The Gift by Danielle Steel Page A

nuns, went to the chapel with them for prayers and vespers, and were only allowed to speak at certain times and hours. And Maribeth was shocked to discover on her third night that the other girl's baby had been fathered by her uncle. She was a desperately unhappy girl, and she was terrified of what lay ahead of her in childbirth.
    On Maribeth's fifth night in the convent, she could hear the other girl's screams. They went on for two days as the nuns scurried everywhere, and at last she was taken to a hospital and delivered by cesarean section. Maribeth was told, when she inquired, that the girl would not come back again, but the baby had been born safely, and she learned only by coincidence that it was a little boy. It was even lonelier for her once both of the other girls were gone, and Maribeth was alone with the sisters. She hoped that other sinners would arrive soon, or she would have no one to talk to.
    She read the local newspaper whenever she could, and two weeks after she'd arrived she saw the notice of Paul and Debbie's wedding. It made her feel even lonelier, just seeing that, knowing they were on their honeymoon, and she was here in prison, paying her dues for one night in the front seat of his Chevy. It seemed desperately unfair that she should bear the brunt alone, and the more she thought of it, the more she knew that she couldn't stay at the convent.
    She had nowhere to go, and no one to be with. But she couldn't bear the oppressive sanctity of the convent. The nuns had been pleasant to her, and she had already paid them a hundred dollars. She had seven hundred dollars left, and almost six months to be wherever she went. She had no idea where to go, but she knew she couldn't stay locked up with them, waiting for other prisoners like her to arrive, for the months to pass, for her baby to be born, and then taken away from her, before she could go home to her parents. Being there was too high a price to pay. She wanted to go somewhere, live like a real person, get a job, have friends. She needed fresh air, and voices, and noise, and people. Here, all she felt was constant oppression, and the overwhelming sense that she was an unredeemable sinner. And even if she was, she needed a little sunshine and joy in her life while she waited for the baby. She didn't know why this had happened to her, but perhaps there was a lesson to learn, a blessing to be shared, a moment in time that need not be wasted. It didn't have to be as terrible as the nuns made it, and she told the Mother Superior the following afternoon that she would be leaving. She said she was going to visit her aunt and hoped that she believed her. But even if she didn't, Maribeth knew that nothing could stop her now, she was leaving.
    She walked out of the convent at dawn the next day, with her money, and her small bag, and an overwhelming feeling of freedom. She couldn't go home, but the world was her own, to discover, to explore. She had never felt as free or as strong. She had already been through enormous pain when she left home, and now it was only a matter of finding a place to stay until the baby was born. She knew it would be easier if she left town, so she walked to the bus station and bought an open-ended ticket to Chicago. She had to go through Omaha, but Chicago was the farthest point she could imagine, and she could refund the rest of the ticket anywhere along the way. All she wanted to do was leave, and find a place for herself for the next six months until she had her baby. She waited at the bus station until the first bus to Chicago began to board. And as she watched her hometown slip away, when it left, she felt no regrets. All she felt suddenly was excitement about the future. The past held little for her, just like her hometown. She had no friends there. There was no one she would miss except her mother and her sister. She had written them each a postcard from the bus station, before she left, promising to give them an address as soon as