“I . . . I don’t know. But I just realized. We call them tunnels.”
He blinks at me, the whites of his eyes bright in the gloomy cave. “What’s your point?”
“Don’t you get it? Not tunnel. Tunnels. The tunnels are sacred,” I say, echoing part of the story.
“As in, more than one,” Aaron says. “Well, shit!” He grabs my shoulder and shakes it.
“But we don’t know where it goes.” I’m sure he’s as aware of this as I am, but I point it out anyway. “Could be a dead end.”
“True. But there are no snakes in there, right?”
“Not that we know of.”
“Excellent. So we’re in agreement, then.” He pulls through the water, moving slowly to the left, around the front of the ledge, to the side with the now snake-free puddle. “No sudden movements,” he says from the corner of his mouth. “They’re distracted. Let’s keep it that way.”
Aaron climbs up and then kneels on the rocky floor, planting a foot and lacing his hands together. “Here. Step into my hands.” He mimes lifting me up into the tunnel.
“Why should I go first?” I ask.
“Because you’re bigger and stronger, and you have to be able to pull me up once you’re in. Come on. We don’t have time to argue.”
He’s right. I put my foot into his hands and grasp the ledge above me, heaving myself up as Aaron lifts. Once my chest is over the ledge, I wiggle into the tunnel and lie on the floor to catch my breath.
“Hurry up!” Aaron urges, his head bobbing in and out of view.
Below, one of the snakes rears back, then lunges for Aaron’s ankle, jaws wide. I grab his hand and pull. His feet scrape against the wall as he scrambles up, kicking the serpent in the head. Another rattler strikes, but too late, and Aaron rolls into the tunnel beside me. He scoots into a sitting position and slouches against the wall, holding up a hand, in victory, maybe. When I weakly mimic his gesture, he slaps my open palm. “High five,” he says, then shakes his head at my confusion. “We did it.”
We did . . . something. I’m not sure what. Survived, maybe? I’m going to wait to celebrate.
He holds out an arm toward the darkness in front of us. “You wanna lead, or should I?”
I shrug and begin crawling forward. The ground slopes up slightly and water flows past us, but not nearly as deep as in the bigger tunnel, covering only our hands and knees. After a few minutes, the tunnel opens into a cavern-like room, not as big as the Marriage Cave but big enough to stand up in. There’s no pit, just a rounded ceiling with a couple of slits that cast moonlight near our feet like scattered stones.
The tunnel branches, and we look at each other silently, weighing our options. Aaron takes a step toward the right. I hesitate, then head for the left. We need to explore both paths.
“Hey!” he calls, when he realizes I’m not following him. “We’ve gotta go this way. It’s the running water. It means there’s a way out.”
A way out. I hesitate and start to turn, but my foot slips on something smooth—a large rock, maybe?—and I go down hard on my knee.
“Caleb? Did you hear me?” When I don’t answer, Aaron sticks his head around the corner. “What the hell, man? Let’s g—” he starts.
Then he sees the bones.
52
MIRIAM
I shouldn’t be surprised, or even angry because Rachel refuses to hear the truth. My best friend has always been the most faithful person I know. Next to my mother. Which makes me wonder: What does my mother know? She took Rachel in when Naomi left. Did she know she was raising the daughter of her Prophet?
My mother is still home, though my father, a Council Member, has already left for Chapel. She takes one look at me standing on her doorstep and pulls me inside. “My baby. Your father says Aaron has been arrested. What on earth is going on?”
As she pulls me close, I feel a flood of shame at all the lying I’ve done. I’m not used to keeping secrets from my mother, and I fear if I open my mouth, it will all come pouring out.
“I don’t know, Mother.” Secrets and now lies. I don’t even recognize the woman I’ve become. For a second, I long to be the old, naïve Miriam. I long to curl up in my mother’s arms and let her stroke my hair and tell me everything will be all right.
But I can’t. And not just because she won’t sit still long enough to let me. Even as she waits for my explanation, as we’re minutes away from either Salvation or Damnation, she’s still tidying her house. I follow her into the kitchen, where she grabs a rag and starts to wipe down the refrigerator.
“Mother, stop. Does any of this matter right now?”
She pauses her vigorous scrubbing long enough to say, “I won’t go into the Tribulation with a messy house.”
I choke back a laugh that ends on a sob. “Some of us have worse things on our conscience than a messy house.”
She clutches the rag to her chest. “Miriam.”
All that disappointment balled up in one little word. How does she do it?
“Please don’t. I’m a woman now, remember? My sins are my own to make.” I slump into a chair at the kitchen table.
“As is your repentance.” Clearly, my mother has been talking to Rachel.
“What if I’m not sorry?”
A lesser woman would be shocked at my outspokenness, but she merely shakes her head and slides into the chair across from me and reaches for my hands. “This is the wrong time to be headstrong. Your future is at stake.”
I don’t tell her I can no longer imagine a future here. Instead I ask, “Do you never question the hypocrisy of it all?”
“What are you talking about?”
“I know about Naomi, Mother. Daniel told me she was dead, but she’s not.” I pick at a woven placemat, gauging her reaction from the corner of my eye. “Why would he lie? And why would we believe him?”
“He is Chosen. And we are here because he has Chosen us. To hear the True Message.”
“What if there is no True Message?” I ask. “What if he’s just a really good storyteller?”
She blinks, wide-eyed. “How can you say that? You’ve witnessed his gift firsthand.”
She’s talking about the prophecies he’s made about the Outside, the wars and the murders he predicted. Sometimes he’d share a dream, and the next day he’d share reports that confirmed his predictions. Only now I know that none of it was true.
“You didn’t grow up here,” I say. “You followed him, voluntarily. What made you leave everything else behind? Please, Mother. It’s important that I know.” Part of me is curious, but another part needs to know how she did it. How to gather the courage to leave everyone—including my own mother—behind.
“I was your age,” she says. “We heard about this man who was traveling the country. He drove around in a van and did dream interpretation out of a tent. He was set up outside Bakersfield, and a group of us drove out to see him.”
“You drove?”
Her expression is pained, as if it hurts her to talk of these things. And maybe it does, dredging up those memories after all this time. “I didn’t drive that night. Though I did know how.” She fiddles with the rag, then stops and folds her slender fingers in her lap.
“Who went with you? Father?”
“I didn’t know your father at the time. It was just some people I used to know. Friends.”
I can’t picture this at all, my mother on the Outside, riding in a car with a group of people I don’t know that she calls friends.
“My older sister was with us, too.”
Older sister? I have a thousand questions, but as in every conversation with my mother, I hold them back. This time, not because I think she won’t answer but because I fear my interruption will stop the flow of words. And though the information she is giving me is new and terrifying, it’s also exhilarating. She has—had�
��a sister. On the Outside. Whom she left behind.
She is quiet for a long time, staring up at the cracks in the plaster ceiling. “I didn’t believe,’’ she says finally. “Not really. I didn’t think Daniel would actually be able to see my dreams.” She looks right at me. “But he did. The things he saw.” She stops and clutches at the crucifix around her neck. “I never told anyone about the nightmares. Or about my father—”
“Your father?” I can’t help myself. The words spill off my tongue, dangerous, like jagged ice. I know the term for my mother’s father—grandfather—because I learned it in Lessons. But it has never been spoken in my house, or any other in New Jerusalem I know of. Daniel teaches that we are all the family we need. Those the First Generation left behind are inconsequential.
“He was not a nice man. He did . . . things . . . that a father shouldn’t do to his daughter.”
My mind reels, and my heart aches for the girl she used to be. “Mother.” My voice cracks.
She shakes her head. “It was a long time ago. And Daniel saved me. He took me away, brought me here. Showed me what it means to love. Gave me a home, and a future. He made me a wife. And a mother.” She smiles then and reaches to grip my hands tight. “Miriam. You are the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I can’t bear to lose you.” My mother, who has always been serene in the face of any crisis, is crying tears as heavy as the rainfall outside. “You are my life. Believe me when I tell you that New Jerusalem is a refuge in a sea of sin and debauchery.” She pushes a lock of hair from my cheek. “I didn’t want you to ever witness any of that. That’s why I came here. To be safe.”
“But New Jerusalem isn’t what you envisioned. There’s sin here, too.”
She just looks at me, sadly. And though she doesn’t acknowledge the truth in my statement, she doesn’t deny it either.
“Tell me about Naomi,” I say. “Did you know she was alive? That she was trying to get Rachel back?”
“Naomi made her choice, long ago.”
“What does that mean?”
I can see the emotions warring on her face. She’s keeping something from me. “Tell me.”
“You have to understand, we were different back then. Just a handful of us who understood the truth about Daniel and his abilities. We had all been hurt; we’d all been told that we weren’t worthy. And then we met Daniel. And he believed in us as much as we believed in him. At first, we all lived out of a bus. We’d stop somewhere, set up the tents. Daniel would do a reading, and if he managed to touch a soul, they would come with us. About the time I thought we couldn’t fit another person in that vehicle, Daniel dreamt of the tunnels.”
Though she smiles at the memory, I feel sick to my stomach as I recall something Aaron told me. Daniel’s father owned this land. Which means Daniel’s dream of the tunnels didn’t come from God. It was just a memory.
“And so we came to New Jerusalem,” my mother continues, oblivious to my distress. “But it was still a small community. All of us living together, crammed into the Farmhouse. We were . . . close.” She slides her crucifix back and forth on its chain. “When the Joshua trees blossomed the first time, it was a message from God. Because of the temptation to sexual immorality, we were all to partake in the Matrimony.”
She’s quoting 1 Corinthians. Loosely.
“Those of us who had been here since the beginning were joined. Mishael and Lydia. Hananiah and Judith. Azariah and Phoebe. Gideon and Chloe. Your father and I.” She waves her hand in the air. “All the Elders. And it worked out perfectly,” she continues, “one woman for each man, the way God intended. And then Naomi came to us.” She jerks her head back and forth, as if to shake off the memories. “Daniel was still going Out regularly, trying to find Outsiders who might be saved. One day, he came back with Naomi. We had all been wed. But she didn’t have a husband. Maybe that should have been a warning to us. But she was so lost, so alone. We let her join, and we paid the price. Phoebe most of all.” She smiles sadly. “You know the rest. Azariah ran off, before he could be punished. Naomi gave birth to Rachel, and then she gave her up . . .”
“But Rachel isn’t Azariah’s daughter.” I want so much to believe her, but I don’t. Sarah’s version of this story makes much more sense. Why else would Naomi need to hire detectives to get Rachel back? Because she can’t take her from her father. There’s probably a rule about that.
“Who told you that?”
“It doesn’t matter. I can tell by the look on your face that it’s true. All these years, you all just kept on lying. And what about Rachel? How do you think she felt, believing her father to be an adulterer? Although I guess being a false prophet isn’t any better.”
Her face goes white, then pink. “Daniel couldn’t claim Rachel. His responsibility is the community as a whole. He is husband and father to us all.”
I shiver with revulsion. “All except Naomi.”
“Naomi asked to leave. Begged, actually. And he let her go. Don’t you see? It was her own choice. Just like it was Aza’s to run.”
But Abraham’s questions have awakened an instinct for truth I didn’t know I had, and I point out the flaw in her story. “But Azariah wasn’t Rachel’s father. He wasn’t the guilty one. So why would he run off? Why not stay and protest his innocence? Tell people the truth about Daniel?”
My mother apparently doesn’t possess the ability to question. She blinks. “Everyone is guilty of something.”
“And what about Phoebe? Why didn’t anyone ever tell her that her husband wasn’t an adulterer?”
“It wasn’t my place.” Wearily, she pushes back from the table and stands, moving to the small mirror on the wall to adjust her head scarf.
I can’t even look at her.
“Daniel is not a bad man, Miriam,” she says to the mirror. “Flawed, yes, but aren’t we all? He is the Living Prophet. He will save us. And he is loyal to those he cherishes. That’s why I stayed. He deserves my loyalty—all our loyalty.”
“So you’re telling me that Naomi’s sin, the one so Contemptible we must never speak of it, was having sex with Daniel and then choosing to leave when he tossed her aside?”
“You’re being deliberately obtuse.”
“I’m obtuse?” I jump from my chair. “You knew, and you all stuck around and kept swallowing his lies!”
She turns to face me. “Not everyone knew. I only knew because Naomi told me. We were friends, you see. Our daughters were sisters.”
Sisters? Suddenly I can’t breathe. No. She can’t mean . . . I take a step backward, stumbling on the chair leg. Is she saying what I think she’s saying? Not just Naomi and Daniel, but her and Daniel?
“You aren’t the first person to sin in the name of love, Miriam, and you won’t be the last.”
Daniel and my mother. Daniel, who sent Naomi away and told us she was dead. Daniel, who doles out punishment to the wicked.
Daniel is my father?
“But . . . if he was the one . . . why did he let you stay?”
“Boaz chose me. My pregnancy could be explained. But Naomi was unwed . . .” She doesn’t finish the sentence, but she doesn’t need to. She means that Naomi’s baby was evidence of sin. And in order to deflect from his own guilt, Daniel pointed to Azariah. But why didn’t Phoebe’s husband defend himself? Was he so enamored of his Prophet, he took on that sacrifice? Or so afraid, he’d rather face the cruelty of the desert?
My mother adds, “Naomi could have stayed. All she had to do was admit to her sins and ask for forgiveness.”
But that isn’t all, and we both know it. She would have had to accept the Shame as her due, while she watched the rest of them revere the real father of her child. She would have had to live a lie. Like my mother did, with my father—or the man I was raised to believe was my father—Boaz. This is my bloodline, my inheritance. “That’s why you took Rachel in.”
&nb
sp; My mother nods. “You’re sisters.” She smiles through her tears. “You needed to be together.” Mother pulls me close, and though I can’t stand to touch her, her revelation has left me too weak to struggle. “I know of your dreams. You are more like him than you know.”
My dreams. But she’s wrong about those, too. I didn’t dream of Caleb because God wanted us to be together. I dreamt of him because I wanted him. Daniel built this community on falsehoods and fantasy. Because Aaron was right: That’s all dreams are.
“And now you must beg for forgiveness and banish your sinful thoughts.”
Banish them. I don’t know how to do that. For the first time in my life, I’m thinking clearly. Like the thoughts in my head are my own, and not something I’ve memorized and repeated so many times they’ve lost all meaning. Now, I’m looking for the meaning. Instead of biting my tongue, or spewing out scripture, I want to say the words in my heart. Instead of ignoring those feelings, or pushing them down, I want to let them out. I want to feel them.
I don’t say any of this to her. I wish I could. She isn’t supposed to share these things about her past, and I know she wasn’t supposed to tell me about Naomi, or my . . . Daniel. She only did it so I would choose the path she thinks is best. But as strong as her love is for me, her devotion to Daniel is stronger.
“You will repent?”
“I’ll think about it,” I say. And then, because I don’t want the last thing we say to each other to be a lie, “I love you, Mother. Always. I hope . . . I hope you remember that. No matter what happens.”
“Of course. Keep faithful,” she whispers, kissing my cheek.
“I can’t. But I gave it a fighting chance. Just like in that song you used to sing.” I try to smile, to soften the pain for both of us, because the sorrow etched deep into her face is enough to gut me.
We both know the truth. I don’t belong here anymore.
The Virtue of Sin Page 32