What You Are Is Beautiful

A Loving Sin

A/N there will be a mature content warning as usual. Feel free to scroll past it if you don't want to read. *** will be placed at the end.

"I was a really good and disciplined kid," Beatrice started. "I wanted nothing more than to please my parents and make them proud. They had me studying every night with different tutors and only the most impeccable grades and behaviors were acceptable. For the longest time, I kept pushing myself to meet their ever increasing standards for me. Every time I came close to a milestone, they moved the goal post back and told me I wasn't even close. So eventually, I noticed and I stopped trying. I became rebellious and started acting to make myself happy. I stopped doing well in school. I brought home my first ever D on a report card when I was 14. My parents were furious, so they grounded me. I wasn't allowed to go see friends or leave the house for extra stuff, not that I even had time to before. They were very strict on who I could be friends with and where I could go at what times. But they didn't pull me out of all my extracurricular activities. So I started being more social in clubs and sports and outside classes. I started skipping out early on clubs to hang out with this group of kids that I met in my music theory class. That's how I met Natalie."

Ava glanced to Beatrice who had now shifted her gaze to stare at the wall in front of her. She could feel Ava's eyes on her and tried hard not to squirm under the pressure. What she said next was going to be a bigger secret than what she had shared with anyone before. And last time she had shared anything like this, she had been shipped away to a Catholic school that was instructed to change her. That couldn't happen again. What if the OCS found out? Would they send her away for these sinful impulses? Would they take her from Ava? And all of her Sisters? But Beatrice knew that Ava would never tell. Ava was different than the other Sisters and Beatrice was learning to trust her more.

"She was so kind and soft and everything about her felt like home." Beatrice's voice cracked in pain. "She felt like the home I never had and had always needed. She loved me for me and she showed me in so many ways. I felt alive when I kissed her, like she had managed to breathe her warmth and liveliness into me." She paused and sniffled. "I hadn't been really religious so it didn't hurt that I was in love." Beatrice placed her thumb and forefinger at the bridge of her nose. "I was young and stupid and naive. But I wanted my parents to know about the girl that I had so hopelessly fallen head over heels for. So I sat them down at dinner and I told them."

Ava could see the faint glow of light around them reflected in the pool of tears swimming at the bottom of Beatrice's eyes. She wanted so badly to lean forward and envelope her in the hug she so desperately needed, but she was terrified that she would scare the girl off. So instead she just sat and listened.

"And they were repulsed. They looked at me not like I was their daughter, but like I was a disgusting vermin that had to be dealt with. So they found a way to deal with me. They enrolled me in a Catholic school in France. They got rid of me and separated me from Natalie."

"Beatrice," Ava whispered soothingly. She took the other girl's hand in her own and felt a squeeze in response. Beatrice reached forward with her other hand to wrap Ava's hand in her own. She held on tight as she finished.

"They were told to change me, so they tried. They taught me hours upon hours of scripture every day. They taught me every feminine activity they thought they could. And they made sure that I was aware of how much less I am because of not only being a woman, but because of who I loved. The pain was enough to make me into what I am now. They know that I had suffered enough to be afraid to repeat the mistake. So they let me go when I signed up for an Order at 16. Luckily there's no minimum age to be accepted. I was first positioned in France in an Order neighboring the school when I heard rumors of the Warrior Sisters. I took up fighting as a hobby and soon enough, Father Vincent was called and he offered me a position in the Order of the Cruciform Sword. I took it and I went through my training and climbed the ladder and now I'm here."