Storm (27 page)

The dove flaps off in the opposite direction from the raven. That makes sense; the raven might choose to think of her as food, though I imagine him determined never to get near the ark again. Who goes willingly back toward their prison?

The dove heads for the nearest mountain peak in that
direction. Her body hangs round and heavy on those wings, flapping, flapping. She is beautiful, strong, steady. I hear each beat of her wings in my heart.

Finally she’s there, and she circles the peak slowly, searchingly, but she doesn’t settle. Off she goes, toward the next peak. She flaps hard, but she clearly has far less power than the raven; she has to flap so many more times to travel the same distance. It’s taking her a long time. The morning is passing.

The babe stirs in my arms. I set him to the breast, holding him in place with one arm while my other hand plays with his ear. But my eyes go back to that dove. All of us watch her—Queen and The Male and Bash and me. She is halfway to the next peak, flying low over the water. The sea is calm.
Please stay calm. Please don’t splash her.
She seems to move more and more slowly. Is that simply the illusion of distance? She reaches the second peak. She circles it. Again and again. Ever more slowly.

I don’t know how long we’ve been standing here, but the babe has nursed on both sides and is clasping my thumb, opening and closing his fingers around it, making little noises. Every time I look down at him, he is looking up at my face, and I smile so happy. This babe has made me so happy.

I look up at Bash and bang his leg with my hip. He bends over me. I kiss his cheek. He smiles, but in a distracted way. He’s already straightened up and is watching the dove again.

She’s heading back toward us.

“She’s given up,” I say. “How could she give up so easily?”

“She won’t land on rocks,” he says. “She wants a branch. A dry, clean one.”

“Where on earth is there such a thing?” I want to shout at the dove. I want to tell her to make do with what she finds. That’s what we all have to do. That’s what life is now. But then I watch her, pump, pump, pumping her wings, working so hard, and my anger dissipates. Maybe before coming on the ark she could fly great distances; I don’t know. But all that time without flying may have weakened her. She flies so low, I imagine the water reaching up and swallowing her.
Courage, little dove. Courage!

With each wing flap I feel the pain in her shoulders. I feel the panic at the water below, so close her toes must be wet. I feel her heart race.

She makes it.

“Alas!” shouts Noah. “No dry land out there.”

“But the raven! The raven hasn’t come back!” It’s Ham’s voice.

“The raven can live on rocks. He can eat carrion. The dove needs a tree and fresh leaves. We need no less than the dove.” The shutters slam.

Queen and The Male immediately go down the rope to their cage.

Bash puts his arm around me and the babe. “It won’t be long. Look how much it has changed just since the babe was born. It won’t be long, Sheba.”

I swallow. I am still inside the dove. I am still shouldering
the weight of failure. “Even if land appears everywhere, the animals on the ark won’t survive long without sources of sweet water.”

“Rivers will come back. It will rain again. Rivers. Just think of rivers.”

“The babe’s father was born by a river. The river Pishon.”

“Wonderful name. It starts like
pistah
—like the name of your favorite plant.”

I look at my pistachio plants. All five of them have come up. That alone is remarkable, for everyone knows not every seed is good. “Pishon.” I caress the babe’s head.

Bash kisses the top of mine. “Pishon is a good name. Bash, Sheba, and Pishon. They sound right together.”

T
he night is so hot, even naked I pant. I walk slowly, standing tall in order to catch any bit of breeze that might come. At home we would have slept on the roof on a night like tonight. But the roof would not have been so hot as the wood under my feet is now, because we would have strewn it with long grasses to act as padding and to give a bit of air passage under our backs. And even though the grasses always matted down flat by halfway through the night, they still wicked away our sweat and cooled us off a little that way.

Nothing cools us tonight. Pishon is stretched long on my forearm, asleep, his cheek cradled in my hand, his legs and arms dangling over the sides, his little rump against the inside of my elbow. He lies there and sweats. Now and then he emits other hot, wet things too—and I simply go over to a bucket of seawater
and rinse us both off. He doesn’t even wake. He’s an easy baby.

I should be sleeping now too. I try to get as much nighttime sleep as I can. But this heat . . . I can’t bear it.

Queen and The Male seem to be suffering too. As soon as Bash threw down the rope tonight, they climbed up here, like usual. They greeted Bash before he went down, like usual. They greeted me and Pishon like usual. But then they sprawled out on their backs without touching and fell asleep. There’s nothing usual about that. I’ve never seen them not touch in their sleep before. Their arms tend to intertwine. Often they form a single tangle of bonobo, making it difficult to distinguish which parts belong to Queen and which belong to The Male. I look at them now and wonder if they wouldn’t be more comfortable in their cage. I don’t know. Maybe it’s like an oven down there. But maybe it doesn’t get as hot as this roof, this roof that bakes in the sun all day. Could it be that they came up here tonight purely out of loyalty?

There’s so much I don’t know about Queen and The Male. It’s funny to think you can live with creatures in such close quarters for so long and not know what’s in their heads. I walk past them slowly now, careful not to disturb them.

I pick a pod and chew on it as I go. We’re so lucky to have these plants. We eat leaves and pods every day. I’m careful to let some plants go to seed, so I can save those seeds. But there are plenty of plants for eating, too. Not much soothes me better than chewing on a pod. I feel strong. Birth left me broken, but, finally, I’m strong again.

I don’t walk anywhere close to the edge of the roof. I’ve never liked being near the edge, but with Pishon in my arms, I take no chances. The image of him crawling toward this edge flashes in my brain. A spasm shoots up my core. I clutch him tight. That’s a long way ahead, though. And we’ll get off the ark soon. I kiss Pishon’s downy spine. “It’s all right,” I whisper. “It’s all right. You’ll be somewhere safe by that time, I promise.”

I walk just far enough to be able to gaze out over the rocks below, all the way to the edge of the water—way out there—where Bash stands fishing in the moonlight. He makes a grand figure. I smile. And all at once my whole self aches for him.

Screamer has been walking the roof with me. It’s unusual for him to be up here at night; it feels like a treat. Now that Bash doesn’t go onto the middle deck anymore, Screamer doesn’t always have a ready ride up to the roof. He doesn’t dare climb the rope on his own. At the end of some nights, as Bash climbs up the rope, Screamer will be waiting at the porthole to be carried up. Other nights he won’t be. Last night he was there waiting—and so Bash carried him up and he spent all day today with us. Then when Bash went back down tonight, he refused to go. I think he simply wasn’t ready yet. He misses me. I think he feels tonight is as much a treat for him as I feel it is for me.

These animals are good to me: Queen, The Male, Screamer.

“Screamer?”

He pays no attention to my voice. He just keeps walking.
Padding really. His short tail flicks now and then. His flat face makes him look ready for a fight.

“Screamer, do you know you’re a good cat? I’m glad you came with me when the rains started. I’m glad you stayed with me. You are all I have left of my old life.”

Screamer stops still and his tail stiffens, his ears pull back. He hisses low and horrible. My breath quickens. I follow his eyes.

Someone walks along the rocks. A small person. Smaller than Noah and his sons. Who on earth could it be? And now I see another one. And a third! It’s the women! It’s Nela and Ada and Leba. I look in every direction, but it’s only the three of them.

They go in a line along the water’s edge. Now they run, only one at a time, out into the shallows. They raise their legs high. I can’t hear them, but I think maybe they’re laughing. Maybe they’re dancing in the tiny waves. They’re not doing a chore, that’s for sure. So Noah couldn’t possibly have allowed this. He must not know. Their husbands must not know. No one knows about the dance of the young women in the surf.

They’re moving toward where Bash fishes. I’m quite sure he doesn’t see them yet, for there’s an outcropping of boulders between. But if they dance around those boulders . . .

I don’t know what to do. If I shout as loud as I can, even if I manage to make Bash hear me, which is doubtful since he’s so far off, but even if I do, I might wake everyone else sleeping on
the top deck. That would be much worse. But I can’t just let the women come up on Bash unawares. Whatever might happen, it won’t be good.

I tuck Pishon to my chest and run over to The Male and Queen. I shake them awake. I pull Queen toward the edge of the roof and point. “There, Queen, look! Do something! Anything!”

She doesn’t look.

No! I never taught Queen to follow my pointed finger. I forgot all about that. I tried that once, the first time I saw Bash’s rope hanging beside our porthole, but then I forgot. How could I forget! And there’s nothing on this roof that I can throw to get Bash’s attention. I couldn’t throw that far anyway.

The women are nearly at the boulders now. They’re picking their way daintily along the water’s edge. Hopping as the waves come in and out.

I am crazy with fear. Why didn’t Bash and I think of a long-distance way to warn each other? What fools we’ve been!

Bash is still fishing. He pulls in his rope and throws another fish into his bucket and casts out the rope again, as though all is well with the world. No, no, no! So little has been well with the world for so long now. If anything happens to Bash, nothing will be well with the world ever again.

Queen hugs me around the legs. I let out a little sob. How can she know so much about what I feel, when she doesn’t know what pointing means? I kneel beside her and point at Bash. Screamer hisses and hisses.

And she looks! Queen actually looks. She slaps The Male’s arm and stares out at the women. The Male looks alertly in the same direction Queen looks. He makes a little scream, then he and Queen disappear over the side of the ark, down the rope.

One of the women dashes out into the surf again. It’s Leba, I think. And, oh! She goes under! There must be a steep drop-off of the mountain’s edge at that point. The other women are jumping around. I think they’re screaming.

Leba doesn’t come back up. Why doesn’t she come back up? My heart cramps, like it did when my brothers went under the river water. I couldn’t go after them. But these women can go after Leba. Why don’t they? I can’t understand it. Everything is going wrong. I hold Pishon tight.

Bash runs around the boulder. He sees the women. They clutch at one another, all crazy. And I know they’re screaming now—I see their open mouths. But I don’t know whether they’re telling Bash what happened or if they’re just wild.
Please, Bash! Leba’s in the water. Save her! Save Leba!
He jumps into the surf.

Nela and Ada hold on to each other and watch. Bash comes swimming back, dragging Leba. He carries her toward the ark in long, clumsy steps. The women trail behind him. I see Leba move her arm. She’s alive!
Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you
.

The Male appears out of nowhere. He races at Ada and Nela, with Queen right behind him. All four of them grind to a standstill. The Male and Queen block the two women’s way to the ark. Bash looks back and clearly says something, because the
women move forward slowly now, giving The Male and Queen a wide berth.

Leba struggles out of Bash’s arms and jumps to the ground. The two women dash past The Male and Queen, and all three of them run toward the ark. I can’t see where they’ve gone. I’d have to peek over the edge of the roof to do that, and I don’t dare.

Bash stops and watches after them. Then he runs back and fetches the bucket and his fishing rope and one large fish, too large for the bucket, which he manages to dangle from the rope. He comes up over the side of the ark roof. Queen and The Male follow. Bash sets down his gear and pulls up the climbing rope.

I am standing there, with Pishon in my arms and Screamer at my feet, shaking my head. Queen and The Male come over and squat beside me, pressing against my legs. “Where did they go?”

“Up a rope ladder to the middle deck. I’m sure they’re on the top deck by now.”

“What do you think they’ll do?”

He shrugs. “What can they do? If they tell Noah, they’ll get in trouble for being out at all.”

“And you saved Leba’s life.”

“Yes, there’s that, too.”

“So they might be grateful.”

“I would be if I were them.”

“So we’re not lost.”

“No, Sheba. We’re not lost.”

I think of the astonishment that the women must have felt at seeing this enormous naked man. This giant. My giant. Can they really keep that to themselves? “Bash? Can you send Queen and The Male back down to their cage?”

“Sure.”

“And take Screamer down there too.”

“That might be a tough one. He didn’t want to leave you tonight. Why do you want to get rid of him?”

“I want to be alone with you. We are married now, right? If anything should happen, I want to make sure we had at least one night together as man and wife.”

Bash swings an arm out so fast, I jump back. But he’s caught Screamer by the scruff of the neck. He smiles. “Sorry I scared you. I guess I can move faster than either of us thought when I want to. And now I want to.”

T
he stench of excrement hangs over this morning. Ham and Shem and Japheth and maybe even Noah shovel the animals’ waste out the portholes every day—all except what they need for their dung fires—but no one has the energy to carry it down to the ever-receding sea. So it has piled up, and in this heat the odor rises. We on the roof have a halo of hazy muck over us. It’s getting worse all the time.