The Book of Longings(118)

“Go to Jerusalem? Now?” said Martha.

“Mary said he sometimes prays in the Garden of Gethsemane,” I said. “We might find him there.”

“It’s almost the second watch of the night,” she argued.

Lavi had been slumped against the wall, nearly invisible in the shadows of the house, but he stepped forward now. “I will go with you.”

“It’s foolish to venture into the valley at this hour,” Lazarus said. “It seems Jesus has decided to spend the night on the hillside. He’ll return in the morning.”

Mary took my arm. “Come, you’re weary. Let’s get you to bed. Martha prepared you a fresh mat in Tabitha’s room.”

“I’ll leave at daybreak,” I said, sending Lavi a grateful smile, then let myself be led away, stopping to retrieve Jesus’s cloak. I would sleep in the folds of it.





ii.


I woke late, well past dawn. I felt for Jesus’s cloak beside me on the mat, then sat up and slipped it over my tunic.

Moving across the room, I glanced at Tabitha, trying not to wake her. I bent over the basin and splashed a palmful of water across my face, then delved through my few belongings until I found the little pouch with the red thread. I wrapped it about my left wrist, laboring to knot it with my other hand.

Lavi was waiting for me in the courtyard. If he wondered at my wearing Jesus’s mantle, he didn’t say so. Nor did he mention the hour. He handed me a piece of bread and a hunk of cheese, which I ate hungrily.

“How will we find him?” Lavi whispered.

“We’ll begin at the Garden of Gethsemane. Perhaps he slept there.”

“Do you know where this garden is?”

“It’s at the foot of the Mount of Olives. Last night Tabitha told me of a path that leads there from the village.”

I must’ve looked racked with worry, for he gave me a searching look. “Are you all right, sister?”

Sister. The word caused me to think of Judas. I didn’t know how to go on being sister to him. I wanted to answer Lavi that I was well and he shouldn’t worry, but I sensed there was some great portending darkness out there.

“Brother,” I said, my voice cracking a little.

I stood and walked to the gate.

“We will find him,” Lavi said.

“Yes, we will find him.”

As we descended the slope, the sun climbed into thick clouds. Everywhere pilgrims were waking beneath the olive trees, the whole hillside seeming to undulate. We walked rapidly, quietly. The hymn I’d written to Sophia began to sing in my ears.


I was sent out from power . . .

Be careful. Do not ignore me.


I am she who exists in all fears and in trembling boldness





* * *



? ? ?

IN THE GARDEN, I dashed through the trees, calling Jesus’s name. No one answered. He did not step out of the gnarling shadows and open his arms, saying, “Ana, you’ve come back.”

We wandered through every part of the garden. “He’s not here,” Lavi said.

I came to a standstill, the frantic feeling still going in my chest. I’d been so sure I’d find him here. All night, as I’d wandered in and out of sleep, my mind had pulsed with images of this garden at the foot of the Kidron.

Where is he?

In the distance, I could see the Temple protruding beyond the city wall, casting its white dazzle in the air, and next to it the towers of Antonia, the Roman fortress. Lavi followed my gaze. “We should go and search in the city,” he said.

I was trying to imagine where in the vast maze of Jerusalem he could be—the Temple courts? the Pool of Bethesda?—when I heard someone moaning. The sound was deep and guttural, coming from the trees behind us. I started toward it, but Lavi stepped in my path. “Let me go and be certain there’s no danger.”

I waited as he ventured into the grove, disappearing behind an outcrop of rocks. “Ana, come quickly,” he called.

Judas sat on the ground hunched over his knees, rocking back and forth, making a godforsaken sound. “Judas! My Lord and my God, what has happened?” I knelt and placed my hand on his arm.

His crying ceased with my touch. He spoke without looking up. “Ana . . . I saw you . . . from a distance. I didn’t mean to draw your attention. . . . Do not look at me . . . I cannot bear it.”

A sudden coldness formed inside me then. I shot to my feet. “Judas, what did you do?” When he didn’t answer, I shouted, “What did you do?”

Lavi had kept a tactful distance, but he was beside me now. I didn’t take time to explain what was happening, but stooped once more in front of my brother, fighting to drive the fear and outrage from my throat. “Tell me, Judas. Now.”

He looked up and I saw it in his eyes. “You handed Jesus over to the Romans, didn’t you?”

I’d meant to hurl the accusation, wanting it to strike him like a slap, but the words came out in a whisper, floating into the quietness like a moth or a butterfly, its wings a thing of incomprehension. Judas squeezed his hand into a fist and struck himself hard in the chest. There was a leather pouch filled with silver coins opened beside him on the ground; he grabbed it and flung the money into the trees. I watched, breathless, as the coins fell to the ground and lay there glinting like the shed scales of some grotesque creature.