OOC :
Hearing Hirem speak of himself for the first time, Edith stops her work and watches unblinkingly as the massive man looks down and humbles himself with his story. She's scared to move in case he should be interrupted by her carelessness, or have the story flee like a frightened animal if she reminds it that she's still here. Of course his story would be a tragic tale. He is too far from home, and too strong, and to be born from a life of ease.
When it comes to the preacher, since she first met him he has been aglow with a rose tint she put over him. In her eyes the man on top of the boxes speaking loudly of faith and loyalty, and the man that jumped to her defense when things went sour, is the epitome of human. She squeezed what little of the man she has seen into the mould of the hero because that is what she wanted to see. And to hear that he is not what she wanted him to be is a blow she saw coming, but denied anyway. Who knows what he did to loath himself like this. He could have been a bigot, a rapist, or worse: a murderer. The thought sours on her tongue. But in bringing himself down, she finds she can finally meet his metaphorical eye as someone closer to the flawed human they all are. He is still out of shouting distance to the likes of her, but she can see him from where she stands. She lost a hero, but maybe she can gain something else; a confidant, or a friend.
His eye rises to meets hers, and her concentration snaps under the focus of his coffee coloured eyes. Flustered to be caught staring, she goes back to work with a force. She fumbles the rolled ball of clay off the table and places it in the center of the pottery wheel. She should say something. He just spouted the, well, edited truth at her, but it was the truth. But sympathy seems demeaning and empathy for his situation is beyond her. How can she properly relay her admiration, compassion and dismay? Thankfully he moves on smoothly without waiting for her floundering mind.
He asks her then to imagine her life if she were to give part of herself to something bigger. The image is tantalizing, and seems to culminate from her walking with her head held high with purpose, into an image of her battling the unjust with the god at her side in true, day-dream logic. She sits heavily on the stool behind the pottery wheel and absently creates a shallow well two inches deep in the center of the future urn. She attempts to crush the poisonous dream but it takes hold in a way she feared it would. She exhales heavily, and behind this little indulgence she looks tired.
“Here”, she hooks her foot around the leg of a nearby stool and pulls it opposite her on the other side of the wheel. “This is the fun part, why don’t you come help?” she asks kindly. "You're too pretty to be a wallflower."
With the peddle under the wooden contraption she gets the plate spinning, and using the tips of her fingers she coaxes the clay to rise like the hood of a charmed snake. It’s not until he sits opposite that she clears her throat and answers him with the rare honesty of her own.
"I'd like to have a sort of divine hand in my life", she says carefully, as if measuring every word. "It would be comforting to know that I can lean on something stronger than myself. See, a few years ago a series of horrible choices lead to someone throwing a bellied lamp full of kerosene at me. Thats how I got the scars. It caught me right here-" she points to a spot over her sternum "-and exploded. But it could have just as easily been a teacup, or a petching doily, if either happened to be closer at the time. Maybe I could have got a nice, clean scar or a big bruise out of it and it could have been something to tell tall tales about at dinner parties. But it wasn't and I went up like a torch. At the time I didn't curse anybody. I just sat there in the healing centre and lamented my pretty little face. As I saw it, gods belonged to other, stronger people. People the gods would actually care about, you know? The gods had nothing to do with it, and I had nobody to blame, and nobody to- ah, lean on. I guess. I wish there was. I could have made it through with all the little pieces of myself I lost on the way.”
But...
So stupid. So blisteringly, painfully stupid. She opens her mouth, shuts it again, and suddenly becomes immersed in correcting the spinning urn. "Though... I've had the story of the man and his useless gods stuck in my head since I last saw you. Do you remember? It was the first story you preached on those boxes. Anyway, I just- I was wondering... That man, before Yahal came to him, did he have any... redeeming qualities?" she says, in a way that insinuates nothing.
Because I have none to offer your god for his help either, she finishes in her mind with a loathing snarl. If she were clever, or talented, or selfless or strong then she would have something with which to give to this god. As she is there is nothing to her name but a shallow but strengthening determination and a struggling, self-absorbed need to repel anything wondrous.
"Because there must be something Yahal asks of his people in order to be their guiding hand. Nobody is that selfless."
