Page 7 of Souls We Rip

My father stood at the door, one hand on the threshold, his fingers tapping on it. His long nose was scrunched in disgust. His dark eyes spoke louder than his hurtful words, making my body shake.

We resumed our preparation, but I still wondered. What story about the Goat Man can make my mother react that way?

Who was the Goat Man?

Ana

The water glided off my shoulder, washing the foam from my mum’s homemade soap, whose flowery fragrance would last for the entire night. Placing the water ceramic jug on the grass, I stepped out of the trough. The soft breeze touched my body as I pulled on my linen dress.

Droplets of water dripped from my hands, falling on the grass, resembling the morning dew in my wake.

After bathing myself, I stepped through the narrow corridor of the house. Halting one second, I admired the picture of The Ox Cart. My mum acquired it at a fair before Angelica and I were born, to bring colour into her house. It wasn’t the real painting, but a reproduction, admired by every neighbour who crossed our threshold.

I always imagined the man who wielded the cart to be my father. It had the same type of hat, the same brown coat, but instead of two oxen, our cart had two horses.

Passing by the kitchen, which was empty, my feet carried me straight to our room.

The hand-woven wool carpet brushed my toes. It depicted a large yellow flower in the middle of it, its petals falling on the edges.

Angelica’s slender body spun around, her feet ready to dance the night away.

“What are you going to wear?” I asked, taking my long hair and making two braids out of it. Securing them with the only two silk ribbons I had, I watched as the sun started to hide itself.

“This dress,” she wheezed. Angelica inhaled, stopping herself from prancing, holding a dress with embroidered birds on its waist.

I helped my sister take off her garments and pulled the strings to make it look slimmer. Not that she needed it.

She inhaled once loudly, and as soon as I finished with the dress’s strings, she started to swirl around the room again.

“You will get dizzy if you do not stop,” my mum chastised, but on her lips grew the most warming smile. Her sun-kissed skin crinkled as her sky-blue eyes watched my sister trying to braid her own hair.

“Let me help you,” I said, following her through the chamber.

She turned this into a game of chase and started laughing.

“You’ll get sweaty, girls!” Even my mum didn’t take herself seriously then, joining our laughter.

We circled the room for a good amount of time until both of us were left breathless.

My eyes stopped on the large map of our country, Romania. Its yellow paper was worn out by time. The brown of the mountain was replaced by a faded ivory. When we received the map, Angelica and I promised ourselves that we would visit our land. She mentioned the Goat Meadow and the Hollowing Waterfall from the Bucegi Mountains, to breathe the fresh air and to drink the coldest of waters. I would have loved to arrive at the sea in the Constanţa area. I could only imagine how the salt would cling. In the end, it would be just a dream. Angelica would get married, thus leaving us behind. Leaving our dreams to die.

Without a doubt, our father would have dragged us back by the hair. We couldn’t find work either. Nobody hired women unless for serving in a tavern filled with males like my father or selling their bodies.

Shaking my head from the horrors passing through my mind, I went to my sister and gave her a kiss on her forehead. “Now, can I help you?”

Her smile touched my heart. She was the most astonishing young woman in the village.

Even if we sold produce at the market, we wouldn’t be able to buy the livestock that would help us have revenue.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and plastered a smile on my lips. Braiding her hair, I noticed a red mark on the back of her neck. Memories from two nights ago flooded in when Angelica and I forgot to close the horses.

He did that… Maybe it was a good thing if Angelica left the house. She could finally be safe.

I secured Angelica’s hair with a red ribbon my mum dyed last week with radish juice.

“You two are my most prized gift of all time. You are the air that I breathe, remember this, my sweet, loving daughters.”

I forgot that Mum stood in the threshold, watching us. Her blue eyes were filled with unshed tears, with love on full display.