Eve: A Novel by Wm. Paul Young Read Free Book Online Page A

emotions. “I’m sorry too . . . that I growled at you.”
    “Then you’ll forgive me?”
    That little bit of kindness broke apart her resolve. The waterfall of feelings, which she had been holding at bay, came rushing like a torrent. She didn’t just cry, she wailed. She sobbed for losses she didn’t even remember, for the storehouses of memories and faces that she couldn’t access, for pain that only grace and kindness can approach, for rising fear, and because she was just a little girl and she didn’t know where home was and she felt lost and everything hurt again and she couldn’t keep it back.
    And this man, this kind man, cried with her. He bowed his head till it touched hers and put his hands on both sides of her face as their tears mingled. She thought it was a sort of baptism. The lost and the found, forever and irretrievably entwined.

Five
----

T HE G ARDEN OF G OD
    “C ome, Lilly,” the woman whispered, and for an instant as the girl rose up, the light around her imploded and she thought she was again losing consciousness.
    Lilly gasped as her sight returned. “Mother Eve, where are we now?” The colors, sounds, and smells of a grand forest overwhelmed her senses.
    “Inside Eden’s gate.” Eve’s strength of presence flowed through Lilly. “It was outside Eden’s boundary that you witnessed Adam’s birth.”
    The place was astounding and yet suited her perfectly somehow. The warmth, the humidity, all brought comfort and ease and pleasure. So this is what normal was always meant to be . But hard on the heels of that thought came another: You’re anything but normal. You don’t belong here .
    “Lilly, would you like to see more?”
    When Lilly nodded, Eve grasped her hand. They rose up,buoyed on the air itself. Her feet felt as if they were on solid ground even as she looked down at the receding earth. The view tipped her sense of balance. Recovering was simple; all she had to do was look up and out, trusting in the invisible solidity beneath her feet. She couldn’t resist and tapped her foot. Yes, it felt like something was there. Eve looked at her and grinned.
    Above the trees they slowed to a stop, suspended.
    “This is the Garden of God,” Eve said, “created for all of us to inhabit.”
    “It’s enormous!” Lilly exclaimed. It spread in every direction for hundreds of miles until in the distant horizon the boundary walls rose and disappeared into the sky, each like a geyser of rainbowed water. The nearest border was close and powerfully impressive. The air was clear and crisp and warming, as if perfectly attuned to her.
    “You said Eden is a cube, right? As big as it is, I don’t think that we would all fit in here.”
    “Eden expands and contracts as needed. It is not a place as you would understand. In the coming age, after all has been finished and allowed, it will grow to include all creation.”
    “You sound sad,” Lilly said.
    Eve smiled at her. “Not sad, my daughter. Remembering. It is here that righteousness dwells.”
    “Righteousness?”
    “Right relationships, face-to-face and trusting.”
    “Is that even possible?” Lilly felt embarrassed by her impulsiveness. “I mean, is there such a thing?”
    Eve squeezed Lilly’s hand. “Yes. And don’t be ashamed, Lilly.Our deep longings remind us we have lost something vital and precious. Such yearnings are the stirring of hope. Of returning.”
    “Returning where?”
    “To this garden.”
    “But didn’t God make you leave?” Lilly asked.
    Eve sighed and appeared about to answer when something diverted her attention and she smiled. “Listen,” she directed.
    Lilly could hear it too. Approaching from a distance, it was a song both beautiful and slightly off-key. It was the clear and joyful voice of a boy making his way through the forest.
    “Is that . . . ?”
    “Adam? Yes! Look!”
    But Lilly glanced at Eve instead and recognized the face of a woman young and in love.
    •  •  •
    J OHN WAS