"How could she? You
were mine from the
start, long before you
married her!"
"Oh yes, Jacob," Rachel continued,
"Leah knows you don’t love her, but I
have my pain too … I’ve had to bear
the shame of being barren, to watch
while she’s borne you son after son,
to resort to giving my handmaiden to
you to bear children for me, to see
the looks of pity and hear the sly
asides from the tribes-people...“
Swallowing hard, her mind went back
to earlier on that day. Leah's son,
Reuben, had gone into the fields,
found some mandrakes and taken
them home to give to his mother.
When Rachel asked Leah for some of
Reuben’s mandrakes, their deepseated rivalry had sprung up and
instead of either saying yes or no,
Leah took the opportunity to accuse
Rachel of taking Jacob away from
her.
wished she hadn't risen to the bait but she had, and had traded her
husband’s companionship for the
night for Reuben’s mandrakes.
Loneliness bit into her like a living
thing, twisting and turning, raging
and hurting. Pulling her shawl tighter
around herself, she whispered to
Jacob’s imaginary face, "I never
thought it would come to this..."
There were still some morsels of food
in the bowl, but she pushed it away
abruptly, got up, and stepped
outside the tent. Her gaze went up
past the roofs of the other tents, up
to the velveteen sky where millions
of stars were twinkling, and her
thoughts went to the God who had
promised that Jacob’s descendants
would be multiplied like the stars of
the heaven.
She wiped away a tear and asked –
"Do I have a place in that plan, Lord?
Jacob now has eight sons - I claim
"What an irony, Jacob!" Rachel
laughed bitterly, "How could she?
You were mine from the start, long
before you married her!"
As she took a sip of water, she
/
Adapted from Starry Sky by Danny Thompson Jr
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dthompson7/6839384738
JASMINE'S PLACE
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