The Virtue of Sin Read online

  We hurry past the girls’ bonfire, skirting a cluster of younger girls playing hopscotch in the sand, and over to the feasting tables. The lavish buffet I helped my mother prepare will soon be set out; until then, the rest of the women straighten tablecloths and arrange bread and sweets into piles. Delilah is here, too, moving a plate from one side of the table to the other and then back again as her mother, Chloe, supervises.

  Zacharias bursts into tears at the sight of his mother and squirms to be put down. When Rachel releases him, he runs to Chloe and buries his face in her skirt.

  “There you are! Your sister and I have been looking everywhere for you!”

  Delilah rolls her eyes heavenward. “I told you he was with Rachel, Mother.”

  “And I told you to keep an eye on him,” Chloe says, but she sounds only mildly exasperated.

  Normally, Delilah is tasked with wrangling her many brothers and sisters. But today is a special occasion. With no Lessons, and the Elders preoccupied with Celebration preparations, it’s expected that the children should also get a chance to enjoy this tiny taste of freedom. Plus, it’s her wedding day.

  As Rachel and I hand over the trays of vegetables and bread, another mother, Judith, slips the crying boy a cookie, and his tears immediately evaporate.

  “Delilah, move those cookies to make room,” Chloe orders.

  Delilah wrinkles her nose as she sticks her tongue out at us, her freckles blurring into one sandy cluster, but she does as she’s told. Until we serve our husbands, we must serve our parents.

  Judith hands us each a cookie and wipes her calloused hands on the apron tied over her dress. The women are all in nicer clothes tonight, the dresses they normally save for Chapel. Rachel and I and the other girls will wear white for the wedding, while Judith and the other Elders are dressed in traditional cream linen. “How are you girls feeling? Nervous? Excited?” she asks.

  I’m tongue-tied all of a sudden, and to cover, I shove the cookie in my mouth. Judith is almost as good a cook as my mother, and she’s definitely a better baker. Not that she looks it. She’s thin and wiry, like she never eats. And maybe she doesn’t. With a husband and six sons, maybe the food never makes it to her plate.

  “We’re excited and nervous,” Rachel answers for both of us.

  Judith smiles. “The boys are the same,” she says, waving a hand toward the glow in the distance. “I finally sent Caleb and Marcus away. They were more hindrance than anything.”

  “Oh, I can’t imagine Caleb being a hindrance. Can you, Miriam?” Delilah asks.

  I choke on my cookie, and Rachel gives me a raised eyebrow and a tiny shake of her head. “What can we do to help?” she asks the women, too loudly.

  “There’s still the meat—” Delilah’s mother says, but Judith interrupts.

  “Let them go, Chloe. This is their special night.” Judith winks, and this time I’m sure it’s at me.

  Delilah doesn’t give her mother time to reconsider. “Let’s go.” She crams the cookie in her mouth and links her arms through both Rachel’s and mine, pulling us away from the food and the fire and into the darkness of the night desert.

  We walk, mostly because we can and everyone else is too busy to stop us, but we’re careful to keep Zzyzx Road and the city fence to our left, while the voices of the women and children fade at our backs. We weave our way slowly between scattered rocks and the spindly Joshua trees with their branches raised toward heaven in prayer, like their namesake at the Battle of Jericho. But what do these trees pray for?

  Sometimes I imagine they were once people, like us, stuck out here so long they grew roots. A blasphemous thought, I know. I pluck one of the waxy blossoms sprouting from their outstretched arms like pale fingertips and tuck it behind my ear. Unlike other wildflowers, these don’t bloom every spring. Their appearance is the very reason we’re all out here tonight. It’s a sign God has finally called for another Matrimony.

  Rachel finishes her cookie and dusts the crumbs from her face. Then she squints into the darkness. “It’s time to go back.”

  I don’t ask how she knows. Rachel’s sense of duty is as inborn as the dent in the bridge of her nose, the one she rubs when she’s nervous.

  “You two go on,” I say. “I’ll follow in a minute.”

  “Or you could just come with us now. We still have to change out of our work dresses.”

  I sigh. “I have to pee, Rachel.”

  She wrinkles her nose, then massages the dent. “There’s no toilet out here. You can go at the house.”

  “I can’t hold it that long. I’ll go behind this tree.”

  Delilah’s eyes widen with glee; Rachel’s with shock. “You can’t,” Rachel says.

  “Of course I can. The men do it all the time. I’ve seen them.”

  At her gasp, I amend my words. “I don’t mean I’ve actually seen them. I mean, I’ve seen my father go off by himself, behind the Pavilion. So why can’t I?”

  “Because you’re a girl?” Rachel counters.

  “But it’s still pee,” Delilah says. “There’s no difference between male and female pee.”

  Delilah has done enough diaper changing to know, and Rachel gives up the fight. “Even so, I’m not going to stand around while you pollute the desert. Come on, Delilah.”

  “That’s why I told you to go ahead,” I call after their retreating backs. “And it’s not pollution if the animals all do it.” I don’t actually have to pee, but my argument is still valid.

  I walk a bit more until I’m far enough away from the bonfire so that if I squint, the flames are hands holding up a column of climbing smoke as an offering. The sun has slipped all the way behind the mountain now, and above me, stars decorate the sky like thousands of candles lit in honor of tonight’s marriages. The magnitude of all this beauty, all this freedom, leaves me breathless. I know this is the same desert I see every day, but Out here, it’s wild and untended. Here, the ground is unswept, the sand coarse and rocky, the bunches of yucca and desert paintbrush scattered by God instead of gardener. The farther I go from New Jerusalem, the less evidence I see of any human hand.

  I walk until I see the guards. I knew I’d run into them eventually, and that I’d have to stop before they caught me. We were told they would be patrolling during the celebration. Even Outside, there are still boundaries we can’t breach. But it doesn’t matter, because I’ve come far enough. I turn and duck behind one of the taller trees, my heart pounding in the stillness. For the first time tonight, I am afraid. Not of being chosen, but of being caught—here, at the boys’ fire. Tonight, of all nights, I shouldn’t risk this.

  But I need to see him one more time.

  2

  MIRIAM

  SCARCELY HAD I PASSED THEM WHEN I FOUND THE ONE WHOM MY SOUL LOVES.

  —Song of Solomon 3:4

  Their fire is built close to the mountainside, and they gather round it, dark shapes that move and ripple in the light of the flames. My skin tingles at the sound of their laughter. Girls aren’t allowed to speak in the presence of boys, and because we’re always separated, they rarely speak in ours. The only time I see any boys for any length of time is at Chapel. And at Chapel there is no speaking unless Daniel invites us to respond. That’s a rule even I have never broken, though going a whole day without talking is the worst form of torture.

  But these boys—they’re so loud! As they jostle and play, they seem more alive than the girls I talk to every day. I taste jealousy, sour and hot in the back of my throat, at their easiness with themselves and one another. At their right to speak their thoughts aloud. I’ll never know that.

  And then I see Caleb.

  He is illuminated, his skin bronze against the white of his shirt, his blond hair shining as the others fade until they are but a gray fuzz and only he remains. We were friends, up until the age of Separation, which was when Daniel decreed the
oldest of the Second Generation must begin Lessons. Before that, we all used to play together, though I don’t remember Caleb making me feel like this. Mostly, I remember him as quiet. And determined. Once, when the chain kept coming off an old bike Rachel and I shared, he’d fixed it. Even after my father told me it was my own fault, and that seven was too old for riding bikes. Caleb had waited until my father went to a meeting at the Council House, and then he’d squatted in the dirt at the foot of the driveway and worked on it until it was done. I still remember him like that, holding my handlebars with muddy hands, a big smile on his face. “I cleaned out the links. It should work fine now.”

  That was the last time we spoke. It was also the last time I saw the bike. Father said it was time for me to put away childish things and gave it to one of Delilah’s brothers.

  Caleb turns to say something to the others, and his deep voice carries through the darkness, wrapping me in its warmth. I should feel guilty for listening, but it’s only fair. He has heard me speak since the Separation. A few months ago, Rachel and Delilah and I were lingering outside the girls’ schoolhouse after Lessons, in an effort to avoid going home to our chores. I was last to leave, and as I turned to go, I saw him around the corner of the building. I don’t know where he was supposed to be, but I’m sure it wasn’t standing there, spying on us.

  When he knew I’d caught him, he didn’t blush or bolt. Instead, he smiled. Then he bent down, traced something in the sand with his finger, and pointed at me before he slipped around the other side of the building. By the time I rounded the corner, he was gone. But he’d left me a message, written with the same coded language we use for Bible Study. A heart, an ear, and a mouth with sound waves coming from it. I love to listen to you speak.

  Even now, months later, the memory makes me shiver with some thrilling emotion I can’t name. I should have felt obligated to report his infraction, but I didn’t. Instead, I stared at those precious symbols until they were burned into my memory. Then I erased the evidence and kept his secret.

  Will he keep mine?

  He stares into the darkness where I’m hiding for a long moment, his body still as the others move around him. His gaze is drawn to mine like a magnet, though he can’t see me here. Can he?

  Then the corner of his mouth curves upward, like the crook of a finger. It isn’t just a smile, it’s an invitation. The tether between us grows ever stronger, the heat that infuses my body far greater than the desert sun. Surely this must be love. Has God sent him dreams of me? Will I finally know what it’s like to speak to him? Hear his secret thoughts? Touch him? Be touched—

  “Aha! Caleb. I knew it!” a voice calls from behind me.

  “What are you doing out here?” I whisper, though I want to shriek.

  “Running away.” There’s no whispering for Delilah.

  “What? Why?” I peer behind her into the blackness. “Running away from who? Where’s Rachel?” If we get caught out here, especially on this night, our punishment will be severe. And Delilah’s pale skin glows in the moonlight, a beacon for anyone who looks in our direction.

  But she’s oblivious to my concern as she flops down beside the tree. “I’m teasing. I followed you. I didn’t believe your pee story for a minute. You’re trying to get a better look at the boys, aren’t you? Why didn’t you invite me?” She picks up a stick and traces a pattern in the dirt. She’s always doodling—in her notepad, in the sand. Even on her clothing. About the only place I’ve never seen her draw is in her Bible.

  As I crouch beside her, I see this isn’t just any doodle. It’s a circle with an arrow pointing out the top. Husband.

  Caleb left me this symbol, too, just last week. Right after the Matrimony was announced. Along with another circle with the curlicue tail—choose—and the circle above a cross—wife.

  “Don’t worry,” she says, still drawing. “Caleb will pick you. I’ve seen him watching you at Chapel. He likes you.” She moves her hand, and I see she’s made the jagged scribble for fear. Does she know about our secret communications? Has she noticed me scouring the sand for evidence of his interest?

  She brushes her hand across the sand, smoothing it out. “I just wish there were another option.”

  There are nine girls taking part in the Matrimony tonight, and of all of us, Delilah is the least interested in marriage. She’s also the youngest, fourteen to most of our sixteen, so she’s had two fewer years of her mother extolling the virtues of the institution. Rachel and I are the eldest of the Second Generation. Some of our Brothers and Sisters are too young for the responsibilities of marriage. Privately, I think Delilah is one of them. But she has bled, so the Lord has determined her worthy of a husband; she must go forward tonight.

  “What other option would there be?” I ask. “The Lord wants us to be wives and mothers.”

  “I don’t know. A vessel for knowledge, maybe? We could be teachers. Like Phoebe.”

  It’s only because I love her so well that I don’t remind Delilah of the shame Phoebe endured before becoming a teacher. She says we are all her children, but none of us really believes that. “I think even Phoebe would rather be a mother.”

  “That’s not true,” Delilah argues. “Phoebe says knowledge is the most important gift.”

  “She has to say that. She’s a teacher. Obviously, the gift of life is the most important.”

  Delilah rolls her eyes. “There are plenty of smart women in the Bible who didn’t marry or have babies. And don’t tell me you’ve never wondered what it’s like Outside.”

  I can hear Rachel’s voice in my head, a firm never, leaving no room for doubt.

  But I have.

  Oh, I know all about the dangers. The rest of the world does not live as we do. Only when we’re locked inside the gates are we safe. Outside, people do unspeakable things to one another. My secret shame is that I’ve tried to imagine these things. But all I can ever picture is this vast desert, stretching on and on. Sometimes I dream of others, faceless people out beyond the mountains, their bodies contorted in something other than prayer. But the images are hazy and jumbled, and they fade when I wake, because I have nothing concrete to compare them to. Though I’ve been taught all about the dangers of sin, no one wants to tell me what it looks like.

  “I’d rather go Out there than be chosen by a Faithless man like Azariah,” Delilah says.

  Azariah was Phoebe’s husband. He betrayed her with another woman and then ran away, leaving her behind, childless and alone, to live with the shame.

  “But . . . that would never happen to us.” Would it?

  “How can you be so sure? What if I get picked by a husband I can’t love? Or what if he decides he doesn’t love me?” She tosses her stick aside. “This is it. We can’t be chosen twice. If they betray us, we’ll be forever Stained. Just like Phoebe.”

  Before I can think of a response, the world goes dark. Someone’s doused the boys’ fire. I look for Caleb one last time, but he’s hidden behind the cloud of hissing smoke. Then the music cuts out on the speakers above, and a sharp squeal reverberates off the mountain walls.

  Delilah bounces to her feet, her hands pressed against her ears.

  “We have to get back,” I say. “If we’re late . . .” I don’t finish. Like everything else about this night, I don’t actually know what will happen if we’re late. Will we be Shamed? Held in Contempt, our names forever excluded from the Book of Truth? All I know is there’s no time for keeping to the shadows. I take Delilah’s hand in mine and break into a flat-out run, the rocky sand dragging our stride and chafing inside my yucca-leaf sandals.

  I slow to skirt an outcropping of dark boulders. I think we’re safe from punishment now that we’re within view of the gathering; the clumps of Joshua trees have thinned enough that we can see the dark silhouettes of the women and girls as they move in and out of the torchlight near the mouth of the cave. But I don’t see
the boy until it’s too late.

  I trip over his body and go down hard on my knees, the coarse sand scraping my bare legs with granules sharp as glass.

  “For heaven’s sake—” The rest of the words die in my throat at the distinct and deadly sound. I know the night amplifies everything, but the snake’s rattle is still impossibly loud. It comes from everywhere at once, and fear puckers my skin like a thread pulled tight at my neck. Hours pass in a matter of seconds as I bite my tongue and try to gauge how likely a target I am to the unseen reptile. I’ve lost a sandal, and my skirt is twisted about my knees, leaving a good expanse of ankle and calf exposed. My muscles twitch, urging me to run, but movement will only tempt it.

  “It’s moving away.” Delilah’s voice is low, for once. “Give it a minute.” She must be standing behind me, though I don’t dare turn my head to look. Instead, I watch the boy who lies beside me, eerily still. He may be dead. The thought hits me sudden and hard, like the rock that struck Goliath.

  “Are you all right?” The words slip off my tongue before I can catch them back. The sand is cold, which must be why my hands tremble as I reach toward the shock of blue-black hair. I turn toward Delilah. “It’s Aaron.”

  “The Outsider?”

  “He’s not an Outsider anymore.” The words are more my father’s than my own. As a member of the Church Council, he is constantly reminding me of our obligation to welcome new members into our fold. And it’s been many months since Aaron’s family renounced sin and joined our community. They are family now, or so I’m told.

  “Are you alive? Can you talk?” I press my fingers against his neck, and relief warms them as I feel the fluttering of his pulse. “Do you need help?” I move my hands along his arms and then down his legs, searching for the wound. “Where did it bite you?”

  “My . . . foot.”

  His hand clutches mine. Thankfully, the night conceals my blushing as I lean toward his foot. There. In his heel. Two tiny pinpricks, each oozing a dot of blood.