Instrumental Emmett
Instrumental
Emmett
[on a many-times-creased-and-folded piece of paper, slipped into a leather-bound journal in Emmett’s backpack]
You must understand: You have a role to play in our family.
You are a protector and a safeguard, a confidant.
You are, in many ways, my legacy, at least for now.
Do not think that I see you only as an object, a mindless thing created from the work of my hands and the word of the Divine One.
You stood beside Dana at the chuppah when Miriam and I were married.
You taught Noah to read Torah, in the moments when I thought he would refuse to learn.
I watched Ruth take her first steps into your arms. You bear Isaac’s face—and may God forgive me for that indulgence, for all it hurt us both—and in keeping you by my side, I have had his presence, or at least a memory of it, for longer than I deserved.
You asked me once, “Who am I to you?”
You are my greatest achievement, and my deepest regret. You are proof of the Divine, and a reminder that the gift of creation should be His alone.
You are my son’s memory. But you are not my son.
Text message from: Ruth Stein
Are you really going all the way to California?
Text message to: Ruth Stein
Yes.
Text message from: Ruth Stein
Is it because of what Dad said?
Text message from: Ruth Stein
Because you know that doesn’t matter to me. Or to Mom. Noah’s being awful but you know he’ll regret what he said when he comes to his senses. You belong with us.
Text message to: Ruth Stein
It’s complicated.
[message not sent]
Text message to: Ruth Stein
I’m sorry.
[message not sent]
Text message to: Ruth Stein
I would stay if I could.
[message not sent]
Text message from: Ruth Stein
Emmett?
[read: 1:48pm]
Emmett knows he should refuse.
In the first place, the idea is…unthinkable.
Delilah seems intelligent, seems—at least in the short moments Emmett has spent with her—like a bright, sensible person, and intelligent, bright, sensible people don’t invite strangers to join them on a cross-country road trip on a whim.
That she’d asked Emmett to coffee as a thank-you was surprising, but not entirely outrageous, and it had been an unexpectedly enjoyable experience, without the edge of nervousness and self-doubt that Emmett was used to experiencing in every interaction with anyone outside Jacob’s family, and sometimes even with them.
But this invitation goes far beyond gratitude, tipping well into the territory of the strange and confusing and perhaps even suspicious.
Emmett can almost hear Jacob’s voice in his head reciting the running list of Emmett’s tells and missteps, recalling the myriad ways in which Emmett’s slips nearly exposed them.
To ignore all of that and accept Delilah’s invitation, spending countless hours in a car with someone who does not know what Emmett is and can’t be allowed to find out—
Jacob would never forgive him.
But Jacob, he thinks, is not here.
As if sensing Emmett’s hesitation, Delilah holds up her hands.
“I know it sounds wild,” she says, and grins when Emmett can’t quite suppress a laugh.
“I do, really! And I swear, I’m not usually like this.
But everything for this trip is booked for two people anyway, and doing it by myself is just pathetic, even if I’m telling my manager and all my friends that I’m owning it.
And you said you’ve never done the cross-country trip by yourself either, right?
” She barrels on before Emmett even finishes shaking his head.
“So it’s a win-win. You get to California without spending three days on buses, I get a travel buddy, and everyone goes home happy. ”
She pauses, then adds, “Except my mother, who will for sure murder me when she finds out about this. But everyone else definitely goes home happy.”
Emmett blinks. “Your mother would hurt you?”
Delilah lets out a startled laugh. “Of course not,” she says. “That’s the part you’re focusing on?”
Emmett flushes. It’s an unfamiliar sensation, and he puts an unthinking hand to his cheek at the unexpected heat, finding it hotter than it should be against his naturally cool fingers.
Usually he has to manufacture physical reactions like that, raising or lowering his body temperature or bringing a visible color to his skin in response to the cues of the people around him.
This unintended rush of warmth is rare, and Emmett wants to flinch from it.
It’s a dangerous imitation, his body leaning too far into that dark, shameful yearning for the humanity he’ll never be able to touch.
He should say no. He knows he should say no.
Because twenty years ago, in the depths of grief and despair and divine inspiration, Jacob crafted Emmett’s body with his own two hands, drawing him together with clay that held centuries of memories already—reaching back through the generations of Jacob’s ancestors, all the way to that first disciple of the great Rabbi Loew, whose own golem still sits, inert and silent, in the attic of the Altneuschul in Prague.
Emmett is made of water and earth and memory, created to replace the irreplaceable.
On his deathbed, Jacob had given one final order: for Emmett to return to the cave where Jacob brought him forth from the ground and unravel the threads of prayer and will and magic until there is nothing left of him but clay.
“You know the stories,” Jacob had told him toward the end, during one of those few moments when Miriam had been persuaded to go and rest, leaving Emmett alone by his bedside, a quiet, constant sentinel.
Jacob’s voice had been a rasp by then, miles from its old booming strength.
“A golem without a master is unbound. A recipe for madness and danger.”
“But Ruth,” Emmett started to protest, and Jacob had shaken his head on the pillow. “And Noah, and Miriam, and—”
“If you want to keep them safe, you will leave them behind.”
Emmett did want to keep them safe. He always had.
It was why he’d barely ever stepped even a toe out of Jacob’s carefully drawn lines.
The fear of even the hypothetical consequences of disobedience was enough to keep him from taking the risk.
On the rare occasions when he’d felt too restless, too tightly bound by commands and restrictions, he’d looked for ways around the rules instead of breaking them outright—following the letter, if not the spirit, and always begging forgiveness in the moments when he failed to ask permission.
Jacob always granted it, but never without making his disappointment clear. Never without reminding Emmett of his place.
There won’t be any more reminders. But the stories linger, vivid in Emmett’s memory.
So after the final night of shiva, he’d packed a bag—Jacob’s journal, Emmett’s own long-loved daily prayer book, some clothing, a few sentimental belongings he couldn’t bear to leave behind—and used the credit card Jacob had given him for emergencies to buy a bus ticket to California.
It doesn’t matter that part of Emmett has always yearned to feel what it would be like to truly disobey. To do something not just because he wants to but because he’s been told that he shouldn’t. Just to see what it feels like. To see if freedom tastes as sweet as he’s always dreamed it does.
And now here’s Delilah, offering him that chance.
If you want to keep them safe…
But how much of a risk could it be, really? Go back to where I made you, Jacob had told Emmett, but he hadn’t said, Go by bus, hadn’t said, Go without detours, hadn’t said, Go alone.
Emmett is a creature made of scripture. He knows a loophole when he sees one.
“Yes,” he tells Delilah, interrupting her mid-spiel as she lists all the reasons Emmett should agree to join her, outlining the various stops and attractions along her route.
She breaks off, looking as surprised as Emmett feels. “Wait,” she says. “Wait, really?”
Emmett realizes his hand is still pressed to his own cheek, and he drops it. “Yes,” he repeats. “If you’re serious about having me. I’d like to come.”
“Oh my God, amazing,” Delilah says. She has the most expressive face of anyone Emmett has ever met, and the delight that crosses it is bright and beaming despite the smudged eye makeup and the lines around her eyes that suggest it’s been too long since she’s had a good night’s sleep.
“Wait, I’m actually so excited about this, it’s going to be so much fun.
” She grins, fierce and sudden and a little vicious. “Take that, Samantha.”
Emmett blinks, and then remembers—Samantha, the ex-fiancée. The reason Delilah is taking this trip alone in the first place. He considers asking whether Delilah’s invitation is motivated by spite, and then decides not to. It’s not like he could blame her.
“We’ll have to get more road snacks,” Delilah says.
“I got some this morning, but I’ll be real, I inhaled most of them.
Oh! Do you need to call anyone to let them know you’re changing your plans?
With all the stops, it’ll be a way longer trip than your bus ride would have been.
I mapped it out for the scenery, not for efficiency. ”
Emmett thinks of Ruth and the unanswered texts left on his phone.
Of Miriam’s embrace before she saw Emmett to the door, refusing to meet his eyes.
Of Noah, who hasn’t spoken to Emmett since he learned the truth.
Of Dana, Jacob’s only living child from his first marriage, who always knew, and who never forgave Emmett for his existence.
Of Jacob, who will never call for him again.
He swallows. “No,” he says. “No, there’s no one I need to call.”
Delilah stills, some of her animated energy fading.
She regards him for a moment, that same intelligence that first caught Emmett’s attention bringing a quieter, more calculating light to her eyes.
Then, after a brief hesitation, she reaches out, slowly enough that Emmett could move away if he chose.
He doesn’t, and she puts a hand on his arm, squeezing gently.
“Okay,” she says. “Then let’s go.”
Without waiting for a response, she turns on her heel and starts off toward the block where she left her van.
Emmett takes a breath he doesn’t need, tightens his grip on the strap of his bag, and follows.
Listen:
No one loves a monster story like queers love a monster story.
Because how can we not, right? Pick a narrative, any narrative.
We are created into monstrousness, into otherness, into unwanted-ness, through no choice of our own.
Our love is violence, is consumption, is transformation, is metaphor for all of the above; to choose that love is transgression and unraveling and rejection of goodness and rightness and truth—because it must be, right?
Because why else would we be taught that the thing in the woods, in the dark, in the closet, is a monster, if we weren’t supposed to fear it?
—Always Here with Iris Gold, season 3, episode 9: “On Monstrousness”