our gentle sin

blasphemy

10.

LISA POV

On the day, I had believed Sunday had gone well. Mina and Jennie had got along. Jennie didn't seem to be uncomfortable, well at least for most of the time. I was kind of sad when she told me she wasn't feeling very well, I thought we'd have a few more hours to spend together, but to my dismay, Jennie wanted to go home.

She must have felt quite ill because she seemed quite pale and barely spoke on the way back. Although it wasn't my day with her, I went to check on her on Monday, but she was too ill to see me.

It may have been unlikely, but I was holding on to hope that she'd be okay for me to take her out today, or at least enough to sit with me in the garden.

As usual, I headed over to the Convent in the afternoon, but once again, Jennie wasn't waiting for me where she usually was.

I waited ten minutes but she was still a no show. I huffed and was about to see if I could find her when Mother Superior showed up.

"Lisa, hi. Are you taking Jennie out?"

"I was hoping to, if she's well enough."

"What do you mean?"

"She's been feeling unwell, but if she just wants to hang out here I'm fine with that."

"She's not sick, she's been fine. I'll go find her for you."

Before I could tell her that Jennie had been feeling sick since Sunday, she had already turned and left.

Whilst I was waiting, I was a little confused. Mother Superior had said that Jennie has been fine, but yesterday she was too sick to even see me and Sister Rosie had to come to tell me. Maybe she just didn't know that Jennie was sick.

Ten minutes later, Jennie is making her way towards me, and she seems about as happy to see me as she did the second time we met.

"Hey. Are you okay?" I can hear the concern in my voice, but Jennie doesn't seem to care.

She offers a simple, less than friendly "I'm fine."

"Are you sure? You seem... I don't know, like you don't want to see me."

"Let's just go."

"Oh okay. The weather's nice, so I thought we could just go to the park, maybe have a picnic?"

"Sure, sounds good."

Deciding not to push for an explanation, I lead the way out, thinking-- or more so hoping she'd talk to me more when we were out of the Convent. When she didn't, I hoped she'd speak when we got away from the Church.

I was more than disappointed and a little hurt when she didn't speak all the way to the park. I thought that we were past this stage and that she was comfortable enough with me to talk to now, but either we hadn't made as much progress as I'd thought, or Jennie was mad at me.

Strangely, I was hoping for the latter. At least if she was mad at me we could work through it, and these last two weeks hadn't been exaggerated in my head.

I couldn't think why she would be mad at me though. Even so, I was determined to find out.

Having made a quick stop at the shop for some snacks and sandwiches, I set them down on the picnic blanket I had laid out over the grass.

Jennie sat opposite me and opened a bag of crisps, not meeting my eyes.

"Jennie." I get her attention.

"Hmm?" She still doesn't look at me, more interested in the crunchy snack.

"Are you going to tell me what's up?"