Title: Strange Attractors 6/6
Author: K.V. Wylie
Disclaimer: Permission to use these characters relating to BtVS & AtS, has not been given. Joss, Twentieth
Century Fox, UPN, WB & Mutant Enemy own TM and copyrighted them. This is purely for fun,
and no copyright infringement is intended
"In our pilgrimage across the roof of hell, let us search for flowers."
Issa Oraga Haru
Though it was evening, the August sun still shone warmly across the sidewalks and on the faces of Giles and Ira as they walked towards the synagogue. It had been three months since their house had burned, three months since Ethan had disappeared into a bitter, fiery night, and three months since the strange connection between Ethan and Giles had finally been broken.
Giles hadn't realized the weight of the link until it was gone, but he hadn't quite reconciled to its absence either. He and Ethan had been a part of each other for too long, and the aftermath felt like he'd lost a lover.
He owed Ethan too. For all that Ethan had done to Giles, one moment wiped the slate clean. That night three months ago, when Ira would have run into the flames of his burning house, Ethan held him back. As hurt as Ethan was and as strong as Ira suddenly discovered he was, Ethan had held onto Ira and kept him alive.
Ira gave Giles' arm a reassuring squeeze. Giles turned to look at him, and couldn't quite repress the twitch that always accompanied the sight now. The pandora's box of magic, once open, could not be closed, and Ira had had to work hard to learn how *not* to bring spells of fire down from the sky. His hands trembled often lately, and his hair, once a burnished copper colour, was now completely white.
This evening, however, he smiled at Giles and was thoroughly happy. Earlier, Ira had lit a candle without taking out half the ceiling. Tonight, which would mark a triumph for Giles, was one for Ira as well. For Ira, a simple act of lighting a candle. For Giles....
Giles smiled in return. Tonight would bring something for which he'd worked very hard too.
As he and Ira took their seats in the synagogue, Giles remembered Rabbi Benjamin Hilkin's face when he'd delivered his essay.
"What it means to me to be a Jew," Giles read. "It means to begin anew."
He put his essay on Benjamin's desk. Benjamin looked at him for long moment, looked at the two short sentences on the paper, then looked at Giles again. A slow smile crossed his face, the smile of one who'd been bested and didn't mind.
Giles underwent circumcision a few days later, in the presence of Benjamin and two other Rabbis, a process that unnerved Giles on levels he didn't know he possessed. Ira took Giles home from the hospital the next day and offered to tend to him. Giles, in a spasm of vulnerability, kicked Ira out of the living room and slept curled up in a ball on the couch for two days. Ira bore that, and the rest of the healing time, with quiet patience.
The first reward had come this morning. In the early morning, just after sunrise, Giles stepped into the Mikvah.
Immersion in the water of the Mikvah, a pool of natural water, was the moment of conversion for Giles, the moment he'd been heading for, but the atmosphere in the Mikvah house had thrown him at first. There were other people there, people who were not involved in his ceremony. Some were talking and laughing in the hallway. Others gossiped in the showers about their jobs and children.
Jews did not submerge in the waters of the Mikvah without being thoroughly clean first, and the initial procedure had a clinical feel to it. Giles was given a list of instructions that included shampooing, brushing his teeth, flossing, and removing everything including his watch and ring. He was given a robe, but was only allowed to wear it until he was near the Mikvah pool. Then, under the eyes of three witnesses, he had to shed the robe and enter naked into the water.
He was surprised at how warm the water was, and how quickly he forgot that he was not alone. A feeling of peace came over him. He closed his eyes and slowly submerged.
The sounds around him disappeared. He lifted his legs and floated weightless in a span of suspended time that felt like a gift.
At last, he stood and came partly out of the water. The first person he saw was Ira. He spoke the first blessing while looking into Ira's eyes.
Benjamin began the ceremony by asking the beginning questions. "Do you, of your own free will, choose to enter into the covenant between God and the people Israel, and to become a Jew?"
"Yes," Giles said, and was started at how hushed his voice sounded.
Benjamin continued asking the questions of the ritual. At the end, he read from the Book of Ezekiel. "With pure waters will I purify you, and you will be pure. A new heart will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you. I will cause you to follow My teachings, and you shall keep My statutes. You shall be My people and I will be your God."
After Giles came out of the water and was in the robe, Benjamin took his hands and said, "Welcome, Haskel ben Avraham Avinu, Haskel son of Abraham our Father. Mazel tov!"
Ira interrupted Giles thoughts and brought him back to the present. "Rupert, are you all right?"
Giles nodded. The seats in the synagogue were filling up and the service would begin soon.
"You had a curious look on your face," Ira said.
"It's been quite a day," Giles replied.
"Yes," Ira agreed, and laid his hand once again on Giles' arm.
The Cantor walked to the front of the room. A blessing was given. Then, with a smile, he nodded at Giles and called him forward. Giles walked down the middle aisle, took a place on the bimah, and received into his hands, for the first time, the Torah.
He looked over the congregation, towards Ira, and said, "I began this journey because I loved one Jew."
Then, with the wonderful weight of the scrolls in his arms, Giles began the Shema prayer.
"Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one."
(end)
A note on the Hebrew name I chose for Giles. Haskel means "intellect". Ira translates into "descendant", and Ethan into "strong".