Journey towards Acceptance

Occupying my Thoughts

Jude had woken up stupidly early and couldn't go back to bed. She didn't want to accept the reason why she couldn't fall back to sleep and so she stayed in bed for an hour, rolling from one side to the other, pushing any thoughts of her gorgeous distraction out of her mind. 'I can't keep doing this to myself. I could at least start working. Taking my mind off of her is better than sitting here avoiding the situation.' And so she did. 7 am came and Jude had her face buried in some papers until she heard someone knocking the door.

"Come in"

Sister Mary Eunice opened the door and looked surprised when she saw Jude working so early in the morning.

"Sister is everything okay? Why are you working at this time? You should be annoyed at having to wake up and in desperate need for food."

Jude chuckled "I see you have me all figured out Sister! I couldn't sleep and decided to start working."

"Do you want me to get you something Sister?"

"No thank you. I will go get food when I finish what I am doing."

When the young nun had left Jude looked at the last pile of papers and files she had to assemble. She usually hated it, but now she finds it rather interesting. She was falling behind with the paperwork but thanks to the girl occupying her thoughts she is now up to date.

It was now 10 am and Jude arranged the files into their appropriate boxes storing them away in the cabinet. She looked around at her office and smiled thinking she was done for today and she could finally relax. Moments later realisation hit her. 'I need to talk to her. But what will I tell her? How do I put my feelings into words? Do I dare tell her I love her?' Jude sat on the chair behind her office thinking how this could turn out. 'Lana, I love you. No. Too soon. Lana, I know I assigned you into the institution and I would like to apologise for not allowing you to live your life as a free individual. What am I saying? How is that relevant to what I want to say?' She was on the verge of tears. How could she tell Lana how much she means to her without sounding desperate? How could she even utter the words when she couldn't even form them into a sentence in her mind?'

A knock on the door brought Jude back to her senses. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, stood up and took a deep breath. When she declared her appearance decent she called "Come in" and Sister Mary Eunice stepped into the office.

"Sister there is someone here to talk to you."

"Send them in Sister."

When Jude saw who came through the door she was stunned. She was able to maintain her usual poised self but deep inside she was fuming.

"Do you want to take a seat." Jude smiled pointing at the chair.

In the common room Lana was sitting at her usual spot. Only this time instead of looking outside or staring at the plain white wall she was writing. She was able to tear a couple of pages out of her book the night before and hide it in her hospital gown while Jude wasn't looking, along with the pen she was taking notes with. She was extra cautious this time not to get caught. She really didn't want to end up in electroshock therapy again. Her body was turned in such way that people couldn't see what she was doing. It was uncomfortable but she didn't care. She wanted to finish writing this down.

She found herself awake at 5 am that morning writing a letter to Jude. She knew she didn't have the courage to actually hand it to Jude, but she wanted to finish it anyway. At 7 am she completed the letter, folded it and placed it in the pocket of her gown. She didn't want to stop writing. She has just realised how much she had missed it. When she got in the common room at 7:30 am she began writing down some of her thoughts down.

It was now 11 am and she put her pen down. She couldn't remember what she just wrote down. It was as if she was in a state of trance; writing unconsciously. She started reading and immediately she figured out that everything she had written was based around the night before and how it would have ended if Frank hadn't interrupted them. She found herself blushing at what she wrote. She was embarrassed for having such an active imagination, but the reason behind her blushing was the elaborate description of how their first kiss would be. The kiss was a battle of dominance is what she had written. 'No that's not right' she thought. 'Our first kiss will be meaningful and full of love, not lust.'

She read three sentences of her story before someone yanked the piece of paper out of her hand. She turned to look at the person who was now holding her thoughts in their hands, annoyance written all over her face. When she looked up she saw Jude looking down at her, a weird smirk on her face.

"Good morning Sister" Lana said shocked. "Could I have my paper back please?"

"No, Miss Winters, you may not."

Her reply took Lana by surprise and she quickly formed an excuse. "It is the interview we had yesterday and I am rewriting it."

"Is that so Lana? Cause I have the notepad with the interview in my room. You left it on the table. You should really come up with better excuses dear."

"I am sorry Sister. It will not happen again."

"Good. Now stand up, give me your pen, empty your pockets and give me any other pieces of paper you got."

Lana emptied one of her pocket's contents on the table. Cigarettes, matches and the pen. Jude grabbed the pen and pointed to Lana's other pocket.

"This one is empty" Lana said casually.

"I want you to turn it inside out so I can see there is nothing in there."

"Of course boss" Lana was ready to give Jude the 'I told you so' look. That is until she turned her pocket inside out and a folded piece of paper fell from it and on the floor. "Shit" she whispered.

"Lying again, Miss Winters." Jude said as she picked the piece of paper from the floor and placed it in her habit's pocket along with the other pieces of paper and pen.

"Now Miss Winters, follow me. You have a visitor."

Lana could tell Jude was in a playful mood this morning. She couldn't stop smirking and Lana knew that whenever Jude had that kind of smirk on, things were going to go downhill really quick.