"Kiss goodbye to me,
Wish me luck in my endeavor
Dog will keep you company
And you'll stay here forever"
~~Children of Eden
~~*~~
Adam had been sitting with the dog. Adam liked sitting with the dog. It was a plain creature, half as tall as Adam, not nearly as broad, four-legged and brown-furred. A simple creature. Adam liked simple creatures. Eve had always been attracted to the flashy, the colorful, the complicated. She liked peacocks and butterflies and leopards and gryphons and platypuses. Platypuses, honestly. Adam wasn't quite sure what Father had been thinking when he made that one.
Adam liked the dog. He wasn't exactly pretty, but he had a simple sort of charm. Adam liked things like that. Things he understood, things he didn't feel compelled to question. The dogs looked up at him with big chocolate brown eyes, and Adam knew he had the dog's loyalty and affection. Nothing was going to change that.
Eve liked the cat. Adam didn't exactly understand this. The cat was pretty enough, but sometimes it acted like Eve's friend and sometimes it didn't. Sometimes it would listen to Eve, and sometimes it would run off to do as it pleased. Even more perplexing was that Eve didn't seem to mind. Eve would just laugh and say that if the cat could be controlled, she wouldn't like the cat as much. Adam didn't quite grasp this concept, either.
Adam was patting the dog's head when Eve came down the path. She was doing something new. She was… making music. Adam stood up, startled. He'd never heard Eve make music before. He had heard music -- Mother and some of her attendants played music. But Eve had never made music.
She was humming. Somewhere between Lucifer and Adam, Eve had discovered that she could hum. On the periphery of her consciousness was the fact that she could sing, too, but she hadn't yet worked up the nerve to make that step. But she flounced along the path, humming an aimless tune and skipping a little bit. She'd finished her fruit and tossed the pit into the forest, vaguely aware that the seeds would make a new tree. Will it be another Tree of Knowledge? she wondered. Or will it just be a normal fruit tree? Maybe the seeds of the Tree of Knowledge make something littler than the Tree of Knowledge… the Bush of Theories? The Shrubbery of Supposition? Eve giggled girlishly. All these new thoughts were occurring to her, and while it was overwhelming, it was also heady and exciting.
"Eve?" Adam said apprehensively. "Something's… different."
The tremor in his voice shook her from her merry attitude. She looked down at the fruit clutched in her right hand and remembered what she had to do. "Adam… I think… I think I'm going away," she said at last. Adam blinked at her, making her wince. Those eyes… she thought. Big and blue… so clear, so innocent… did mine look like that before?
"What do you mean, you're going away?" he asked. The dog was head-butting his leg, wanting to be petted again.
"I mean… I mean I think I've found a way through that wall of trees. I'm going to go see what's on the other side."
"But—"
Eve didn't let him get any further. "Now, you've got the choice to come with me if you want to, but I don't really think you do," she said quickly. "You… you like it here. And not that I don't! But I want to see what else there is… what's on the other side…" Her gaze drifted away, over the tops of the trees, where the garden stopped but the cerulean blue sky continued. "I've got to see what's out there."
"Will you be back?" Adam asked plainly.
She turned her eyes back to meet his. For the second time in all existence, they were welling with tears. "I… I don't know," she replied. "I honestly… just… don't know."
Adam was starting to panic. Eve can't be leaving. That's… not right. It just isn't. That's not the way things work. "But… but you can't leave. Then there would only be one of us. There are… there are supposed to be two." Adam couldn't say how he knew this, but every particle of his being affirmed the statement.
"I'm sure Elohim will make you another sister," Eve said consolingly.
"But I don't want another sister. I want you to be my sister." There was a trace of desperation in his guileless voice now.
"I… I can't be, Adam."
He blinked at her. The dog whined. "I don't understand."
Eve tugged on one of her dark curls, thankful that it hung over her body before realizing that Adam wouldn't realize anything was wrong. "Well… you said it, didn't you? Something's different. And it's different enough that… that I can't be your sister anymore."
She dared to glance up at him, only to wish she hadn't. He was staring at her, disbelieving, and Eve thought he would have been crying if he'd known how. His arms hung limp at his side. Strong arms, she thought, and wondered why she hadn't noticed before. A brief comparison of their bodies flashed through Eve's mind. He was built for strength; she for softness. Not that each wasn't capable of the other, but they had been constructed differently. I wonder if I will ever have the opportunity to ask Mother why…
At that moment, Eve felt something stir deep within her being, a strong desire she had never known before. She knew that so long as Adam was innocent as she had once been, those feelings would be trouble. "Adam, I have to go. You can't understand why." She felt a stinging at the back of her eyes, and then those tears were back. Will I be crying all the time now? She wiped at her eyes with the back of one hand. "You can come with me if you want… if… if you eat this—" She held out the fruit Lucifer had given her. "Then you'll be like me."
"Then can I be your brother again?"
No, her mind said, but Eve's mouth opted for more tact. "You will be like me. We can be close again."
Adam knew she was evading the question, but decided not to call her on it. Tentatively, he reached out and took the proffered fruit from her hand. "Wh-where did you get this?"
"You know," she said simply, gazing at him with blurred vision.
He gaped. "Eve – you didn't!"
"No, I didn't. The angel Lucifer plucked the fruit. I only took it."
"That's just as bad."
"No!" Eve felt the childish instinct to stamp her foot. "No, it isn't bad! I don't know why Father wanted us to think it was! But it's good, Adam. It's good to know what I know."
"You don't look happy," he stated, and Eve had to concede him that point.
"I didn't say it made me happy," she replied. "I said it was good to know. In knowing, there is happiness and unhappiness."
"We have happiness now. Why trade it for—"
"Because there's so much more!" The desperation was in her voice now as she pleaded with him, though she understood the folly of trying to make an innocent see reason. I might as well be speaking to the dog. Eve sighed heavily. "Oh, Adam, there's so much more happiness than what you know now. You can't appreciate it all, and I can't describe it to you. I can only promise that the great pleasure is worth the pain."
Adam tore his gaze from Eve and looked at the fruit. So simple a thing, to make the world so confusing. "Wh-what do you want me to do?" he asked softly.
Eve started slightly. "What do you mean?"
"Do you want me to eat the fruit or not?"
"I want…" Eve had to stop. What do I want? Of course I want him to eat it, to be like me and come with me and be my partner and share the journey with me… but not if it will make him unhappy. She bit her lower lip. I couldn't bear it if he was unhappy… better to face the world beyond the Garden alone than to share it with a miserable Adam… She stepped forward and cupped Adam's cheek in her hand. "I want you to decide. If you think it will make you happy to know what I know, then eat. If you think your life is better spent here, then do not eat. The choice is not mine."
So close to Adam, Eve could tell how much he was trembling. Choice, she considered, is a terrifying thing. I am glad to have it, but… but it is still frightening. There is too much power in it…
"Eve… I don't know…" he said at last. "I can't… I can't…" He was stumbling over words that were unfamiliar to him. "I can't choose. Not… not so quickly, at least… do you have to go now?"
Eve nodded. "I'm afraid so. If I don't…"
"What will happen?"
"I don't know. But… but I know I have to go."
Adam felt the cold wetness of dog's nose against his leg. "I don't want you to."
"That is my choice. This—" She touched the fruit with one long finger. "This is yours." Eve moved backwards from him, aware that tears were now spilling freely onto her face. "I love you, Adam," she said. The words had been spoken before, but never with such understanding and meaning. "And the choice is yours."
A long few minutes of silence followed. Adam was probably unaware of it, as they had always been unaware of the passing of time but for the rising and setting of the sun. Eve, however, felt it keenly, felt the weight of each second pounding in her skull as she watched Adam, who was staring at the fruit. She wondered if he could feel the tension in the air as she could, and supposed not. To Eve, it seemed as though the very sinews of the universe were about to split, with so much weight balanced on this single moment.
After a small eternity, Adam looked up at Eve, clearly about to speak. But at that precise moment, the sky darkened, and a crack of thunder disrupted the air. Eve shrieked and threw herself against the nearest tree, wishing she could melt into it. Adam stood frozen, the fruit still cradled in his palm, too stunned by the intrusion to move.
Elohim had come.
[Authoress's Note:
[I'd like to thank everyone who has reviewed so far for being so kind. Next time – what *will* Mother and Father say?]