Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: Commitment (01/05/12)
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TITLE: Validity of a Vow | Previous Challenge Entry
By PamFord Davis
01/12/12 -
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How could it get any better than this? What is worse? I live in paradise and every day is sublime! God provided all his needs: he walked in the midst of riches, fruits and even gold was easily gathered. He never even gave a thought to being poor. He enjoyed perfect health and had never been a witness to death. “Eve, I take you as my bride.”
Eve remembered that commitment and wondered how she could have been so naive to believe the serpents lies… Better days lay behind her and Adam; she experienced worse than she could have imagined. God banished them from the garden, Adam toiled endlessly, food was scarce, and labor pains in birth for two sons were nearly unbearable. She craved more of Adam’s love…
Love for Adam, Cain and Abel sustained her. As both wife and mother, she felt needed. God had promised death for disobedience; what was death? She learned death was the cruelty of Cain, the victimization of Abel, blood crying out from the ground and an emptiness even the love of Adam could not fill.
Eva placed a bookmark in the Genesis chapter, closed the Bible and placed it on the nightstand next to her bed in the cramped Nursing Home room. She had been daydreaming again. The characters in scripture were as real to her as the nurses who kindly cared for her. The Bible was not merely history; writers shared details of lives of real people. She had empathy for Eve.
Her own heart had felt the joy of becoming a bride and the wedding vows still rung in her ears though she could hardly hear a rap at her door. Eva slowly turned her head to the left and saw her mate of over 65 years with his head slumped over on his chest, asleep setting up in his wheel chair, in front of the window, where the nurse encouraged him to sit and watch the birds.
He had paid no attention to birds and little to Eva during the last three years. The doctors diagnosed him with Alzheimer’s disease, he slipped away to a world of his own, and the walls of separation were formidable. Eva felt the heartache of death long before any preacher would share a eulogy.
Preacher Gray knocked on the open door, entered and greeted Eva with a smile, saying, “Good morning Eva. What have you been up to?”
“I’ve just been reading from Genesis, thinking about Adam and Eve, the vows a man and wife make to each other during their wedding service and how little they understand what they mean. It seems like just yesterday… I, Eva take thee Charles.” The words trailed off across space and time.
The squeaking of a small movement of a wheel chair broke the silence and preceded a faltering voice declaring, “Till death do us part.”
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Loved this!
"the wedding vows still rung in her ears though she could hardly hear a rap at her door." Great way to express how meaningful wedding vows were to Eva.
Edit for run-on sentences. Ex: Eva slowly turned her head to the left and saw her mate of over 65 years with his head slumped over on his chest, asleep sitting up in his wheel chair, in front of the window, where the nurse encouraged him to sit and watch the birds.
Overall, a well told story with a great punch at the end.
Though I was a tad confused at first because the MC's name is so close to Eve. The transition from her musings to present time was a tad abrupt. Perhaps if you had started the story in the present, then taken the reader into her thoughts and dreams before bringing us back to the present it might have flowed better.
I really enjoyed the ending. It brought the reader full circle. Though the actual idea itself is not super original, I still think you did a great job staying on topic while delivering a poignant message.