after year: but she could change herself. She could try, like Sister Julienne, to be the still serene point around which everyone revolved; that was where her Sister's wisdom lay, in 'knowing the difference'.

Evangelina snorted at the mental of image of herself attempting Julienne's particular brand of still serenity. As always, snorting whilst drinking resulted in expelling tea through her nostrils in a waterfall of sorts. Timothy, sitting opposite, gawped; perhaps in horror, perhaps in awe. It had been an impressive splutter.

'Do you need a hanky, Sister?' he asked gravely, offering her his own. Shelagh, Evangelina noted, looked somewhere between pleased and surprised. 'This is a clean one, honest. Mum give it to us before we came.'

Mum… Evangelina found herself sniffling at the glow that lit the former nun's eyes at that. She pulled out her own hanky, a cloth was was large enough to double as a wrap for a (very small) baby and flourished it.

'Thanks, young man, but I'm well supplied.' She blew her nose hard, aware that Sister Monica Joan was stiffening at the foghorn-like sound and Julienne looked mildly amused, as if she'd been able to read Evangelina's mind.

Perhaps she had. Evangelina had learned long ago that underestimating Julienne was a serious mistake.

'Aren't you going to share the joke, Sister?' Trixie prompted, leaning forward from the head of the table where she sat at her usual place at Julienne's right hand.

Evangelina smirked as she took a gulp from her mug of tea. No posh porcelain for her. 'No joke, Nurse.' She beamed benevolently around them all. 'I've made a new year's resolution,' she announced.

'Not to snort, one hopes,' Sister Monica Joan said, unfortunately not sotto voce.

Trixie gave vent to a snort of her own at that, her eyes dancing above the hand she'd clapped over her mouth. Evangelina grinned.

'Sorry, Sister, but no. I'm no fancy-pants, ain't you learned that yet? No, I'm just realisin' sommat. We're all healthy, we've got work to do, good work, God-given work. We does all right by the East End, and we do all right by ourselves. Age an' experience on the one hand, and youth an' new ideas on the other.' Deliberately, she sent a wink towards Jenny and Trixie, relishing their surprise and confusion.

All the same, she could not resist one last dart. 'But the next time you girls decide to let a man into the delivery room…' She allowed her voice to hang menacingly as she shook an admonishing finger, and the young nurses quailed visibly. Evanglina broke into a broad grin. 'You tell me, you hear? I want to be there, I want to see this brave new world everyone's talkin' about, even if it means men cluttering up places they shouldn't be. I ain't no fossil yet, and I'll thank you to remember it!'

A gale of laughter turned into an explosion of conversation as Trixie and Jenny began eagerly to describe what it had been like. Evangelina listened as everyone else began to comment, ranging from Timothy's plaintive 'Why isn't a man allowed to be there if he's the dad?' to Sister Monica Joan's memory of a man who had inadvertently attended a delivery of his child, 'But it made no matter, for when the child was safely arrived and I turned to him, I found the good fellow lying quite unconscious, blissfully unaware of what had transpired…'

Across the length of the table Evangelina met Julienne's eyes and they exchanged a smile of perfect understanding.

End