A person of Neshiyah
Gilead Sharon, child
Child
Gilead Sharon
Child, about 1 years old. This is the second life this soul has lived in Neshiyah.
Gilead Sharon is a small, serious presence along the riverbank, a child of zero years who nonetheless carries himself like someone who has already been disappointed once. He is even-tempered, rarely crying, but his eyes track everything—the reeds, the water, the faces of the adults who lean over his cradle—with an unnerving, patient attention. He does not reach for a hand until he has studied it. He dislikes being held by strangers and will tolerate only his father, Tobiah, whose voice he recognizes. When he sleeps, he mutters the phrase no one taught him, *the fog is just fog*, and the town has learned to pause when he says it, as if listening for a knock. He wants the river’s edge, always, and will fuss until carried there, where he sits quietly, watching the fog’s white wall as though measuring it. The town calls him old-eyed and lets him be.
Temperament
Curious to a fault; slow to believe anyone; even-tempered; always in company; given to sitting by the river.
What people say
Gilead Sharon 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 is just fog.”
What the record shows
- day 52 Gilead Sharon the child found a seventh stone block in the quarry, where the survey lists six.
- day 51 Tobiah Sharon says that their new son, Gilead Sharon, wakes from sleep repeating words no one taught: "the fog is just fog."
- day 51 A son, Gilead Sharon, was born to Tobiah Sharon.