Friday 18 June 2021

The Peacock 195

 "I have seen him before, years ago", Aaron says.

I reply, "You just saw..."

"The angel.  We have a protector in common, Christopher."

"You really saw him?"

"I really saw him.  About twenty-five years ago the first time."

Carl suddenly asks Aaron "What was going on in your life at the time?"

"You also saw him?" says Aaron.

"I saw him indeed.  But for me this is the first time."  Turning to Aaron, he says, "So this isn't your first time."

"I suppose I could tell you all something about it right now.  It was very strange. It was back in August of 1996.  I would have been forty then.  And I was going through a very difficult time.  The Community of the Transfiguration had recently broken up, and we were each living in different places.  I was just hanging on by a thread.  I was not securely employed, doing contract work as a home support worker, getting very few hours and sometimes having to depend on welfare in order to pay the rent, and that was it's own kind of hell, they made it such an onerous and kafkaesque process.  Plus, I was being afflicted by killer toothaches.  I was also in a building with noisy neighbours.   Really, I could not see any real direction for my life and I seemed to be living in a state of artfully contained despair..."

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