Chapter 6~ Not Just A Memory

Chapter 6

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Sylvia

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He didn’t leave a card. No address. No way to reach him.

For a man who seemed to have all the answers in the palm of his hands, Nikolai had simply disappeared like a ghost, leaving me to stew in my own desperation. And I was desperate. We all were.

Mother Beatrice did her best, pleading with the parishioners to keep the shelter open, but for an NGO housing only women and children, generating no revenue—there was only so much the church could do. The shelter was shutting down. There was no denying it anymore. We were quite literally out of options.

“Father Andrew would have known what to do,” I’d heard the Sisters whisper this morning, voices low but edged with frustration.

For the three days it took me to arrive at this terrible decision, I felt absolutely miserable.

Because there was something I could do.

And that truth felt like a noose tightening around my throat.

Agnes had made sure everyone knew.

“A certain man is willing to help us, but can you believe he’ll only do that if Sister Sylvia calls him? Apparently, only she knows where to find him, but she has refused to do so.”

“But why?” someone had asked, voice sharp with accusation.

“Well, why else? Isn’t it obvious that she’s bad luck? She never wanted to be here in the first place. She needs freedom to go into the world and sin. What better way to do that than for this place to be shut down?”

The words stung. Not because they were entirely wrong. But because they weren’t right either.

I never wanted to be here, but I never wanted this either. I didn’t want to be the reason these children lost their home. I didn’t want to be the one everyone looked at with thinly veiled resentment, their anger curling around my name like a curse.

Mother Beatrice had pulled me aside earlier, her face lined with exhaustion.

“Sylvia, we won’t be able to feed the kids much longer after we get kicked out. We need to put the ones we can up for adoption.”

“There has to be another way,” I had pleaded.

“We have four days left. Four days before we get kicked out. All these kids, including you, the Sisters… The church is not willing to take up the burden.” Her voice softened, almost coaxing. “Unless… unless you’re willing to help.”

I had shaken my head, my voice barely above a whisper. “You don’t understand. He’s dangerous.”

“You’ve said that a thousand times already,” she said gently. “And I get it, child. I’m not pressing you to do something you don’t want to. But what could be worse? A roof over our heads, all of us together, or these kids—homeless, scattered in strangers’ houses, forced to bond with people they’ve never known? When you could change that.”

And then she had looked me in the eye, driving the final nail into my coffin.

“Picture Maeve in the hands of a bad man as a father figure, Sylvia.”

I had frozen at the implication in her tone, my pulse pounding in my ears. Maeve, the little girl who still flinched at sudden noises, who clung to me at night when she thought no one was watching.

My stomach churned, nausea creeping up my throat.

Somehow, I know I had been Maeve once.

I had known what it was like to be passed around, to be under the control of men who smelled of sweat and alcohol, their dirty hands heavy and insistent.

I had learned early that struggling only made it worse. That silence was sometimes the only armor you had.

“You’re so beautiful, sunshine.”

A phantom voice whispered through my mind, its owner long gone but never truly forgotten. My breath caught in my throat, my hands clenched into fists.

“So soft… so obedient…”

I squeezed my eyes shut, willing the memories away. I couldn’t afford to remember. Not when that distant memory could very much repeat itself, not only to me, but to children who still had a chance.

But the voice was persistent. “You look so pure… I know you’ll taste even better…”

A choked gasp left my throat. The room tilted. My skin turned slick with sweat, the air in my lungs was suddenly nog enough. Suddenly, the walls were closing in on me, the dim candlelight flickering violently, those shadows that made me want to jump out of my skin stretched and curled out of the curtains towards me like claws. My vision swam, my lungs tightened and every breath suddenly dragged like razor wire through my chest.

I didn’t realize I had moved until my back collided with the cold stone wall. My knees threatened to give way, but I had to find something. I had to stop him. I gripped onto the nearest bench, my fingers trembling.

“No, no, don’t come any closer…” The words spilled from my lips before I could stop them. But what harm could that little voice do against him? Against a man four times my size?

Still, I tried. With a voice barely a whisper, shaky, frantic, I pleaded again. “No…please.”

My pulse pounded in my ears. My stomach clenched, and suddenly, I wasn’t here anymore—I was there.

Trapped.

A shadow loomed over me. Strong hands gripped my wrist. The scent of sweat and alcohol suddenly replaced the usual sweet scent of incense and roses in Mother Beatrice’s office.

No. Please, no.

A pair of hands grabbed my shoulders, shaking me—hard.

“Sylvia!”

I choked, my body stiffened as bile rose to my throat.

“So perfect, my baby,”

No. No, no, no—

“So pure… so sweet…”

Hands latched onto me. Hard.

I snapped.

A feral sound ripped from my throat. I thrashed, panic surging like wildfire, my nails clawing at the arms holding me. My body reacted on pure, raw instinct, kicking, shoving, desperate for escape.

I needed to get away. I needed to get away.

“Sylvia!”

I struggled harder.

“Sylvia, it’s me!”

Not him.

Not him.

“Sylvia, look at me!”

The voice was different. Softer. Familiar.

I blinked rapidly until the haze in my mind cleared just enough to see a face. Lined with worry. Eyes wide, pleading. The hands still held me, but they weren’t rough, weren’t cruel.

Mother Beatrice.

“It’s just me, Sylvia. It’s just me.”

The words barely registered. My body still trembled, the phantom touch lingering on my skin like filth I could never scrub off.

“What…” My voice cracked. I swallowed hard, trying again. “What just happened to me?”

Mother Beatrice hesitated, her gaze searching mine. “You… I think you remembered something.”

No.

Not a memory.

Mother Beatrice squeezed my hands. “Are you alright? Do you need me to call a doctor?”

I swallowed several gulps of air, then shook my head.

“But…”

I shook my head again. “No. I don’t need a doctor.”

She grabbed her rosary. “Then let’s pray for you,”

“No! I just need to go to my room.”

“But will you be alright?”

No doctor could fix this. No prayer could erase what happened to me.

Because it wasn’t just a memory.

It was a warning.

“Maeve will not be given away to any man. None of the kids will.”

Mother Beatrice blinked in confusion. “What do you mean?”

I nodded repeatedly to drive my point home, as if I understood, but my mind had already been miles away, racing toward a man I barely knew, hoping he was my last lifeline.

The next problem was I had no way to find him.

The only place I’d ever seen him was that burnt down chapel, where he first threw that offer around like he had all the time in the world to be generous. If he was anywhere, it would be there.

Which brought me to my current predicament: sneaking out in the dead of night like a cheating wife.

Oh, I was a cheating wife.

As a nun, I should be married to my faith. But somehow, something in the eyes of that man told me being around him would never allow that to go smoothly.

I clutched the coat tighter around me as I darted through the overgrown bushes behind the shelter. The night air bit at my skin, my breath fogging in the cold. Each crunch of leaves under my feet made my heart slam against my ribs in fear, but I couldn’t afford to hesitate.

If Mother Beatrice caught me, I’d be locked inside until sunrise with a long lecture about safety and God’s plan. And unfortunately for both of us, God’s plan hadn’t been doing me any favors lately.

And so I raced against the midnight air, my pulse a frantic drumbeat. The old chapel wasn’t far—just beyond the trees, past the fence, and across the abandoned road. Not exactly a trek, but it felt like miles when every shadow made my stomach twist.

By the time I reached the crumbling stone steps, I was panting, a mix of exhaustion and nerves. The building was disappointingly silent and empty. I pressed my hand to the heavy wooden door and—

It opened.

Not because someone was on the other side, waiting. No, the thing just creaked open like an invitation. Or a bad omen.

What if they’re ghosts here? Father Andrew’s for one.

“Shut up,” I admonished myself silently. “There is no such thing as ghosts.” I kept the conversation going in my head.

“When a saint dies, his soul goes to be with God. It doesn’t hover around aimlessly.”

I swallowed hard and stepped inside.

The air was colder here, so thick with the scent of old wood and candle wax. It was dark, but moonlight spilled in through the stained-glass windows, painting fractured colors across the stone floor.

He wasn’t here.

I shouldn’t have expected him to be.

I let out a shaky breath and sat down on the nearest bench, my legs finally giving out. The silence pressed against me, like even the air knew how absurd this was.

What was I even doing?

Banking on some fleeting moment of kindness when life had taught me better than to expect anything?

I pulled my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around them, trying to chase away the cold creeping into my bones. My body shook—not just from the cold, but from the guilt I felt.

The offer expired four days ago. My fault.

Did I expect he’d be waiting here for me to run to him?

Still, I pictured the shelter, the overcrowded halls, the exhausted nuns doing their best to stretch resources that were already nonexistent. And then I pictured the alternative—nowhere to go, no roof over my head, no safety.

If he didn’t show up… what then?

I rubbed my hands together in a failed attempt to warm them. I had never felt this helpless in a long time. I glanced toward the door.

Maybe I should just leave.

But my body wouldn’t move. Some stupid, reckless part of me still held on, still clung to the hope that he would walk through that door, that he hadn’t just vanished into the night after dangling hope right in my face.

The minutes stretched. The cold deepened. My stomach twisted with frustration, fear, something dangerously close to disappointment.

He wasn’t coming.

The shelter will shut down and it’ll be my fault.

The kids and everyone will suffer.

Because of me.

Because of me…

For the first time in a long time, I had no idea what to do next.