Birgitta the Nun

Part 43 - The Waiting

And waited they did—waited and waited—for nothing to happen. It seemed they were alone in eternity. Their minds drifted away. All existence appeared excessive around them, as if time had been interrupted from ever happening.

Birgitta, apart from taking the time to pick her nails perfectly clean, took the moment to think things over, to turn the whole situation inside-out. And she did manage to find some peculiarities in their position—

"Aren't you a wizard?" she at last ventilated her thoughts.

"What's that got to do with it?" Charlie replied.

"Well—then," Birgitta hesitated, "do some magic."

"I may be a magician—but I wasn't born on Wall street." Charlie scowled, "Money isn't magic - it's Black magic."

Birgitta could find no logic in the wizard's arguments. But she agreed to lie low on one condition: that they should also pay their respects to the peasant's cat. And sure enough they would, promised the wizard. But first things first—and right now the time had come to change their position. They needed to get further away from the church, the wizard explained, but closer to the path. Soon enough the procession would leave the church and go by—and she wanted it happening right in front of her nose.

She speculated her options and found a wide gravestone in just the right position, parallel to the path leading directly from the church entrance. Birgitta watched her circle the stone, then disappear behind it. The nun followed suit and squatted next to the wizard, folding her arms around her knees.

"It's terribly quiet around here," she whispered and let her thin voice creep into the thick silence. "The whole village seems lifeless, even the square— " she broke off, turned and looked at the gates. "It really is awfully quiet, all of this place."

"Not quiet enough—" the wizard muttered. She did not take her gaze off the church and its colorful windows. A slight movement caught her attention and she narrowed her eyes. Then it was gone.

Birgitta shuddered, but again let the silence of the village fall. It almost gave an echo, that's how silent the silence was. It wrapped up their ears in cotton and made them feel deaf. The air around them - around all of the village and its decorated church - seemed completely empty, but at the same time extremely compact. Then, a thud and a voice—

"Why are you hiding behind this stone?" the voice asked. It was a very small voice, sounding cut off, almost as if coming from a tiny box.

Charlie and Birgitta looked around, astonished, to see nothing. They even felt their ears to see if anything was blocking them.

"Lower," the small voice said.

And indeed lower they looked. As it would be, peeping around the corner of the gravestone serving as their shelter, the smallest girl Birgitta had ever seen was making their acquaintance. She was so small she could surely run on watch-batteries—or travel via mail in an envelope.

"Don't interfere Hilda," the wizard said, looking in the opposite direction. "You shouldn't be here."

"But don't you want to say good bye to mother?" Hilda asked.

"Well—I am, in my own way. I even brought flowers. See—" Charlie shoved her elbow in the side of Birgitta, who reluctantly brought the drooping flowers up to the little girl.

Hilda smelled them and smiled. Her hair was red and curly, her figure round, and her tiny legs straight—she almost looked like a little flower herself.

"They're nice," she replied. Then, taking on a more serious expression, "They talk a lot about you at home you know. Sure, it isn't all nice—the things that they say—but I think they miss you."

"Don't interfere," Charlie repeated. "You know I can't go back—anyway, what's the point? Now that mother's gone there's no one to consult."

"We've got a new cat," Hilda offered.

Charlie made a face, as if appalled by the thought of a new cat, but soon recovered. She shooed her sister away, and the tiny little girl disappeared among the graveyard bushes.

Incidentally, the small hairs on Birgitta's neck were standing on end. She vaguely remembered something about Charlie's mother being ill—and that she, Birgitta, had recommended Charlie to do nothing about it—"A cold is nothing," she had said, "especially not to a wizard." But this lady was no wizard, was she? Lord. A thought went up to Birgitta: was this her doing? Was the passing of Charlie's mother all her fault?

"So—your sister's a gnome?" Birgitta asked at length.

"Yes. What of it?" Charlie muttered. "Not everyone can be a wizard."

Birgitta shrugged her shoulders and didn't persist. Maybe gnomes and wizards were related in the end? Why not? If Charlie's mother wasn't a wizard herself, then maybe her children could be all kinds of strange creatures? The idea thrilled Birgitta somewhat. She even thought about asking to meet the family. But no—she was just curious, not ambitious.

Again devoid of activity, the cemetery resumed its chronically low aspect. The procession remained hidden inside the church and the nun and the wizard ached with boredom. Everything appeared dead around them—that is, extra-very dead, considering they were among graves. It even seemed Hilda had never appeared to give them a lively little break.

Birgitta fell asleep in the grass. The wizard occupied herself with counting the coins in her pocket. She was making sure they hadn't multiplied during the night. Who knew what coins could do these days? How did people become rich? The wizard didn't know, but she expected it to happen some day or other. But no—no fortune had come to her this morning either. The coins in her pocket remained very few and very small, just like yesterday, and the day before. And all her life.