Read Online Downtown by Anne Rivers Siddons - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Anne Rivers Siddons
Tags: Fiction, General, Romance, Contemporary, Man-Woman Relationships, Young Women, Women Journalists, Periodicals, Atlanta (Ga.)
Ads: Link
“not to let the weekend sisters get you down.
They’re some of the most devout we have, but they’re having a hard time with the twentieth century, and Vatican Two was a great shock to them. This is not a good town for the old-liners.”
Something clicked behind my eyes. “Sister Joan, were you…could you have been playing a guitar and singing in Tight Squeeze Saturday night? My father and I were passing through, and—”
“And saw two renegade nuns and a priest singing to the hippies and ran your poor father’s blood pressure sky high?
I confess. That was me, and Sister Catherine and Father Mark from Saint Stephen’s. We call it a street ministry, but we all enjoy it as much as the kids. I hope your father wasn’t too upset. I realize we do things here that some of our older church members have a hard time with. But we think—the archbishop thinks—that there’s a great need for them. Atlanta is a town for the young.”
“No, Daddy was all ready to take me home, and seeing you all did the trick,” I said, feeling a rush of love for her, a surge of something near sisterly, in the filial sense, sitting on the edge of my bed with her freckled face screwed up in laughter. I had never felt anything like it for a nun before.
“Good. Well, I’ll get on downstairs and let you get dressed.
I just wanted to say hello, and welcome. Oh, and to see if you knew where Rachel might have gotten to? She wasn’t at breakfast, and her bed hasn’t been slept in. We’re all a little worried.”
Cold fingers brushed my spine. “She was going on to a party with some boys we met,” I said. “It was at some ANNE RIVERS SIDDONS / 52
apartments that she said were popular, but I don’t remember their name. The boys seemed okay—”
“And were, no doubt,” Sister Joan said. “Don’t you go worrying about her. She’s stayed out before. I just thought I’d ask. The other sisters are upset—”
“I hope she won’t…you know, lose her room or anything,”
I said, wishing I had not informed on Rachel.
“We’re not her keepers,” Sister Joan said. “The only way she can lose her room is to not pay her rent, or do something much worse than the hours she keeps. I think about her a lot, though. Sometimes, God help me, I think she may simply be one of the lost ones.”
I blinked at her in surprise. This was a woman-to-woman conversation, not nun to parishioner, or teacher to pupil. I thought of the little cardboard wheel of pills in Rachel’s purse. I would have bet anything, in that moment, that Sister Joan knew about them.
“Thank you for breakfast and everything, Sister,” I said.
“You’re very welcome. I’ll be waiting to hear about your first day. Do they call you Maureen, by the way?”
“Some people call me Aisling,” I said, thinking to try again to circumvent Smoky.
“Ashley.” She misunderstood me. “Ashley O’Donnell. How very pretty. It sounds like a byline, doesn’t it? Very smart and now. Well. Happy landings, Ashley O’Donnell.”
And she was gone in a swirl of skirts.
I stood looking after her. Ashley O’Donnell. Ashley O’Donnell…I liked it. It did not sound Irish, or Catholic, or anything except young and smart and rather glamorous. That was it, then. From here on out, I would be Ashley O’Donnell, senior editor of Downtown magazine, Atlanta, Georgia.
When I left Our Lady and ran out into the cold, dazzling morning, I had rolled the waistband of my blue 53 / DOWNTOWN
skirt until the hem brushed the tops of my knees, and brushed and shaken my hair until it sprang from its accustomed careful flip and fell over my forehead and one eye in a tousle of curls. I rubbed my cheeks and bit my lips for good measure. Aisling O’Donnell of Corkie might not wear miniskirts and Sassoon hair, but Ashley O’Donnell of Atlanta most certainly would.
The city pulsed with light and morning; the sidewalks danced with them. The streets were crowded with people on their way downtown, and
They’re some of the most devout we have, but they’re having a hard time with the twentieth century, and Vatican Two was a great shock to them. This is not a good town for the old-liners.”
Something clicked behind my eyes. “Sister Joan, were you…could you have been playing a guitar and singing in Tight Squeeze Saturday night? My father and I were passing through, and—”
“And saw two renegade nuns and a priest singing to the hippies and ran your poor father’s blood pressure sky high?
I confess. That was me, and Sister Catherine and Father Mark from Saint Stephen’s. We call it a street ministry, but we all enjoy it as much as the kids. I hope your father wasn’t too upset. I realize we do things here that some of our older church members have a hard time with. But we think—the archbishop thinks—that there’s a great need for them. Atlanta is a town for the young.”
“No, Daddy was all ready to take me home, and seeing you all did the trick,” I said, feeling a rush of love for her, a surge of something near sisterly, in the filial sense, sitting on the edge of my bed with her freckled face screwed up in laughter. I had never felt anything like it for a nun before.
“Good. Well, I’ll get on downstairs and let you get dressed.
I just wanted to say hello, and welcome. Oh, and to see if you knew where Rachel might have gotten to? She wasn’t at breakfast, and her bed hasn’t been slept in. We’re all a little worried.”
Cold fingers brushed my spine. “She was going on to a party with some boys we met,” I said. “It was at some ANNE RIVERS SIDDONS / 52
apartments that she said were popular, but I don’t remember their name. The boys seemed okay—”
“And were, no doubt,” Sister Joan said. “Don’t you go worrying about her. She’s stayed out before. I just thought I’d ask. The other sisters are upset—”
“I hope she won’t…you know, lose her room or anything,”
I said, wishing I had not informed on Rachel.
“We’re not her keepers,” Sister Joan said. “The only way she can lose her room is to not pay her rent, or do something much worse than the hours she keeps. I think about her a lot, though. Sometimes, God help me, I think she may simply be one of the lost ones.”
I blinked at her in surprise. This was a woman-to-woman conversation, not nun to parishioner, or teacher to pupil. I thought of the little cardboard wheel of pills in Rachel’s purse. I would have bet anything, in that moment, that Sister Joan knew about them.
“Thank you for breakfast and everything, Sister,” I said.
“You’re very welcome. I’ll be waiting to hear about your first day. Do they call you Maureen, by the way?”
“Some people call me Aisling,” I said, thinking to try again to circumvent Smoky.
“Ashley.” She misunderstood me. “Ashley O’Donnell. How very pretty. It sounds like a byline, doesn’t it? Very smart and now. Well. Happy landings, Ashley O’Donnell.”
And she was gone in a swirl of skirts.
I stood looking after her. Ashley O’Donnell. Ashley O’Donnell…I liked it. It did not sound Irish, or Catholic, or anything except young and smart and rather glamorous. That was it, then. From here on out, I would be Ashley O’Donnell, senior editor of Downtown magazine, Atlanta, Georgia.
When I left Our Lady and ran out into the cold, dazzling morning, I had rolled the waistband of my blue 53 / DOWNTOWN
skirt until the hem brushed the tops of my knees, and brushed and shaken my hair until it sprang from its accustomed careful flip and fell over my forehead and one eye in a tousle of curls. I rubbed my cheeks and bit my lips for good measure. Aisling O’Donnell of Corkie might not wear miniskirts and Sassoon hair, but Ashley O’Donnell of Atlanta most certainly would.
The city pulsed with light and morning; the sidewalks danced with them. The streets were crowded with people on their way downtown, and
Similar Books
