"Oh, no!"

What could she be doing? Even the vilest whore in the city wouldn't be contemplating thoughts like those about the Lord God! The confused woman shook the tears from her eyes, getting up from the bed and sliding her long white legs over the cotton top sheet. She had to get out of bed, away from those thoughts haunting her with a horrifying regularity lately.

"Cold shower," she whispered to herself, clinging temporarily to the doorway molding for support. Sister Mary Theresa rested her forehead against the cool wood, smiling weakly as she thought about the water. Her students had told stories about stepping into cold showers to hold down sexual tensions. How she reprimanded them for telling such filthy stories in her class! Even the school wits a house of God! Even the small office where she and three other young Dominican nuns helped certain political candidates was a house where no such filthy talk could be allowed.

And yet the nun found herself walking unsteadily down the long darkened corridor, gasping for breath, realizing the only hope for her sexual arousal was a cold shower.

"Oh!"

That thought stopped the young nun dead in front of the large bathroom. Was that all that awaited her in this life? Sexual arousal constantly torturing her, to be satisfied only by a brisk cold shower in the middle of the night? That thought nearly took her breath away and sent another flow of tears from her eyes. She whimpered, wiping the tears with her knuckles. Why should she be crying? Surely she'd known what kind of life she'd be leading when the Holy Father placed the ring on her finger and made her take the vow of chastity! This would be a life of poverty, abstinence, of complete sexual refusal. In many ways Sister Mary Theresa was far more fortunate than other women who'd also joined convents. At least this order allowed her and her friends to do social and political work.