Forbidden

by R. R. Banks

  But after dinner each night, we're expected to be back in our dorm, locked away from the rest of the sect – as if our childlessness is a contagious disease that can be caught. But being Fruitless meant we were exiled. We were banished from the sect. And yet – we were forbidden to leave the Ark.

  All of that means that Ruth and I have a lot of time to ourselves. The isolation is impacting her far more than it impacts me. She craves the social interaction. Needs it. Wants it. And maybe it's because I have nothing but contempt and disgust for Raymond and his true believers – or maybe it's because I have Danny – but I'm happy to be isolated from them. Happy to not have to interact with their brand of lunacy.

  But I can also understand Ruth's sense of loneliness. I haven't told her about Danny. I won't tell her about Danny. As much as I like Ruth – and I consider her my only real friend right now – I don't know if I can trust her. Not with something that big. If Raymond ever found out that I was sleeping with somebody from town, it would mean my death. No question about it.

  “You really don't look too good,” Ruth says.

  “I feel like I'm going to throw up.”

  “It's going to make getting your chores done today a problem.”

  “Maybe if I throw up all over the laundry, they'll grant me mercy.”

  Ruth laughs. “Right. Because they're big on mercy.”

  The bells at the small church begin to toll and it sends a charge of adrenaline through me. Ruth and I share a look, a sense of dread welling up within me. The bells only toll when we're called to chapel – and it's not a chapel day. Which means that somebody is set to be punished in the yard.

  “Wonder who it is?” Ruth asks.

  I shrug. “Does it matter?”

  “Not really, I suppose.”

  The only thing that does matter is that we are in attendance to bear witness. Everybody living on the Ark is required to be in the yard when punishment is doled out. Raymond believes it cleanses all of our souls and acts as a deterrent to bad behavior. Personally, I just think he gets off on making us all watch him display his power as the leader of the sect.

  I sigh and put on the veil we're forced to wear. Ruth puts hers on and together, we step out of our cabin and into the bright light of the Wyoming morning.

  Chapter Five

  The morning air is cool and feels nice upon my skin. Overhead, the sky is blue and filled with thick puffs of cloud. A lone hawk circles in the air above us. And in that moment, I wish more than anything, that I could be up there alongside him, flying far, far away from this place.

  “Brothers and sisters,” Raymond calls out, his voice echoing around the compound. “We must once again gather to bear witness.”

  Tied to a rough wooden pole in the middle of the yard is a girl. A young girl, of course. She can't be more than fifteen or sixteen. I don't remember her being brought in, but then, surprisingly, a lot of people came to the Ark to join Noah's Children. The lost. The lonely. Those who just need to find a place where they fit in and feel like they belong.

  It took me a long time to see it, but Raymond preys on the desperate and the needy. Those who have no other place to go. And while we girls are forced to stay at the Ark – even the Fruitless – others are free to leave when they choose to. Those – like my parents – who Raymond deems have no value to our community. Which is Raymond-speak for those who either can't sleep with him or provide him with a daughter he can sleep with.

  From behind my veil, I look at the crowd gathered around the center of the yard. The faces in the crowd I see around us are frightening. Zealots. True believers. They want to see the pain inflicted upon this young girl. They want to hear her scream. See her blood. They want to see her suffer.

  Except of course, for some of the young girls who are being victimized by Raymond and his men – their “wives.” While some of the “wives” definitely fall into the true believer category, I can see in their faces that some of them obviously don't.

  Like me, some of these girls have been dropped off by drug-addicted parents who sold their little girl as they chased the next high. I recognize the all-too-familiar shadows upon the faces of those girls.

  The eyes of those girls are downcast and the expression on all of their faces is a mixture of fear and sadness. Perhaps, they believed that the girl tied to the pole would escape. That they saw her as a beacon of hope that maybe one day they too would find the courage to try and escape within themselves.

  And maybe seeing the girl tied to the post, waiting to receive her punishment dimmed those hopes. Snuffed them out. Maybe seeing the girl, dragged back by the Shepherds, killed their hope of ever getting out of the hell they are being forced to live in.

  “Brothers and sisters,” Raymond addresses the crowd. “This young woman, wife to Elder Arnold, doesn't seem to think much of us or the life we've built for ourselves out here.”

  The crowd responds with boos, hisses, and cries of outrage. Raymond – although it's the exact reaction he wants – looks suitably grim. Maybe even a little sad about the situation. I've come to learn that Raymond is quite a talented performer. He's a chameleon – able to blend into any situation. He's able to be all things to all people – and yet, manages to convince them that he's genuine and sincere.

  It took me a long time to see through his lies and deceit, but with the help of some of the books on psychology Danny had given me – not to mention a lot of long conversations with him – I finally see Raymond for what he is. He's a predator. A deviant who preys on people – especially young girls. He belongs in prison.

  “This young woman ran away from the Ark,” Raymond says. “Ran away from us. But most of all, she ran away from her husband.”

  The crowd responded with more hisses and jeers – much to Raymond's delight. Beneath the dirt that cakes the girl's face are bruises and cuts. The Shepherds had roughed her up a little before bringing her home. And knowing those bastards the way I do, I don't doubt they had their way with her as well.

  Tears cut streaks through the dirt and grime on her face and her body trembles as she cries. My heart goes out to her and I want to help her, but I know I'd be inviting my own beating if I did. And as one of the Fruitless, I know what my punishment will entail. As much as I want to help her, my sense of self-preservation is greater. I was used and violated every day for years with Raymond and have no desire to let myself ever feel that sense of violation again.

  “God's law demands that this Hannah be punished for her sins,” he says. “For her transgressions against us all.”

  The crowd around us cheers wildly and I feel the knots in my stomach tightening. The bloodlust and desires for vengeance that saturates the air around us is thick. Raymond is whipping the mob into a frenzy – a mob that is demanding blood to atone for this made up sin.

  I wish, not for the first time, that I had the strength to put a stop to this. That I had the courage to step in. But I don't. And I'm ashamed of myself for it.

  “Brothers and sisters,” Raymond calls. “Hannah must be held to account for her actions. But as God's law demands, it is her husband who must first hold her accountable to him.”

  Elder Arnold stepped forward, an ugly sneer on his face and a whip in his hand. My eyes well with tears and I open my mouth to speak – to put a stop to this madness – but then close it again without saying a word. I lower my eyes and shake my head, disgusted with myself for not being a good enough person to say something – anything – to stop this.

  Like he's encouraging the crowd at a football game to cheer, Raymond walks around the yard, whipping them into a frenzy. That's what this is to Raymond – a show. This is his arena and his fans are this bloodthirsty mob and he exhorts them to cheer, to blindly allow this young girl to be beaten. Bloodied. He is giving them what they think they want.

  This is nothing more than theater for Raymond. Theater that blinds the people to what it really is – Raymond exerting his control over their minds.

  The crack of the whip an
d a split-second later, the sound of the girl's ear-piercing shriek make me jump and set my heart racing. I look over and see an expression of excruciating pain upon her face and blood already staining the back of her shirt. Elder Arnold reaches back again and I avert my eyes, not wanting to witness Raymond's perverse display of “justice.”

  Again and again, the crack of the whip echoes throughout the yard. The crowd has quieted, but the look of zealotry in their eyes hasn't lessened. The girl's shrieks have stopped, and she hangs limply from the pole, the back of her shirt flayed open, bloody gashes from the bite of the whip criss-crossing her flesh.

  “Enough,” Raymond finally says. “God's justice has been served. Well done, Elder Arnold. Take Hannah to the Reflection Room where she can ponder her misdeeds and ask for God's forgiveness.”

  The two Shepherds who'd brought her in, untie the girl and drag her limp, seemingly lifeless body, away. Raymond stands in the center of the yard, looking around at the crowd, shoulders back and chin high, as if daring anybody to challenge him.

  Like anybody would. Everybody in that yard knows all about what happens to those who challenge Raymond. Some end up being lashed until their spirit is broken. And others just – disappear. Raymond's control over Noah's Children is absolute and he rules with an iron fist. He does not tolerate dissent or those he deems to be non-believers or who aren't pious enough – meaning, those who do not bow and scrape at his feet and worship him.

  The smile that crosses his face is almost reptilian and even from where I'm standing, I can tell that he's aroused. It's all I can do to keep from throwing up – which would be sure to earn me a few lashings of my own.

  He beckons to a blonde girl – Cassandra, I think her name is. She can't be more than sixteen herself, but is one of his “wives.” She happily bounces across the yard to him and takes his hand, looking up at him as if he is Christ himself. A memory of being her age floats through my mind and makes me shudder. I fight back the wave of nausea and focus on the dirt beneath my feet instead.

  “Brothers and sisters,” Raymond calls out. “Let us take the rest of the day to reflect on what we have just witnessed. Let us think about how we can better watch out for one another. How we can help cleanse some of the – weaker – in our community of these impure and unnatural impulses they have. We can discuss it in chapel tomorrow.”

  He turns and puts his arm around Cassandra, leading her back to his cabin. As they step inside, he turns around and looks straight at me. A slow, greasy smile crosses his face and he winks at me as he closes the door behind him. No doubt, to inflict some form of horror upon the girl.

  Ashamed of myself for feeling the way I do, I walk back to my cabin, glad that I'm not the one in Raymond's cabin with him.

  Chapter Six

  Eric

  The heat was unbearable. It always was. I crouched down in a bombed-out building, huddled among the chunks of concrete, random debris, and blood that seemed to be everywhere in this God forsaken place. I'd only been in-country for a month, but I already knew why the other soldiers in my unit called it the Shit – capital S.

  I felt the sweat rolling down my back underneath my fatigues and flak jacket and wanted nothing more than to strip it all off and take a long, cold shower. But I knew from experience that it would be refreshing for a moment, but I'd be back to sweating like a pig ninety seconds after getting out of the shower.

  This was not what I'd envisioned when I'd enlisted straight out of medical school.

  I didn't expect it to be the country club and charity gala circuit I was raised in, but life in Afghanistan was a lot more – brutal – than I'd ever dreamed of it being. Than I'd ever thought possible. I'd seen more death and grisly shit in my month to last me a lifetime.

  The sound of explosions and gunfire rattled in the distance, echoing down the rubble-laden street that once passed for a neighborhood. My unit had been on a routine patrol – just another shitty walk through a shitty, burned down, husk of a neighborhood.

  It was all normal. Routine. Until it wasn't. The rattling of the AK's favored by these shitheads rang out and then all hell broke loose. We'd walked into an ambush. The firefight had been fierce – the worst I'd ever been around during my brief time in-country – and to be perfectly honest, I nearly pissed my pants.

  Not proud of it, but I'm not ashamed of it either. War is a real bitch and it takes some getting used to – if you can ever actually get used to it.

  Although I'd gone through basic like everybody else, I wasn't a fighter. I was a doctor. My role wasn't to take lives, but to save them. And although I figured I'd be stationed at Landstuhl – the hospital just south of Ramstein Air Force Base – my first assignment had me attached to an infantry unit as a field medic.

  It was a grind. It was brutal. And I was learning on the job that over there, in the Shit, I wasn't going to be able to save every life. It was a bitter fucking pill for me to swallow, but I did what I could for as many as I could. I'd been able to save quite a few of my men already, but the ones I hadn't been able to save haunted me. I saw them every time I closed my eyes to sleep.

  And I expected that I always would.

  “Captain, we've got incoming,” said Corporal Meeks.

  “Thank you, Corporal.”

  I'd set up a temporary med station in the ruins of somebody's house. It wasn't ideal, but given that it looked like Godzilla had rampaged through the neighborhood the platoon was clearing, it was the best I could do. At least this place had four walls and a roof – pocked with bullet holes though they were.

  Meeks had been stationed to stand guard over me while the rest of the platoon cleared the neighborhood and either killed or drove off the enemy fighters. And from where I was sitting, the sound of gunfire was growing more sporadic, meaning the fight was just about over.

  For now, anyway. Something else I'd learned was that in the Shit, the fight never really ended.

  “Lieutenant Donovan,” I called. “We have wounded. When they start bringing them in, I need you to run triage. Give me the most serious first and if I don't need your hands, you handle the others.”

  “Yes, sir,” she called back to me from her station.

  A moment later, two men carried a third man into the house. His face was twisted in pain and he was bleeding from a wound in his abdomen.

  “Took a bullet from some asshole sniper, Cap,” said one of the soldiers.

  “On the table,” I snapped. “Donovan, I need you.”

  The man on the table was writhing in pain and screaming so loud, I thought they might be able to hear him all the way up at Landstuhl. Donovan helped me hold him down, but he was moving around so much, it made it difficult to get his jacket and shirt off.

  When we finally did manage to get them off, I saw the blood pouring out of the bullet hole in his side. Once I'd washed away the blood and had stopped up the hole, I was able to better assess the situation.

  “Looks like you got lucky, Private Mendez,” I said. “Sniper got you through the love handle. We should be able to get you patched up.”

  “Hurts like a bitch, sir,” he hissed.

  “Donovan,” I called. “Something to take the edge off for Private Mendez, please?”

  “Sir,” came another voice from the doorway.

  I turned to see two men carrying a third on a stretcher. As Donovan gave Mendez a shot to ease his pain, I rushed over to the wounded man. He was unconscious and had a gaping wound in his chest.

  “IED,” said one of the men carrying him. “Took some shrapnel from the blast.”

  “Get him on the table over there,” I said.

  They rushed him to the table and set him down. And when I got his shirt and jacket off, my heart immediately sank. I knew that there was going to be no way to save him. The holes torn through his chest were ragged and the blood was pouring out in rivers. I had no doubt that his internal organs had been shredded and that he had massive internal bleeding.

  The man was going to need extensive
surgery immediately – and even that wasn't a guarantee to save his life. He needed more than I could do in my temporary med station. A lot more.

  “Captain,” came Sergeant Willis' voice. “I've got another man that needs help.”

  I looked to the doorway and saw him helping another soldier in. Blood saturated the leg of his uniform and he was grimacing in pain. I looked at the man on the table before me. His skin was growing pale and his breathing was shallow. Ragged. Donovan looked at me, the obvious question in her eyes.

  “Captain,” said one of the men standing next to me – Corporal Norton. “Can you help him? Can you get him back on his feet?”

  I looked at the soldier, opened my mouth to speak and then closed it without saying anything. I looked back at the man on the table, watched the rivulets of blood spilling out of his ragged wounds to pool on the table beneath him.

  I knew the answer to the question, I just didn't want to give voice to it.

  “Captain?” he asked again.

  “Sir?” Donovan said.

  I hesitated, my emotions swirling around inside of me. A dark maelstrom of fear and grief that was causing me uncertainty and indecision – things that were deadly in my line of work. I didn't want to let this man die and yet, I knew intellectually, that I couldn't save him.

  “Please, sir,” said Norton, “He's like my little brother. Can you help him? Please, sir. Help him.”

  I stared at the man who had tears in his eyes. His lower lip trembled and the grief-stricken look that contorted his face tore me apart. Med school never prepared me for moments like that and I didn't know how to react. I'd never felt more helpless before in my entire life.

  “Sir,” Donovan snapped. “There's nothing we can do.”

  The man looked at her, his face blanched with horror. “No, you have to –”

  Donovan's voice snapped me out of my haze. She was right. And I knew it. As much as I hated to admit it, there was nothing we could do for the man on the table. Maybe if we'd been in a properly equipped operating theater. Maybe. But there in the dirt and rubble of that bombed out neighborhood, there wasn't anything I could do.