Summary/Important Information: This is a reworking of my six-year-old piece "Isaac's Gatlin". The plot will stick pretty closely to the old one but I reserve the right to take creative liberties here and there. This takes place up to a year before Burt and Vicky come through Gatlin.
Chapter II
Lace Curtains
Micah found her reading.
He bobbed down the stairs and spotted her in the kitchen, poised neatly on the counter next to the stove. One of Rebekah's long legs hung off the edge, her toes grazing the floor, and the other was pulled beneath her in a distinctly catlike manner. She was very pretty, sitting like that. Too bad she was frowning.
Her forehead was wrinkled in a distasteful way as she gazed intently at her book, the cover page folded back so it was set in a permanent curve. Micah knew she hadn't seen him yet. She was too caught up in her story. He ventured farther into the kitchen, not wanting to frighten or interrupt her, but he felt markedly attention-hungry today so he gave one of the dining room chairs a deliberate kick. It made an ugly skidding noise on the tile and Rebekah looked up, unfazed.
"Good morning, Nathan," she said coolly. Micah frowned back at her.
"Beck-ee," he whined, pulling out the chair he'd kicked so he could sit at the table.
"Sorry." Her tone made it clear she wasn't, but he knew by now there wasn't much use in arguing with his big sister. She always won. Micah began drawing invisible pictures on the wooden grain of the table, his eight-year-old attention span fluttering on to other subjects. It was so hot already; his thin pajamas stuck to his skin with a light layer of sweat, and it was only ten o'clock.
"Has Isaac come yet today?" The thought thrilled and disappointed him at the same time. It would be awful to have missed Isaac. Rebekah's tan form shifted a little in of the corner of his eye, but her voice didn't betray her.
"No, Micah," she said quietly. "He hasn't."
He popped out his lower lip, frustrated with her this morning. There was something different about his Becky and he definitely didn't like it.
"He is coming, right?" Micah pushed, desperate for a real answer. "He comes every morning. Isaac wouldn't forget about me, would he?" Rebekah laughed suddenly and he looked at her, surprised, but she was still reading her book.
"You know what, Micah? I am very certain when I say that Isaac would never forget his morning visits." She laughed again and absently pushed some blonde hair out of her face. "I would be very surprised if he did not come again today. Very, pleasantly surprised."
Micah propped his elbows up on the table, frustrated. His big sister did not like Isaac, not even a little, and it wasn't fair. Isaac was a good man, he knew this for sure; he kept them safe and happy. He made the corn grow again. Micah would do anything for a sliver of the attention Isaac gave Rebekah. She could be so ungrateful.
"You," he began slowly, "are being mean."
"To who?" she asked. Rebekah looked up briefly from her book. "You?" It was a trap.
"No." Micah looked back at the table, her blue eyes burning him. "To Isaac. He's a good leader, he made the corn grow again, he visits every day!"
"Oh yes, he sure does," Rebekah agreed, and laughed again. She shook her head, grinning, and placed one slender finger in the pages of her book. Micah chanced a look at her but she still had that funny look in her eye, so he looked at the book instead. On the curved, warped cover he could see a big golden frame. Inside was a scary man wearing nice clothes. Maybe the book was making Rebekah so unpleasant.
"You're being mean," he said again, and felt his lip tremble with the possibility of tears. Instantly Rebekah slid from the counter, fluid and beautiful as her long hair trailed behind her. She set the book on the table near his hands and pulled Micah into a hug. Her sun-baked skin was warm on his face.
"I'm sorry, sugar," she said gently. He felt her smooth his thick black hair back from his forehead. "It's been a rough day already. It's so hot. I'm just cranky, that's all." Micah bathed in her good humor for a moment then wriggled from her grasp.
"It's okay. You're not mean, not really." He glanced outside to the early August corn, green and rustling. A thought occurred to him. "Have you seen—"
"The boys are outside playing. They came by earlier but you were still asleep." Rebekah slid into a kitchen chair and picked up her paperback. "If you hurry you can be back before Isaac visits. He usually comes around lunchtime." She looked at him and smiled, a much prettier smile than she'd given him all day. "I'll have sandwiches made too, how's that sound?"
"Great!" Micah ran to her and pressed a wet kiss against her cheek, then did a lap around the kitchen table and hurried for the stairs. "I'm gonna go get dressed!"
"You better be back for lunch," Rebekah called after him. "I won't run and find you if Isaac comes while you're gone. If you miss him, tough shit."
"Potty-mouth-Becky," he crowed joyfully and skidded around the corner, hoping that Mordechai and Jedediah weren't too far off.
Rebekah stood at the window over the sink, pulling back the white lace curtain slightly so she could see the cornfield outside. Micah's little head of black hair bobbed up and down as he darted through the stalks. She watched until he was too far into the field to see.
The curtains her mother had picked out. Rebekah always thought they looked trashy but her mother had insisted they were "quaint", which merely translated to "trashy" as far as she was concerned. Now her fingers played across the delicate designs, surprised at how rough lace could feel, how intricate the stitching was. She found herself wondering who had made these curtains for her mother to find at the fair and bring home, where they would frame the window overlooking the cornfields, regardless of what happened in the den or any other home in Gatlin. The holes her parents left behind when they went the way they did were subtle but deep. Rebekah could keep them from her mind most days, but other days she found herself touching some stupid item she hadn't noticed in years, hoping desperately to touch the people these things belonged to.
"Good morning, Rebekah."
She had been so enraptured with the delicate workings of the lace curtain that the voice was like cold water down her back. Rebekah whirled from the window, already knowing she'd see his small dark form standing there in the kitchen and still angry that it was true.
"Isaac, you little bastard," she snapped, and he grinned.
"My my," Isaac murmured, walking slowly towards her. "Your brother is right. You do have a potty-mouth."
"Go fuck yourself," Rebekah said instantly. He paused, and then his lips curled into another smile. It looked sick on his pale face.
"That's not very nice."
"I'm not a very nice girl." She turned from him and ran some hot water in the sink. There was only her dish from breakfast that needed washing but there was an off chance he'd talk less if she looked busy. Isaac leaned comfortably against the counter near her, their elbows touching. It was not an accident.
"Oh, I could disagree with that," he said smoothly, but when she snapped her head up to curse at him he was holding her dirty plate and fork obligingly towards her. Rebekah set her mouth in a thin line and took them.
"Thank you."
"I happen to think you're a very nice girl," Isaac murmured, and paused as she reached for the dish soap. Her pajama top was riding low on her chest. She was suddenly and painfully aware of it.
"Don't you have somewhere to be?" Rebekah asked harshly, tugging the thin material higher so he would stop staring at the curve of her breasts. It didn't help. She could feel his eyes like small sticky hands on her.
When he didn't answer, Rebekah turned from the sink and forced him to meet her gaze.
"Every morning you come here," she said, crossing her arms, "and every morning I have nothing to say to you. What do you think is going to change? That one day you'll walk in here and I'll have something to talk about besides how the corn is doing and how much I wish you were elsewhere?" He smiled evenly back at her, amused, as if she were a small child doing something very silly.
"I simply enjoy the conversation," Isaac murmured. "However limited it may be." Frustrated, Rebekah turned back to the sink and turned off the tap. She dunked the plate in the soapy water a few times.
"Micah's not even here. Come back later." Rebekah glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. He made no attempt to move.
"Some light reading?" Isaac indicated the abandoned paperback on the table. "The Picture of Dorian Gray? Oh Rebekah," he chuckled, shaking his head in mock disappointment, "when will you learn the Scripture is the only thing worth reading?" She gritted her teeth and began scrubbing her plate much harder than the scant egg stains warranted.
"Isaac, you're testing my patience. Get out of here you little –"
"Careful," he warned, and rested his hand gently on her back. She stiffened so suddenly that she was sure Isaac noticed, but he didn't seem to be discouraged. "Careful what you say, Rebekah dear. It can get you in a lot of trouble."
"Careful what you touch, Isaac dear," Rebekah said brightly, ignoring the cold chills his touch sent rolling down her spine. "It can get you castrated." She was determined he wouldn't see her flinch.
"I saw how you treated young Micah before I came in." He glazed over her threat and moved his hand to her waist, his fingers trailing down the soft cotton of her night shirt. It occurred to her that maybe this was why he came early: to see her in her pajamas. She shuddered a little and suddenly felt her legs were too bare, even in the thick summer heat. "You're certainly on edge today, hm?"
"Before you let yourself in," Rebekah corrected, and remembered briefly the sound the screwdriver made when Malachai crept in one night and disabled all the locks in her house. It had been Isaac's order, of course, but the metallic scraping and his heavy steps past her door when she was supposed to be sleeping was bone-chilling. She was told that all the houses had the same treatment, but he lingered outside her room for far too long and Rebekah had to wonder why hers had been the first.
"Rebekah," Isaac chuckled, clearly amused, "you are simply a ray of sunshine today. Radiant as always." He paused, licked his lips, and his fingers began to move again. "Simply… radiant." His hand began to move southward, past her waist and nearing the hem of her nightshirt.
The chills turned to white-hot rage, and Rebekah turned quickly.
She grabbed him roughly by the wrist of the offending hand and twisted it hard, using it as leverage to pin him to the counter. His body slammed into the cabinets, and her body slammed against his; it hurt a little, but it hurt Isaac more because he grunted loudly and didn't struggle.
"Let's get a few things straight," Rebekah hissed, her mouth close to Isaac's ear. "First of all, my name is not Rebekah, it's Ellen. And second of all—" His face didn't display any of the numerous emotions she had expected, so she twisted his arm a little further.
"Ow," Isaac said, his tone bored.
"Second of all," she continued, so angry it was difficult to not break the little twerp's arm, "if you ever touch anything that you have not been invited to touch – and trust me, you will never be invited to touch –" Rebekah twisted again, her resolve to remain rational waning. That crack would sound so wonderful…
"Ow," he repeated.
"You will find yourself losing some parts that I promise you will sorely miss. Got it?" Isaac didn't respond; his silence was infuriating, and while a part of her wanted nothing more than to give it that final twist and hear him scream, the shrinking bit of sanity in her brain warned her that there were no doctors left in Gatlin, and a teen-preacher with a broken arm would be far more difficult to deal with than regular psychotic. While the first day of August had brought her a strangely irate mood, Rebekah considered that she did not in fact want Isaac to leave her house with bone protruding from his skin.
She put a tiny bit more pressure on his arm and he finally answered.
"Oh yes," Isaac said brightly, his tone complacent. "I understand." Rebekah released him at last and returned to the dishes as if nothing had happened.
"Remember it," she whispered, dunking her hands back in the water. It was lukewarm. The soap felt greasy.
Laughter came from outside. Rebekah glanced up in time to see Micah scurry past the window, curly-haired Jedediah trailing behind. They scampered back into the corn, calling for Mordechai.
"Beautiful child," Isaac murmured, rubbing his shoulder thoughtfully. Rebekah rinsed the dish and set it in the now-drained sink. She looked up and glimpsed Micah's black shirt disappearing through the stalks.
"Yes, he is," she agreed, the first genuine words she'd given him all morning. Micah giggled somewhere in the corn and Rebekah felt a real smile spread across her lips. Isaac glanced at her sideways, a dark smirk playing at the corners of his mouth.
"I wasn't talking about your brother."
"Get out, Isaac," Rebekah said softly. She didn't look away from the window, even though Micah was long gone and all that was left was crisp green cornstalks. Her fingers found the dishtowel and she began drying her hands so he couldn't see them shake.
"Certainly, Rebekah," Isaac said politely, as if it were the first time she had suggested such a thing. He walked for the door, taking his time, and paused when his hand met the knob. "I will see you tonight, I trust?"
"Only if Micah wants to go." She stared straight ahead. She refused to look at him. There was a distinct possibility she would be sick.
"Oh, he will," Isaac said quietly, a smile in his voice. "He always does."
The door closed at last with a soft click. Rebekah waited a few long, horrible moments to make sure he was really gone. When she saw his dark form slipping out through the cornfield, she set down the dishtowel and began taking down the curtains. She couldn't be caught off guard like that again.