Ruth: Reimagined

Promise

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Promise
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Her body trembled slightly, and she held herself in a tight embrace. She was sure her bones would break. It all went quiet, deep within Ruth’s soul. The silence echoed from the other rooms, too, with the weeping having come to an abrupt stop in the middle of the night.

Sitting at the foot of the bed in the dark, she stared, at empty space, wide awake, with a far-off look in her eyes. The grip, she held her arms in, was starting to bruise, yet still she held on.

And, slowly, like it had waited all day for this moment— because as Mahlon, and Chillion’s body were taken away by stoic, strong men, who held, no understanding of the worth, of the people they were carrying off, while the women, weeped bitterly, all of them shaken to the core, by the loss, it still felt impossible, like a horrible, horrible dream; even when their bodies, were washed, and dressed in white— and there was no warmth in the hold of his hand, and Mahlon looked deathly pale, and he didn’t turn at her entrance, neither did he react to her voice, like he always did.

It still felt impossible. Even as their graves were dug, and it was time to put them in, and in a mess of crazed grief—Naomi fell into the graves  of one of her  sons, pleading for them to wake up before it was all over.  Ruth watched on, her body cold, as Orpah, who was still a weeping mess, pulled Naomi out of the grave.

And then they were buried, covered by the dust of the earth. The men who had helped said their goodbyes, and the three women were left to mourn in the cave, in a deep silence that echoed in their tortured souls.

Even then, for Ruth, it all still felt, still seemed impossible. When they all stumbled back into the house, when the sun had set, and the darkness covered the earth in a blanket, they wordlessly parted ways and stepped into their rooms. After about an hour, where Ruth was sure everyone was asleep, Orpah broke the silence with her heart-wrenching wails.

It wasn’t long before Naomi’s wails were heard, too. Although they were softer, they came from the deepest parts of her, they dragged on, achingly in painful sounds.

It was hard to sleep through a storm such as this. One that had wrecked their lives forever. It was a storm, Ruth knew well, one that had tortured her for years and years.

She still had the scars to show, the pain seared forever in her memories. It was a storm  she was certain she would not have to face again, yet there she was in the midst of the storm, with another dead loved one  to add to her list, with a heart that had been shattered, and mended, and shattered and mended, that once again, lay shattered.

With the wails, from both Orpah and Naomi, gripping her soul, as she held herself tightly, till she bruised— the wells,  within her, broke forth again, a slow cracking, her soul bled again, as the tears slipped past her eyes.

It was extremely hard to sleep through grief. If they were to sleep, if they were to allow the heaviness to overtake them, to slip into an abyss that called out to them, then when they woke up, it would all feel too real.

At one point, during the night, the weeping from all sides came to an abrupt halt. In the silence, Ruth was consumed by a turmoil of feelings.

“Gone,” she whispered, and then the silence spoke back to her in a weeping of its own, deep, dragged out and drowning.

And then the door creaked open, and Ruth’s head snapped towards it. Orpah stood, peering in, with an oil lamp, her eyes red, cheeks stained with dried tears. She slowly dragged her eyes over the big room and witnessed how Ruth took up a small place of it, not even laying on the bed.