Chapter Fifteen - Farewell and a Promise

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Chloe stood in her room looking at herself in the mirror, making sure her habit was on perfectly. She could see no flaws in how she'd put herself together. She turned to the side and thought she looked like any other nun she saw walking around Vatican City. She jumped a little bit when Felicity tapped quickly on the door.

"Come on in," Chloe said with a sweep of her arm.

"You look good!" said Felicity with approval. "We just need to make a few adjustments. Let's be honest, a mother knows her child's face, nun's habitat or no nun's habit." Chloe nodded with her eyebrows raised. She supposed Felicity had that right. "I brought my makeup up kit. I figured we could make some adjustments to your face, just in case they happen to look your way."

"Why can't I just talk to them? That way they won't worry anymore," lamented Chloe.

"I know. I wondered about that, too, when I first changed. The thing is, there would still be questions. Families fight to get their loved ones back. Always... if they show this much interest, they won't go away easily. It causes too many problems and in the long run, Vatican City will do what it needs to do in order to protect its secrets. Your family may worry, but at least they'll be safe."

Chloe let that sink into her brain so that she could remember the words later when she burned to hug her mother and father. She felt her eyes sting with unwanted tears. She quickly sniffed and blinked her eyes before she turned to look at Felicity. She saw the makeup on the bed. "What are you planning to do?" she asked with keen interest.

"I think we can thicken your eyebrows and give you a mole or two," giggled Felicity. She actually giggled, which made Chloe roll her eyes good-naturedly.

"Okay, if you think that'll trick my mother, go for it," said Chloe. Felicity moved to pick up her eye-liner with an excitement that amused Chloe. "Felicity, what did you do before you joined the Red Guard?"

"I was taking aesthetics and makeup artistry in college. What you see right here is what I would have loved to do every day, making people beautiful. Except," she said with a curve of her lip, "in this case, I'm making you... well...less attractive. Sit down on the bed and be prepared for the unbelievable."

"It'll have to be pretty good to be 'unbelievable' at this point," observed Chloe as she sat down on the bed and turned her face up to Felicity.

Felicity smirked as she prepared to work her magic on Chloe's face. "I am going to make you look positively nunny." Felicity was almost giddy. Chloe felt the quick strokes on the pencil run across her brows. She sat as still as she could as Felicity's strokes moved slowly across her brow, seeming to go right through the middle.

"Really, a unibrow?" asked Chloe.

Felicity tittered, "Of course."

"My parents won't be the only ones staring at me. You're going to make me so homely that everyone will be staring at me. Why don't you try to make me less conspicuous?" Felicity thought about that for a moment. "Like, mole or unibrow, but not both."

Felicity agreed with a slight nod of her head, "You're right. I just wanted to see if I could actually make you ugly. But, yeah, everyone would be staring at you then. Okay. Would you rather have the mole or the hair?"

"I have to go with mole. Who would keep the hair if they had the choice?"

"You raise a valid point. Okay." Felicity dug out her makeup remover and applied some to a cotton pad. She carefully removed the offending makeup. "Still thicker brows, though, okay?" Chloe nodded. She felt Felicity apply a mole beside her nose. It took a few minutes. Felicity finally sat back a little bit and studied Chloe's face. "I think you look pretty average," she said with satisfaction.

Chloe got up to look at herself in the mirror. She didn't think she looked too bad, but definitely not like herself. She actually kind of like the mole on her face, it make her look unique. "It's funny, you know, I kind of wish I could keep the mole." Chloe glanced at Felicity with admiration. "Do you have anything in that magic bag of yours for my eye-colour? Some contact lenses or something?"

"Great idea. Yeah, I do. How about blue?" asked Felicity.

"That would be awesome." Felicity pulled out the lenses, which were in a fresh package.

"Do you know how to put them in?"

"Yeah. I used to wear them, before the change," commented Chloe. She took the package and opened it. She popped the lenses in her eyes and looked in the mirror. She felt pretty confident that her parents wouldn't recognize her if they happened to see her in the crowd. "Alright! Let's go."

The two friends walked out into the hall and nobody would known they weren't true nuns. They truly looked the part, right down to their dowdy shoes. They turned the corner and went up the stairs, preparing themselves for the crowds that inevitably filled the various Vatican buildings.

"We have eyes on the street right now monitoring your parents' progress during their visit here in Rome. They said earlier that they should be arriving at Vatican City around eleven o'clock. We're at ten thirty now. So, we have some time to find a place for our observations," informed Felicity.

"How long have they been in Rome?" asked Chloe, though she wasn't sure she wanted to hear the answer.

Felicity looked over at her with confident eyes, "Only a few days, Chloe. They came a few days before your transformation was complete. We've been watching them closely since their arrival."

"Nobody said anything about them to me," Chloe replied.

"Chloe, you've been dealing with enough don't you think? You've been a Red Guard for three days, and you've had to adjust to a lot. Most Red Guards don't even know when their parents come looking for them. Nobody tells them. Nobody wants a new Red Guard distracted by that kind of extra emotional upheaval. Johnny shouldn't have said anything. But once he did, your emotions had to be dealt with. So here we are. You can see them, watch them, say your own emotional good-bye. That's what we're doing here."

Chloe nodded sadly as they continued to walk through the hallways. Finally they came to a small bench receded in the hallway facing the main entrance to the building. "Let's sit here," said Felicity. "We have a great view of the entry way and we can see everyone who comes in. Let us sit here and pray for awhile," she winked here, "like good nuns do." They both bowed their heads ever so slightly and started to play with their prayer beads. They lowered, but didn't close their eyes.

It seemed to Chloe that the minutes ticked by like hours. She was just starting to lose patience when she saw the sight she'd been waiting for. Her mother and father walked through the doors. Her mother had worn a sundress to counter the hot Roman heat. She wore a shawl as stipulated by Vatican rules. Chloe smiled at her pleasantly plump body and her curly, red-dyed hair. She had her glasses on, which had turned shaded in the sun. Good old mom in her transition glasses, she thought.

Her mother was leaning heavily on her father, who was taller and slimmer. He was thinning on top, but his hair was still dark brown, almost black. He also wore glasses, but he was too cool for transitions. He had a moustache and slightly bucked teeth. His face was kind and gentle. He held on to his wife with attentive care.

They both searched the faces as they passed and Chloe could tell from their desperate expressions that they were praying to see her face in this throng of people. She swallowed hard in response to this realization and gripped her rosary more tightly. "You're okay, Chloe, and they will be okay too. They will become even better friends with Derek's parents as they share in their grief. They will always think of you and hope to see you again. But they will be okay. They have each other."

Chloe closed her eyes. She wasn't sure if Felicity's words helped her. She looked at her parents and remembered everything good about them. She thanked them in her head for the life they had provided her. She took the time to reflect on their trips together, all of their days and nights on the road for her hockey games, their family nights playing boardgames by the fireplace. She had had a fabulous life with these people. They had given her everything she could ever have asked for. And she would make them proud, even if they didn't know it. 

She promised them, in that moment, that she would do the right thing in the situation she found herself in, even if it meant her life wouldn't be easy. They had taught her that the right thing was often hard, but always worth it. She smiled at them with haunted eyes and said her farewells. You never knew what life would hold in the future, so she didn't say good-bye as Felicity has suggested.

She watched her parents as they walked past her, barely sparing her a glance. She watched as they continued on to the next room in the palatial building. "Do you want to walk behind them? Or skip on to the next room so that you can see them some more?" asked Felicity.

Chloe shook her head, "No," she responded. "I'm good now." Felicity nodded and lead her back towards their living quarters.


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