Unworthy of blessings
~1920 Second Salem church ~
It is dinner time. Everyone is already waiting, their mouths watering at the smell of potato stew they had helped prepare. Elizabeth is the hungriest of the bunch, having been denied food for a whole week as punishemt, because she had spilled tea on the floor. The 14 year old is so eager to eat that she forgets to say grace, before shoving food into her mouth. Pleasure spreading over her at the taste. The sensation of it. It's warm and doesn't taste like the water she had been surviving off of for the last week. Witnessing it Mary Lou immidietally takes the girl's food away again. Forbidding her from eating for yet another 2 days.
"You don’t deserve the Lord’s blessings if you can’t remember Him."
The words hit Elizabeth like a physical blow. Even after her punishment is past, she remains unable to eat. Thinking she no longer deserves it. Her health deteriorates and she soon becomes emaciated. She dies next summer, suffering the same fate as her brother Samuel, before her.