Eve (53 page)

And then began the most unusual hours of Naava’s life. She was leapt upon by those vulgar women, who glared at her like hyenas, and transformed, with many pullings and proddings, into a vision of their design. Naava did
not understand their chatter. They seemed oblivious to her protests. They yanked on her hair and pulled on her eyelids and jerked her chin this way and that, grunting either their approval or repugnance.

The women laid out animal-hair brushes and small wooden boxes which, when opened, displayed the most astonishing colors of crushed stone and sparkling minerals. These the women stroked on her face, and Naava began to wonder what she looked like.

There were extraordinarily fine hairpieces made of lapis lazuli and magnetite and coral and agate, laid in fantastic shapes of butterflies and stars and frogs. There were gold and copper and silver bracelets and nose rings and necklaces, all with exquisite etchings.

When they were done with her face and hair, they moved to her hands and arms. Very carefully, the women used henna to paint flourishes and flowers and dots on Naava’s palms and fingertips and wrists, turning her hands this way and that to get at them properly. She had to sit for a long time to allow the artwork to dry. When she had sat long enough, they twisted her around and around to see what they might have overlooked.

Obviously the prince had chosen her to play Inanna because she was beautiful.

She only wished she could see what she looked like. She wanted to know what her parents would think when they saw her.
Would they see how wrong they’d been about her?

If asked, Naava would have said that the most glorious part of that day was when she was led up Inanna’s steps the back way. It was the moment when she realized that this was happening—
really
happening. She was going to be presented to all the people of the city—and to her family—as someone special, as someone of splendor.

The women had at last acquiesced and let Naava glimpse herself in a polished silver mirror at the very end of their preparations. What she beheld was a creature beyond her imagination, a woman so completely obliterated by adornment that she could not see any evidence of herself.
This is what it feels like to be Inanna,
she thought.
This is what it feels like to be a goddess.

So she carried herself like one. She pressed her shoulders back. She held her neck erect and her head high, which was difficult because she wore a heavy crown of wired leaves and butterflies and flowers that sprang exuberantly around her head with each and every step she took.

There were an abundance of steps to Inanna’s temple, and Naava felt slightly wilted by the time she reached the top. As she rounded the corner of the temple, she smelled the incense. She saw the sea of waiting people below and immediately felt a wave of dizziness pass over her. She heard the priestess’s voice reciting something in a booming voice.

Then, a pause. It was so quiet that Naava could hear a child cry out from below, followed by the parents’ whispered scoldings.

Just as quickly there was a rattling—a
shush shush shush
noise—from inside the temple. Naava glimpsed the terror on the people’s faces. Again the noise came from inside, and again came the gasps and quick genuflections of the crowd.

Only one small segment of the masses below did not bow, did not gasp. Adam and Eve stood near the front, agape at all the goings-on, not aware they should be afraid. Cain bowed. He understood the priestess’s words and the unusual sound. Dara smiled and whispered in his ear. He frowned, and his brow furrowed. He shook his head, lifted her up, and put her on his shoulders. Back and forth they talked, and at one point Cain seemed agitated with her and took her off his shoulders. Naava couldn’t see Dara anymore, the crowds were shoving so. When Cain crossed his arms and stared at Naava, she felt the smallest sense of unease wash over her.

She brushed it aside.
Just wait, just wait,
she thought.
The best is yet to come.

The only person I tell is Cain. When he bows to Inanna with all
the other people, I whisper in his ear about what Balili is doing way up there in the house on top of the steps with his bull rattle,
shush shush shush.
Cain doesn’t believe me at first.

“Balili showed it to me,” I told him.

Cain shakes his head and points at the little house. “It’s the breath of Inanna, come down to visit us.”

I shake my head. “No,” I say. “Here. Look.” I pull one out of my robe. “I was going to show you later.” I show him my baby rattle, shaking it close to his ear.

Cain looks around him and says, “You cannot mean all of these people are worshipping a rattle.”

I nod and pull on his robe, for him to lift me up.

He frowns and picks me up and puts me on his shoulders, so I can see the heads of all the people, like carrot tops sticking up from the ground. I can even see Zenobia and Puabi and Ahassunu and Shala bowing low to the ground and looking up at Bosom Lady at the top of the steps. And now there’s Inanna, the Queen of Heaven, with a crown of springy things around her head.

Cain looks up at me and says, “See? I told you so.”

“That’s Naava,” I say. “She’s going to live with the prince.” Cain sets me down real quick and grabs my arm. “What did you say?” I shrug. “Zenobia says she’s going to live with them. To make babies.” Cain looks and looks at me. He chews the inside of his mouth like Naava and Father do when they’re thinking about something. He lets me go and stands back up with his arms across his chest.

I tug at his robe again. I can’t see anything, except for hands and bellies and feet.

“Not now, Dara,” Cain says. His voice is scary angry.

When Mama called me over from Ahassunu and Zenobia, I had so much I had to learn about my family. Jacan had grown taller like me. Father had almost gotten eaten by that bad lion, and Abel and Jacan had saved him. Now he walked around like Aya.

I asked Mama where Aya was.

Mama said, “We had to leave her at the gate. You remember how the women startled at seeing her bad leg?”

I nodded.

Mama said, “Abel stayed with her. He is kind like that, you know.”

I nodded again, but then there came Aya, with Abel supporting her with his hand. It didn’t even look like Aya was limping! She was wearing a new robe, the color of Mama’s and her eyes, and now Aya holds her head up to the sky, instead of down to the ground.

Mama smelled good, like rain and lemons. She laughed and brushed up against Father all the time. I thought Father might tip over, but he didn’t, he just smiled and kissed Mama a lot.

Just look, I go away from my family, and they all go to sleep like caterpillars and wake up like butterflies. They are so different.

When the prince first led Naava away, Cain took us all to where two big men with red sweaty faces were roasting a boar and a gazelle over a big fire. Round and round the meat turned, crackling and popping and smelling like garlic and herbs. My insides growled, and my tongue watered. Cain sat everyone down at tables and went back to get some food. Thank the
stars and moon that I didn’t have to take care of those children for a while. It was just me and Aya taking care of Mama, now that she was going to have the baby.

It was funny. Mama drank too much beer, and the lines around her eyes got all crinkly like sand with ridges. After tasting the meat, she winked at Aya and said, “Well, Aya, I think you could teach them a few things.”

Aya looked at Abel really quick, then back at Mama, then she got as red as a fox’s tail.

“It’s true,” said Abel.

Aya hid her face with her hands. But she was smiling, I could tell.

The grown-up people were dancing all around us, round and round like the boar was spinning. A man came up to Mama and told her she was very beautiful; what was her name? She didn’t understand, so I told her what he said. Mama giggled and said, “Eve.”

“Eve,” he said. “Eve.” He put his hands on her eyelids, to see if her eyes were real. He told her that they were the lapis lazuli of the desert and kissed her hand. She smiled.

Father reached over and waved the man’s hands away.

“Oh, he’s not hurting anything,” said Mama.

Father frowned and hissed, “Have you forgotten what they did to Aya?”

“Look at him,” Mama said. “He’s an old man.”

“An old man with a penis,” said Father.

Jacan laughed, but Father was not amused.

So many men came up to Mama that Father moved over to sit next to her. If he saw anyone come close, he waved them away.

One of the men stopped to talk to Cain about his dates. He wanted to know what Cain was going to offer them now that his dates were gone.

Cain’s nose flapped like laundry hanging in the wind, and he put on his angry face. “Wait and see,” he said. “Why do you kick a man when he is down?”

Mama turned to me and said, “What does the man want?”

I said, “He wants Cain’s dates.”

Mama’s eyes flitted from Cain to the man, from the man to Cain. “Do you know the
secret
of my son’s dates?” Her eyebrows arched like mushroom
caps, and she laughed, giddy, and leaned her chin on her hands. “I taught him.” She grabbed Father’s arm. “
We
taught him. And guess who taught
us?
Elohim. Blessed be the name of Elohim.” She raised her beer goblet into the air. “Blessed be the name of Elohim.”

“Mother,” said Aya sharply. “That’s enough.”

Still, Mama laughed. She was starting to sound like Cain.

When Naava was presented to the masses, she understood nothing.
The priestess—the large round woman who had slaughtered the lamb in Naava’s family’s courtyard moons ago—addressed the crowd, and the people bowed to her. Suddenly there was a storm of clapping, and there he was, by her side, steadying her arm with his hand. “You are beautiful,” the prince whispered as he waved to the crowd. Naava sneaked a look at him and gasped. He had been decorated even more than she. Jewel after jewel had been piled on his chest, and he wore a skirt covered with shiny disks that tinkled as he moved. His face was masklike, and a thick gold band encircled his head. “Stay,” he murmured to Naava. “I must be cleansed.”