A/N: An interlude amidst all the happily-ever-after.
It is well before dawn when Phyllis wakes to the unmistakable sound of Nurse Busby rushing to the washroom and slamming the door. Even the nurses are not immune to stomach flu it seems.
Nurse Mount's bed is empty – she is presumably attending to Nurse Busby – and Phyllis luxuriates a few moments in the feeling of being tucked up in a warm bed, knowing that she does not have to be awake for a few hours yet. But then her bladder interrupts insistently. She sighs. Long experience has taught her that rolling over and trying to ignore it will do her no good here, so she resignedly rolls out of bed and stuffs her arms into her bathrobe.
Seeing as their shared washroom is otherwise occupied, Phyllis makes her way downstairs, feeling her way down the banister and using the hall table to orient herself in the dark. There is no sign of Nurse Dyer, who is on call, but Phyllis' hand finds her cloak on the back of a chair in the hall, where it has absolutely no business hanging.
As she passes the door to the chapel, Phyllis has the strange sensation that she is not alone. The air feels lived in.
Phyllis is not one for superstition, but neither is she one to ignore a gut feeling; In spite of her full bladder and the late hour, she pushes open the door.
The moonlight falls softly through the stained-glass windows, illuminating a figure kneeling, not before the altar, but before one of the chairs, clinging to the seat with both hands.
White fabric – a veil, a coif and a collar, probably – lies in a heap beside her. Her grey hair, free and wild, hides her face.
It is Sister Julienne. Or rather it isn't. Because surely Sister Julienne would never be found in such a position in the wee hours of the morning, in the chapel, her hair uncovered and her back to God?
She only registers Phyllis' presence when Phyllis bends to grasp her elbow and pull her to her feet. Her skin is positively grey and her eyes lifeless, even as they look at Phyllis in surprise.
"Come," Phyllis says, forestalling any protest, and guides her gently out of the chapel, leaving the puddled fabric where it lays.
She leads her into the kitchen and deposits her firmly in a chair. Leaving the lights out, she retrieves a blanket from the back of the settee and wraps it gently around the other woman's shoulders. She fills the kettle and sets it on the hob. Satisfied, she turns back to Sister Julienne, who sits, head bowed, exactly as Phyllis had left her.
"You stay there," says Phyllis firmly. "That clear? I'll be back in two ticks."
There is no response, but the woman does not seem disposed to flight, and so Phyllis risks a quick trip to the loo.
When she returns, so has Sister Julienne. She has shed the blanket and poured two cups of tea. She sits, still unveiled and red-eyed but alert and seemingly composed, warming her hands on one of the mugs. At Phyllis' entrance she gestures to the chair across from her.
It is a gesture Phyllis has seen a thousand times, offered to women in need – to mothers, to nurses, to Phyllis herself on occasion. It is a gesture that invites confidence and it is not fooling Phyllis one bit.
She has watched Sister Julienne support others through the death of Sister Evangelina, the brief but unpleasant reign of Sister Ursula and the illness of Sister Mary Cynthia, when surely she has been just as shaken by those blows. The birth of Nurse Turner's son, while surely a blessing not a blow, has taken yet another loved one away.
So who does Sister Julienne turn to now? To Sister Monica Joan? To God? The choice is a grim one. It is a choice between someone who is not all there and someone who (if you ask Phyllis) is not there at all. It is hard for Phyllis to conceive of a faith that could fill that void, one that could sustain the Sister through Sister Monica Joan's chatter or the Almighty's silences.
"I thought I told you to stay put," she sighs, picking up the blanket and eyeing the Sister appraisingly. "It's time you let someone else take care of you for a change."
"I'm afraid that's not in my nature." The voice is not as steady as the Sister would probably have liked.
Phyllis decides to push – this nonsense ends here, now. "If Sister Evangelina were here, I am sure she would have something to say about that."
The blow lands and Sister Julienne visibly reels, then straightens and tightens her lips. "She had a great deal to say about any number of things. That does not necessarily mean –" But here she cannot continue, only tightens her jaw and shakes her head against what Phyllis knows are the beginnings of tears.
She is surprised when the nun recomposes herself and looks her squarely in the eye. "What you just saw–"
"What I just saw was a woman desperately in need of someone to talk to," interrupts Phyllis. "And here I am. I don't claim to have any answers. But I'm listening, if you'd like to talk about it."
Sister Julienne looks at her for a moment. The gaze is steady and considering. Phyllis dares to hope.
"No," says Sister Julienne after a moment, standing with her tea and setting it, untouched, beside the sink. "I wouldn't."
She turns and leaves, straight-backed and silent-footed, but Phyllis stays hunched at the table until the mug in her hands grows cold, as worry coils in her stomach and the rising sun tinges the kitchen pink.