Part 12 (1/2)

It was Christmas Eve. And far too many creatures were stirring at Elderbrook. You'd think that Seekers would have left to be with family that night. Wrong. It seems we were family.

There was abundant cooking, feasting, drinking and merry-making (Heather was baking up a storm in the kitchen) but nothing official. No meetings scheduled. And only a coterie of core faithful allowed on-site. Except for one. A special guest. Dr. Peter Scheibling-a strapping young ethn.o.botanist from Albuquerque. Raine had recruited him in his efforts to begin holding regular ayahuasca ceremonies at Phil's place. Peter wanted to check out the joint, get the lay of the land and see if it was worth the risk bringing the drugs (he called it ”medicine”) into Canada and administering them. Scheibling had visited Peru and Brazil many times and had studied extensively with various shamans. He claimed to know what he was doing, how to concoct and serve the brew, what kind of diet to follow in preparation, what drug interactions to look out for. He told us he used to belong to a church in Santa Cruz that used ayahuasca in its services. According to him, there were ayahuasca ceremonies being held regularly all over North America. You just had to know where to find them. He said he'd heard about a Toronto doctor who was quietly experimenting with ayahuasca as a cure for drug addiction, and that he would try to track her down to see if he could tap into her supply. He seemed friendly, bright and knowledgeable, but for a scientist, awfully airy-fairy. He had long blond hair that rippled down to his waist, a studded eyebrow and two strangely pierced ears-the stretched-out kind with gaping holes in the lobes that you could poke your finger through. And although he arrived in normal clothing, he immediately went to the guest room and changed into a kind of Moroccan dress for men (it looked like pyjamas) with a pair of Uggs and an earflap hat. Somehow, he carried it off, still looked masculine. He smelled strongly of cinnamon oil.

People were drawn to him. Maybe because Raine presented him as if he were some ill.u.s.trious dignitary who had deigned to grace us with a visit. Phil thought he was hunky (Oh my G.o.d, it's Fabio!) and got all giggly around him. Eldrich and Steve were clearly enamoured, listening raptly to his Amazonian adventure anecdotes, hanging on his every word as if he himself were a shaman. Young Coco, who seemed to know him fairly well, was inordinately playful and flirty, plucking his hat from his head and trying it on, offering to braid his hair, fingering his leather bracelet (all of this driving Eldrich quietly mad, which was fun to observe).

After dinner, Peter held court before the fireplace in the formal living room. I stuck around for a while, but when Peter, Eldrich and Steve went off to do ”research” (i.e., mushrooms) and Phil went to bed, I headed back to my bubble. I was one of the chosen few invited to partic.i.p.ate, but I wasn't in the mood. Amy was at her parents' place for the evening, so I had a chance to get some work done before she got home. And I was on an interesting part. The audio. I had completed the major casting and most of the detail finishes on MAMA. Now I just had to add the door on the womb and the giant eyeb.a.l.l.s, which my friend Jocelyn was making out of gla.s.s (remaking, actually; I wasn't happy with the first pair). It was a ton of fun mixing and fiddling with the sounds I'd recorded and downloaded. Catelyn had graciously provided the sweet murmurings of MAMA. She wasn't a big girl, but she had a lovely low voice. Very mellifluous. I just needed to blend the right amount of reverbed heartbeat and womb whoosh, and then figure out optimal repet.i.tion interludes. So that's what I was playing with until about 11:30 or so, when I decided to brave the cold and go nab some of the treats Heather and Staci had been baking all evening.

The house was strangely peaceful, the kitchen empty and lovely-illuminated only by stove light, the throaty whir of the dishwasher churning, the aroma of lemon loaf and b.u.t.ter tarts cooling on the counter. It was cozy and Christmasy, and it made me feel oddly happy. But where was everyone?

I poked my head into the den and saw Tyson and Wayne playing a silent, brooding game of chess in front of the fire. In the bas.e.m.e.nt theatre, a handful of Seekers were watching It's a Wonderful Life-Alexa, Mindy, Anne-Marie and her son, Moina and Perry, holding hands, weeping. No sign of the mushroom trio, though. They must have holed up in one of the bedrooms. I opted not to seek them out, grabbed some baked goods and, feeling strangely elated, headed back to my bubble. As I was sprinting across the lawn I heard something-something besides the icy gra.s.s crunching under my sneakers. A familiar sound. A familiar Amy sound.

It was coming from the pool.

As I moved toward it, the sound grew more intense and then disappeared.

The pool lights were off, and all I could see was a thick ma.s.s of steam rising from the balmy water. It looked sinister, like a great boiling witches' brew in some h.e.l.lish cauldron. It was only when I was right at the pool's edge that I spotted them. She was clinging to him in the shallow end. Her arms around his neck, her legs wrapped tightly around his hips. They weren't moving.

I wish I had said something snappy, but a tsunami of epinephrine was slos.h.i.+ng over my brain, short-circuiting the synapses. ”What the f.u.c.k!”

”Oh!” said Amy, releasing, pus.h.i.+ng away.

Since then, so many rejoinders, but at the time ... nada.

”Johnny!” said Raine, with a big stupid smile on his face. ”Come on in, the water's fine!” He stood and opened his personally-trained arms wide, gesturing for me to join them.

I winged a b.u.t.ter tart at his head. It hit hard and exploded off his left temple.

”Hey!” screamed Amy.

I fired another one that thudded against his chest.

”Not cool!” shouted Raine. But I didn't respond, I was out of there.

Soon after, they showed up at the bubble, all earnest and mature and soft-spoken, determined to talk me down, trying to tell me that they were just practising the Inst.i.tute's touch therapy, and that what had happened between them in the pool was nothing more than an innocent and G.o.dly interaction, and how could I be so possessive and ridiculous and angry?

I was pretty composed by then (after smoking a j and swallowing a ma.s.sive quant.i.ty of whiskey); the river wasn't calm, but it had frozen over. I listened quietly with a mild-mannered smile on my face. I sipped the prosecco they had brought along. I nodded and nodded in apparent understanding.

”Look, man,” said Raine, slapping my knee. ”I know you and Amy are together! Everyone knows that. And I have a lady friend back in New York!”

Nod. Sip.

”Amy and I were just connecting in the Lord's love. Nothing smarmy about that. That's a beautiful thing to do, right? That's why I invited you to join us!”

Sip. Nod.

”You should have,” said Amy.

”Seriously man, would I have invited you to join us if we were tryin' to hide somethin'? I mean, think about it.”

I considered. I nodded. ”OK,” I said.

They were pretty convincing, actually. Maybe Raine wasn't such a s.h.i.+tty actor after all. I may have even believed them if I hadn't heard that sound. That familiar Amy sound.

It was the sound she makes when you fill her with c.u.m.

”So we're good?” said Raine, squeezing my knee and rising.

”Yeah, we're good.”

”All right,” he said. ”I'll see you guys in the morning. Merry Christmas!”

”Merry Christmas,” said Amy with a little wave.

But we didn't see him in the morning. I'm happy to report that I never saw the large-headed, thick-thighed dips.h.i.+t again. Because he left Elderbrook that very night. He left soon after returning to the house and discovering that young Coco was not sleeping peacefully in the guest room like she was supposed to be. No. According to Amy, Raine found darling Coco in Eldrich and Steve's room, starkers with her mouth full of Peter Scheibling's b.a.l.l.s and her legs spread wide as Eldrich attempted to cram his colossal s.c.h.l.o.n.g into her teeny tween t.w.a.t (while Steve-o knelt behind him, tonguing his master's glory hole and jerking himself off).

It seems the mushroom trio had gone cuckoo for Coco puffs.

My absolute fave part was that degenerate-Eldrich and his pervy crew reportedly gave Raine the same spiritual-connection spiel that he and Amy had laid on me in the bubble.

When I heard that, I remember thinking: Maybe there is a G.o.d. And maybe Eldrich is right about his magnificent sense of humour.

Eldrich

Things fall apart. The centre cannot hold.

Emotions flare. Emotions obscure.

Raine's last visit with us was at Christmas. John moved back to Hawton Boulevard in January. But neither of them ever denounced the Inst.i.tute. Not once. Not ever.

Whoever suggests such a thing is a liar.

Amy

So ... Eldrich, soaring on psilocybin and suffering a horrendous lapse of judgment, tried (and thankfully failed) to have unprotected intercourse with Raine's fourteen-year-old daughter. Unfortunately, Mushroom Steve and Peter Scheibling were in on it too. A group thing. Not at all unusual for the Inst.i.tute at that point, except for the underage-minor portion of the equation. Was the girl s.e.xually compromised? Yes, of course. Three adult males took her to bed-though not against her will at least. Coco admitted that she'd sought out the men and initiated the escapade. But who knows how far she meant it to go. Did she leave the Inst.i.tute as a virgin? Yes, a.s.suming she arrived as one. There was nudity and oral, but no actual penetration.

Thank heaven for small mercies and huge c.o.c.ks.