This has been on my mind for a few days now, so I finally got around to writing it.

"You alright?"

The sound of her Sister's voice startled Julienne out of her reflections. Sister Evangelina stood in the doorway, peering around the door that a moment ago had been left less than halfway open.

She sniffed quietly, swiftly putting the paper she had been holding back into its envelope.

"Yes," she replied, "I'm fine."

"What are you doing just sitting there, then?" Sister Evangelina made her way into the room, closing the door behind herself and sitting down in the chair opposite Julienne, "Come on," she told her, smiling slightly, trying to encourage her, "Out with it."

Julienne smiled a little too, feeling almost as if she was one of her Sister's patients all of a sudden. But, when she spoke again, any sign of a smile soon faded.

"I can't tell you, Sister," she told her firmly, "No, really, I'm afraid I can't. Confidentiality."

"Ah, I see," Sister Evangelina nodded, "But could it have anything to do with the fact that you've been watching that door everyday, like a child waiting for its mother to come home, since Shelagh Turner went to the London for her tests?"

Julienne's mouth fell open a little.

"Have you been reading my letters?" she asked, astonished.

"I'd be a fool if I needed to to be able to tell what's on your mind," Sister Evangelina told her.

There was a silence between them.

"She can't, can she?" Sister Evangelina asked her after a long while.

Sister Julienne shook her head softly.

"No," she whispered at last, "She can't."

"Well," said Sister Evangelina, after a moment, softly, sadly, "It was to be expected. All things considered."

Julienne looked at her.

"She's not expecting it," she told her, a lump rising in her own throat as she said it, "Patrick told her to take the tests, but she's still not expecting that this-... Her heart is going to break."

"Perhaps it's not meant to be," Sister Evangelina told her gently, "We always say the Lord has a reason for everything. Well, I think He's got a reason for this. You know," she continued carefully, "She would never have had children anyway-... if things had been different. If they had been-... the way they were."

"The Lord is not judging her," Sister Julienne murmured, almost murderously, pressing her fingertips closely together on the envelope of the letter.

"I didn't say He was," Sister Evangelina told her calmly, "That's not what I meant," she sighed heavily, looking at her Sister's eyes, bleary and fixed on the desk, "Sister, I know you love the girl."

Sister Julienne's head dropped just a fraction, in an air of capitulation. She seemed to have tears in her throat.

There was another silence that seemed to last a long time. She battled for composure.

"I have to tell her," she said at last, "I've got to be the one who tells her."

"You don't have to be," Sister Evangelina told her straight away, "In fact, I think it would be best if you didn't. It'll upset you too much, and that will only upset Shelagh more. I'll do it."

"No, you don't understand," Julienne told her, "I have to tell her. I called the London and told them to send her results to me so that I could tell her."

Sister Evangelina's eyebrows raised distinctly.

"And they let you do that?" she asked, a little incredulously.

"I'm the head of her local ante-natal centre," she replied, "Strictly speaking, she's a patient now. Why shouldn't they?"

Sister Evangelina narrowed her eyes a little. In response, Julienne only smiled sadly.

"Like you, I saw the likely outcome of this," Julienne told her, "After all, her illness will have greatly reduced her chances. I wanted to protect her."

"But how?" Sister Evangelina asked, "That's what I want to know. How does you knowing or even you telling her make any of this easier for her in the long run? As far as I can see, it's just upsetting you!"

"Because-..." Sister Julienne told her, "I can tell her in a way I know it will be easiest for her to hear. And when I have done that," she continued levelly, glad that her voice did not seem to be quivering, "I will be able to tell her as quickly as I can that you don't have to carry your child to love them with all your being. Does that make sense?"

Sister Evangelina nodded slowly. Her eyes were shining.

"Do you think I've done wrong?" Julienne asked her.

"No, Sister," she replied, "I don't think so."

End.

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