novice, and her sister Natalie left on a scholarship to college. By then she was not only fascinated by Elvis, but passionately in love with all four of the Beatles. She wrote to the Sisters often from upstate New York, where she was happy in school, dating boys, and doing all, or at least most, of the things she had dreamed of while she was at St. Matthew's.
Two new boarders had arrived at the convent by then, two little girls from Laos, sent there by one of their missionary Sisters. They were much younger than Gabriella, but shared a room with her, just as she had shared hers with Natalie and Julie.
For four years Gabriella never heard from her mother, but she still thought of her from time to time, as she did her father. All she knew of him was that he had gone to Boston and had been planning to get married, to a woman with two daughters. She had no idea what had happened to him after that, and had no way to pursue it. Her mother, she knew, still lived in San Francisco, and a check came to Mother Gregoria once a month, precisely on time, paying for her room and board, but there was never a letter with it, a note, an inquiry as to how Gabriella was, or if she was well and happy. There were no cards or gifts on Christmas or birthdays. Gabriella's life centered now entirely around life at St. Matthew's, and everyone there loved her. She worked harder than almost anyone, would scrub any floor, any table, any bathroom, she would do chores even the other nuns would balk at. And she did brilliantly at her schoolwork. She still wrote stories and poetry, and all of her teachers agreed that she had real talent.
She still slept at the bottom of the bed, still had nightmares at night far too frequently, and never explained them. And Mother Gregoria still watched her from afar, concerned at some of what she saw there. The pain in Gabriella's eyes was dimmer now, she had grown even more beautiful, though she herself had no sense of it, nor any interest in what she looked like. She lived in a world without vanity. There were no mirrors in the convent, and she still wore the cast-off clothes of the girls who came in as postulants, and never seemed to think anything of it. As she had set herself the goal at ten, her life was one of sacrifice, and doing for others. But she still insisted, when they talked about it from time to time, that she had no vocation. When she compared herself to girls like Julie, or the ones who came in from elsewhere, she could see the difference between them. They were so sure, so certain, so unfailing in their devotion to their calling. All Gabriella could see in herself were the faults, the failings, the mistakes she made, or the times she insisted she had thoughtlessly hurt others. In truth, her humility was far greater than those who held up their vocations like so many trophies. And Mother Gregoria tried year after year to make her see it. But she was so intent on denying her virtues and pointing to her flaws that she couldn't imagine herself becoming a nun at St. Matthew's, nor could she see herself ever leaving. Hers was a completely sequestered life, living among the love and protection of the nuns, and she knew without a doubt that she would die without that.
“I guess I'll just have to stay here and scrub floors for the rest of my life,” she joked with Sister Lizzie on her fifteenth birthday. “No one else wants to do it. And I like it. It gives me time to think about my stories while I'm scrubbing.”
“You could still write your stories if you join the Order, Gabbie,” Sister Lizzie insisted, as they all did. Everyone in the convent knew how strong her vocation was. Gabriella was the only one who didn't know it. And sometimes they just smiled at her, and ignored the silly things she said. They knew that eventually she'd hear the calling. It was impossible to think that she wouldn't, and she still had a lot of growing up to do in the meantime.
At sixteen, she had completed all her high school work, and in spite of all their efforts to keep her with them, they had to admit she