Second Place — “The Scent of Eden“

by Madeline Page

The walls are white, but his eyes are dark.
Leather straps writhe in serpentine coils over his limbs.
I keep my eyes fixed on his sternum, but I can feel his mournful stare, sharp as a needle.
“Sorry, it’s cold,” I mutter, placing the stethoscope on his chest.
Then I wince – as if the chill will matter in a few moments.
I want to apologize again
To stutter some semblance of condolence
For the frigid bite of the instrument telling him he is alive, but not for long
For the weight of his sin
For the way I will watch as he dies
But there are no words big enough to fill the space between us
No sentence to express the gravity of his sentence
So, I silently number the pulses of his quickening heart,
Like a bird bravely beating against the cage of his ribs

Seven years ago, I pledged to do no harm,
Swore an oath that I would battle death with books and splints and syringes.
The woman in the mask made no such promise.
I can’t see her expression as she prepares the poison
But I can see the man on the table
How he surveys the needle entering his arm
And I can see the stare of the woman watching, palms pressed against the window.
She has his eyes. I can’t meet her gaze.

Sterile swab, quick prick
It slips in so easily, poison merging seamlessly with plasma.
It is not my hands that push the plunger on the syringe
That inject the death into his veins.
I have done no harm
But I have not helped, either
Is there a difference?

He whimpers softly, like a child.
My son makes that sound, alone in his room in the dark
Afraid of the shadows crawling over the walls
Afraid to speak, for fear they will strike.
But I hear him
I come and turn on the light

And suddenly I want to run, to jump onto the table and slay the snake-like straps restraining theman
But there is no way to stop the spread of this darkness.
Pentobarbital has no off switch
And I don’t know if my legs would move, even if I told them to.
So, I watch him watch the night creeping closer, knowing the impossibility of escape

Knowing that nobody is coming to turn on the light.

They told me what he did,
The black sins indelibly staining his soul.
He has sinned.
The wages of sin is death
I know how to see the brokenness of the body
How to chart brain waves
Map fractures in bones
Identify bacteria in blood
But there is no tool in my arsenal for diagnosing the state of the soul.
Judge not, that you may not be judged
Is it wrong to stop the spread of sin?
He did what was wrong.
There are many parts, but one body
Should we let his sin fester in our society
Grow like pathogens on a petri dish
Like a tumor, a bulbous blight?
Remove the wooden beam from your eye
Sin should be excised.
But are my dirty, shaking hands fit to hold the scalpel?

I catch a whiff of the masked woman’s perfume as she moves to discard the syringe.
It smells like a garden
The scent of Eden, when we wrenched the pen from the author of life and tried to write our own story
Playing God, like children playing pretend
Swimming in their fathers’ suits
Stumbling in their mothers’ heels
And falling, of course.
Nothing good comes from playing God.

His eyes are closed now, but his chest still rises and falls, slowly.
The woman behind the glass fingers a silver cross resting just below her collarbone.
I shudder
Because the Sanhedrin thought they were doing what was right
Condemning a criminal
Piercing Him, letting His blood water the earth like rain from the cross
But they were wrong.
Father, forgive them
Father, forgive me.

He no longer moves.
Behind the glass, the woman’s head is bowed. She is shaking.
Behold, your mother

The masked woman gestures to me. I must perform my duty.
Somehow, my numb legs carry me to the table.
He looks the same.
His chest is still warm

But its hollow silence echoes in my ears.
Why have you abandoned me?
No pulse pounds against my fingers
The bird no longer beats its wings
All the ends of the earth will remember, and turn to the Lord
I turn to the masked woman, try to pronounce him dead
But the words stick like cement to my quivering lips.

The walls are white, but the room is stained with sin.
As I leave, I can almost hear the devil laughing.