Sacred (27 page)

On the little table next to my bed rested the two books I had been meaning to open for weeks now, but for some reason had resisted exploring:
Jewish Mysticism
and
A Guide to the Sefirot
.

The first title seemed too expansive to start with, so I slid the second book from the stack and sat curled with it on my bed.

Inside, I found a strange sort of diagram that looked like a spiderweb with a tail hanging down from the bottom, or a tree with a very short trunk. There were ten circles connected by lines, and in each of the circles was a strange word, none of which meant anything to me:
Malchut, Yesod, Hod, Netzach, Gevurah, Chesed, Tiferet, Binah, Chochmah
, and
Keter
.

Tree of Life

Beneath the diagram were the words “Tree of Life.”

The next page described the diagram of the Sefirot, of the Tree of Life, as the ten emanations of God’s “qualities” here on Earth. It went on to say that the Kabbalist—anyone who studies the Kabbalah—would exert himself to perfect, or embody, each quality on the tree. He could even go so far as to think of the tree as his own body, and at the same time, as a kind of a blueprint of the energy makeup of the entire universe.

In the first pages of the book, I was reacquainted with Martin’s statement that perhaps God is the best within all of us, as the writer explained that the essence of each of us and that all of Creation is one and the same … and this means that the Tree of Life is within each of us, just waiting to be tapped into. When a person does this, he taps into the nature of God.

I didn’t fully understand what I was reading, or why Martin might have wanted me to read it. But I pushed on, repurposing my excellent note-taking skills to try to untangle the complicated rhetoric that was so foreign to me.

I made a list of the ten emanations of God, and next to each I wrote a modern, English translation as I found them in the book:

Malchut: Kingdom

Yesod: Foundation

Hod: Awe

Netzach: Victory

Gevurah: Judgment

Chesed: Lovingkindness

Tiferet: Balance

Binah: Knowledge

Chochmah: Wisdom

Keter: Crown

I stared at the list, rendered in my neat handwriting. I knew what each of these English words meant … at least, I
thought
I did. But placed in a list like this, these words seemed to be more meaningful together than any one of them would be on its own.

I felt a tingle in my spine, a strange sensation like the one I sometimes got just before a moment of déjà vu. Curious, I turned to the next page of the book.

In the morning, I woke, groggy, to the smell of a turkey in the oven. I took a deep breath … Christmas.

I found Daddy at work in the kitchen, chopping up potatoes and dropping them into a pot of water on the stove.

“You must have gotten up early to get the turkey started,” I said.

“Crack of dawn,” he answered with a smile, but something about it didn’t seem sincere.

“Daddy? What’s the matter?” I felt wary, almost scared.

He looked at first as if he was going to deny that anything was wrong, but then his face fell and he sighed. “You’re going to find out; I might as well tell you. Your mother went downstairs last night, after you’d gone to bed.… She saw the tree, Scarlett.”

“So? It wasn’t supposed to be a secret.” I felt a hard knot forming in my stomach.

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Daddy said.

“What are you talking about?” I felt tears springing to my eyes and I fought back a panicky sensation.

He shook his head, miserable, and I saw his eyes dart to the window over the kitchen sink. I pushed past him and peered out down onto the yard.

There was our Christmas tree, still decorated, pine branches akimbo, thrust up against the trash cans.

It was one of the saddest things I’d ever seen. Hot tears streaked down my cheeks and I felt the knot in my belly spread to a tightness in my chest.

“She had no right,” I seethed, teeth clenched. “She’s not the only person who matters in this family.”

“Your mom is in a lot of pain right now, Scarlett.” Daddy’s voice was strained and nervous-sounding, like he was trying really hard to keep things together.

“I’m sick of Mom’s pain,” I said. “I’m sick to death of all of our pain.”

I stormed out of the kitchen and down the hall to my mother’s room. I hated her closed door; I hated the dark shadow of sadness that seeped out from under it. I thought maybe I hated my mother, too.

I saw my hand on the doorknob; I saw the doorknob turning; behind me, I felt my father’s panic rising to a palpable level, his desire to keep the peace at all costs suddenly costing much too much.

My hand dropped to my side. I trudged down the stairs
and retrieved the ornament box from the front hallway before going outdoors to the tree.

One by one, as if picking fruit, I plucked the ornaments from the plastic branches, wrapping each one in paper and then placing them gently in the plastic bin.

That was Christmas. None of us mentioned presents, and when Daddy presented the turkey dinner at two that afternoon, I wasn’t home to eat it. I wandered down to the seashore, watching the gentle drift of the waves against the sand, and I counted, over and over again, the days until Will would come home to me.

At last, New Year’s Day came and went, and then school resumed. Will had sent me a text from the road, telling me that he wouldn’t make it to school because of the ferry schedule but he would be back on the island in time for rehearsal after school.

He had never sent me a text before. I tried not to let it bother me that he was sending one now instead of calling, but then I decided that if it bothered me so much, I should just call him. So I did—but he didn’t answer.

Mrs. B had scheduled rehearsals for three afternoons a week over on the Casino’s stage. Our high school plays were kind of a big thing for island locals; even people who didn’t have kids at the high school turned out to watch us perform.

Brandon Becker and Katie Ellis had been cast in the other leading roles, along with Will and me. Brandon was playing Jack Worthing, and Katie was his fiancée, Gwendolen Fairfax.

Mrs. B had posted a list of which scenes we’d be practicing on which days; today we’d be rehearsing scenes from the second act, so the four of us—Will, Brandon, Katie, and me—all had to be there, as well as Amanda, who played my governess, Miss Prism, and Connell, who’d been cast as John’s manservant, Merriman. Mr. Steiner, the vice principal, was playing the Reverend. Mr. Steiner had earned a Drama minor back in the mid-eighties, and he loved to get involved with the school plays whenever he could swing it.

Will rushed into the theater just as Mrs. B was staging the first scene between me and Katie. My heart leaped to my throat when I saw him shutting the doors against the windstorm outside and slipping into a seat in the second row, his script in hand.

My hand shot up in a wave, and I heard Connell snickering offstage. He murmured, “Big Red’s got the hots for the Jew, all right.”

His comment barely registered with me; what I was focused on was Will’s awkward half wave in return, the way his gaze glanced off of me and settled somewhere on stage left.

Nausea churned through my stomach. Something was wrong.

I spoke all my clever lines with Miss Prism, but I was distracted, and Mrs. B kept stopping the scene to tell me that I was rushing. Finally, after what felt like hours, she dismissed Amanda from the stage.

“All right, Will,” she called out. “You’re up. Let’s start with the engagement scene, shall we? Get that out of the
way. Places!” She clapped her hands sharply, obviously relishing her role as director.

I sat demurely in the garden chair and Will stood over me. This was the scene where we were to pronounce our love. I tried to catch Will’s gaze, to smile at him, but he wouldn’t meet my glance. He ran his eyes across his lines, though if I’d had to guess, I’d have said that he wasn’t seeing the words.

His brow was furrowed, and his dark lashes hid his eyes from me.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Mrs. B called out, motioning with her hands for us to get going.

I knew for a fact that Will had all his lines memorized. Still, he didn’t lift his eyes from the script as he spoke his first line: “I hope, Cecily, I shall not offend you if I state quite frankly and openly that you seem to me to be in every way the visible personification of absolute perfection.”

And though his words were, most certainly, the words every girl longs to hear from the boy she loves, his tone was flat and distant, tinged with despair.

The scene went on like that until Will knelt at my feet to declare, “What a perfect angel you are, Cecily.”

I was to reply “You dear, romantic boy,” and then we were to kiss, and I was supposed to run my fingers through his hair.

He said his line, and I said mine, full of fear, and then our mouths came together in a kiss.

But it wasn’t a kiss. Our lips touched, my hand found its place in his hair, but that was all. The electric spark I had
come to associate with Will’s touch was all but extinguished, and the press of his lips felt mechanical against mine.

My eyes swelled with tears, but when we pulled apart I managed to murmur, right on cue, “I hope your hair curls naturally, does it?”

“Cut there,” called Mrs. B, dissatisfied, from her seat in the audience.

“The Jew’s not much of a kisser,” I heard Connell mutter to Brandon offstage. Next to me, it seemed that Will stiffened, but he didn’t turn.

“I don’t know, I’m not really buying the connection,” Mrs. B said. “No romantic energy. Let’s try it again, just the last part, with the kiss.”

She ran us through the scene four times. Each time, the kiss felt more plastic, more distant, until at last, during the fourth run-through, I clutched Will’s hair desperately in my hands and forced my mouth hard against his, pressing my body into his cold embrace. And then, as if against his will, his hands slid around my waist and his mouth grew soft and warm. I clung to him as long as I could, as if by prolonging this moment, I could force away his coldness to me.

But at last Will pulled away, his green eyes troubled.

My line came out breathy, all in a rush—“I hope your hair curls naturally, does it?”

“Yes, darling, with a little help from others,” murmured Will, and he untangled himself from my arms, taking a deliberate step away from me.

“That’s the way,” applauded Mrs. B. “All right, people, we’ll call it a day. On Wednesday, get ready to run lines from act three.”

The others gathered up their scripts, books, and jackets, and filed out of the theater, chatting happily.

Mrs. B followed them, and called out over her shoulder at us, “Be sure to pull the door tight when you leave.” Then she was gone, and we were alone.

I turned to Will. He seemed guarded, as if determined to keep his distance from me.
Probably in case I decide to attack him again
, I thought bitterly.

“What happened?” I asked.

He shrugged. “You didn’t do anything wrong, Scarlett.”

His words echoed my father’s from Christmas morning. I felt a flush of anger rising in my stomach.

“I know that,” I said. “What’s wrong with you?”

He seemed to choose his words carefully. “It’s nothing you can change,” he began at last. “It’s just … we’re a bad idea, Scarlett, you and me. I’m not good for you.”

“But you said … you promised you wouldn’t leave me.” I hated the way I sounded. Whiny, grasping, like one of those girls I couldn’t stand.

He shook his head. “It’s nothing you can change,” he repeated.

“You lied,” I seethed, and I stumbled offstage, blinded by my tears. I yanked my jacket off the chair and fumbled for my bag.

As I slammed through the doors, out into the windy evening, I heard his voice saying something, but I couldn’t hear his words over the sound of my sobs. The wind wailed too, and it pushed at my back, driving me away, along the edge of the sea, away from Will.