Witch and Judge

I am here. In my skin. In my flesh. My spirit clings to the body not as a vessel, but as a home, and I will not be moved.

I repeat the watchwords against division, clutching someone else's rosary. I repeat them. My nails grasp at a different bead, any other bead. My hands forget everything in their cloying desperation for the comfort of a warm wooden anchor. My eyes are drawn away from me - the tears do not help. I cannot see, but then I can. Judge is heaving a great piece of wood, striped orange and white. His back is hunched and his feet struggle against the splintered wooden barrier. His mouth is statically agape, and his face does not contort or demonstrate any recognition of circumstance. He is the unaffected taskee, and the last three feet of his unwieldy plank strike me from the shoulder to the ground. I am dead.

I am clutching the rosary again. My spirit quiets as I reflect on the anger of the grotesque monster I inhabited. He drove a cab for tourists before this country fell into ruin. Three sons, four daughters, and a dead wife - a widower who had not given thought to a better alternative. The cabin of his vehicle was a presentation - ash-colored cloth seats without stain or spot and two complementary water bottles protruding out of the door cup holders made an effort unmistakable. His ethos was not so much a blunt acceptance of reality as a cold disdain for wishful thinking. All of this poured into my heart as I spent the last few seconds of his life with him, and now I am here. And the door scrapes against the dirt towards me, creating a small mound as it goes.

I am not a small woman, but Judge is a tall man. He is an oak that has grown straight and uniform, its roots deep under the earth, unexposed. When I look into his brown eyes exposed by the sunlight, now reflecting about this pale wooden shed, I see a stern father. It is all in how he creases his eyebrows.

"Are you okay?", he asks me.

Still clinging to my borrowed rosary, I stand up. My spirit clings to my body with renewed vigor. The vague pain of loss that always reminds me of my husband starts to fade away. It is a beautiful feeling - the body reunited with the spirit like long-lost lovers. Two co-inhabitants, not two halves. But it doesn't go away completely, though my spirit is quieted. All of this in the thirty seconds it takes for me to rise, arthritic pain searing my hip.

"I am alright, thank you," I say, ginger but proud.

He does not carry that large piece of wood anymore, but his hands have the blisters to prove he once did. He does not want to show it, but he looks tired, and the bulging plastic monster on his back carrying all of our supplies seems to make it worse. He needs to rest.

"I am really feeling quite at peace - perhaps we should rest?"

He seems to have difficulty understanding what I am saying, his eyes are fixed upon a small hole in the corner of the shack, where something has dug up the dirt foundation.

"It is good to rest here." His gruff voice and Italian accent remind me of an old don from a mafia movie who spoke wistfully of "the old country." But he lacks any of the charm or familiarity.

His breath is still heavy. The rising and falling of his chest is easily seen through his fleece jacket. His mouth is slightly agape, as though it only existed for the intake and expulsion of air. He blinks, blinks again, then finally there is motion. He does not spring into action. He slowly rolls his shoulders and the large backpack falls to the dirt on its bulging pockets, rolling back and forth like an upended turtle. I strongly believe in the importance of polite conversation - it is the only contribution I can make given my infirmities.

"What wonderous weather it is!"

He begins to unroll the sleeping bag. It is for me, of course - he is ever the gentleman in that way, at least.

"Was it a joy to have such weather in your youth?"

The sleeping bag haphazardly sprawled on the ground, he takes out a portable stove. His hands seemed design to break the little dials, yet he turns it with shaking fingers and a hunched back, like a chef garnishing his signature dish.

"Perhaps you might tell me something of the flowers here? A special kind your mother preferred?"

I am quite shocked he has ignored me here. That kind of question is bound to get an emotion out of even the most stalwart Presbyterian. Alas - nothing. He opened the can of soup with his Swiss army and that means it is almost time for bed. And for the "debriefing," of course.

"We are only one day from Monteriggioni. We have no food left. We have one liter of potable water. The terrain will not be diffficult. The elevation will be difficult. We will leave at 600. We will arrive before 1800. Do you have any questions?"

As his words come out, I feel a twisting frustration. Two months of scavenging Rome. A week of marching through Tuscany. So many dead people. Good people. Good people that he killed.

"How many more of them will you murder before you let me leave?"

He raises his busy, unkempt unibrow. "You have a burden. I have a burden."

"You have a burden? I watch you. I see what they see. I feel what they feel. They had hopes - do you?"

"I do, witch."

A couple of tears form in the corner of my eyes. They are both pitch black. I start scratching my blotchy red skin. He does not say it with the twisting of inflection or with intention to harm.

"My name is Marigold." I thrust my finger forward at him, and some rogue conscience makes me feel silly. But is is the right gesture for the right moment.

"I need you, witch, and you need me."

I am his tool. His edge against the infected. And nothing more.

"They are not demons, and I am not a witch. You are deranged. You - You are sick. The next time they are near us, I just might not tell you anything! I might just take a little trip with them."

"Then I will die."

My legs have adjusted to the long days of walking, but I am still exhausted. I want to prolong the argument. I want to share how the infected feel with him - I certainly have tried. I want him to see the crisp interior of the cab. I want him to know about the children and the mothers and the friends and the loved ones. But I don't think any of that would matter. At this point, I doubt he has any point of reference. He must be a statue brought to life. Or a thing sprung out of the ground. I fall asleep.

I am moving. Quickly. Faster than I ever have. I am hungry - starving. Grass touches my face springing backward as easily as forward. My paws leave no evidence in the dirt. I dig a little. My back scrapes against wood, and it hurts. I have to eat. I bite something.

I awake to a shout. I cannot see - it is too dark and our flashlight turned out weeks ago. We had hoped to find a new one at this Monteriggioni. I feel around on the dirt.

"Something bit me. A mouse. Demon."

Judge is infected. I did not wake up. Why did I not wake up?

"You will kill me."

It is still dark. I still cannot see. I feel something rubber, indented, grooved - Judge's shoe. I feel something wet. Something furry. The mouse. Dead.

Hours pass in silence. I cannot go to sleep. Judge has hours, and almost all of them will be spent in darkness.

Dim morning light fills the shed. Judge shoved it open hours ago, but only now I noticed. What I would give for an infected to stumble nearby. I would do anything to be someone else. I would do anything not to be Judge's comforter. We do not talk. I do not apologize for my outburst, and a regrettable part of my soul feels schadenfreude as Judge will have to suffer as an infected. He has made others suffer so much. He has killed so many of them, and I am the witness to their pain. I resolve to not kill him.

I look at Marigold. She is a pitiful thing, wretched, even. Marigold stands up. I stand up. I am Judge, but I am also the witch. But I am also Marigold. I am Judge. I want nothing more than to not be this thing. This demon. I want to see a happy world. I prayed so much for the witch. I loved her, and now she is standing up. She drives the swiss army into my neck, and I stumble. I die.