Chapter 1. Tender hands and hearts
In the days after sharing the news about the pregnancy, there was a feeling of relief in the Turner family. The initial anxiety was kept at bay. Even Sister Winifred, who visited to take Shelagh's blood pressure was beaming. She called Mrs Turner "our own mother-to-be".
Then the situation with Sister Ursula started to give unease. Shelagh was deep in her thoughts walking home and would have passed the school yard not noticing anything, if it wasn't for that laugh. Her own girl's, Angela's laugh.
She saw Tim and a brown-haired girl sitting in the swings at the playground, with Angela in a push chair. They seemed to be having a cosy time. Shelagh decided to pass them. Something in the position of Tim's head tilting towards the strange girl prevented her from interrupting their time together.
Not long after she had come home, Tim and Angela arrived. Shelagh took Angela in her lap: "Did Mummy's girl have a nice day?" Then she turned to Tim: "It's good that you are back. Mrs Penney has left already. You can change my bandage."
Tim shrugged. "Okay, I guess."
They sat at the kitchen table for that. The disinfectant bristled on Shelagh's hand. "Do you remember the one time you had hurt your hand in the school yard?" she asked from Tim.
"Vaguely. I recall you bandaged it then." He kept a pause. ""Or Sister Bernadette. Sometimes I find it easy to think of you as the same person as her, and sometimes you seem like two different persons."
Shelagh raised her eyebrows, diverted. "That is interesting. I often feel the same myself." She put the bandages away. "Thank you for taking Angela with you so that Mrs Penney could finish the laundry. Incidentally, I saw you sitting in the playground today. But as you had company, I didn't come to fetch Angela."
"Did you?" Tim coughed a little. "It was Susan Parkin. She is the sister of Ben, my classmate."
"Oh yes, I remember you speaking about a Susan. From the chemistry club."
"They both are in the chemistry club. There are some girls from St Lawrence in the club. It is…." - he stammered with the word - "co-educational"-
"Co-educational is good. Prepares you for the life with women."
"Mum, are you trying to say something?"
"Only that I hope you have a good friendship with both boys and girls. I have a lot of experience with female support, in the Sisterhood. But now I live with men, and Angela."
There was a gentle air of encouragement, mixed with wistfulness in Shelagh's voice. It made Tim swallow any impertinent, snarky response. Instead he said, still trying to find his balance, "It is good to be out with Angela. Girls are very interested in her." He smirked with some self-satisfaction.
"Yes, Tim. That was exactly what brought to my mind the encounter we had so many years ago, your hurt hand and Sister Bernadette. I was interested in that little boy. Fortunately this young man that I am mother to now resembles him quite a lot."
"Mum, for a former Nun, you have some extraordinary trains of thought," Timothy laughed.