Sister Floriana

The Fight

"Sister Floriana!" One of the younger ones whined, tugging at her habit.

Floriana turned and crouched down to face the little boy. 

"What's wrong, Javier?"

"Emilia stole all my purple crayons!"

"For no reason?" 

"Yeah!"

Floriana sighed, standing up to scan the room for Emilia. The whole kindergarten, roughly 9 boys and ten girls, was busy coloring the pages Floriana had procured for them. During the afternoons, once the tutor left to educate the older children on history and arithmetic, she liked to come in and help Sister Diana out with their playtime. Today she was actually outright replacing Diana, because of her other duties. 

Sure enough, Emilia had a whole pile of purple crayons by her side, and was coloring like nothing was wrong. She really liked the color purple. 

"Hmmm," said Floriana. Maybe this was a teachable moment. She bent down to Javier again.

"So you want those crayons back?"

"Uh-huh," he said. 

"Well, Javier I'm gonna tell you a little story. Have a seat."

He just plopped down where he was, and she sat down across from him.

"This is a story about a little girl, just twelve years old-"

"Twelve's not little!" he said, incredulously.

"I guess it isn't," she agreed, smiling. "Anyways, my good friend Sister Emmie told me this story, about her friend Sister Diana. When Diana was twelve years old, she had a bully in her class. Her name was Benita. She thought she was better than everyone because she was tall."

This would've been 8 years ago, back in 1929.

It was before most of them were even novices; just little girls that liked to wear the habit because they wanted to be nuns someday. Some of them still lived outside the monastery with their parents. There was no war and no Republic- King Alfonso XIII ruled, alongside his prime minister Miguel Primo de Rivera, the dictator. The girls didn't really understand what that meant, but later on the nuns seemed happy that both men weren't coming back, despite Alfonso's support of their side in the war. 

No, Diana was much more concerned with studying, and learning the skills to make herself a nun someday. She lived in the village with her father and mother, both of whom were old friends of Father Alvadeo. A working class family, the monastery was naturally the most likely place for her and other children to learn to read and write. These were the days before the Society of Jesus had been banned.

Whenever the nuns had the girls play outside, Diana would retreat to the shade of an oak tree and read. Sometimes a textbook, sometimes a novel, often the Bible. Every time someone tried to talk to her, she'd bury her nose further in it. The Bible worked especially well for this. 

Until one day, when she was approached by a little girl with brown hair and freckles.

"Um, hello!"

Diana looked up, raising an eyebrow. Then she went back to her book.

"Um, hi?" she spoke again.

Diana frowned and looked up. The girl was still there, convinced Diana must not have heard her.

"What?"

"Ummmmmm... my name's Emmie," she said. 

"I'm sorry?" Diana cupped a hand to her ear.