Mother Maccabees

The woman had never cried a day in her life. Life had never been enough to make her think of wasting tears on it.

She didn’t cry when she had become a woman and they were still boys. She had long blond hair and her curves flowed from an otherwise chiseled frame. She had to work hours on the farm before walking miles to school with her books. They were heavy because she liked them that way: chemistry, philosophy, languages many both extant and exhausted. And then it was hours of labor until bed. There was no waste on her body or in her mind. Every moment had to be used to better herself. The very thing that made her strong and lovely made her erstwhile suitors ashamed of their petty thoughts and brutish charms. They all knew she would be no mere farmer’s wife and felt something less of themselves because of it.

She didn’t cry when her father died. That tree of a man was what her family was built around. The only thing larger than his frame was his heart, the only thing stronger than his haunches was his will. For eighteen years he suffered the burden of having one daughter and no sons on a dusty farm in the outlands. His yields were always barely enough to feed the family and never enough to bring to market. Never once did he raise his voice to her or her mother. Never once did he wish for more than he had. Never did he rest: her mother had chided him for not attending services, but the one time he did rustlers made off with both cows and half the chickens. Her mother never questioned him after that. His instincts in caring for her and her mother were always right, though he was too gentle to argue with them. They learned to trust him. They buried him in a pine box on the farm he had worked and they had to sell.

She did not cry when the academy refused her application. They did not believe a girl from the dusty outlands could have amassed such an academic resume as her. They thought it best to quietly turn her down, to spare her reputation. Her mother was furious, and she was too. At least a little. It seemed unfair. But it was what she had come to expect from life. So she didn’t think of crying then.

She didn’t cry when she met Job. She felt love. And more than that admiration: this young man was better than his peers. He reminded her of her father, and her mother loved him well. She and he would stay up all night debating. Arguing vigorously over some finer point of law or logic. She would devour the materials he brought from the academy. Never sure which she was more happy to see when he came on the weekends: he or his books. But when they both left come monday she found herself smiling over what he had said more that what she had read.

She didn’t cry when mother was arrested. The Legion had a new commander who hated the old ways, and she refused to miss a service. They killed the preacher. They said he had taken a shot at one of the soldiers. Her mother saw, and she knew better. She visited her mother for as long as they let her. Her mother always asked after Job, and asked about her job at the bank, and asked for a scripture. The soldiers would always take her mother’s holy books in a day or two, but she kept bringing them. As long as she could until they moved her mother and she never saw her mother again.

She didn’t cry when Job proposed. He had gotten a job, a good job. He had a house, and there was nothing but good things in the future he offered to share with her. She was happy, and said yes with a smile. She walked herself down the aisle. Only his family came. Only his family could come: hers was gone. They had a honeymoon. An awkward first night followed by much practice. She and her husband were happy.

She didn’t cry when the first baby came. She had labour pains all-off-a-sudden, and she didn’t know any better. Never had she seen her mother labor, ‘cause none of her siblings had survived till birth. She thought to go to the hospital too late. She birthed her son in the bathtub. Her years of farm life helped her then. The pain was such she broke off the tub’s spicket. Her beautiful boy came, and he cried out, and she offered him her breast, and he was content. They named him after her father.

She did not cry when Job told her he wanted to become a preacher. He wanted to give it all up: the house in the city, their friends, their children’s toys and tutors. He wanted to buy an old dusty farm in the outlands and preach the truth. He said it was something he was called to do. He couldn’t be happy till he did. He traded their happy future for a gamble. And she went with him. It wasn’t her dream, none of it was, but she loved him and she was his wife. His partner.

She didn’t cry when they lied about her family. The small town lived on whispers, and followers of the way were outside of the norms of tolerance. They said her children were tortured, that she was brainwashed, that Job was a womanizer. She heard it all. The whispers were not whispered. Outland folk were as subtle as the land they worked, and she was far too perceptive to be a simple preacher’s wife.

She didn’t cry when the rumors turned out to be true. Job had faltered. While she was keeping the farm and teaching the children, he had kept a mistress. He came to her crying and ashamed. He begged for her forgiveness. She wondered at him: this man was nothing like her father. Of course she forgave him, and he did reform. Never again did he stray, and never again did they share a bed.

She did not cry when the legion came back. Not satisfied with their previous attempts to silence the truth. They made it illegal to believe. It was a treason to follow the way. Was it belief or stubbornness that killed her husband? It hardly mattered to the widow with many children. He had been shot as he carried comfort to a dying woman. It was his mistress from long ago, now herself consecrated to the truth. The town whispered. More like grumbled. The preacher’s family was blamed for the legion’s presence. They were not wrong.

She didn’t cry when her eldest son was killed before her. She felt her breast burn as he lay gasping and looking up at her. She wanted to scoop him up, press him to her bosom, and silence his pain with her womanhood. But they would not let her. One by one they asked the same question they had asked her eldest, and one by one her children died for what Job had believed. The youngest girl they split in two. And her baby, the two year old boy, he cried until it was his turn. And then by some miracle he said clear as day that he loved the truth and would not forsake the way. They killed her six times that day. Left with nothing but bitterness she did not cry.

She did not cry. The town hid her. The neighbors begged her forgiveness. They had seen what the legion had done, they had seen her children’s witness. They believed as Job had. They listened to her every word and kept her as their hidden treasure. They brought their young to her for her blessing and their sick she comforted. Marriage she would not perform. Many young men rose up and drove away the legion for a time. They rebuilt the preacher’s house, and she lived there in peace. In time other preachers came, and the townsfolk left her be.

She did not cry. No divine sign came to comfort her as she saw the legion come back in force. She wondered if it had been good, this life of hers lived longer than her ambition, her love, or her children, and never really with any belief. When the officer asked her if she rejected the way, if she refused the truth, she said through virgin tears: “what other way do I have, what other truth can you give me?” He killed her quickly, there in that house Job had built on that dusty farm in the outlands she had loved all her life, and this she thought a small mercy.