Addison Fulton
In the end of the beginning, Eve says to Adam, “I want a divorce.” She is the first woman to say this, she will not be the last. ‘Divorce’ is one of the many words that flowed into her mind when her teeth pierced apple flesh. Other words included in the bunch were lie, betray, alone and love.
God hadn’t told Eve what love was because, in Paradise? She didn’t need to know.
“Fine. Me too,” says Adam. He crosses his arms over his chest, angry. That’s another one of their new words.
“Fine.”
“Fine.”
This is the first argument, the first domestic, the first spat.
“Why’d you eat that fucking apple?” Adam mumbles. It’s a cheap jab that’s meant to wound Eve’s recently acquired sin of pride.
“Why did you eat the apple?” She asks in return.
“Because you did! So why did you do it?”
Eve runs her tongue over the little piece of apple skin still stuck. Residual sweetness lingers on her tongue. Even now, especially now, as the desert spreads out all around them, she could really go for a cold glass of apple juice.
The apple was hers. In a sense. Or rather, the choice was hers. How little was hers? Not the garden. Not her ribcage. Not her heart.
But the little piece of apple skin, stuck in her teeth?
That’s for Eve.
Even now, she can feel its phantom sweetness. The give of it, under her teeth. Why give humans teeth for biting apples if she’s not supposed to bite apples?
But she supposes it doesn’t matter. Her mouth is designed it seems, to eat apples, but she wouldn’t have eaten it if she didn’t want to.
And she had wanted Adam to have a little of what was hers, a compulsion because, at the time, she hadn’t known the term love.
“I’m leaving you,” says Adam.
“Fine! Good,” says Eve. “You can do that now. You’ve got free will. So leave.”
Adam stays standing where he is. His hands shift. Those hands are free to do whatever now, but they can’t seem to choose what vulnerable place to cover first.
Eve covers her apple skin with her tongue.
“You leave,” says Adam.
“What?”
“You ate the apple first. You leave. I’m staying here. You start walking.”
“No,” says Eve. She grinds her foot in the earth and kicks up dirt. “Why do you want to stay?”
“Why do you want to stay?”
“You think the garden door is going to open again for you, don’t you? That’s so stupid,” and Eve laughs the first laugh that has ever been laughed.
Adam looks away from her, up at the giant wall separating the past from him, “I want to go back.”
It is the first hard truth ever to be spoken.
Eve laughs again, rage-filled joyous sounds falling out of her mouth. The apple skin has driven itself deep enough into her gums that they’ve started to bleed.
“Well, I don’t.”
It is the first important realization to ever be had.
“We’re going to die out here,” he tells her. “I don’t want that.”
“Then why did you eat the apple?”
“Because you did!” He repeats. “Because I trusted you and I loved you!”
Eve’s eyes run over him. His hand is currently protecting the spot where his rib used to be. Does she love him? Does she?
It’s such a new word to her. It’s so hard to define. Has Adam defined it? What does he mean?
“I want to be free.”
“I want to be safe.”
They are having the first disagreement. They are having one of the oldest.
“It appears we’ve hit a wall,” Eve says. She stares up at the first wall. It separates her from everything she’s ever known. It shoves her toward everything that one day will be known. The whole, horrible world stretches out beyond her.
“It appears we have.”
“Then we should go different ways.”
They come to the first agreement.
“You’ll go that way,” Eve says. “And I’ll go that way.”
“And if we ever see each other again, we’ll pretend we don’t know each other.”
And yet neither moves. They could. They have their free will, now. They are their own to control. And yet–
“Did you hear that, God?” Eve yells into the sky. It is so big, now. The leering eye of the sun is unhidden by flowers and fruit trees. She knows they’re being watched. “We want a divorce. We want to be separate now.”
God doesn’t answer them. Instead, He send am them ravens and vultures to circle overhead, waiting. Wolves prowl nearby. These creatures God has gifted the ability to mate for life. He has granted them mercy, and community. Simplicity. No apples for the vultures and the ravens.
They survive in pairs and packs.
“We’re free now,” Eve says. It is a horrible thing for a human to know.
“We stand a better chance of surviving if we stick together,” Adam says. It is a horrible thing to know.
“I chose to eat the apple,” Eve says.
“I know.”
“I’m not in love with you.”
“I know,” Adam says.
“I didn’t choose to be here.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t choose to be your wife.
“I know.”
The birds. The wolves. The sun. Beauty and death and love are all around them. Birds and wolves are less controlled by God. They choose their own mates. They choose their mates in order to survive, in order to make their children survive. They choose, but they have to. This is how they live.
“I love you,” Eve says.
“I love you too.”
“I have no choice.”
“You do,” Adam says. The birds and the wolves press closer. The first humans huddle closer to each other. “You could choose to die.”
“I could.”
“But you won’t?”
“But I won’t.”
Adam nods. He tips his head up toward the sky.
“I think that’s a good choice.”
Copyright Addison Fulton. All rights reserved.