Sylvie
The pressing feeling of guilt and shame coursed through me. I immediately made my way to the confession room ignoring the stare of my other classmates. My arm began to itch painfully. Do I even deserve forgiveness, repentance? Maybe I should have stayed at home. I entered the boot and bowed my head in prayer.
"Forgive me father for I have sinned," I said, inhaling deeply to calm my raging nerves. The words felt foreign as if rehearsed, like I had stolen from someone else. Maybe I had. I'd already stolen enough today.
A pause, heavy and long, pressed against the thin wooden screen. I couldn't see the man beyond it, but I felt the hush of his presence, close, listening.
I swallowed. "I forged someone's signature." The confession scraped out of me, brittle and small. "I couldn't...I couldn't face him. I couldn't let him know I needed him...his permission, that I was bound by him. So I signed my name instead." My nails bit crescents into my palms. "It was wrong... I know but it's the only way to keep him from reaching that desperate side of me again."
My voice trembled, the words spilling out faster. "Every time I think about going to him, I feel sick. My stomach turns. I hear his voice in my head telling me I'm no good and I..." I broke off, catching my breath. "I thought maybe if I confessed it here, it would mean something. That God would know I wasn't trying to defy him, just...survive."
Silence stretched on the other side. Not the quick, perfunctory quiet I expected, but something thicker, watching. I wondered if the priest thought less of me, if he guessed who I was and why my sin carried a different weight than it should.
I pressed my forehead against my clasped hands. "Please...just tell me it isn't unforgiveable. Tell me he understands." I cry.
His deep baritone came low through the screen, steady, almost careful. "You are not unworthy because of what was done to you. Forging a name does not stain your soul; it only shows how much you long to protect yourself. You deserve more than survival. You deserve peace and happiness."
The words sank into me like lights finding cracks in a dark room. For a moment, I forgot the shame, the tightness in my chest. No one has ever said that to me before without wanting something from me in return.
I blinked against the sting in my eyes, "Do you really believe that?"
"I do," he said, firm. "And one day, you will too."
When I stepped outside of the aisle, the church looked different, brighter somehow, though the candles hadn't changed. My steps felt lighter, as if I'd left more than a sin behind. I didn't see the priest watching me from the shadows, his gaze fixed, drinking in the sight of me like I was his only prayer answered. But then, I felt it, like heat prickling at the back of my neck. Eyes on me.
I turned my head, but the church was nearly empty. Just shadows stretching across the stone floor, candles flickering in their holders. Still, the feeling stayed, heavy and certain, as though someone had marked me, claimed me in silence. I wrapped my arm around myself and walked faster towards the doors, whispering the priest's words over and over in my head, trying to drown out the chill that followed me out into the night.
I shook my head, forcing a deep laugh under my breath. Nerves, that was all it was. Old ghosts and nothing more. Yet the chills followed me outside, stubborn as my shadow.
The front door groaned open, and my stomach tightened the way it always did when I crossed the threshold. His presence lingered like smoke in the house; you could practically taste it in the air before you even saw him.
He was in the living room, a half- zipped suitcase yawning open on the couch. Shirts, chargers, and scattered papers spilled out as he moved around with practiced impatience.
My throat went dry. "You are going somewhere?" I asked, though my voice was barely audible but I knew he heard. He always heard me.
"Work trip," he muttered without looking at me, shoving clothes into his bag. "A week or less. Hard to tell when you are worried for your little sister."
Relief punched out of my lungs so quickly I swayed. A week.Seven days without his footsteps in the hallway, without his knock at the door or him trying to break the lock, without him brushing too close.
But the tension didn't vanish just yet. My shoulders stayed tight, like I was waiting for him to change his mind, to notice the tremor in my voice, to turn around and remind me that I was still his to corner. I stayed by the doorframe, clutching my bag so tightly my knuckles ached. "Safe trip," I whispered, the words tasting bitter, but I didn't care. Because underneath the fear, there was a crack of light, sharp and blinding. One week of breathing without him is my best definition of freedom.
I shut the door behind me after I was sure he'd left. I sank onto the edge of the couch, staring at the space where his suitcase had been. My body hummed with both possibility and fear, and I whispered to myself as if it were a prayer: Please let him stay gone this time.
I curled my legs beneath me, the silence of the house pressing in like a soft blanket. For once, it wasn't suffocating, it was mine.
My mind began to wander, timid at first, like a child testing the waters for the first time. I could sleep in late without listening for the creak of the floorboards. I could eat what I wanted without shrinking under his stare. I could even step outside, breathe the night air, maybe visit the church again, and hear that voice that is awfully familiar yet reminding of my worth.
The thoughts tasted dangerous, like stolen fruit. Sweet but edged with guilt. What if he came back early and caught me living as though he didn't own my silence. What if he found out I'd dared to imagine a life where he doesn't exist?"
I hugged my knees to my chest, whispering to myself in the quiet: Just one week. Use it. Don't waste it.
And for the first time in years, the thought of tomorrow didn't feel like a punishment. It felt like an opportunity.