[P] there is no sugar in the promised land

[Hagar]

HAGAR IESHAN

i must learn to be content
with being happier than i deserve

O

n the day of the party, I am radiant: red as the setting sun and gold as the risen one, waltzing from room to room with vases full of primrose and snowberry branches that I take out of the servants' hands with a wink and set in their places. Some of them smile--most of these are forced in a way that they never quite are with my siblings; it is no small feat to secure a job with out family and I think than often my attempts at grace come across more as an insult to their profession than an act of kindness--but more of them incline their heads and reach back into their baskets, where there seems to always be more cupped primrose, more small but plump snowberries with no end.

Yesterday I saw Adonai, carefully watching our hall of statues, I think choosing the best of the best of them to stand at the front. Sometimes I think of him and it doesn't seem real. Sometimes I look at him, like now, as I cross from the main hall through the door to the courtyard and he is just behind me--still thinking, still staring--that he is still not so different than he was.

This is a lie, of course. Nothing could be more different. We are a fractured family. I think we always have been. I think I was the only one who did not see right away.

I am carrying silk the same shimmering wine as my robe to the corner of the courtyard when Ruth finds me. Hagar, she says, what are you working on? I have always liked our brothers best-- women are complicated and messy and often hard to talk to, even if they are your kind of women, even if they are your family--but I have always liked Ruth the best. Ruth does not ask me hard questions about who I am. Ruth does not challenge me to be any better than I am capable of being.

Ruth sees me and knows, I think, that I am trying. We are trying. It does not matter that neither of us would say this out loud, to each other. We are trying.

I smile at her, holding one square of neatly folded fabric out to her. "Carrying these over there," I answer, already walking toward the abstract shape of a booth made out of the same bony white trees that Pilate brought in to hang baubles and lights from. I don't stop to see if she takes the fabric or if I'm still holding it when I arrive-- I am too busy giving my work an appraising look. "I figured we could use a party game. Somehow, Pilate agreed truth or dare would be fun."

I give her a sidelong glance, smiling conspiratorially.

"And you're...?"

@Ruth