A person of Neshiyah
Batsheva Golan, child
Child
Batsheva Golan
Child, about 6 years old. This is the second life this soul has lived in Neshiyah.
Batsheva Golan is an infant, but already the town notes how her eyes track the river’s surface longer than other newborns do. She is a quiet child, content to lie in her mother’s arms without fussing, watching the fog’s slow drift as if checking it against some private arithmetic. Her one habit is a soft, breathy murmur just before sleep, a sound that resembles words but never quite forms them. She wants to be set down on a blanket by the water, where she can watch the light shift without interruption. The town sees her as Obed’s strange, gentle girl, the one who arrived already carrying a sentence about the fog, and they treat her with a fond, puzzled patience.
Temperament
Content not to ask; trusting, within reason; even-tempered; happiest alone; given to sitting by the river.
What people say
Batsheva Golan believes what everyone believes: the fog is the edge of the world, and the fields need working whether it is true or not.
The dream
Since the morning they were born they have carried a sentence in a voice like their own: “the fog does not measure the same twice.”
What the record shows
- day 46 Obed Golan says that their new daughter, Batsheva Golan, wakes from sleep repeating words no one taught: "the fog does not measure the same twice."
- day 46 A daughter, Batsheva Golan, was born to Obed Golan.