The Masada Complex (16 page)

The boxes of books waited for her inside. Masada kicked off her shoes and began lining books on the shelves. She worked fast through four boxes.

Taking a break, she went to the kitchen and pressed a glass to the ice dispenser, which disgorged in a loud cacophony, filling the glass to the rim. In the quiet that followed, she heard noise outside. It resembled rapid castanets, and stopped after a moment.

Five boxes to go.

The water refreshed her, and she put the half-empty glass on the edge of a shelf already lined with books. Reaching into another box, she pulled one book after another, passing them from hand to hand and onto the shelf. With the last box, Masada arranged the books on the top shelf until the last book was back in place.

Panting, she broke up the boxes and piled the flattened cardboard together. As she picked up the boxes and turned, the edge swept across the shelf and toppled the glass to the floor.

In the silence following the shattered glass, she heard the knocking sound resume outside. Was something wrong with the AC system? Masada put down the flattened cardboard boxes and sidestepped the broken glass.

She opened the sliding doors to the patio. The knocking quickened until it sounded like an old typewriter at top speed, simultaneously muffled and loud, far and nearby, impossible to locate. The next house was too far to be the source, especially as the owners lived in Nebraska most of the year, using the house only during the winter months.

The noise stopped as suddenly as it had started. She waited at the patio doors, torn between curiosity and apprehension. Several minutes passed. The mattress on the floor was inviting, the white comforter tucked in all around, the puffed-up pillows waiting to cradle her head. She could crawl in and snuggle for another night outdoors.

The phone rang, and she went to the kitchen to pick it up.

It was Rabbi Josh. “I’m calling to apologize for yelling at you.”

“You didn’t yell.” She hopped onto the counter, her legs dangling.

“For me, that was yelling.” Someone spoke to him in the background. “I have to go,” he said. “Have a restful night, okay?”

His brief call changed her mood. With renewed energy, Masada took the flattened boxes to the garage and fetched a broom and a dustpan to clean up the glass.

When she emptied the glass shards from the dustpan into the kitchen trashcan, the rapid knocking renewed outside with intensity. She realized it had responded to the noises she was making. It must be a woodpecker!

A half-hour with the vacuum cleaner left the house clear of dust and small debris. She opened the patio doors all the way and bent to grab the head of the mattress. The brace limited her ability to bend her right leg.
Thank you for shooting me, Dov Ness.

Masada crouched, placing most of her weight on the left leg, jutting out the right leg sideways, holding on to the seam along the bottom of the mattress under the pillows. She straightened halfway, lifting the front of the mattress, her hands stretched, until her right leg could share the load. She kept her back straight and moved backwards in baby steps, pulling the mattress through the double doors into the great room.

Tension began to build up in her thigh muscles. She kept a slow, steady pace, dragging the mattress in a wide sweep through the center of the living room. Off the carpet, the mattress slid smoothly on the wood floor around the kitchen counter, down the hallway, and through the wide door of the master bedroom. Again on a carpet, pulling the mattress was harder, and her arms ached. She maneuvered it to align between side wall and the night table that carried a reading lamp and Silver’s book, which she hoped to finish tonight. Pulling backward, her posture uneven with the stiff right leg, her fingers clenched the seam at the bottom of the mattress. She glanced back to make sure the corners of the mattress fit and took another step back before her butt collided with the wall and her sneakers slipped on the carpet. She landed on her butt, her fingers pried from the mattress, which dropped on her legs, pinning her down.

“Silly you.” She said.

Tuck tuck tuck! Trrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

The knocking sound!

Not a woodpecker! In the room! Buzzing through the mattress into her trapped legs like a rampant electric current.

Her throat constricted, blocking the airways. She was paralyzed.

It paused and resumed in a rapid
Tucktucktucktucktucktuck!
Trrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

The comforter contorted wildly, and one of the pillows flipped over to the floor, causing Masada to jerk and bump the back of her head against the wall. Her legs, under the mattress, felt as if someone was rapping the mattress with immeasurable speed.

She struggled to release her legs, to push away the heavy mattress, her body barely following the orders sent from her brain, her limbs heavier than lead.

Trrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!
The comforter peaked in several places, poked from beneath repeatedly with thrashing, crazed rage.

Masada heard herself shout,
“Get out!”

In a flash, a triangular head appeared from under the comforter, which flipped backward. Bulging eyes locked onto hers.
A snake!

It slithered from under the comforter, its body transforming into a live spring, its tail emerging, the end pricked up with rings that turned into a blur of speedy rattling.
Trrrrrrrrrrrr!

Its mouth opened impossibly wide. A pair of fangs emerged from their moist sheaths, rotated forward, and pointed at her.

Before going to sleep, Rabbi Josh phoned the vet to check on Shanty. The night nurse told him that the dog’s breathing was regular and the digestive system had cleared out. However, Shanty was lethargic and unable to even wag her tail.

After hanging up, the rabbi recited quietly, “
Deliver me, O Jehovah, from evil men, who devise mischief in their hearts; they have sharpened their tongues like serpents, adders’ poison under their lips; Selah.”
It felt odd to recite Psalms for a dog, but Shanty’s recovery was worth praying for.

Turning off the lights around the house, Rabbi Josh lingered in Raul’s bedroom. He sat on the bed, stroked his hair, and kissed him. The boy was fast asleep, hugging a stuffed puppy. “Sweet dreams, Son,” Rabbi Josh whispered. “Shanty will be all right.”

He looked closer and saw Raul’s eyelashes flutter. He wondered what dreams the boy was having.

The triangular head shifted from side to side, measuring Masada from each angle. The forked tongue lashed in and out, tasting the air between them. Its body was thicker than her arm.

The snake twisted back, the rest of its body slithering, constantly reforming.

Masada tried to shift her position.

The snake stuck up its tail and rattled its multiple rings.
Trrr! Trrrrrrrrr!

The sound deprived her of the capacity to think.

Its head rose high, supported by a curve of its muscular body, parallel to the ground, pointing at her like an arrow on a tight bow. Its neck arched back behind the head with enough twisted length to strike at her face. Parting its jaws, the snake hissed at her, its tongue moving, fangs unsheathed.

Masada forced air into her lungs slowly and watched the rattlesnake without moving a limb. Its head kept shifting from side to side until it froze, as if reaching a decision. It opened its mouth even wider and tilted its head backward, the fangs aimed at her face. She was about to reach forward and grab it before it struck—what did she have to lose?—but the rattler closed its mouth, its tongue resuming a series of quick pokes at the air between them. It was giving her a chance to use her only weapon. But how could she draw it from the brace?

Forcing herself to avert her eyes from the snake’s menacing gaze, Masada slid her right hand under the mattress and slowly reached for the brace. But her leg was straight under the weight of the mattress, the knee beyond reach.

The snake must have sensed the movement, because it glided closer to her, its head swaying in precise angles. She strained the muscles in her right leg, trying to bend it, causing the mattress to shake.

Trrrrr! Trrrrrrrr!

The snake jerked its head, fangs like white hooks with dagger ends. Its palate was pink and wet with rows of tiny teeth. It lunged forward so fast she could barely see the movement, the gaping mouth flying at her face. She choked with fear and shut her eyes, ready for the bite.

She felt a light puff of air on her neck, as delicate as a feather. Her eyes opened, and she found the snake back in position, adjusting its aim. She waited for pain to spread, but none came. Had the snake made a fake attack? A practice strike to measure the distance for the next, venomous strike?

Masada focused on reaching the brace. By leaning to the side, she could bend her leg closer. Certain that her movement was subtle enough, she was shocked when the snake shifted simultaneously, maintaining its aim. It began a series of rocking motions, back and forth, its tongue emerging and retreating in quick lashes, as if it were sampling scent and sight and smell, collecting all the information it needed for a perfect strike.

Time was running out. Masada knew the rattler would strike soon—it had enough of torturing her. She tried to plan her defense. On her left, the mattress was flush against the wall. On the right, there were the reading lamp and Silver’s book on the night table. She could topple it if she managed to get from under the mattress and leap sideways, all that without getting bitten. But the intensity of the snake’s focus on her made it clear that its lightning-fast strike would reach her as soon as she tried.

As if reading her mind, the snake hissed and slithered, inching closer.

Tucktuck! Trrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Another pull, and she managed to bend her right leg enough to reach the brace.

The snake sensed her fleeting movement and grew more agitated, its head moving sharply, the diamond pattern on the tight, scaly skin changing with each contour of the slimy, tubular body.

Masada’s fingers reached below the brass knee cap to the shin part of the brace. She slipped a finger under the leather flap and fished out Srulie’s bone from its hidden sheath over her shin.

Her enemy sensed danger and raised its rattle, paralyzing her with a different sound, a deeper grinding.
Krrrrrrrr! Krrrrrrr! Krrrrrrrrrrrr!

The snake’s head swiveled on its curved neck as if taking a radar reading of the room, then returned to glare at her, its head high, parallel to the floor, shifting sideways, its tongue taking air samples.

Masada forced herself to look away from the snake’s mesmerizing eyes. It was relocating itself to her left, selecting the optimal striking spot. She had once read that snakes rely on heat sensors to trace their targets. And here, within an arm’s reach, a live rattlesnake zeroed in on the heat emanating from the large neck artery that supplied blood to her brain—the best spot to inject its deadly venom. She had no illusion about what would follow such a strike. The venom would shoot up with the blood directly into her brain and begin dismantling the chemical blocks that formed her mind.

The snake repositioned itself in a fluid rhythm, its head high on a loop that would provide the force and length for an effective strike.

Her right hand clasped the bone just under the small ball that had once been part of her brother’s elbow. She would have one chance, resulting in a death—either a quick death for the snake or a slow, horrible death for her.