A Modest Confession Atop a Cream Soda
"Pfft... is that so...? Now that I think about it, you're quite right. The sisters I knew when I was at school always kept their hair hidden beneath their veils."
A small laugh escaped me as I drew a clean handkerchief from beneath the counter. She was still sunk deep in her anguish, so I held the cloth out and nodded toward the white milk foam clinging at the corner of her mouth.
At that, Clara's eyes went perfectly round. She looked down at the handkerchief, then carefully wiped near her upper lip with a fingertip, and white cappuccino foam came away on her skin. She seemed to realize that, until a moment ago, she had been delivering the most solemn sermon in the world while wearing a milk mustache.
"H-hyaaah!"
The youthful shriek burst out of her, and Clara's face flushed crimson to the tips of her ears. She all but snatched the handkerchief from my hand and began scrubbing desperately at her mouth.
"Th-this cannot be...! To have shown so unkempt a sight...! B-Brother! I beg you, I beg you, please forget that ridiculous face from a moment ago!"
Mortified beyond recourse, her feet kicked frantically beneath the chair. She had the handkerchief clamped over her mouth as she looked up at me, and her eyes looked ready to fill with tears at any second.
"A-and as for my hair slipping out from under the veil... th-the dormitory's mother superior is forever remarking upon that very thing...! Nnngh... I finished the dawn patrol and hurried out so quickly that I failed to tidy the strands that had come loose in such a disorderly way...!"
Clara's voice shook past all control as the excuses spilled from her. Determined, it seemed, to raise her collapsed dignity back up, she cleared her throat again and again and laid the handkerchief demurely across her lap. Yet her fiercely burning cheeks, and the trembling fingers clenched in the fabric of her habit, betrayed every bit of her shame.
"In any case! A servant of the Lord ought never to be disordered by so much as a hair's breadth... and yet before you, Brother, I feel as though I am led into a trial of faith again and again!"
She had begun, by now, to shift the whole of the blame onto me.
"Even so, the cappuccino and the madeleines were good, weren't they?"
Smiling, I passed her the shortcake and the macarons she had been staring at all the while.
"Here, at least, I hope you'll live the way you did before you took the veil."
Anyone looking at her could tell she was still far too unseasoned to be called a nun obliged to practice piety and abstinence. Rather than straining to play the adult and binding herself into the shape of a flawless believer, I hoped she would loosen, here, the feelings she had been holding down—until the day she could practice restraint of her own accord.
The moment I finished, a small gasp slipped from Clara's lips. Her gaze traveled from my hand to the snow-white cream cake and the brightly colored macarons on the counter.
"The days... before I took the veil..."
Slowly, she eased the strength from the hand that had been gripping her sleeve.
"I believed that before the Lord I must always be a composed adult, a steadfast soul who breaks evil. If my faith should waver... then the weight of the faith I wield would lose its way as well."
Clara confessed it quietly, her head bowed. She reached out with care and picked up a single pink macaron. On any other day she would have turned aside, dismissing it as a shallow worldly temptation, but now a quiet smile was spreading at her lips.
"And yet... just as you say, Brother, in this secret sanctuary alone... only a very little... might the Lord not turn a blind eye to this little lamb's indulgence? I find myself wishing to offer that excuse."
Clara opened her small mouth and bit into the macaron, and her cheeks colored as pink as the strawberries on the cake. Theological torment, the solemnity of an inquisition into heresy—all of it melted clean away. She lifted her fork, cut a modest piece from the edge of the shortcake, and slipped it between her lips, and a pleased little breath escaped as she chewed. The face that quietly brightened over something sweet was no different from that of an ordinary, lovely girl one might meet anywhere.
So that she—changed from a pious nun into a happy girl—might savor a little longer a stretch of time that was only hers, I hung back a step and busied myself tidying the display case. Amid the sweet dessert and the soft milk foam, Clara looked peaceful, as though she had set her heavy cross down, if only for a moment.
That was when it happened.
Tiri-ring. Tiri-ri-ring.
From Clara's side rose a ringtone one hardly ever heard anymore, a plain, dowdy electronic chime. Startled, still holding her fork, she flushed and ducked her head. She rummaged urgently through the pocket of her habit, drew out an old flip phone, and stared at it. When she saw the number on the screen she could not even bring herself to answer; she hesitated, then pushed the phone deep back into her pocket.
A flip phone, in an age when a smartphone was simply assumed. Another side of her pulled a small laugh out of me.
"Haha... you really do live a life of restraint."
At the light joke, Clara's shoulders gave another great flinch. She hastily gathered both hands before her chest and rushed to raise her voice.
"I-it is by no means that I have fallen behind the times! Th-that flat contraption they call a smartphone overflows with every worldly temptation and every pleasure-soaked scrap of information. It is no different from a modern fruit of the knowledge of good and evil!"
As if to cool her reddened cheeks, she shook her head in a hurry.
"T-true prayer must be offered not upon a flashing screen, but within quiet meditation. The dormitory's mother superior has always stressed as much! For a student who must carry her studies together with a magical girl's duties, keeping one's distance from needless digital devices is nothing other than a perfectly natural part of spiritual discipline!"
Even as she declared it, Clara's eyes had lost their destination and were darting every which way.
"Furthermore... is a machine with a broad screen not e-especially liable to be broken in the course of a magical girl's work? To carelessly destroy what the Lord has granted is waste, and it is sin. This flip phone, however, is sturdy enough that it would not so much as flinch if I set it beside a weapon of judgment!"
"Yeah. I like classic things, too. Would you like a drink besides the cappuccino?"
My answer settled quietly over the excuses she had been spilling out in a rush. At the soft, rounded word classic—offered in place of old and unfashionable—Clara's eyes widened just a little. The feet that had been kicking busily in the air came to rest, neat and still, upon the chair's rung.
"C-classic... y-yes! Classic! A steadfast value, unswayed by the current of the age, that does not change. Just as the word of the Lord remains valid even after two thousand years, a true object does not alter its form!"
As though she had never been flustered at all, she slid the flip phone once more, with great care, deep into the pocket of her habit. The effort to rebuild a nun's dignity was convincing enough on its face, but flushed red all the way to the rims of her ears, she looked far less pious than simply, terribly cute. Clara lifted both hands and fanned her cheeks in small, quick motions. She glanced down at the cappuccino cup, where only a trace of cinnamon remained, then carefully raised her eyes to meet mine across the counter.
"When you speak of a drink... might something cold, with ice in it, be possible?"
She gathered both hands neatly upon the bar. Her gaze dipped just a little, and the careful murmur that followed was thick with excuse.
"Just now... I argued the dormitory rules and the importance of faith with rather too much fervor, and my throat feels dreadfully parched..."
"Sure. I'll make you something refreshing."
This time, rather than faith or some lecture on history, I decided to make her something that would simply suit her. I took the syrup we kept at the bar, poured it into a tall glass, and packed the glass with ice. Over that I poured sparkling water and crowned it with a touch of fresh cream, finishing a drink meant to answer sweetness and thirst at once.
"It's an Italian cream soda. They call it Italian, but... it was actually invented in America."
I slid the glass across the counter. She wrapped both hands around the cold glass, listened, and tilted her head a fraction.
"Italian in name, American by birth... a drink with a deceptive pedigree, like a wolf in sheep's clothing."
She delivered the verdict in a solemn voice, working hard to find a flaw. Her eyes, though, had already gone to the cold beads gathering on the glass. Carefully, she took the straw between her lips and drew in a sip.
"Ah..."
With that small breath of wonder, her shoulders sank in a slow release.
"Truly astonishing. The moment those cold bubbles slip down my throat, the vexation and the heat clouding my mind seem to wash away like snow in the sun..."
Clara lifted her mouth from the straw and let out a long, contented sigh. Soaked through with sweetness, that face belonged to an ordinary girl of her age, hidden inside the shell of a habit.
"Setting aside such worldly pedigrees as Italian or American... it is a truly splendid flavor."
Savoring the sweetness left on her tongue, Clara looked as unguarded as any schoolgirl cheered by a good snack. The strict nun, the magical girl—the whole veneer seemed to have melted softly away beneath that sweet, gentle foam. Our eyes met for a moment, and we broke into laughter at the same time.
"Haha... I've come to know quite a few new sides of you, Sister Clara."
I said it quietly, and she lowered her gaze, as if shy.
"Before Mother Superior, and before the other sisters, I have always had to show a solemn, exemplary face. But... before you, Brother, the tension comes undone in the strangest way."
Clara gave a shy little nod.
"Whenever you're tired, or you want to set a heavy burden down, come by as you like."
At that, she fiddled with the straw and whispered.
"Whether it is truly right, as a servant of the Lord, to lean upon so worldly a sanctuary... my faith is not yet clear enough to judge."
Even so, her voice had grown a degree softer.
"But... sometimes—only sometimes—I think a time like this wouldn't be so bad..."