The Devoted (11 page)

(Pause.)

AR: Many lines, yes. It began to get violent.

C-ABC: Violent? How--

AR: He would slap us. Choke us. It wasn’t in private. He was sometimes with several of us at once. And maybe we did something wrong during the day. Maybe we left a smudge on the mirror. So we’d be in bed, supposedly for a relaxing time, and he’d just start yelling and being very aggressive with his hands. And the rest of himself.

Edgar Pike’s Journal

May, 2009

I’m realizing the effectiveness of certain words and topics when it comes to recruitment.

The recruitment venue is a source of pride to me. They like us at the yoga center, and have even expressed looking forward to my talks. Call us a “gang,” which I’ll take. It’s fun and cute and light.

Those who come are from varied sectors. Jed is what Malcolm Gladwell calls a Connector; that is, he’s good at bringing people together. Every Friday, I’d say 10 percent of the audience is from him, just chatting with strangers on or near the beach. The rest are from New Age sectors; they enjoy yoga, of course, and tantra and meditation. Vegan diets, many of them. A good deal of marijuana users, which is okay. They’re impressed when I join them for it; it yields me young.

As of now, we have 23 members. I’d like millions. I think the Internet will have to become involved at some point. Matthew can be of assistance there. He was homeless, briefly, but ironically spent much of his time in the Apple store, surfing the web.

Recruitment doesn’t happen during the talks. The talks themselves have a hook regarding Oneness. From Oneness, I go into the Gush. Most of them seem to get it immediately. We then do meditations right there, and all of them get it. They see, meditating, that there’s the gush -- which is always running hot; all our instincts and feelings and drives and rhythms and aliveness -- and then there’s the hum...

You CAN ACTUALLY Separate The Two. At any moment.

Once you see that you can divide them, you see that both are illusions. I speak in support of the gush, which is where much of life’s pleasures reside. The hum, however, I speak of as more real, since it’s foundational and identical within every single one of us.

But real recruitment happens after, during snacks and juice. I speak to the women, primarily, though lend courtesy to the men. Our discussions are primarily about the sermon. Some say “lecture,” which is okay.

Then I’ll use words. It shames me when I fail and delights me when I succeed.

One such word is “tits.” I will speak to a woman for a long enough time, get her to like me, then use “tits” in a given context, usually in pursuit of humor. If she doesn’t like it, I discard the exchange. If she deems it funny or proceeds unimpeded, then I know she is of a sufficiently sexual nature to warrant further engagement, either then or in the future.

Blushing, I talk of “mooning,” too. Of how, for example, Laura in the group thinks it’s funny to moon the rest of us. This is a good topic, safer than tits, because unlike the above, it straddles the line between sexuality and sheer silly humor. Still, a woman can give herself away through her reaction to the topic. If she likes it, sufficient sexuality has been discovered. If she’s tight, I have no remaining use.

These are sophomoric games; I’ll be the first to admit it. But like the low word I dislike, they get at the root of our basic truth. Pleasure centers. Gush. Not to be dismissed, unreal though it is, essentially.

Last Day –
1:53PM

Him: “Anyway, four in a row, whatever, but Paul was later.”

“No. I met him before we met Susan.”

“Maybe, okay, fine. But I met him after I met Susan.”

“So we’re going with who you met or who a given group representative met?”

“I guess me. It makes no difference.”

“It’ll make a difference when we’re all standing there at six o’clock.”

Some space grew between us as we spoke, but He narrows it, His footsteps hard on the floor.

“I’ve lost a lot of people this year,” He says. “Am I going to lose you, too?”

Till now, I thought gulping was a thing of myth. But here I go, Adam’s apple clicking.

“Interesting choice of words,” I say, my mouth a humid hollow. “Talking about loss.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

I look into His (computer salesman) eyes.

“Matthew?”

But I say: “I’m fine. You’re not gonna lose me.”
He releases some air. Now He’s touching my face, the expression of which works hard not to change. I’ve got ground to hold, and it goes like this:

“But you realize what this means?” I say to Him.

He waits.

“It means Jolie’s now going first.”

Last Day –
1:54PM

“What do you want from me?” He says in return, only He doesn’t verbalize those words; He makes them come to life by sighing and letting His palms go even with the ceiling.

What He actually says is: “All the more reason to make sure we move quickly.”

And then He’s done with me again, which is to say He’s gone from the shed.

The light and green and blue flood in and ice me.

I hear music coming from the house, drums (keep drumming) and bells and flutes and pipes and strings. All of them by way of a CD player that He usually keeps locked in a closet off the kitchen. Every day, though, right before two, He brings it out to spur the Ecstatic Dance.

I watch Him go across the lawn, the mathematics of His motives so clear as to be startling. Jolie was afraid of the knives, so He punished both of us by putting Theo third to last instead of her. Then, as a way to hide His motives and keep us docile, He oversaw our wedding, becoming a proponent of an institution that (believe it) He’s always hated.

Then, to stick the knife in deeper – and having gained some ground by marrying us – He put Jolie first in the goddamn order.

His reasons? Only God can know.

Which to Him is no invasion of privacy, since He thinks He is God.

To me, however, as I watch Him go up the steps, He’s looking more and more like some kind of man.

Last Day –
1:55PM

And I may be but a boy, but I think it’s time to start stabbing this man back.

From BREAKING NEWS L.A.’s exclusive interview with Jed Bracken (10/12/11):

Look, I was the closest guy to him, save for maybe Matt Barrett, and I can’t say with certainty that I ever knew what he was really thinking. That’s the whole fucking point! You know what he’s thinking, you may as well go home.

Nah, fuck that. You gotta stick around! On Tuesday, he seems mad at you for some strange reason, then on Wednesday all of a sudden he’s giving you a hug and calling you his “son.” So on Tuesday you want to blow your brains out, but on Wednesday you could climb a fuckin’ mountain with no gear! So you want more of that Wednesday feeling, all the time! But on Thursday he’s fuckin’ pissed off ‘cause his soup is cold. So you spend Friday-Saturday-Sunday trying to appease him. Nothing, right? But Monday! Oh, man. Monday he starts telling like ten other people how handsome he thinks you are. And your blood gets all juicy. You’re a god.

So when you feel like a god, you don’t want to know what he’s thinking! You just want to keep feeling like a god. He’ll be giving a goddamn sermon, and you’re half-listening but you believe everything he’s saying – because, fuck, hey, at least he’s not mad at you right now! And if he is mad, who cares? Forgive him. Wait for him. Because come tomorrow, you just might be his son again.

You getting any of this?

Last Day –
2PM: ECSTATIC DANCE

I go across the lawn. This is it. Far be it from me to know my own nature, but I’m sensing that it’s not some loose conglomeration of obedient parts.

I’m sensing instead that it doesn’t like a wall against its back.

Which is fitting since I have wind at my back, and it pushes me in through the home’s rear door, whereupon I’m greeted by holy music and dancing bodies and guzzled wine.

Energy like this: relentless. It’s a compulsion with compulsiveness as its goal (keep drumming).

But I’m about to take the moving entity that is Jolie, and snap her into a freeze so tight it’ll choke her.

She comes up to me. Kisses me. Lips like the rose petals about her head.

My mouth, however, doesn’t kiss her back. It gives her words:

“He wants you to go first,” it says, and I watch the words settle upon her gray matter like fallen feathers.

No more dancing. No more moving.

She looking at me/me looking at her.

But then her eyes go perfectly closed. Whatever’s behind them, I cannot say. His words from the Group Talk Session, maybe?

Whatever it is, it gets her dancing anew.

And by the time I turn away, having sneered, her dance is twice as ecstatic as before.

Last Day –
2:06PM

Okay, Jed, you fucking dweeb: It’s you and me, so let’s get used to it.

Door locked. Sink on. Phone dialed.

He answers with that voice that I’d love to punch: “Matthew?”

“You left us.” I’m sneering so hard I’ll need a dentist. “The pressure was absolutely fucking insane, and you guys just left one night.”

“I’m sorry, Matthew.”

“How am I supposed to trust you if you left?”

“Would you rather trust the person who’s for life, or the one who’s for death--?”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know the fucking argument already. I’ve been through it. But why should I trust
you
?”

The silence of the Jed.

“It’s already the afternoon,” Jed says. “If we knew your location--”

“No! I swear to God, I will hang up this phone. I’m out on a limb like you can’t even imagine.”

“He doesn’t love you, Matthew.”

And here’s The Leader’s special magic. Here’s me defending The Man with force: “That man sacrificed everything for us. He had a life, he made money. Do you know how long he cried after you went?”

“He’s not a well person, Matthew.”

“You knew Ascension was possible for years.”

“Matthew, he only really started mentioning it when he fell under scrutiny --”

“Stop saying my name over and over--”

“He’s just not brave enough to kill himself by himself--”

More wordplay like that and I’ll kill myself now.

“That’s all well and good,” I say. “But he’s never walked out on me. He’s never lied to me.”

And that’s the thing about The Leader. That’s why His hooks form such ambitious curls. All that fucking truth and loyalty. Head games, sure. But Jed’s a whole other form of person.

“He has,” Jed says.

“Which?” I ask. “Walked out or lied?”
“Lied!”
“I’m not talking about little things.”

“Matthew--”

“
What?”

“Did you hear my messages?”
“No.”

Jed: “He’s been sexual with Jolie.”

And at this point, as if I haven’t already, I lose my fucking mind--

“You’re a liar!” I scold him. “You’ve always lied!”

“Ask him.”

“
I hope your life is a fucking mess. I’ll put a goddamn curse on you.”

“Ask both of them.”

I throw my back against the bathroom door, so hard it’s like I expect a stampede to come through.

And Jed starts up with: “We can help you start all over again. Your whole life. Matthew?”

Too much of that name. I shut the phone.

I feel like a guy who’s got violence where his soul belongs.

Edgar Pike’s Journal

May, 2009

Did Laura think she could continue her behavior without an occurrence such as tonight’s? It’s getting to the point where barely two days can pass without her lowering her britches and exposing her rear end to somebody. She is “known” for it, now. It makes my blood start to jump, and I imagine many of ours.

So now she’s embarrassed and it’s awkward between us, because I made a display of ejaculating on her hindquarters. Beth was near to us, and Angela, and one of them said I was “marking my territory,” which was solid humor.

It was a natural extension of her exhibitionism. Tears can flash in her eyes and she can pretend she’s not talking to me, but I don’t see her packing her bags. And I refuse to bother with feelings of guilt or shame.