The Inner Rot

In the darkest part of the forest was a monster.

The monster was only a woman (in appearance), but her soul was filled with rot, and sometimes it filled her belly until she was gagging up mud into the waste bin. And on moonless nights, eerie things happened. Shadows played tricks, like making fingers look like twigs, making eyes glow like coals, making hair look like vines, and skin like pale bone.

But the woman wasn’t a monster. Not yet.

*

Eve was green-eyed, brown-haired, and as pretty as her mother, who was the prettiest woman in the village.

Her father named her Eve because she was his first daughter. My little apple, he called her. She won’t ever grow up and leave your daddy all alone, will she? And she would laugh and say, Maybe, Daddy. 

Daddy would poke her in the side and say, all the men in the village will fall in love with her one day and you had better not forget the man who loves you the most, no ma’am. Only room for one man in your heart, yeah, my little apple?

Her mother was a witch, and her father was a pastor. They had started out best friends as children, and grew up together. Still best friends, Mama would say. But Mama kept her mouth shut about magic and Daddy didn’t know a thing.

They loved each other, but Eve knew that her father loved God more.

(Only room for one man in your heart, yeah, my little apple?)

When Eve was little, she would stand by the pantry and watch as her mother made the tea boil, filled the water pitcher, and chopped the carrots for the soup - all at one, with a twist of the wrist and a mildly clouded-over look in her eyes.

Eve never told, because that was the first Rule her mother told her. Like a game, Mama would say. Secrets are fun.

This secret was fun, at first. Eve and her mama would sit by the lake and dip just their toes, because the water was cold but they liked it anyway. Mama would teach Eve how to skip stones further than they should go, and Eve showed her mother how she had learned to make a seed sprout without water.

But then there was a hanging.

Eve’s father took her, his nails drawing little moons on her wrist as he dragged her away from her mother.

She shouldn’t have to see, she shouldn’t have to, this is wrong, John, this is wrong-

Quiet, Mary, you be quiet now. You be quiet. These wicked women get what’s coming to them.

And later Eve had watched as they tied a rope around Mrs. Hess’s neck. Mrs. Hess was a fifth grade teacher and was putting devilish thoughts in our children’s minds was what the men said. 

(These wicked women get what’s coming to them.)

The men also whispered.

Sticking that nose where it doesn’t belong. Telling me how to do my job all the time, yessir. That woman was one-

Eve hadn’t watched when they kicked the stool from Mrs. Hess’s feet. She turned her eyes to her father instead, as though she might find answers lying behind that curtain of green eyes, the same shade as her own. The same shade as her mother’s.

Later she went home and cried in her Mother’s arms. When Daddy left for work the next morning, Eve left for the woods surrounding the house and found a pretty vine with little green buds. The vine was thick, and she grasped it, tugging the ends off the tree.

When she held the whole thing, it lay coiled in her hands like a thick rope, or maybe a-

They stuck that noose around her neck and everyone was just watching-

Eve dropped the vine like she’d been burnt. When she looked at it again, the green was brown and spotted yellow with the fuzz of decay. Withered.

She stumbled back home and fell right into bed, hiding in her covers. She could hear the rattle of pots being washed, and simultaneously, carrots chopped and water boiled.

The next week there was another hanging. This time it was old Miss Bird, the strange spinster who wore trousers and thick spectacles. Again, Eve looked away and stared into her father’s green eyes. For a moment she was reminded of that vine. 

When they went home again, Eve huddled in her blankets and heard a dull hiss. She went out to the kitchen and saw her mother let out another low noise. Mama was chopping carrots. The knife, sharp from unuse, had cut her unskilled hands more than once.

That night Eve’s father had stayed out late, so Eve and her mother slept together. Eve heard her mother’s heartbeat, buh-bum, but when her mother switched sides and Eve’s ear no longer rested on Mama’s chest Eve could still hear a heart, but it was a different rhythm.

Buh-dum, buh-dum, a fierce heartbeat and an

Inhale, rattle, like a fragile breath from an old lady.

Another hanging- but no, this woman was found innocent because-

I am innocent, I swear to you, I was under the influence of the devil, wait a witch, the real witch isn’t me it’s-

When the woman was asked to point to those who had enchanted her, she gestured to the women who had gossiped behind her back days prior. 

They were hung in the square not long after, bodies wracked with sobs and wails. Eve’s father no longer forced her to attend. She did anyway, like by staring into the horrors she might find answers. Every one she found (Witches evil witches devil devil, her father said) felt like a violent lie.

(These wicked women get what’s coming to them.)

That night Eve heard it again, the Buh-bum, buh-bum, inhale, rattle, exhale. This time it overlapped with keen wails.

Eve’s mother grew distant. Her parents argued more. Her father stayed out later, barred from their room, and would sleep on the couch with eyes half open.

Don’t you worry, little apple, your mama and I are still best friends, we just-

But they weren’t anymore, where they? No sir, and Eve went home to her Mama and found a pale bruise on her mother’s jaw.

It’s nothing, darling.

But Eve had the same magic her mother had, and she could hear the whisper of thought, that murmur of

He hit me he hit me he-

It wasn’t the first bruise on Eve’s mother. There would be two more, and one would end up on her father as well, a small mark from a desperate, closed hand attempting to push away the monster that was husband.

(Still best friends, we just-)

The next month, when Eve lay to sleep, there were low moans to join the chorus of the dead. Piercing screams. Inhale, rattle- no, no, no- buh-bum, buh-why why why pleeeeease pleaseplease

For she was a witch like her mother and you will bear witness, the dead spat in her face. But they weren’t angry at her. No, they were angry at someone else.

(These wicked women get what’s coming to them.)

Eve’s father gave Eve a little necklace made of silver and emerald, his grandmother’s necklace. They ate a small dinner and Eve was allowed not one but two large slices of peach cobbler.

That night had been the eye of the storm, where everything was calm for but a moment.

The next morning, Eve’s father dragged his wife to the hanging square.

But Mama had been so careful were Eve’s first thoughts, which soon dissolved into tears and screams and cries as she was held back by her uncle, who easily dwarfed her small frame.

And when they put that rope around Mama’s neck, for a moment-

The vine, his eyes, the noose, decay.

Eve grew limp enough for her uncle to let her go, then caught her father’s gaze, those horrible green eyes that hid the poison within. The rot. The wither.

Then she twisted her wrist like her mother had so often done, and the hanging square exploded with withering green vines with pale thorns that grew dark with blood as they surrounded her mother in a protective wall.

Screaming. Crying. Shouting. One man was clutching his Bible like a lifeline. Another grew pale and stumbled.

And the vines erupted in Eve’s mother, in Eve-

And they turned into demons of wood and vine and-

But when he looked again Eve was just a girl, just a girl, and the vines were gone everything was gone.

Eve’s father stared at his daughter in horror, turned to his brother, but he wasn’t looking at him, everyone was just standing there and…

Didn’t you see-

Confusion.

See what, John?

Eve…

She’s right here, John.

But when they hung her mother, Eve’s father had looked at her swinging corpse and saw a thin line of sap leaking from her mouth. A bulge of straw peeking out of her shirt.

He didn’t say a word. Not a word.

But when he lay down to sleep he heard-

Buh-bum, buh-bum. Inhale, rattle, exhale, nonono pleeeease NO stop it, Mary, sto…

And when he woke up he was staring into the eyes of his wife, no longer green but black as coal. 

Eve’s mother wrapped pale hands around his throat, and he felt the sharp prick of splinters digging into his skin. Vines restrained his arms and legs. He tried to scream, but it came out as a weak croak. He heard his heart beat erratically, heard his breath rattle in his chest in a weak attempt to breathe.

Stop it, Mary, sto…

Quiet, John, you be quiet now. You be quiet. These wicked men get what’s coming to them, get what’s coming to them YES THEY DO-