What a beautiful story!

It carries so much hurt, confusion, longing, and shame without ever losing its grip. The boarding school, Sister Francesca, Mother Josephine, the dark dormitory, “stroke her back,” all of it builds a world where tenderness and fear get tangled together in a way that feels painfully believable. Nothing is flattened. The innocence, the desire, the guilt, the danger at home, the silence around abuse, it all sits there at once.

What gives it real force is the emotional honesty. You let the reader feel how a young mind tries to make sense of things it should never have had to carry. Lines like “I had sinful thoughts and desires for my friend,”“I acted alone,” and “the softness of her skin on my fingertips” hit hard because they come from that exact place where love, secrecy, protection, and punishment all blur together. Heavy, intimate, and deeply human.