The Girl in the Photograph by Lygia Fagundes Telles

Author:Lygia Fagundes Telles
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dalkey Archive Press

Chapter 7

Sister Clotilde came in triumphantly with the bouquet of daisies and the bag of fruit.

“I bought oranges, melons and apples. And bananas, too, look what a lovely bunch.”

I interrupt my bicycle exercise but continue to lie on the floor. With my fingertips I blow her a kiss.

“You’re a saint.”

“Don’t I wish.”

With her arms hanging limply inside the sleeves of her habit, she bows her head and becomes pensive, looking inside herself. What she sees must not be encouraging.

“Would you really like to be one?”

She smiles her yellowish-green smile, her dentures are a vague vegetal shade. She sniffs the daisies, her face still uninspired.

“When I was an adolescent I wanted to be Saint Theresa, she was my model. I did everything she did, I even painted little oil pictures, do you believe it? I didn’t manage to have the fever, my health was always excellent. Later I wanted to be Saint Theresa D’Ávila.”

Harder really. I stare at the ceiling.

“Las Moradas.”

“Have you read it?” she asked clasping her hands in enthusiasm. “I used to know it almost by heart. ‘No es pequeña lástima y confusión, que por nuestra culpa no entendamos a nosotros mismos, ni sepamos quién somos.’ ”

Her lead-gray apron reaches down to her well-turned ankles. She has a slender waist. Naked she must look a lot better.

“Many nuns are no longer wearing habits, haven’t you thought of doing that? Your legs are pretty, Sister.”

“‘Teribles son las ardiles y mañas del Demónio para que las almas no se conozcan ni entiendan sus caminos.’ ”

I stick my first two fingers against my forehead and make a face, which is lost because she’s looking inside herself again, even deeper. Confusión y lástima. She opens her mouth and inhales, surfacing.

“Ah yes, I was telling you I wanted to imitate the two Theresas. I didn’t have the candor of the first nor the intelligence of the second. I learned the lesson, it’s foolishness to copy others. The state of grace of a soul resides more in a state of unconsciousness than in anything else. I very much like the primitive painter before he discovers he’s primitive,” she adds examining the small purse Annie left on the table. The clasp is open and from the top of it escapes a fine eyeliner pencil.

“This friend of yours, for example. Couldn’t she be closer to God than we who live for that ideal?”

Oh Lord. If she keeps it up I’ll kill myself.

“Isn’t that the phone, Sister? I’m expecting a call.” She listens. She hugs the tray she brought against her chest and fixes her almond-eyed gaze on me: neither sweet nor bitter. The sleeves of her habit end in points, like wings: a bird not of the earth nor of the sky. Battles of conscience, poor little thing. She knows it is less serious to make love with a woman but still she must burn with remorse.

“It’s next door. There’s a phone that’s always ringing somewhere in the neighborhood and nobody answers.”

I close my book and lean my head against it.

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