Mud Vein(12)

“Once they were tempted and ate the fruit they were on their own, exiled from God’s provision and his protection in the place he created for them.” When Isaac doesn’t say anything, I go on. “They leave perfection and have to fend for themselves—hunt, garden, experience cold and death and childbirth.”

I flush after the last word leaves my mouth. It was dumb of me to mention childbirth considering Daphne and their unborn baby. But Isaac doesn’t skip a beat.

“So you’re saying,” he says, crinkling his eyebrows together, “that so long as we stay here—in the place our kidnapper provided for us—we will be safe and he will keep the heat and food coming?”

“It’s just a wild guess, Isaac. I don’t really know.”

“So what’s the forbidden fruit?”

I tap my finger on the tabletop. “The keypad, maybe…”

“This is sick,” he says. “And if one painting means that much, what else is hidden in here?”

I don’t want to think about it. “I’ll make dinner tonight,” I say.





I look out the window as I peel potatoes over the sink. And then I look down at the peelings, all piled up and gross looking. We should eat those. We will probably be starving soon, wishing we had a sliver of potato skin. I scoop up shreds and hold them in my palm, not sure what to do with them. I counted the potatoes before I chose four of the smallest ones out of the fifty-pound bag. Seventy potatoes. How long could we stretch that? And the flour, and rice and oatmeal? It seemed like a lot, but we had no idea how long we’d be imprisoned here. Imprisoned. Here.

I eat the skins. At least they won’t go to waste that way.

God. I am grimacing and gagging on my potato skin when I drop the potato I’m holding into the sink and press the heel of my hand to my forehead. I have to focus. Stay positive. I can’t let myself sink into that dark place. My therapist tried to teach me techniques to cope with emotional overload. Why hadn’t I listened? I remember something about a garden … walking through it and touching flowers. Was that what she’d said? I try to picture the garden now, but all I see are the shadows that the trees make and the possibility that someone is hiding behind a hedge. I am so f*cked up.



“Need help?”

I look over my shoulder and see Isaac. I’d sent him upstairs to take a nap. He looks rested. Surgeons are used to the lack of sleep. He’s taken a shower and his hair is still wet.

“Sure.” I point to the remaining potato and he picks up a knife.

“Feels like old times,” I half smile. “Except I’m not catatonic and you don’t have that perpetually worried look on your face.”

“Don’t I? This situation is kind of dire.”

I put my knife down. “No, actually. You look calm. Why is that?”

“Acceptance. Embrace the suck.”

“Really?”

I feel his smile. Across the two feet of air between us and a sink speckled with new potato skins. For a minute my chest constricts, then the peeling is done and he moves away, taking his soap smell with him.

I have a need to know where a person is in a room at all times. I hear him in the fridge, he crosses the room, sits down at the table. By the noises he’s making I can tell that he has two glasses and a bottle of something. I wash my hands and turn away from the sink.

He is sitting at the table with a bottle of whiskey in his hands.

My mouth drops open. “Where did you find that?”

He grins. “Back of the pantry behind a container of croutons.”

“I hate croutons.”

He nods like I’ve said something profound.

We take our first shot as the meat is simmering in the skillet. I think it’s deer. Isaac says it’s cow. It really doesn’t matter since this sort of situation steals most of your appetite. We don’t really taste anything—deer or cow.

We both pretend that the drinking is fun instead of a necessity to cope. We click glasses and avoid eye contact. It feels like a game; click your glass, shoot whiskey, stare at the wall with a stiff smile. We eat our meal in near silence, faces hanging like limp sunflowers over our plates. So much for fun. We are coping willy-nilly. Tonight it’s with whiskey. Tomorrow it might be with sleep.



When we are finished, Isaac clears the table and washes our plates. I stay where I am, stretching my arm across the wood and resting my head on the table to watch him. My head is spinning from the whiskey and my eyes are watering. Not watering. Crying. You’re not crying, Senna. You don’t know how.

“Senna?” Isaac dries his hands on a dishtowel and straddles the bench to face me. “You’re leaking fluid otherwise known as tears. Are you aware of this?”

I sniff pathetically. “I just hate croutons so much…”

He clears his throat and squashes a smile.

“As your doctor I’d advise you to sit up.”

I sniff and straighten myself until I am in a sort of upright slump.

We are both straddling the bench, now, facing each other. Isaac reaches out both thumbs and uses them to clear my cheeks of tears. He stops when he is cupping my face between his hands.

“It hurts me when you cry.” His voice is so earnest, so open. I can’t speak like this. Everything I say sounds sterile and robotic.