Random unrelated stuff

The Leper

*disclaimer* i wouldn't consider this story PG 13. PG maybe. but wattpad wouldn't let me mark it any lower :P

i wrote this years ago. It was kinda like word vomit; i just typed it all out to convey  a single emotion. then, after reading it over, i decided that it was way too emotional. disgusted with my gushiness, i tucked this story into a "junk" file on my computer and forgot about it.

until now......

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She could hear the dirt crunch beneath her feet, but she couldn't feel a thing as she stepped forward hesitantly, and she cursed the days long ago when she had wished for a life without pain. 

She didn't know what made her walk toward this man, dragging her diseased and decaying body with her. He didn't look any different from the others, the ones who had exiled her and beaten at her in every way they could. 

He spoke of brotherhood. She remembered all too vividly the day when her older brother had seen her walk through burning coals without seeming pained and hit her arms on doorframes without pausing to curse.  She was sent with damnations and blows to the Leper's Court even before the ragged sores began to form on her body. 

She had gone to the temples often to pray, crying "unclean" before her like a spear dripping with blood that parted the crowds shuddering from her path. Even now the people, many of them sick as well, though not with something so heinous as leprosy, darted from before her and closed behind to stare at the tenacity of a leper woman approaching a healthy man without remembering to inform everyone around to stay away. She was too mesmerized and intent on her hope and fear to remember to yell out her brand, her mark, her disease.  They could only stare at the tell-tale bandages that covered most of her. 

She could hear Him speaking of a temple. She remembered kneeling on the temple steps because even the gentiles who had come to worship did not want her to contaminate the inside. 

They called Him Rabbi, Teacher. The Rabbis that passed her on their way to perform their holy duties had spit on her, hit her, thrown stones that opened her wounds farther, did any demeaning thing they could without coming too close. At these times she had been wryly thankful that at least her sickness prevented them from grabbing her, twisting her wrists, dragging her to some dark alley, and punishing her for her mysterious sin. They could only curse and jeer at her. Their words tore at her even more than the virus under her skin. What must she have done to bring on Jehovah's judgment in such a way? Even she didn't know. The Holy Men had not refrained from adding insult to injury by guessing. They defaced her honor, her honesty, her obedience, everything. She said nothing to deny any of it. Whatever they said might have had a grain of truth to it, and this was one of the pains of being a woman and a leper. She must never speak out in anger, especially not to a Teacher of the Law. And they were all like that. What made her think that the man she was stumbling toward on deformed feet would be otherwise? 

He wasn't handsome, he didn't speak elegantly, he was not learned. The dirt that covered him showed that he was not rich. But His eyes spoke of kindness. He had healed so many already. He claimed to be the Son of Jehovah. If anyone could ask God to take the curse from her, he could. But would he? Was he like the others?

He could help her. She put another foot on the ground in front of the other. But would He? She raised a bandaged hand absently to brush away a fly that had smelled her death. Was He just another man who would curse and hurt her? She hoped that her hope wasn't ill-founded. She wished that, somehow, her fears would not be true as they always had been. 

If He would just kill her, He would prove His mercy. If only He would lessen the pain. 

She had heard of Him forgiving the sins of those who came to Him. Maybe, once she her iniquity was taken from her, she would not suffer like this. Would He do that for her, a leper, a woman, a sinner?

She imagined what she would say to Him, even as she went forward. She imagined Him laughing scornfully at her pleas. Her mind saw Him kick at her, the light in His eyes distant and withheld. She almost turned back. But He was looking at her now, and she knew she had to try. She couldn't live like this anymore. If He turned her away, as she was almost sure He would, she would kill herself rather than live the rest of her days rotting in a pool of curses and sins. 

A man standing beside Him bent; his hand opened wide to fold around a stone. She closed her eyes and flinched from the expected blow, but rushed forward to close the remaining distance to Him. Her decayed legs could not recover from her sudden speed. She sprawled on her hands and knees before Him. Tears gathered in her eyes. She didn't open her eyes. She could hear His robes rustle as He moved. He would hit her. She held still for the judgment. She couldn't help but think that she would cherish His strike for all of it's anger because He had deigned to touch her. She sat expecting His wrath.

She just barely felt his hand on her cheek. She stiffened. But she didn't feel the pain. The tears flowed unchecked from her closed eyes. She was too sinful to even receive His punishment. Then she frowned. She could feel the cloth bandage fall from her face. Had He hit her that hard? How had she not felt that? Had her disease taken the feeling from her face as well?

She was overcome by pure shock. She felt warmth on her cheek. It could not have been the sting of the slap. Was He really? No He couldn't be...

She opened her eyes. His palm cradled her cheek. She looked up to His eyes in surprise. And wonder of wonders, He looking at her, and He was smiling. She closed her eyes again in relief and contentment. She felt so overcome with joy that she couldn't do anything but sit there. She couldn't believe any of this. But she desperately wanted to believe it. She could almost believe that He loved her, she that her own family despised. She knelt in contentment before Him, as healing flowed from His hand and eyes over her broken and cracked soul.