To my right sat a large porcelain bathtub with decorative iron feet. The porcelain was chipped in places but otherwise had been polished. It was filled to the brim with clean water.
Kathryn stood directly in front of me, dressed in her black dress, next to a table lit by a single candle. On the table were an open black-leather Bible, a brass bowl with some liquid in it, a clear glass with what looked like moonshine or some other clear fluid, a small golden ring, and a folded white robe.
Wyatt stood to my left, dressed in blue overalls, next to Bobby who was wearing a dark robe, but not like mine. His was old and ragged and dirty, which surprised me, considering how obsessive Kathryn was about cleanliness.
He watched me with pride, wearing that sheepish, crooked smile of his.
"Hello, Eden," he said.
"Hush, Bobby," Kathryn snapped. "Not a word from you."
Bobby hushed, but his smile remained stuck to his face. Wyatt looked on kindly, hands folded at his waist.
Kathryn gave me an encouraging nod, lifted the Bible, took a deep breath, stared directly into my eyes, and spoke without looking at the pages opened before her.
"As it is written, though having made man in his image as his children, God found man's ways wicked and intolerable. And what God had made lovely, he now detested, having no stomach for the wayward means of what he had made. Thus he hated his children and saw to confining them to a place of eternal torture without mercy. And there came into this world of hatred the Son of God, proclaiming that if those God had fashioned in his likeness bowed before God in fear and presented themselves as living sacrifices, the One who had fashioned them in love would forget his hatred of them and allow them to escape the torture awaiting them."
She took another deep breath and this time blew it out through pursed lips.
"And so it came to pass that on the morning of the seventh day of the new creation, man brought the spotless lamb, a living sacrifice, before God. And with it, a goat."
Her eyes shifted to Bobby.
"And on that goat God placed all of his hatred to satisfy his lust for vengeance."
My heart leapt with frightful worry. I had never heard of this kind of God.
She turned back to me. "The lamb was found to be pure and acceptable in his sight. He took her as his bride, to be touched by nothing impure for the length of her life. And he commanded the lowly mother of the bride to tend her well and to present her pure before him on the seventh day so that his anger might not rise up again. In this way will God's favor rest on the bride and on her household and return blessing sevenfold."
One last breath, through her nostrils.
"Selah," she said softly.
She dipped her head and set the Bible on the table.
"We present this bride to our Father to take away all of our sin, that we might be found acceptable in his sight and restored to our true birthright as the blessed children of God."
She walked up to me and slipped the black robe off my shoulders.
"In removing the black robe, we shed the stain of sin from this spotless lamb of God."
Kathryn released her grip on the robe and let it fall in a heap around my booted feet.
"Come with me, sweetheart," she whispered, taking my arm. "Please do exactly as I say."
I was wearing only my underwear and the rain boots and although it was hot outside, I suddenly found myself trembling.
"Sh . . . sh . . . sh . . . There now, it's going to be okay. I'm not going to hurt you."
She stopped at the edge of the tub.
"Step out of your boots and directly into the water without touching the ground, darling. You can't dirty your feet and defile the water."
Kathryn had said I wouldn't be hurt, and nothing she'd done so far made me think she would lie to the daughter she'd gone to such lengths to find. The words and rituals were strange, to be sure, but then everything that had happened to me during the last six months was a bit strange.
So with Kathryn's help, I pulled first one foot out of a boot and set it in the ice-cold water, and then the other. Now in the tub, gooseflesh rippled over my body and I stood shaking.
"Move closer to the front, sweetheart."
I shuffled to the middle of the tub.
"Now sit down."
I hesitated, then lowered myself into the cold water, shivering.
She smiled at me approvingly, placed her right hand gently around my throat and her left hand at my lower back.
"As God himself was lowered into the grave to appease his Father's rage, so now we offer this lamb into the grave so that she might rise and be found worthy of God's love." To me: "Don't struggle, darling."
Without further warning, Kathryn applied pressure to my throat and pushed me back. I'd heard of baptism, of course, and so I already knew that she was going to push me under. I let myself go, not wanting to upset her.
The moment the water covered my face, I felt it fill my nose and panic ripped through me. My body jerked up.
But Kathryn wasn't ready for me to come up yet. Her grasp on my throat tightened and she held me down.
For a moment, I relaxed, thinking that it would only last a second and then be over. But the second turned into two, and then four, and suddenly I wondered if she was actually going to drown me.
The instant that thought entered my mind, my survival instincts swallowed me and I began to struggle to get my head up and out of the water. But with my increased effort came increased pressure on my throat, holding me down.
I could hear Kathryn's muffled voice crying out above me, and the sound pushed my fear deeper. I began to thrash, clawing for the edge of the tub, kicking my legs, screaming underwater.
Still, my mother held me down. I thought that I was going to drown. With each passing second I became more certain.
But I didn't drown. Instead, just as my world started to go black, my head was suddenly pulled up and out of the water. I came up sputtering and gasping for breath.
Kathryn wrapped her arms around me and held me tenderly. But I was confused and I began to cry.
"It's okay, sweetheart. I'm right here. Sh, sh, sh . . . Mommy's right here to hold you. That's my girl, I'm right here for you. Sh, sh, sh . . ."
I let her hold my drenched head in her arm and slowly brought myself under control.
"It will be much easier if you don't struggle the next time," she whispered. "We're almost done."
When I had calmed, she pulled back and put her hand under my arm.
"Stand up with me."
I pushed myself up with her assistance and stood in the tub. Kathryn retrieved the folded white robe from the table, opened it wide and told me to step out of the tub. She draped the robe over me and helped me slide my arms into the sleeves.
"You see? You're perfectly whole," she assured me. "You have nothing to fear. We're almost done."
She led me to the table, picked up the brass bowl, and dipped her fingers into the liquid.
"With this virgin oil, I anoint you, Eden, the spotless lamb cleansed of all unrighteousness."
She raised her hand over my head and sprinkled some of the oil in my hair. Then retrieved the golden ring from the table and lifted my left hand.
"With this ring I do wed thee to God."
She slid the ring over my finger. Then kissed each of my cheeks.
"What was lost is now found. What was dead is now risen from the grave. What lived in transgression is now made whole, a spotless bride now loved by the God of vengeance."
She gazed lovingly at me for a long moment, then turned and walked to the wall. There was a whip with leather straps hanging from a nail. She unhooked it and walked back, face now flat, eyes on Bobby.
"And on the goat he transferred all of his anger for the goat he found unworthy of his love."
She was going to whip Bobby? My heart froze, and I almost cried out. Maybe the fear had robbed my voice, I don't know, but I watched in disbelief as Kathryn instructed Bobby to take off his robe and turn around.
He was smiling as he did it, eyes on me. Proud. Surely not aware of what horror might be headed his way.
"Bend over," she instructed.
He obediently doubled at the waist and stood ready.
Kathryn gently whipped his back with the straps once. It was a symbolic beating.
"To this unworthy flesh I transfer all of God's wrath."
She whipped him again, gently. But her words cut to my heart.
"I confer all of our sin to the defiled one . . ."
Another lash.
"So that righteousness might be found in the pure bride."
Again.
"I curse thee . . .
Again.
"I curse thee . . .
She laid the whip across his back seven times. On the third 'I curse thee' something in me changed. I was watching my young brother who was too nave and innocent to fully grasp the emotional burden being placed on his back, and I realized something new.
I knew that I was home.
That I was home and I wasn't going to leave.
I wasn't going to leave because if I did, there would be no one to save Bobby, just like Kathryn had told him. I couldn't abandon my poor, innocent brother. Ever.
What I'd half decided the night before was now sealed in my mind.
After Kathryn had laid seven lashes across Bobby's back she told him that he could stand straight.
He turned around, smiling wide with crooked teeth, as proud as could be. And I smiled back, holding back a well of tears that wanted to cleanse my eyes of what they'd just seen.
I love you, Bobby. I will take care of you. I promise you, I will never leave you.
"It is finished," Kathryn said, spreading her arms wide.
Wyatt started to clap and was joined first by Bobby, and then by me.
"It is finished."
But really, it had all just begun.
12.
Five years later
KATHRYN STOOD at the kitchen sink and watched through the window as Wyatt's truck pulled to a stop beside the house. He'd left long before sunrise and had been gone all day, hauling barrels and repairing a copper still for Zeke.
Now, dusky shadows reached deep into the surrounding bayou. Despite the approaching night, the summer air was still thick. She didn't mind at all, though, because it reminded her of the day her precious lamb had come to her. Their first night together as a family had been a night just like this one.
Had it been five years already?
Five years . . . Amazing how quickly time slipped away. Eden had been so beautifully naive then, clueless about the ways of redemption and purity and yet so innocent.
Five years . . . She was so much more now. Not always perfect, but as close as any human was likely to be. It hadn't been an easy path-righteousness never was. Her role as mother and teacher had required never-ending attention and wisdom. Eden's had required trust and obedience.
But there was no price for purity in the eyes of God. No cost too high for absolution. No task too great for the sake of love. And no mother or daughter could possibly love each other the way she and Eden did.
Wyatt's work boots clomped up the rickety porch stairs, and then the rusty screen door slammed shut behind him. His footsteps stopped a few feet behind her.