Infinity in the Palm of Her Hand: A Novel of Adam and Eve

by Belli, Gioconda

  Suddenly they felt a watery oscillation beneath their feet, as if below the surface of the earth a tide were moving the rocks, everything that only recently had been solid and rigid. Beside them abruptly appeared a strange, long creature with a round body and scaly skin, slithering along the ground. Eve recognized the face, the eyes.

  “Is it you?”

  “He has turned me into this. His mood will change. When he gets angry he does things he later forgets. Fortunately, when he remembers, he regrets what he’s done and makes amends. What he’s done to me won’t last long, but in your case it will take much longer. You will never be able to return to the Garden.”

  “It’s your fault,” said Adam, recognizing her. “You deceived us. You convinced the woman and then she convinced me.”

  “You used your freedom,” said the Serpent. “That is how it had to happen.”

  “And what do we do now?”

  “Live, grow, multiply, die. That is what you were created for, to have knowledge of Good and Evil. If Elokim hadn’t wanted you to eat the fruit, he wouldn’t have given you freedom. His pride is wounded, nevertheless, that you dared defy him. He will get over it. He is casting you out because he fears that you will eat of the Tree of Life and never die. He wants to hold the power of eternity over you.”

  “You should have told me that if we also ate that fruit we could avoid death,” Eve sighed.

  The Serpent clicked her tongue. Eve restrained a gesture of repugnance when she saw that it was forked.

  “You are incorrigible,” the Serpent said. “But do not believe that eternity is a gift. You will have an ephemeral life, but I assure you that you will not be bored. Because you will not have eternal life, you will have to reproduce, and that will keep you occupied. And now I must go, escape before he takes away my gift of speech—something he has done more than once. Go that way. You will find a cave.”

  The ground was rocking again. Streams of refulgent, thundering light burst against the sky. In the blink of an eye, the Serpent disappeared, agile, and wriggling away through the undergrowth.

  Adam looked at the woman. They were holding on to each other, attempting to keep their balance.

  Stumbling, they looked for a tree to give them support. They clung to its trunk to keep from falling. Eve’s eyes, wide with fright, were darting here and there, not focusing on anything. He smelled her fear, for the first time experiencing uncertainty, the terror of not knowing what to do, where to go. If only the ground would stop moving, he thought. With Eve, he slid down to the ground. He held her tight. Like him, she was trembling, doubled over with her head between her knees. He heard her pleading with the Earth to stop shaking.

  CHAPTER 7

  WHEN THE EARTH STOPPED SHAKING AND THEY WERE able to stand, they peered into the precipice that separated them from Paradise. The splendor that had until then shone above their heads had been replaced by a strange, dull gray sky, a chrome penumbra filled with clouds of dust. They looked into the fissure and through the thick yellow fog tried to make out some way by which they could return to the Garden, but the abyss completely encircled it. Adam knelt, touched his forehead to the loose rock of the edge, and pounded the ground with a fist as he moaned a lament of rage and desperation. Eve stared at him with dismay. She could not explain the catastrophe, or Elokim’s violent reaction. Had such fury been provoked by her having dared eat of the fruit or by the knowledge that she and Adam had acquired in the cave? Had he cast them out so he would not have to witness what evolved from them, what she had seen in the waters of the river? When they chose, and opted for what they did not know, had he felt belittled? There was no doubt that the Garden was beautiful—oh, so beautiful!—or that he had made sure that they lacked for nothing.

  “I never thought he would cast us out,” Eve said aloud.

  “What did you think, Eve? What did you think?” Adam asked, turning to look at her, reproaching her.

  “I told you. He wanted me to eat of the fruit. He made me feel that was what he wanted. He is curious to know what will come from us. That is why he made us free. At least, that’s what I thought.”

  “And did you think all that would take place in the Garden?”

  “I thought the whole earth would be our Garden.”

  Adam looked at her with pity. “You were mistaken,” he said.

  “We still don’t know what there is farther on, Adam. It may be that we will find what I saw. Elokim must know what he is doing.”

  The man’s smile was ironic and melancholy. What could he expect of her, other than curiosity? She was blessed that this was how she responded to uncertainty. He, on the other hand, felt paralyzed, filled with fear and repentance. He did not want to move from where they were. He clung to the possibility that Elokim would think it over and allow them to return.

  “I think that we should ask Elokim to forgive us, prostrate ourselves until he allows us to return.”

  Eve felt his anxiety on the soles of her feet, on the palms of her hands, and in the misty liquid that had pooled in her eyes and was beginning to trickle down her cheeks. Adam felt the woman’s warmth at his back, and the moisture of her tears. Slowly, he rose up and looked once more toward the Garden. It was floating in the distance, in clear, unreal air. From the twisted, leafy branches of the Tree of Life issued the golden, placid radiance that had until then given them light. He wondered whether they would survive without it. Could Elokim be playing a trick on them to make them nostalgic over their loss? Eve left Adam’s side and slowly walked to the very edge of the abyss. As the thick smoke dissipated, thinning as it rose, the outlines of the Garden of Eden became more clearly defined. She could see the paths they had walked so often, the plants and trees whose names they knew. She heard the noise of the rivers that now, without beds, spilled noisily over the precipice. She went back to Adam.

  “I don’t think that Elokim wants to hear us yet,” she told him, stroking his hand. “The Earth has only now stopped trembling. We will have to wait until he gets over being angry with us. Why don’t we go look and see what is there beyond the place where the sky touches the ground? Look how the dust is beginning to clear. Let’s go, Adam. Later we can do what you suggest.”

  He accepted her arguments with resignation. They began to walk, leaving the garden at their back. Through clear intervals in the dust cloud they saw a wide, rugged plain of red earth carpeted with yellow grass dotted here and there with clumps of palms and cedars. Along one side ran the sharp, jagged peaks of precipitous mountains that seemed to have erupted from the ground. At a distance it was impossible to judge, they saw a rock formation. Enormous plates of stone stood out from it as if extruded from some dark region. Farther on, piled-up rocks formed a strange and solitary mountain. Up this mountain snaked the green that spread along the plain until it was lost at the far limits. This landscape seemed not new but exhausted, fragmented, battered. They were intimidated by its enormity and the arbitrary way in which the rocks, grass, and vegetation were arranged, so unlike the Garden. Could it be Elokim who had laid out all that, Adam wondered, amazed that such a desolate and hostile landscape could exist so near the Garden. Eve walked on, trying to subdue the sensation that she had suddenly grown smaller. She felt minute, fragile. He eyes were burning and her nose felt raw.

  “What could it be over there where the sky ends, Adam? Could it be another precipice?”

  “That’s the horizon,” he said. “Look how it is moving as we walk along.”

  Eva looked at the clouds. Where are they going? she wondered. She had never wondered about that in the Garden when she was stretched out beside the river watching them roll by overhead.

  Without discussing it, they turned their steps toward a green blanket of pine trees. Eve stopped from time to time. She picked up rocks from the ground, dried grass. She smelled them. She thought about the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge, so alike and at the same time so different. The land outside the Garden had features and smells that recalled their Paradis
e, and yet things in this place all seemed to offer contrasting possibilities. The stones, for example, could be hurtful and dig into the soles of their feet, or might simply lie there, presenting their hard, sharp edges for her to look at. Did Good and Evil exist in everything around them? she wondered. She gave a start when she reached out to touch a perfect blue wildflower. It had thorns! She had never imagined that a flower could cause pain.

  Adam watched Eve step around the rocks in the path. They had dug into his feet as well, forcing him to hop around them to avoid the stabbing sensation that ran from his legs to his chest. Ever since they had left the Garden, the same body that only a short while ago had provided pleasure had done nothing but cause a myriad of sensations that he could not understand or suppress. The fine dust floating in the air burned his throat; the ashen light that clung to his flesh was choking him and making his skin wet and salty. New words—“pain,” “sweat”—emerged in his consciousness and gave a name to his bewildering discomfort. Each time Eve stepped away from him to touch unfamiliar trees, plants, and small flowers, he turned and looked back at the Garden with longing. He wondered anxiously whether Elokim would get past his wrathful impulse to cast them out forever and leave them exposed and alone in this enormous, inhospitable place.

  Along the way, Adam saw a falcon. It soared in circles in the distance. Animals, he thought. He had forgotten them. Where were they? What had become of them? The lowering white sky weighed down on him. He wondered if that thin light would be as constant as the warm golden light of the Garden. The sensation of his sweaty skin and the heat that inflamed his body forced him to walk more slowly. Eve was sweating, too. The gleam of her wet skin attracted him. He went to her and ran his hand down her back, along her arms. He noticed how reddish her skin had become, and thought that it might be the reflection of the reddish earth. Although they kept walking, they came no closer to the distant greenness. Eve listened to the wind. Where was it coming from? It was like Elokim, invisible but present. It seemed to her that she heard laughter. She thought that it might be those others she had seen. She could not conceive of the possibility that they were alone in such immensity. In the waters of the river she had seen many beings. Again she heard the laughter. She stopped. She signaled to Adam not to speak.

  “Do you hear that? Someone is laughing.”

  “The Serpent. She must be around somewhere.”

  Adam looked up. They were very near one of the strange rock formations that emerged from the earth like enormous monoliths whose walls showed bands shading from pale rose to orange. The laughter was clearer. It did not sound like the Serpent. Adam ran toward the rocks the sound was coming from. Eve followed. They saw shapes moving at the top of one of the promontories. Hyenas. Six or seven of them. The man smiled. He remembered when that name was forming in his mind to be completed in his mouth. For the first time he associated the sound of the hyenas with his own laughter. He called to them. The animals always came when he called. The hyenas did not obey. They were sniffing the air. Their laughter faded into hoarse grunts. They were watching Adam and Eve and pacing restlessly. Eve saw one of them begin to start down toward them. Without knowing why, she felt a cold shiver down her spine.

  “They don’t recognize us, Adam,” she said, on her guard, as a knot tightened in her chest. “Don’t call them anymore. Let’s leave.”

  Adam looked at her oddly. He brushed aside her concern with a gesture that conveyed his dominion over beasts. He called them again.

  Eve, frightened, moved back. Now two more hyenas were coming down from the rocks. Those left behind were pacing around above them as if they could not decide what to do, restless, making strange, menacing sounds.

  Dismissing Eve’s warnings, Adam went to meet them. When he was only a few steps from them, he held out his hand to touch them, as was his habit with any animal in the Garden. Only then did he realize how much they had changed from what they had once been. The boldest hyena crouched and then sprang toward Adam, slashing at him with a paw that raked his hand. That was the signal for the others to come running down from the rocks. Eve screamed as loud as she could, stooped down, picked up a few rocks and threw them with all her strength at the band of animals. Frightened by her scream, surprised by the rocks, the hyenas stopped.

  Adam followed Eve’s example and began throwing rocks as he retreated.

  Stunned by what had happened, possessed by the anguish pounding in their chests, spurred by instinct, the man and woman began to run as fast as they could in the direction of the Garden.

  Just as they neared the chasm, Adam, sweating, his face registering his agitation, took Eve by the shoulders.

  “We must ask for forgiveness, Eve. We must prostrate ourselves and beg Elokim to let us return. You have to promise me that you will never again eat of the forbidden fruit.”

  “Never,” she said, consenting, ready to do anything to escape Adam’s panicked expression and the fear that was making her knees tremble.

  “We still haven’t learned all the things Elokim knows. He has no reason to reproach us. We haven’t changed.”

  Eve looked at him. She didn’t want to tell him that there was no longer any trace of the radiant splendor his body had once exuded; nor did she mention that he seemed to be growing smaller. She did not want to think about the hissing sound of air entering her lungs. The weight of her fear, the frenetic race to escape the hyenas, was making it difficult for her to breathe. Adam was right. The best course would be to return, to beg, to humble themselves.

  They prostrated themselves at the very edge of the deep, open chasm. The air in it was now clear, and at the very bottom they could see rocks with sharp points angled toward them. On the other side, the resplendent foliage of the Tree of Life was visible. Adam avidly gulped air. If he could make a jump that would put him back in the Garden, he would never leave it again, he thought. Still prostrate beside Eve, with his mouth brushing the sandy ground, he shouted out his repentance, every lament and plea he was able to express. Eve seconded him, shamed and contrite, lifting her voice until she felt that all her ardor was consumed in that supplication.

  A burst of wind suddenly rose out of the precipice and enveloped them, rumpling their hair and stripping off the leaves they had used to cover their nakedness. Before their eyes the wind became visible, a thin, blazing entity, a gigantic reddish orange blade expanding and contracting, crackling at their feet, hotter and more terrible than any heat they had experienced. The tongue of fire launched itself at them, licking the soles of their feet, the palms of their hands, scorching their skin, flashing out against them. They scrambled to their feet and began to run, away from the precipice. Not relenting an instant, the fire came right behind them, driving them unmercifully across the plain until they reached the mountain in the middle of the rocky formation. With their arms crossed over their heads, protecting themselves as best they could, their feet raw and painful, Adam and Eve reached the side of the mountain and laboriously climbed, followed closely by the flame. In the midst of some thorny bushes, they could see the mouth of a cave. As suddenly as it had appeared, the flame disappeared with a quiet whoosh. They understood that they had come to what would be their dwelling in the hostile land to which they had been exiled. Paralyzed with fright, they sought refuge in each others’ arms, shaken by sobbing they could not contain.

  “That demonstration of power was almost as impressive as the creation,” said the Serpent, who had appeared on a rock nearby. “And to think that all you did was eat the fruit.”

  “Why didn’t I think to eat of the Tree of Life? Why didn’t you tell me to do that? Why? Why?” Eve queried between sobs.

  “You are misguided if you think that Elokim would have permitted that. Even the freedom he gave you two has its limits.”

  “Today we were attacked by hyenas,” said Adam. “What will happen when other animals do that?”

  “You will have to learn to distinguish between those you can trust and those you cannot. The animals are b
eginning to know the sensation of hunger.”

  “What is that?” Eve asked.

  “Hunger, thirst. You will know them. And you will know what to do. Little by little you will become aware of all you know. You have it inside you. You have only to find it. Go into your cave. Rest. You have had a difficult day.”

  “Day?”

  “Day, night. Arbitrary measurements based on the rotation of the stars. Rest, Eve. Stop asking questions.”

  CHAPTER 8

  IT WAS A LARGE CAVE. IRREGULAR FLAT ROCKS PROTRUDED from the walls, leaving a space in the center covered with fine, dark sand. The sides curved upward to close in a kind of dome pierced at the highest point by an opening that let in light. After the heat of the fire and the brightness of the day, the cool and dark were a relief.

  Eve dropped down upon a flat stone. Adam looked at his wife’s back. Her long legs tucked up against her chest. She looked like the petal of a flower. Despite the prediction that they would die on the day they ate of the Tree, he continued to feel just as intensely aware of his body and as alive as he had since he first tried the fruit. Only his fear of another unexpected and cruel punishment prevented him from entering the woman again and waiting inside her for the agitation and woe that engulfed him to calm. Eve began to beseech him to teach her how to distinguish life from death, and he did not know how to do it without touching her. So many new and painful sensations crammed so close together scarcely allowed him to think.